In 2016, when I first participated in the Meeting of Hungarian Entrepreneurs of the Carpathian Basin in Mezőkövesd, I didn't officially have my own business, only Wameleon Design as a brand on Facebook since 2013. Then, a year later, I found the courage to become an officially registered company. At first, I was on my own, but then I was joined by a few colleagues, relatives, and friends. Our advertising graphics studio - which we can slowly define as an advertising agency - is now based in Sepsiszentgyörgy (Sfântu Gheorghe), but through our clients, our colleagues, and our history, we cover the whole of Transylvania and Romania. We mainly design packaging, logos, and corporate identity.

We believe in the effectiveness of branding, combined with marketing.

The word "Wameleon" brings up interesting associations. Why is that your name?

We needed a name that represented us. A good place to start was chameleon, which everyone thinks of as being able to change its colours to suit, but if you type it into a search engine, it gives you thousands of results. We changed one letter, which makes this brand name unique. It's clear where the name comes from, but in that form, only our content is found online.

What does branding mean to you?

My goal is that when someone comes to me, they get a piece of advertising artwork that is effective - and that's the key word. We help entrepreneurs who are thinking about image building, or visual branding, to make decisions that are not only beautiful and interesting, but also work. But it's easy to make a mistake here. Many clients came to me saying "my company is going down, make me a logo to do better". This is a false idea: many people think that if they have a similar logo to the big and successful companies, they will be equally successful. It was tiring to explain to each and every customer "Stop, let's come back to Earth for a moment because that's not how it works". That's why I started editing publications and writing books for my target audience, so that I wouldn't have to explain to everyone a hundred times how a business works well, but I could say instead, 'Look, here's a book, read it, then come back and then we can start building your brand together. My first book, "It's Easy for You, 'Cause You've Got a Company" is a satirical, humorous, easy-to-read book, with the subtitle "Brand Awareness in Transylvania". It's about how I became an entrepreneur, so the reader can decide whether this Zsolt Rancz is worth listening to. I write about how I imagined my future when I was at school, then after university, I became an employee, then I started my entrepreneurial journey – and how I was constantly slapped in the face and then I came to my senses. I shared all of these in my book and then wrote about my practical experience of the situations and cases I encountered while working with hundreds of entrepreneurs over the last ten years.

This book has brought us fame in the Transylvanian Hungarian market, with over 2500 copies sold since September 2020.

One of the interesting things about this book is that it is quite outspoken. Weren't you afraid it would scare off your customers?

True, my language is quite outspoken and rather vulgar, so it's dangerous, it even says so on the cover: "Warning, foul language", not recommended under 16. I wrote the book in the way I talk in everyday life. It's not my style to talk in literary language, I speak simply, so I can't write in a way that isn't me. This actually was appealing to many people who would not otherwise read a book. I got a lot of feedback saying "I thought it was a humorous book at first, then I accidentally learned something from it". That's my mission: to teach in an entertaining way. 
I wrote my second book together with comedian Botond György, called "Mitől döglik a légy" ('Know What's What'). It's about the role of humour in advertising, with lots of examples. Then we looked for other, more youthful ways to get our brand across to different target markets. This is how the comic "Nyakleves!" (Slap!), a comic about Hungarian entrepreneurs in Transylvania, was born, which we created together with illustrator Timea Kalabér after nearly one and a half years of work, and it was published in 2021.

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Wameleon Design team

On social media, you have very attractively drawn attention to a special colouring book, which is modelled on all the cities of Transylvania. How does this fit into your portfolio?

We are constantly thinking about how we can reach a wider market with our services and products. This year we published the adult colouring book "T*sylvania", which contains all the cities of Transylvania. This means that each town has its own page where we have arranged the drawings of its representative buildings, sculptures, and landmarks into a composition. We have thus created a product that is not only beautiful, not only fun but also is of cultural value in its own right. The illustrations are also a testament to the wonderful drawing skills of my colleague Timea. This publication is also an opening to the Romanian market because a huge percentage of the consumers are Romanian: the headline is in English, the subtitle and all the internal information is in three languages (Romanian-Hungarian-English/German).

Romanians living here care about Transylvania just as much as Hungarians do, and for tourists visiting the region, this can be a very cool product to bring home as a souvenir that shows our region.

On social media, you have also linked personal stories to the cities. How important do you think it is for a team to have a "face" in the company, to express their individuality?

This was part of the marketing of the colouring book, as we want to set an example for our customers on social media. I can sell my own services in the market if I do a good job marketing my own products, i.e. the shoemaker must have good shoes.

I believe that my business will thrive in the long run if it not only serves my needs, not only profits me, not only builds a good reputation for me, but also if we can build the personal brands of my colleagues. Everyone prefers to work in a workplace where they receive positive feedback and praise for their work.

We are a Hungarian-Romanian company, because I have Romanian colleagues. I, as a Hungarian entrepreneur, believe in a borderless entrepreneurial mindset: our first priority is to be human and to be fair to each other. My latest book, which we are just starting to promote, is about altruism as a marketing tool.

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Wameleon Design staff at a team building event- Photo: Zsolt Rancz

Altruism and marketing, that is, wanting to sell something - these seem to be contradictory concepts. How do you manage to combine them?

The key phrase in my latest book,”Jószívű balf*sz” (Good-hearted s*cker), is the people-centred entrepreneurial mentality. This is what I want to promote. In today's world, it is a common stereotype that a business leader is a villain because the market, the media, or society requires him to do undignified things as an entrepreneur. I want to break down this image.

I think a good leader is someone who can see beyond self-interest. You don't have to exploit your employees and it's possible to build a brand decently.

As part of another parallel project, I also invited people like these to the "Man behind the company" discussion sessions in the conference room of the Sepsi Industrial Park. To prove that there are good and lovable company managers, whom time has proved right.

I've been taken advantage of for my bona fides obviously, but I believe that in time all the goodwill will be returned from the universe or karma or God or whatever you believe in. That's where the essence, the title of the book comes from, that the good-hearted are usually taken advantage of. However, I feel that in the long run, goodwill pays off.
 

How did Wado get started and what exactly do you do?

Wado is a digital agency that I created in 2012. The core of our work is the implementation of marketing campaigns and the development of corporate websites and webshops, but we also do graphic design. Currently we have ten people actively working in our team, all of them are Hungarian. We are already present in five countries: in addition to Slovakia, we offer marketing services to small and medium-sized enterprises in Hungary, Austria, the Czech Republic, and Germany. 

According to your website, your partners are very diverse: you've designed a website for a florist, a winery, a tattoo artist, and the Highland Travel Cradle. Which project has been the most memorable in the company's life so far?

I wouldn't single one out, because for me, each client is equally important. But when, for example, we were able to build a start-up webshop in a specialised field up to four million sales from zero, that was huge.

If we do our job well, our partners can be successful in the market, which is great for us too, especially if they thus create new jobs.

What challenges does someone who starts a business as a Hungarian living abroad have to face?

