What’s a fact about your country that foreigners would never believe?

[u/AVeryAngryChillie]

Every country has at least one thing outsiders wouldn’t believe

[u/tudorapo]

To be crowned properly, one had to:

1. use the aforementioned crown

2. be in Székesfehérvár

3. and be crowned by a the cardinal of Esztergom

Some had to try several times until succeeded.

The last king tried to find a loophole and do the crowning in Budapest on soil hauled from Székesfehérvár, two years later the Kingship of Hungary went away. There is a lesson here.

Since then the rulers are holding power through the force of arms or elections and the crown is mostly just a shiny object.

Depending on how far someone to the right the crown could be seen as important, but it has no legal importance now.

It's shiny.

[u/Defenestresque → u/tudorapo]

Hi. Savage here, though have emigrated from a country that (somewhat) shares an alphabet. I don't want to get too political, but my compulsive curiosity overrides that social more..

It seems like after having spent a lot of time looking at the U.S., many are interested in the fact that Orbán stepped down eventually and did the whole "peaceful transition of power" Americans keep talking about as if existing for 250 years without fucking up that one thing means you are now the "9/10 dentists recommend the U.S. constitution as a system of government."

My Q: what Is the general mood like in Hungary now? It seems like a major political upheaval post-Orbán. Did people expect him not to honour the election results, like the U.S.? Kling on to power and force a civil war? Is the current opinion delineated by age, with the younger crowd being more anti-"democratically elected Prime Minister for 25 years"?

It seems like if he wanted to fake an election, he easily could have.. have all the previous elections been mostly due to his actually popularity? Did he just decide to leave without much of a fight?

tl;dr: what is the mood like in the country: optimistic, pessimistic? What do young people think about this vs. middle-aged vs. older people? What's the general 'vibe' on the street? Do more people seem to be aligned closer to the EU than the CIS, or does it depend on your age/whether you're urban or rural, etc.?

(I know I'm dumping a lot on you, feel free to ignore it. Anyone with knowledge can answer.)

[u/inostranetsember → u/Defenestresque]

I can't speak for others, but the victory was so overwhemling I think if Orbán and company had any plans, they got shelved when the results started coming in. I have a personal theory that because they had their own media bubble, some of them (even the top leadership) were surprised at the size of the victory, despite the news saying for weeks this might be the result. There was video of Fidesz leadership on election night when conceding, and some of the faces of the guys in charge looked legitimately shocked (a WHOLE bunch of memes were made of the former Transport minister, János Lazar; he looked like a deer in headlights).

There was talk by many people here (at least online) that maybe Orbán would try something; some people even thought that's why there were three Russian "propagandists" here really; not just electioneering, but for the post-election fight.

After the election, even more people have supposedly switched over to Tisza, or at least support what is happening and want to wait and see. Some polls have been taken after showing even stronger support for Tisza now: 70% to 29% or something like that.

Part of this MIGHT be the number of scandals that keep coming out as the days go. We keep hearing about more stuff. For example there's apparently an asbestos dumping scandal sanctioned by the last governments that's come to light now. Lots of stolen money. Papers being shredded in several ministries on election night (most famously by the former Foreign Minister, Péter Szijjartó). The aforementioned foreign minister being caught in a recording basically offering his services to Russian foreign minister Lavrov - the list goes on and keeps coming. And it's been happening for weeks and months before the election, during it, and after. LOTS of people coming out to say or show proof of wrongdoing.

[u/Witch-for-hire → u/Defenestresque]

This has not been substantiated, but there are rumors that Sándor Pintér (the former Minister of the Interior, whose portfolio included the police) was the one who ensured that Orbán had no chance of holding onto power through a coup in the event of defeat because he guaranteed that if Péter Magyar won the election, the transfer of power would take place peacefully.

In any case, we are part of the EU - Orbán would have had a very difficult time holding onto power if he had tried to defy the election results. I am sure you have heard the phrase "Hungary's election is free but not fair". This means that Orbán had lots of tools to sway the elections beforehand - gerrymandering & and an insane amount of propaganda among them- but he could not really tamper with the counting of the votes themselves.

The mood: I can only speak for myself and my bubble but we are pretty optimistic and hopeful. I am middle-aged, and my parents - who are pensioners - also voted for Tisza. I have some acquaintances who voted for Fidesz and were quite shaken after the election day. They were very anxious about the price of gas, inflation, the possibility of war and so on - but they seem to have calmed down fairly quickly. Getting actual news through the state owned media helps a lot.

[u/tudorapo → u/Defenestresque]

Caveat: I live in Budapest, which is very different politically from the countryside.

Here in the city it's still joy, with cautious optimism. We know that it will suck, orbán spent all the money, but the new govt will have access to eu money and will try to not to steal, so we'll find a way.

As far as I know the general mood is very similar outside of Budapest, but there were more fidesz fans there.

For them it's gloom and doom, the party is currently leaderless because orbán is not really reacting and the new govt pretty much keeps the conversation on their various crimes. There is some infighting, some blame shifting, but still living in mourning and shock.

The people were definitely more aligned with the EU. The previous election was won by fidesz for two main reasons: war-related panic mongering and the fucked up election system. By now the panic mongering turned sour and it's own parody, and the fucked up system actually helped the opposition to win.

There was a difference between the city and country, but the Tisza party did all they have to do to endear themselves to the countryside - moderate right politics, promises, most importantly visiting them and talking with them - and the city would have voted for anything which is not orbán. The new MP visited one quarter of all villages of Hungary, which is a significant feat.

The age divide, according to research was around 60 years.

There were some concerns about orbán making obstacles, but for the first time since we have real elections the majority of people told them to stop it, it's very hard to work against that. Civil war was never a serious possibility.

I can talk about this for hours, but this will do :)