The Secret of Polish-Hungarian Kinship

It takes a very long time indeed to get to Hungary from Poland by train. So long in fact that I resorted to looking in history books as a way of passing the time. There was a lot of stuff in there about Poland and Hungary having common kings and fighting common enemies, which supposedly resulted in an "historical friendship." I found this unconvincing – Britain and France have had common kings and fought common enemies but the only thing this has resulted in is mutual suspicion.

I also learned that Hungarians have an equivalent phrase to "Polak, Węgier – dwa bratanki," which is "Lengyel, magyar – két jó barite." Several Hungarians also reflexively and cheerfully quoted this to me when I told them I lived in Poland – then looked confused when they remembered I was English. One thing I noticed at once from these mirror phrases is that Poles and Hungarians share the characteristic of having seemingly random names for each other's nations. The Hungarian for 'Polska' is 'Lengyelország' and the Polish for 'Magyarország' is 'Węgry.' Perhaps giving each other mutually unrecognisable names helps with international relations and should be recommended by the United Nations.

On the subject of language, I also quickly realised that Poles and Hungarians share the characteristic of having languages that look and sound utterly impossible to foreigners, and that they are quite proud of this fact. Stepping from Slovakia, with its reassuringly Slavic-sounding place names, across the border into Hungary you suddenly encounter a language that looks and sounds like someone has simply spliced a Swedish and Italian dictionary together and added dots over every second letter. I learned 'yes,' 'no,' 'thank you' and 'owl' before my brain refused to cooperate any further.

My first impressions of Hungary didn't yield any obvious similarities with Poland. Saint Stefan, the country's first king, is massively popular. Everything is named after him. Planning to open a restaurant, pub, hairdressing salon, car repair workshop or carpet shop in Budapest? Simply call it Saint Stefan's – everybody else does. The Hungarians even still have Saint Stefan's right hand. It's in a little glass box in a basilica. Once a year the thousand-year-old hand is paraded around the city. Presumably the thumb goes up if the old king likes what he sees. Mummified hands are not, as far as I know, particularly highly regarded in Poland.

Further investigations were inconclusive. Poles and Hungarians love pork above all other meats, but Hungarians put peppers in everything. Poles drink vodka, Hungarians drink pálinka. Hungarians make wine, Poles are intimidated by wine. I did find an exhibition at the National Museum titled "A thousand years of Hungarian-Polish relations," but there were only three rooms. One room contained the original letter from Władysław III accepting the throne of Hungary. My Medieval Latin is a bit rusty but I think it said something like: "Cheers for the kingdom, see you Tuesday."

It wasn't until I was leaving that I finally saw the truth. Near the station was a shop selling second-hand clothes. It was advertised by a large British flag with the word 'ANGOL' in bold, block capitals. The secret of Polish-Hungarian kinship? They both know the true name of the Englishman.

Jamie Stokes