The Slovak government's unpredictable economic policies, the rise in energy prices, Covid, and the war in the neighbouring country have all made the situation for entrepreneurs in Slovakia uncertain; in the past year, we have not known what to expect in a month or even a week. Another problem is the high emigration rate among young people. The motherland is always attractive to young Hungarians living outside of Hungary, many take jobs in Budapest and Győr. This is understandable because as minority Hungarians, they are not only unable to assert their language and culture but also their self-esteem.

What can keep young people here?

I think most people don't want to leave, but they won't swim against the tide. At Wado, I put a lot of emphasis on giving opportunities to trainees. I love working with them, it's great to see their dedication and how they become professionals. The marketing profession is also attractive to them because it can be done locally, and you can keep in touch with foreign companies online. Obviously, you also have to pay attention to wages, as salaries in Hungary are perhaps the biggest drain. Another important thing for young people is a family atmosphere, so that they’d feel valued not only financially but also as people.

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Photo: Csongor Bartók

Despite your international success, you also stayed in Komárom. Why do you like living here?

On the one hand, my family is here. On the other hand, it is very well located, close to both Bratislava and Budapest. Thirdly, Komárom is a beautiful historical city - György Klapka lived here and Mór Jókai was born here. It is a city with weight.

How does this family-friendly approach apply at Wado?

We are currently working in a family house, which by default creates a more direct atmosphere: once we made some cookies in the house and then ate them together. We're celebrating Advent together, lighting advent candles, and on 6 December, Santa Claus came and left some presents on the table for colleagues.

In 2016, you were one of the founding members of the Association of Hungarian Entrepreneurs in Slovakia, whose mission is to build a community to unite young Hungarian entrepreneurs in Slovakia. How did you start to do so?
I believe that the biggest help is not to have fish put on our table, but to teach us how to fish. In our case, it is the transfer of knowledge and the support to increase our networking capital. 
This is why we organized the Slovakia Entrepreneurs Expo and launched our mentoring program with the support of the Hungarian State Secretariat for National Policy. Those who participate in these programs can meet a lot of other entrepreneurs. They can see that others might be struggling with the same problems, and they can draw strength from others and return home with new ideas and solutions.

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Photo: Csongor Bartók

I myself have benefited a lot from the contacts I've made here over the past six years, and we've gained a lot of new clients. It's often said that an entrepreneur is a lonely man, but that's not so - their work impact the lives of their employees and their families. But the burden of responsibility is not easy to carry alone. That is why I think it is important for entrepreneurs to reach out to each other and to the outside world, to get involved in community life.

For me, photography is a great love. Especially the form where I appear to be setting people up, but I'm actually helping them to unfold and show the beauty that they have within them. I always knew I wanted to do photography. I come from a tiny village called Majdány, on the triple border of Serbia, Hungary, and Romania. Six of us are brothers and sisters, I am the eldest.

I had a tough childhood, at the age of 12 I was already working as a day labourer, like adults.

During the school year I worked half days, and during the summer holidays I worked full days, so I didn't study much, but while I was working I was daydreaming. I wouldn't change anything if I could go back in time, I would choose the same family. All six of us are good at a lot of things. This is also evident in my business, Selfieteria, where we did all the walls and rooms: one of my brothers cut the walls, the other did the plastering, we painted, we foiled.

Necessity teaches people to do everything themselves. This is hard to understand for someone who is used to getting everything ready...

I was brought up in the view that everyone is their own destiny-maker, and this is what I followed when I moved to Szabadka (Subotica). I always had several jobs, a fixed one where I was registered as working full-time, and two or three places where I worked part-time. For example, I worked as an ironmonger for a decorator, and we sometimes decorated eleven wedding venues in one weekend. I also worked as a kitchen assistant, so I really took every opportunity to buy my first professional camera. This decorator friend of mine saw the potential in me from my first photos and invited me to take on creative photography as well as ironing, which meant that when they decorated a room, I would take publicity photos of the venue. I was called to many places as a photographer, so I slowly managed to buy the camera that is my great love, which I still use to this day. 

As I listen to your story, it sounds like a folk tale: the eldest girl from a poor family sets out to try her luck, and after many trials, she succeeds. 

The trials and tribulations have indeed shaped me, as I broke a bone between my fourth and fifth vertebrae during an unfortunate lifting accident at work. This happened last March and accelerated my desire to pursue photography. But I didn't open another studio because there are already so many in Szabadka and I feel more creative and playful than that.
We were talking with my partner on the terrace one evening, and the word " selfie museum" came out of his mouth by chance. I'd never heard that word before and immediately turned the lightbulb on over my head that that's what I wanted.

In an instant I was full of ideas, we looked at each other, and we felt that, Oh my God, that's it!

I checked on the Internet that there is one in Serbia, and there are similar ones abroad. I knew that I wanted a more informal, friendly atmosphere compared to them, which triggers more and different emotions. I set up a café where you can sit down, have a lemonade, a coffee, or a hot chocolate, while you look through the selfies you took, and maybe go back if you want to change something. Each room is different, each booth has a theme, and there are seasonal themes such as Christmas and Easter. 

The business is not yet a year and a half old, but I have rooms that are already on their fourth "dress". But there are also rooms that I don't want to change because they are so popular: the "golden room", the " prison" and the western room. A new thing for us is photography in a box, which is very interesting and unique.

It's like taking photos in separate little worlds between shelves.

Yes, and I never have a concept in my head of what each family's pictures and boxes should look like, but ideas come when I see them. They're not pre-set images because they're developed when they're here, which is why a shoot like this takes at least an hour.

Selfieteria's new feature is photography in a box - Photo: Ildikó Bálint

With the Selfie Museum, are you giving people a scenery to imagine themselves in a world that is their dream?

The Selfieteria is a playground for adults. As you enter, time freezes and you're taken back to your childhood. The guests can let go so much, they step out of the daily hustle and bustle, and the hour and a half or two hours fly by so fast it's unbelievable. And the box is particularly magical because it brings people closer together. People who are already very close, and people who are less so, because you have to squeeze in a bit there.

It creates the closeness that is so missing in today's world.

You can see the difference in the families because you can look at their faces, and see what they looked like when they came in, and what they looked like when they left. A mum recently wrote to say thank you, because she felt like a woman again, radiant and wonderful again... It's worth everything to me!

I envy your guests! But can everyone unwind enough to take relaxed, happy, honest pictures? What happens when someone is stressed?

The other day there was a group of people at the Selfie Museum, celebrating a birthday. I could see they were tense and I have a few ways to get them out of it. After a couple of "classic" group shots, I suggested we move away from that for now. I told them that on the count of three, everyone should scream at the top of their lungs with me. At first, they just looked at me, not understanding. I counted to three and they screamed while I took their picture. One young man commented "But the screaming won't show in the picture". I told him I would show him afterwards that it was there! And indeed you can "hear" it because there is a huge energy and sense of liberation in that picture. From then on, the fun and laughter began.

