More Memories

Hajdú

We are back in Hajdúböszörmény (pronounced Hi-do-bis-r-main); Hajdú for short. When we volunteered for Habitat for Humanity in 2008, after we spent 1½ months in Budapest working in the national office, we moved to the farming town of Hajdú for 4½ months; it is quite near the Romanian boarder. At that time we were helped by and befriended a local government official and his wife who we have remained friends with and who we are now staying with for a few days.

Our job here was to help construct 8 houses for people in need. Some of that work was physical (hammering nails and such), some was managerial (managing volunteer teams who would come for a week or two), and some was promotional (helping residents of the town understand the concept of volunteering). We were some of the first Americans to ever stay here. Hungary, as a former Soviet state, by definition had no unemployment, by definition provided everything citizens needed, and by definition needed no volunteers. Slowly, we helped locals understand that volunteering involved doing work for others for free. By the end of our time here, some locals were coming out to the work site to volunteer.