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The Golden Room - Photo: Ildikó Bálint

Are you a good soul watcher?

Yes, it's enough for me to see how a couple looks at each other, which is not always positive, and I want to do something to make them feel and understand why they are together, why they are here. There are work groups of companies coming in for company teambuilding sessions where you can see which colleagues are the ones that pull together more. Or, for example, class teachers bring their classes in for shots and you can spot the little groups of four or five students that stick together! I have a lot of experience of this because I was a victim of this kind of exclusionary mentality as a child. There were many of us brothers and sisters, I wore secondhand clothes, and while my classmates were studying or relaxing, I was picking onions or corn and daydreaming... I wasn't ashamed, but I was lonely in company because of it. I recognize this in the classes and try to forge them into a group, picking people who are not in the same group for a group photo.

Then it's so nice to see a class walk out that door, instead of several different groups of kids as they come in.

Who will help you achieve your dreams?

My partner supports me as much as possible, he is often at home with the child, because we have a three-year-old son. It was he who drew my attention to the mentoring program set up by the Hungarian State Secretariat for National Policy and the Prosperitati Foundation, which was created specifically to support Hungarian entrepreneurs outside Hungary. My partner was already there in the first season, and it was at his recommendation that I took part in the third season of the mentoring program. I am very grateful for this because I have learned, for example, to recognize what is really important and how to deal with failure. It's exemplary when a big entrepreneur with hundreds of employees stands up and tells you how many times he has been down and how many times he has got up. Okay, I thought, maybe I'm not doing it wrong, but that's what it takes to be able to say in five years' time, yes, I did it. I am also grateful to my mentor, we are still in touch, not a week goes by without him sending me a motivational message, asking me where I am, and what I am doing, and giving me some tasks to do...

As we are talking here, I realized that Hungarians in the motherland have brought us Hungarians living in Serbia together through the Mentor Abroad program. Since then, we have been following each other more closely and cooperating where possible. It is important for local Hungarian entrepreneurs to know each other.
 

Beyond computer games

PlayStation, racing, and gunfighting games. Like many other children, this is how they started learning about computers and IT. But after a while, it wasn't just the games that became interesting. They were eight to ten years old when they first got into programming. "I started modifying the files of the games, so I changed the way the game was played," says 21-year-old Zsolt.

If you went to school in the 1990s or 2000s, you are probably familiar with the Comenius Logo program. The little turtle that you had to give instructions to in IT class - that's probably what everyone remembers. Comenius Logo is a simple programming language. "We were introduced to that, too at elementary school. I saw that it wasn't that complicated, and I was interested in creating something that would work automatically," says 22-year-old Tamás.

Years ago, Zsolt Koncsik from Albertirsa and Tamás Bandúr from Dány met in Kőbánya, at the BMSZC Pataky István Technical School of Communications and Information Technology. They were in the same class, and the same group several times during classes, and they helped each other. Today they are both students of computer engineering at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Informatics of Budapest University of Technology (BME). We sat down for a chat in one of the Buda buildings of the University of Technology. The boys returned home from the European Skills Championships (EuroSkills) in Gdansk in September last year as gold medallists.

They were named the best ICT Specialists and also won the Jos de Goey - Best in Europe award, which is unprecedented in Hungary.

IT systems management is a team effort

But let's start at the beginning! What does an ICT Specialist do? They design and operate IT systems for large enterprises, which means they have to figure out which tools, infrastructure, and technologies best serve their needs. There's a big difference between a small company and a large enterprise with a national reach. 
Tamás and Zsolt won the national finals in April 2022, and last year they prepared for the Gdansk competition from March to the end of August. Five days a week, eight hours a day, but they reassure us: there was so much downtime that everyone had time for a little holiday.

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Zsolt Koncsik at the EuroSkills Competition - Photo: MKIK

During the preparation phase, they also had to mentally adjust to the intense pace of the competition: in addition to mental training, team-building sessions were held, where they also got to know former competitors. "I tend to stress things out beforehand, but as soon as the first task started in Gdansk, I worked the same way as I did in the office during the preparation," says Tamás.

"I only get nervous when I feel we are not prepared enough. But luckily we've practiced everything," Zsolt continues. The European Championships itself lasted three days, with five hours of work a day. IT systems management is basically a team effort, with two people doing different jobs. "You need a very deep knowledge in each of these areas, it's difficult to do that alone. Just like in a company, there is an IT department, a team, we worked as a team at the competition," explains Tamás.

"Are you speaking Hungarian now?"

In the competition, they had to develop an IT system for an imaginary company: email system, file-sharing servers, web servers, and so on.

The need to keep everything confidential and to put a strong emphasis on security made their job more difficult. At first, they were working on a system for a small company, and then they had to design and operate a nationwide network. They worked on Linux and then Windows servers. As a complete outsider, I can understand this, but as they say, they have been in funny situations when the subject of IT came up in a group. (The working language in the competition is English, of course, but the competitors can speak Hungarian with each other.)
"The technical terms we use often have no Hungarian equivalent. In one of the mental preparation workshops, the two of us and the software developer were talking, and the others just sat and listened to what we were talking about," recalls Zsolt. "Then they asked, 'Are you guys speaking Hungarian now?" - Tomi continues laughing.

"When I was watching the painters at the stands at the Competition in Poland, it was easy to tell how they were doing with the task, how many elements were ready. Whereas in our case, the most a spectator or fan can see is how many black windows are open on the screen," Tomi explains. As he tells us, the most someone can see is that an IT competitor is sitting at the computer with his head in his hands - and that's not a good sign.

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Tamás Bandúr at the EuroSkills Competition - Photo: MKIK

Tamás and Zsolt tried to remain calm throughout, but there were some unexpected situations. Time was of the essence. On the first and third day, they almost didn't finish the task, with only a few minutes left. On the second day, however, everything went according to plan and they spent the afternoon just checking.

The podium was the goal

"We went on a hunch and thought the competition days went well. We expected that we could probably finish on the podium, that was the goal," says Tamás.

"But the announcement of the results was incredible. As soon as the second place was announced, we knew we had won," they say.

A total of 14 countries competed in the ICT System Operator category, including Austria, Germany, Finland, and Kazakhstan, with the Austrians coming second after the Hungarians and the Kazakhs taking third place.

Tamás and Zsolt were not expecting the Best in Europe award, as they say, before the competition they were joking about how nice it would be to be the first Hungarian to win it.  
"I almost fainted on stage, wondering what would happen next," recalls Tomi. Then their names were announced. This means that they were the best in Europe with the highest score (799 out of 800) out of around 600 competitors. The Austrian gardening team came second, and web developer János Hidvégi came third (find an interview with him here).

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Photo: MKIK

The European champions prepared for the competition in the offices of the HTTP Foundation (Dissemination of Network Knowledge Foundation), with the support of the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MKIK). Their preparation was guided by János Csőke, a EuroSkills gold medallist himself, and assisted by several former competitors. The young people are also grateful to their high school teachers, among them Péter Gödöny and Zoltán Pesti.

"Everything from firefighters to lawyers, but no ICT Specialists"

In their families, they are pioneers, as no one has ever worked in ICT before. "There's everything from firefighters to lawyers, but no IT specialists," laughs Tamás, who was awarded the Commemorative Plaque for the Municipality of Dány, his hometown. "It's a small village, so I know almost everyone, and it's nice to see that other people besides my family were happy about our success."

"In my house, the family watched the results live online, fighting back tears. When I got home, we had a big party. I also got a few invitations to give some presentations in Albertirsa," says Zsolt, who will compete again this year, but this time as an individual competitor, at the WorldSkills World Championships in Lyon, France. Of course, they celebrated their success in Gdansk, too, with the whole Hungarian and international team.

It was a great experience for them to see the Hungarian team constantly helping each other, even when someone was having a bad day.

And why would they recommend computer science to students who are about to choose a career? "You can be a game developer or even a network engineer. There are so many different positions! I think it's good to get to know the field as young as possible. For example, I once taught Lego robotics to nine-year-olds," says Tomi. They both think it's important to finish university, as there are still many new areas of IT they haven't explored, such as cybersecurity and cloud technologies. They add that IT is constantly evolving and it is important to keep up.

Our interviews with other Hungarian medallists from the 2023 EuroSkills Competition are available here.
 

Kindness, professionalism, boundless hospitality. These three words came to my mind while talking to Ildikó Puskás about their family business. The Kiscsikó canteen was launched in 2017, but despite calling itself a canteen, it goes well beyond catering to college students. "Today, we not only cook for students, we also do catering for all kinds of events, even banquets or presidential luncheons. We have basic menus that we have devised ourselves, but we also have made dishes on demand, we are open-minded, we like variety, but we make sure that we keep the great classics on the menu," Ildikó says enthusiastically.

Their story with the Ferenc Rákóczi II Transcarpathian Hungarian College of Higher Education did not begin when the restaurant opened. Both of them studied at the institution, Róbert majored in English and his wife in Philology. Ildikó's family had previously had a small business at the institution, which closed down.

The president of the college, Ildikó Orosz, however, did not forget about them, and two weeks after graduation, she approached the young couple to open the new canteen.

During the Covid epidemic, the college also closed, and the canteen's clientele disappeared overnight. "Then, as part of the Hungarian State Department's entrepreneurship training program, we came up with a strategy, together with wonderful mentors, and assessed the local needs, and we knocked on doors in Beregszász/Berehovo with flyers and started a delivery service, which was the only one of its kind in the city. The contact with the State Department has given us knowledge that we could put into practice. The network of contacts helps us to get to know other entrepreneurs, and the mentors not only give us advice, but we have a friendly relationship and look out for each other," Ildikó recalls.

"Then came something even more terrible, the war," the owner's voice becomes serious. - We relocated to Vásárosnamény, Hungary, my husband and children are there now, and I cross the border every day to run the business. Unfortunately, my husband can't help with the physical work, although he was always there for me before, so "I'm limping on one leg' in that respect, but we have a great team of people who work together and we operate in the same way. Luckily, we have a lot of orders," adds the mother, whose words reveal that the Kiscsikó is more than just a financial source for the family.
"If it was just that, I would have left the business a long time ago. We started the restaurant from scratch, and we've poured our hearts and souls into it ever since."

"Everyone in the team feels the business as their own, and their love is in every dish," says Ildikó, who is very proud that among the guests are well-known people such as President Katalin Novák, singer Magdi Rúzsa, the band Halott Pénz and members of the band Edda.

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Photo: Ildikó Puskás

But it's not just the famous guests who make her feel like it's worth getting up every day and keep going. "We get a lot of love from people. Recently, the fifth graders from a local school were here on a field trip, they sat down for a hot chocolate and we started chatting about who we've cooked for, and how we cook the dishes, and the kids were interested in everything. We sponsored the college's Freshmen Dinner to help the young students eat good food and have a good time. The college organizes many events: at a grape harvest we had to cook for 800 people," recalls Ildikó, who, despite the circumstances, is looking forward to what the future will bring.
 

Childhood in Sárhida 

The interview was scheduled for Monday morning in Budapest, but the face-to-face meeting ended up being an online video call. On Monday morning, Márton Offner had to visit the ER in Zalaegerszeg, the other end of the country, instead of writing his university test in the capital. 
"I had a football match yesterday, I made a bad move, my foot cracked and I broke my metatarsal," he begins. "I've been playing football since I was six, I can’t stop, I’ve always been doing some sort of sport." He now plays football for his town’s team. The 21-year-old grew up in the village of Sárhida, near Zalaegerszeg, and it was only a few years ago that the Offner family moved to the Zala county seat.

"Growing up in a village, all my childhood, when I had free time, I would go out with my dad to do some fixing or I would do some DIY in the cellar by myself. Now as I'm at university, I help a friend renovate his flat, but now, unfortunately, with a broken leg, I won't be able to do not only sports but also this for a while," he laments.

Travelled to Gdansk as a silver medallist

He learned the trade of plumbing and heating after primary school. He says he wasn't sure he wanted to go to university, so he and his parents decided to go to a vocational school. This is how he chose the István Széchenyi Vocational High School in Zalaegerszeg, the school that gave him the foundations.

"I owe a lot to my teacher Imre Péter," he says. He was the one who drew his attention to the national selection competition. This year's EuroSkills was not Márton's first international competition: he started preparing for the 2022 World Skills Championships, at the end of May 2021, which meant he had to move to the capital. Last year, he won silver in Lahr, Germany, and from there, it was almost a steady path to EuroSkills 2023. 

"I spent a year and a half preparing for the World Championships and two and a half for the European Championships," he says.

For the European Championships in Poland, he spent five days a week practicing at the Szily Kálmán Vocational School's workshop, where Csilla Szigetvári, a building services engineer, prepared him for the competition according to a strict schedule. In the competition, the plumbing, gas- and heating installations are divided into separate sections and everything is scored separately.

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Photo: MIK/Flickr

Clamping of pipes, piping, pressure testing

They worked eighteen hours, spread over three days. "We started with the gas module on the first day. Clamping, piping, pressure testing." He lists the steps of the gas pipes installation." He says that technically there is not much difference between gas, water, and heating installation. The competition itself required a high level of precision, accuracy, and speed. There were spectacular installation tasks to be done: building the piping outside the wall, with nice shapes and curves, so aesthetics were important. "In comparison, the so-called five-layer pipe is common in today's world, which is 99 percent behind the wall, so it doesn't matter so much how it looks." 

"My big strength was that I could very much be present mentally. I was able to get up from the difficulties," he says.

But there was something else that surely gave him extra energy during the race. "It was huge to have my parents come out to Gdansk to cheer me on. They said it was an unforgettable memory for them too," he says. Besides, while last year he was the only Hungarian competitor at the World Championships, this year the whole Hungarian team was together. "It created a good atmosphere because everyone was able to talk to everyone."

Sixteen people were competing in Marci's profession, but he says it was clear from the start who the three or four strongest people were, and who might have a chance of getting on the podium.

To the top of the podium after difficulties

On the second day of the competition, he was faced with an unexpected difficulty that made him feel unsure. "I was going the fastest, so I was the first to encounter a problem: the radiator could not be placed where it was originally designed to be. It wasn't the right size. So I had to call in the experts (they do the scoring - ed.) who stopped my time and then they started discussing how to solve the problem.

Here I had 40 minutes of time off, so my rhythm was broken.

Fortunately, by the third day I was able to recover," he says.

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Márton Offner at the top of the podium at the 2023 EuroSkills Championships - Photo: MKIK/Flickr

He cites the announcement of the results as his favourite moment in Gdansk. "I got the bad news beforehand that they had downgraded my pump and radiator to 0 points. Not rightly. It made me a bit discouraged, I was unsure if I was going to get a podium at all," he recalls. All three medal-winning nations - France, Hungary, England in that order - were called to the stage, but it was not yet known who would finish in what order. "Here I was sure I was on the podium, I just didn't know what place. I was a little bit convinced that I would be a silver medallist again. But to win the gold medal was a great experience," he says. 

"I would rather design"

Marci thinks that the professional knowledge he has acquired is useful in any case, but he decided not to stop there. He is currently studying energy engineering at the Budapest University of Technology. "I have no problem with construction, but I'm more interested in design, I'd rather design than do manual work out in the field," he explains. "This competition and my first place are not for the short run but for the long run.  In the long run, such an achievement can look very good on a CV. In the short run, it means professional recognition and a certain amount of fame. For example, I have been told that a large building company already knows my name. That's not bad," he smiles.

"I met a lot of people during the preparation, and you also go through a personal development. However, it also meant a lot of sacrifices, mostly in terms of my relationships. In the last two years, I have spent very little time at home, in Zalaegerszeg, with my family and friends. But in hindsight I think it was worth it," he adds.

For interviews with other Hungarian medallists from the 2023 EuroSkills Championships, click here and here or here
 

Myth 1 – semi-true: 
Semmelweis' discovery was met with total rejection by his contemporary colleagues

Semmelweis became world-famous gradually from the end of the 19th century, when the news of his discovery spread: he "discovered" chlorine handwashing as a means of avoiding puerperal fever, but he could only prove its effectiveness statistically, he did not yet have the necessary pathological knowledge. (The existence of microbes was proved by Louis Pasteur from 1857 on, and his discovery only gradually became known.) In 1847, after much investigation, he came to the conclusion that puerperal fever was not an epidemic, as had been previously thought, but that its cause was to be found in the clinic. A death explained the connection: a medical colleague of his died of septicaemia from a wound he had received during an autopsy, with symptoms similar to those of the women who died after childbirth. From then on, to prevent the transmission of the "corpse poison", he and his students washed their hands thoroughly in chlorinated water before each examination.

The number of deaths dropped dramatically in just a few months.

So statistics – and Semmelweis was a passionate believer in numbers, in practical effectiveness – proved the effectiveness of disinfectant handwashing. But he could not scientifically justify the cause-and-effect relationship. As a result, his colleagues were largely sceptical about the compulsory hand-washing, which was a very tedious, time-consuming procedure that also caused skin irritation. His difficult, impetuous, impatient nature didn't help either. However, documents in the archives testify that Semmelweis's teachers and friends fought tenaciously for him and his principles for many years, and stood by him even after he himself had turned his back on Vienna and went to work in Budapest. One of his English medical colleagues, who had been so impressed by his suggestion to combat puerperal fever when they met in Vienna that on his return to England, he gave several lectures on the subject, wrote to him in 1849: "The fame and truth of your discovery is now spreading in public opinion, and is understood and acknowledged in all medical societies to be a useful thing."

In 1850, Ignác Semmelweis moved back to Buda and became head of the obstetrics department of the Rókus Hospital in Pest, where he also required disinfectant hand washing. He was given an even wider scope when he was appointed professor of obstetrics at the Medical University of Pest in 1855, teaching all his obstetric and midwife students to wash their hands. His professional recognition is also demonstrated by the fact that he was invited to teach at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, but refused and stayed in Pest.

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A painting of a hospital in the time of Semmelweis - Photo: Wikipedia

In 1860, in Vienna, he published his book Die Aetiologie... in German on the pathology and prevention of puerperal fever. Semmelweis himself sent a copy of this to the Hungarian Council of Governors intending to secure a decree for his handwashing reform – they asked the medical faculty of the University of Pest for their opinion, who supported it. Thus it became an official order in 1862 that Semmelweis's proposal should be incorporated into hospital protocol – obviously, this did not happen overnight. Semmelweis wrote open, persuasive letters to well-known professors in major European hospitals urging them to switch to disinfectant handwashing - but, of course, this had no immediate effect, disappointing him in his zeal for a good cause. After his death, his students continued to follow his practice, and disinfectant handwashing was adopted in a growing number of foreign medical institutions.

For example, József Fleischer, who was appointed head of the obstetrics department of the Rókus Hospital in 1869, surpassed even Semmelweis in rigour, so that the proportion of puerperal fever cases in his department remained below one percent.

A young doctor, who regularly sent travel reports from Europe to the Medical Weekly, wrote a few years after Semmelweis's death that "Professor Semmelweis has already made many conquests. In some places, he is followed in silence, in others he is called a leader. It gives me the greatest pleasure to write that a university as famous as that of Berlin is now proceeding on principles which at first were received with doubt."

So it is false to claim that in his lifetime no one understood the significance of his discovery – but clearly, accepting his protocol was a slow process, and in his lifetime he had not yet reached a level that would have given him, a doctor with a responsibility for all patients, the sense of satisfaction.

Myth 2 – not true: 
Semmelweis was conspired against, declared insane, locked up, and practically murdered by his envious colleagues and his ill-intentioned wife.

He was 47 years old when, because of his poor mental state and his outbursts of temper, his young wife and his doctor friends turned to the renowned doctor Ferdinand von Hebra (one of Semmelweis' patrons) in Vienna for medical advice, who recommended asylum treatment. Hoping for an improvement in his condition, he was admitted to an asylum in southern Austria (not Döbling), against his will, of course. Ignác Semmelweis died in the institution on 13 August 1865. This has become the source of many rumours and conspiracy theories.

His doctor friends were considered traitors, and his wife was accused of wanting to get rid of her husband, whose human greatness she did not recognise. She was reproached for not having brought her husband's ashes back to Budapest until 1891 and for having changed his name to Szemerkényi (Ignác Semmelweis' brothers had already changed their surname to Szemerkényi long before, and their widowed sister-in-law had followed suit). Her financial and social status became much worse after her husband's death: she and her young children basically had to rely on the mercy of her relatives.)

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Photo of Ignác Semmelweis (1864) - Photo: MNM Semmelweis Medical History Museum and Library / Wikipedia

New myths were born when he was exhumed in 1963 and his remains were examined by three Hungarian medical experts.

They concluded that Semmelweis had died of sepsis from slow-onset osteomyelitis in his right hand – the same disease he had fought all through his life to prevent.

His disturbed mental state was only thought to be a delirium accompanying sepsis.

The other theory was put forward slightly later by psychiatrist István Benedek: according to him, the insanity, which had become unbearable for his environment, could have been paralysis progressiva, which was the third period of syphilis (haemophilia) leading to death, so Semmelweis would have died soon even without the infection of his wound. (Syphilis was almost a 'national disease' at the time, and could be contracted not only through sexual transmission but also during childbirth or autopsy.) The denouement could have been hastened by sepsis from the hand wound.

The speculation surrounding his death became intense when, in the mid-1970s, György Silló-Seidl, a doctor living in the (then) GDR, managed to obtain Semmelweis's original autopsy report from Austria, which confirmed sepsis but nothing else. However, he published his book both in Hungarian and in German, in which he accused Semmelweis's Hungarian friends and colleagues of "conspiring with fellow Austrian doctors to remove him, imprisoning him unjustifiably in a mental hospital, where he was brutally murdered".

This theory, which is the most bizarre and unsupported by any evidence, has become the most popular, returning from time to time in tabloid and pulp fiction. Notable "experts" (including a popular medical geneticist, a security expert, and a literary historian) have also voted for this fictional version. "'Was he killed? Yes. By whom? How? He was isolated from the outside world, he was beaten, he suffered injuries, his wounds were infected, they were left untreated, he obtained sepsis," Silló-Seidl wrote in a 1977 article in the magazine Élet és irodalom (Life and Literature).

In contrast to him, the more sober and scientific explanation was presented by the medical historian József Antall, who stated in the same newspaper that "Semmelweis was not killed".

There is no evidence that he was treated cruelly, that his injuries may have been self-inflicted in the cell where he was locked up as a danger to himself and the public, and from which he was probably trying to escape – unfortunately, this is true of all people with severe mental illness at the time, for whom more humane methods of treatment were not yet available.

For us laymen, all we can see is that in the photo taken the year before his death, he looks almost like an old man, even though he was only 46, the father of three small children. Looking back after a century and a half, he had a tragic but successful life. "My teaching is to banish the terror of the maternity ward, to keep the wife for the husband and the mother for the child," he wrote as his creed. In fact, we owe him much more than that: thanks to his discovery, all medical interventions became safer.

Literature used:
Semmelweis Ignác emlékezetére, 150 évvel halála után. Főszerk.: Dr. Monos Emil. Semmelweis Kiadó, 2015.
(In memory of Ignác Semmelweis, 150 years after his death. Editor-in-Chief: Dr. Emil Monos. Semmelweis Publisher, 2015.)
http://real.mtak.hu/30826/1/Benedek_I._Semmelweis_MTA_2_u.pdf 
https://mek.oszk.hu/05400/05427/pdf/Semmelweis_keziratai.pdf 
https://leveltarimozaikok.bparchiv.hu/2023/12/08/leveltari-mozaikok-91/?fbclid=IwAR1yaV5y-IWt6J5cAGhwFz6NWLwOkenbIhiO9p0Lmtv8JW8_h8oIpZDFPwc#more-3987

Three human lives

At around ten o'clock that day, two armed men broke into a bank at 16 Vécsey Street, near the Parliament building. "Hands up, don't move, or I shoot!" – shouted one of them, but after a stunned silence, panic broke out, to which the bandits responded with a series of actual shots. Imre Braun, the bank manager, managed to get out of the window to inform the police, but Géza Jójárt, who was about to hand over a thousand pengos to Miklós Szalay, the chief accountant of the National Child Protection League, was shot in the head. With his last remaining strength, he jumped out of the window onto the pavement, but collapsed there, his blood staining the asphalt red. He never regained consciousness. Inside, three other officers were wounded, one of whom – Frigyes Wirth, who had also recovered from malaria in the First World War – survived the attack with a thigh wound. The bullet could never be removed from József Klemm's abdomen, but he survived with it in his body, probably living in pain for the rest of his life. Dr. Imre Róth, 27, however, died of his abdominal wound in hospital two days later.

Miklós Szalay was the one who saved the others. He always arrived at his large withdrawals armed with a revolver, so he pulled the gun from his back pocket and fired in the direction of the attackers.

One of them was shot in the back, and they were so frightened by it that they ran away with the cash they had collected. On the way out, they found themselves face to face with József Benyák, a delivery boy who had been sent by his boss to the bank to change money and had just arrived at the door. That sealed his fate: he was shot dead. The fleeing bandits jumped into a car waiting for them in Vécsey Street and drove off. A car mechanic named Géza Mocsai even shot at them in the street while they were escaping the scene, and he claimed to have hit both the car and one of the robbers. By this time the bank's alarm was sounding loud, which Frigyes Wirth - already injured - managed to set off, and which was heard all the way to Bajcsy-Zsilinszky (then Kaiser Wilhelm) Road.

They drove too well, they were too muddy

The police arrived within minutes, but the witnesses were in shock and could offer little useful information. The crowd in Liberty Square, which had gathered at the news of the events, roared that Budapest was now a clean Chicago. Eventually, an 11-year-old boy playing in the square was able to give the most accurate description of the bandits, and a suitcase seller's testimony led to the identification of the license plate number of the vehicle, which turned out to have been stolen from Andrassy Avenue the night before. The car was found the same day, abandoned on a muddy dirt road near Kelenföld railway station, which laid the foundations for the success of the investigation. Although the robbers had removed their fingerprints, the police could be sure from the speed and efficiency of their getaway that at least one of them was an excellent driver, possibly an experienced car thief, which at the time narrowed the suspects down considerably.

It was mainly car mechanics who possessed such driving skills.

There were many false reports of suspicious individuals – one reportedly thought he recognized the attackers as three shaving Bulgarian gardeners – but the other key piece of information was a report from a member of the public. On Lehel Square, an eyewitness saw two men in the street looking strangely muddy and acting suspiciously, who, in the weather that day, could not have smeared themselves so badly on the paving in Budapest. So the police searched the car repair shops near Lehel Square and noticed that a mechanic called László Szepesi had called in sick that very day saying he had a toothache. It quickly turned out that Szepesi had already served two months for car theft the previous winter together with another mechanic, László Radovics. A carpenter's apprentice called Nándor Tari, who had also tried his hand at car mechanics, drove well, and wanted to be a racing driver, was in prison at the same time. Moreover, he had been an apprentice in the same workshop as József Benyák, who was shot during the robbery and who may have died at the entrance because he could have recognized one of the fleeing robbers.

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Liberty Square in Budapest in 1940 on a postcard

Testimony and an incredible past

Later that night, all three were found and interrogated. Szepesi and Radovic were found in their homes, Tari was found in a pub in Angyalföld, drinking wine and singing merrily. During the interrogations, the police noticed that Radovics was moving strangely and had difficulty lifting his arms, so they called a doctor who examined him and found a pea-sized bullet wound on his shoulder blade, covered with a plaster. The bullet, according to the doctor, could have come from Miklós Szalay's gun, while a wound on Radovics' wrist matched the bullet wound fired by Géza Mocsai. The bank robber then broke down and gave a detailed confession, saying that the crime was Szepesi's idea, that he financed the guns and the disguise, and that he was waiting outside as the driver in the stolen car. Radovics and Tari entered the bank, Radovics shot the teller, and Tari shot the others. According to the statements of the three, weapons and fake moustaches were found hidden in several places.

The gang's previous robberies were also revealed, and these too showed a lot of ruthlessness but minimal success.

In 1931, they attacked the Klauzál Square branch of the Hungarian Counting and Currency Exchange Bank, where they also fired shots, but the safe door was slammed in front of them, so they left empty-handed. In the same year, they also attacked the Mária Street post office in Újpest, but the postmaster fired back and they fled. In 1932, they started with the Lipót körút branch of the Municipal Savings Bank, but the cashier threw a hole punch at the gunman, who dropped his weapon and they all fled. At the corner of Vadász Street and Bank Street, they continued by robbing a man, from whose bag they took 1,000 one-pengő banknotes and 2,000 pieces of 50-fillér coins. Finally, on June 30, 1934, they shot at a sub-officer of the Country Bank in Széchenyi Street and dragged off his briefcase, which contained only one letter. The greatest damage – unfortunately in terms of human lives – was therefore done in Szabadság Square.

"This year is off to a good start!”

It is absurd that it was their clumsiness that led to the tragedy. Radovic's testimony revealed that he caused the panic in Liberty Square by accidentally shouting in his excitement, "Everybody leave your places, or I'll shoot!" 
In any case, the consequences were swift and decisive: the heads of the Budapest banks met as early as 2 January to decide on increased protection for their branches. The police were asked not to allow vehicles to wait outside the bank buildings, emergency alarms were installed everywhere, and security guards were reinforced. 
On 11 February, the trial of the criminals began for three counts of murder in addition to their previous attempts. In the end, Tari was proven right, when he concluded his interrogation with the words, "This year is off to a good start! I'll get a necktie, won't I, Captain?" On 22 January 1936, all three criminals were hanged in the courtyard of the Collector's Prison.

Resources:
https://mnl.gov.hu/a_het_dokumentuma/bankrablas_szilveszterkor.html 
https://horthykorszak.blog.hu/2017/02/25/szombat_esti_remalom_a_szabadsag_teri_bankrablas 
https://welovebudapest.com/cikk/2018/01/02/hires-budapesti-rejtelyek-hogyan-buktak-le-a-30-as-evek-leghiresebb-bankrabloi/ 
 

The reclaimed estate

The wrought-iron gate of the Mikes Estate in Zabola opens onto a breathtaking sight. Not far from the entrance, to the left, the old riding stables catch the eye, the only major farm building not pulled down by the great-grandfather. It was the home of the most valuable horses of the once famous Mikes stud farm, which used to be an important source of income for the family. The magnificent interior, with its arches and columns, is evidence of a restoration that reflects the owners' affectionate and tasteful approach to the estate, with the light of former days of glory almost radiating from behind the weathered plaster.

The main manager of the maintenance and development of the estate is Gregor Roy Chowdhury, the son of Shuvendu Basu Roy Chowdhury, an aristocrat of East Bengal origin, and Count Katalin Mikes of Zabola.

Gregor, known locally as Count Gergely, was born in Austria. His mother, Katalin Mikes had been forced to leave the centuries-old family nest at the age of three due to nationalisation and miraculously made her way to Austria at the age of 16.

She met her future husband, Shuvendu Basu Roy Chowdhury, in Graz, Austria, and the two were married and became parents of Gergely and Sándor. These days, the former spends more time in Zabola – in Romania in general – after the restoration wrestling that began in the early 2000s resulted in the family regaining ownership of part of the ancient estate. It includes the old and the new castle with 50 hectares of the Zabola estate, as well as 3.5 thousand of the 13 thousand hectares of reclaimed forest. But only on paper, the forest issue has been tangled in the maze of the Romanian legal system for years.

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Countess Katalin Mikes - Photo: István Biró

In the footsteps of the great-grandfather

Gregor, or Gergely, has turned into one of Transylvania's most interesting businessmen, after becoming the majority owner of the Secuiana clothing factory in Kézdivásárhely (Târgu Secuiesc), which has a history of more than half a century. All his investments have been made with a single purpose: to raise the capital needed to run the estate. The businessman-count combination was inspired by his great-grandfather, Count Ármin Mikes, who built a new two-storey chateau in 1904-1905, connected to the old castle by a tunnel and a two-storey bridge. The original idea was to have guest rooms on the upper level and offices on the lower. As he eventually had a separate agricultural lodge and steward's villa built, all farming activities were moved there and the new castle was also used as a guesthouse in the 1930s. Old promotional brochures bear witness to the efforts to make the building suitable for tourism.

Ármin Mikes was considered a rather individualistic figure among the aristocrats of the time. An entrepreneurial count to the core, he set up a multitude of companies from Budapest to southern Romania.

Thus, for him, the Treaty of Trianon (1920) was a great blow not only because of the subsequent confiscation of property but also because, as a citizen of an enemy country in the First World War, he lost all his investments in Romanian companies, including a major railway project and its hoped-for benefits. In later years, he sought to rebuild his contacts in Bucharest, was the only Hungarian member of the Romanian Jockey Club, maintained constant contact with the Romanian liberal elite, and was regularly received by Ferdinand I and later by the Romanian King Charles II. Whenever a Hungarian economic delegation came to Bucharest, Ármin Mikes was a member of it. He made the most of those difficult times.

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The old Mikes estate - Photo: family archive

Fantasy in fabric

His great-grandson is also trying to make the most of the opportunities he has created largely by his own hands. "I've been driving a lot around Romania and seen a lot of fallow farmland. It was a time when you could get capital for farming, and farmland seemed like a sure thing. Initially, I rented a lot of small pieces to set up small farm units, and then I looked for agricultural companies in trouble. I ended up with a company in the Dicsőszentmárton area, and the business took off nicely, but I kept looking for something that would grow at a faster pace," he tells us the of the beginning.

When he was offered the textile industry a few years later, he was not interested at first but decided that the company in Târgu Secuiesc, operating practically under the owner's nose, could hold some potential.

"I thought there might be a change in trend soon: after the COVID-19 epidemic, a lot of companies would no longer want to have everything made in the Far East, they’d come back to Europe, at least in part."

"The idea worked to some extent, in the spring of 2022 I started negotiating the takeover of two German brands, and now we have an office near Hannover," explains Gergely.

Family relations in India

He had visited Transylvania several times as a child, but in those days, in the 1980s, they mostly went to visit relatives in Kolozsvár (Cluj-Napoca). He first visited India for a wedding when he was ten years old, and only after his father died in 2002 did he start to focus more intensively on his Hindu roots. Most of his relatives there now live in New Delhi and Calcutta, some of whom would prefer to forget the past, but some of whom are happy to remember.

It's easy to see a bit of fate in the way the parents met. The Roy Chowdhury family, like the Mikes, lost everything after the partition of India in 1947, when Hindu-Muslim strife divided Bengal into East and West Bengal. Gergely says it was only later, as an adult, that he began to "untangle" the threads for himself. On the one hand, there is an Indian family with everything for a comfortable, peaceful life, until in 1947 India was cut in two and the family had to flee the areas outside the borders. However, while Gergely and Sándor's grandfather, born in 1901, had then been living and working in New Delhi for a long time, many members of the family arrived in India with only one suitcase. The refugees from East Bengal received no compensation for the possessions they had been forced to leave behind, only land on which they could build a new home. Those who stayed have endured much persecution, but some are now successful businessmen.

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Part of the Mikes estate today - Photo: Samu Csinta

To start afresh is also a legacy

Researching the past is now an important goal and part of Gregor Roy Chowdury's life.

He visits India and Bangladesh several times a year, keeping in regular contact with 30-40 of his more than 500 relatives scattered around the world.

Recently, a Bangladeshi business newspaper, The Business Standard, "discovered" the distant Bengali who is working on tracing his ancestors. And he found one of his cousins: he is now a chef in the kitchen at the Zabola Estate.

Here at home, expropriation continues, but now of his own free will: The Mikes family has declared a forest in Sepsibükszád as primeval forest under the Conservation Transylvania green biodiversity program, which means they have practically expropriated themselves. Starting afresh is a family legacy anyway. Count Ármin Mikes also bought forests in southern Romania, all of which were confiscated in one twist or another of history. When recently talking to an Indian relative about the forests that are still the subject of litigation, he asked how long this process had been going on. And when he was told that it had been five years, he said, almost consolingly, "We have been in litigation with the Indian state for 250 years."
 

"We discovered together what this profession is all about"

They've always had a computer at home, and even as a child, he saw his parents working on it. He was interested in what it could be used for. At first, like most kids, he just played games and watched videos on it. He was about ten when he became interested in programming. He saw it as an opportunity to build and create something new.
"At the time, my sister was taking a massage course, and I created a website for her massage parlour. Then she didn't become a masseur and the site didn't get live. Maybe it's better that way," he begins, laughing.
He learnt how to program from YouTube videos, completely self-taught. He tried and tried until he succeeded. He not only created a website but also simple computer games. He went to György Boronkay Technical High School in Vác where he started programming seriously. He says that he made many friends there, many of whom he still works with professionally.

"Together, we discovered what this profession is all about. And our teachers encouraged us from the beginning to participate in different competitions," he says.

So even as young as a teenager he already earned some routine at competitions.

When engineering and art meet

While the average teenager is only busy doing school tests, János has been running his own business since high school, which he started with his brother-in-law in 2016. "He was working as a hotel manager and he was in dire need of all kinds of reports on how the hotel was performing. He had an Excel spreadsheet with lots of numbers." But the huge data set was becoming unmanageable. "As a solution, I created a web application (Peaqplus - ed.) that is still used by hotels today," he continues.

After graduation, he worked as a freelance software developer, which is how he first heard about EuroSkills, and then met Zoltán Sisák, who became his coach. After several rounds of selection, it was decided last May that he would represent Hungary among the web developers. For one and a half years, the preparation took place in the office of the HTTP Foundation (Dissemination of Network Knowledge Foundation). As he says, he was preparing practically "from dawn to dusk" for the last one or two months before the European Championship in September 2023.

As he says, web development is a very broad field: from the simplest website creation, such as a company presentation, to web applications. The latter is closer to his heart. "You have to design a complete, working system, like an engineer." 

"On the other hand, I could compare it a bit to a painter or a graphic artist creating something beautiful. Web development is where the two meet," he concludes. 

Messenger "exploded" after the victory

At the EuroSkills Competition in Gdansk, work went on for three days, seven hours a day. They had to work on the website of an imaginary company dealing with artificial intelligence. The first task was to build a simple introductory website and then a complex system.  
"My consultant and I felt that the task was a good fit, I always managed to do what I had planned. However, there was a Kazakh competitor who also did very well. We were hoping for a podium finish, but the gold medal was still uncertain. I wasn't nervous during the race, but I was very anxious when the results were announced. I had a stomach ache, a headache, and a lot of other symptoms. When they didn't announce my name as second, I was relieved," he recalls.

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Photo: MKIK

János Hidvégi not only won a gold medal in his own profession but also came third in the Best in Europe award, the third most points (783) of all this year's competitors.  Never before in the history of EuroSkills has a Hungarian web developer achieved such a high score (this year's Best in Europe was awarded to Hungarian IT system operators).

In János's family, IT is too much of a stretch for everyone; years ago, his parents didn't even understand what he wanted to do with websites. But now they see that his career is going in the right direction. His parents and girlfriend were there in Gdansk to cheer him on. "They even teared up they were so overjoyed. My friends were watching the livestream at home. After the results were announced, I went back to my chair where I had left my phone and my Messenger almost exploded, with about forty unread messages," he says. 

"This is a great event, an experience of a lifetime. You can meet so many talented people and build international contacts." 

"If someone can show that they are a European champion in their field, that can be a strong advantage when looking for a job," he says.

Is artificial intelligence the future?

When I ask him what he thinks makes someone a good web developer, he lists curiosity, a desire to create, creativity, and precision. "I've always wanted to create something that works on its own. It's such a fast-changing profession that you have to be constantly open to new ideas. You have to keep moving forward. You have to find creative solutions to interesting problems."

János currently works as a software developer for a bank and a Hungarian startup enterprise. He will turn 22 in December but already has plans to start his own startup in the not-too-distant future. He is most interested in artificial intelligence (AI): how to make AI software or tools that help developers work more efficiently.

"Artificial intelligence has its dangers, but I'm not afraid of machines taking over. People have believed that many times throughout history. For example, when the steam engine was invented. There will be a different kind of jobs, that's for sure, and we have to adapt and take advantage of the new situation," he says.

The European champion always takes on jobs that challenge him and that he can learn from. And opportunities abound, with companies already looking for him to work with. And why would he recommend his own profession to the younger generation? "You don't need a huge workshop with lots of machines, you can do anything with a laptop if you're persistent enough and interested enough. Not many professions can offer that," he adds.

Our interviews with other Hungarian medallists from the 2023 European Skills Championships are available here and here.