Visit to Lucka 2008

I left Seattle on the afternoon of July 31. Flew overnight to Frankfurt, then on to Vienna. I rented a car and drove to Linz, an hour’s drive west from Vienna to meet Anne and be part of her MFA graduation ceremony from the University of Krems. She was very excited and I was very excited for her. (This photo is Anne with her roommate, Samira, who is from Iran.)

The next morning, August 2, we drove in the direction of Lucka. Prior to leaving the USA, John A. Duran (my uncle) had put us in touch with his cousin, Steve Figura. Steve is the son of Teresa Duran Figura, the youngest sister of my grandfather, John S. Duran. Steve was born in Lucka and currently lives in St. Clairsville, Ohio. He was traveling to Lucka at the same time, to visit with his mother and brother, Emil, and family, as well as to later travel to Poland for a wedding on his wife’s side. We scheduled our arrival in Lucka to be during the time that Steve was also in Lucka. Steve was enormously helpful in making arrangements and then acting as guide and friend once we arrived. Thanks, Steve!

The drive to Lucka was eventful and frustrating. We were pretty sure that Grandpap Duran’s ghost was haunting our journey, doing what he could to keep us from reaching Lucka. Leaving out all the lengthy details, it started with the four hour traffic jam to cross into Hungary – with no apparent reason since there is no longer any customs or passport control at this border. Once across the border, we realized that we did not have the necessary highway toll pass to drive the highway in Hungary, so we got off the highway to look for a place to purchase the toll pass, but being in the middle of farm country, there weren’t any such places. So we drove on into Slovakia, crossing with no fanfare at the town of Komarno, where we decided to stop and stretch our legs...

That’s about when it started raining. As we rose in elevation and the roads became darker and twistier through the hills of central Slovakia the rain turned to snow. Wonderful. Grandpap’s curse continued.

 We plugged on, eventually arriving at the town of Lucenec around 10:30 PM. Exhausted and tense, we found a hotel room (and the desk clerk thankfully spoke just enough English), found a WiFi signal in the hotel lobby, called Steve to let him know, then went out to find some dinner. But it was late and all the restaurants were closed and the pubs had stopped serving food, so we sat at the nearby outdoor bar, had a few beers for dinner and went to back to the room and fell asleep.

It was not hard to find Emil Figura’s house number on the one main road through the village, but when we knocked no one answered and we were pretty sure that Grandpap was snickering somewhere around the corner.

This was the day of the annual folk festival in Lucka, so we followed the other cars to the top of the road and the site of the festival at the Community Center. We asked several people if they knew Emil or Steve Figura but no one we spoke to seemed to speak English nor recognize their names. Until we asked a fellow who was helping to direct traffic and park cars and he pointed at another fellow and said “That is Emil Figura.”

Teresa is Grandpap’s youngest sister. John and Teresa never met. Steve said she is 82 years old, 23 years younger than Grandpap Duran who would have been 105 in 2008 . John had left Lucka before Teresa was ever born, and never returned. Steve said that his mother had visited the USA once when John was living in Florida, but through an unwillingness to travel and some misdirected and laggard communications, John and Teresa never met in person.

In the photo, L to R, are Steve, Teresa and Emil

Teresa Duran Figura
(My grandfather's youngest sister)

After lunch we walked up to the festival. We had several beers, met many people who lived in Lucka, or who had once lived in Lucka and were back for the festival, including some number of distant relatives whose names are already lost to my memory. The folk music was very good and very fun.

Above: Emil, Mike, unknown, Steve

We had a very pleasant walking tour of Lucka. Apparently, the house where my grandfather grew up no longer exists, but this house was the same age and next to where the Durans lived.

Most of Lucka was very well-kept and was a pretty little village with all the modern conveniences one would expect. Martin, and later Steve, pointed out the path over to Kamenica, where Grandma Duran’s family is from. Martin said that Lucka probably had about 700 full time residents, which seemed about right.

Anne and Martin Figura

We had more beer and dinner of goulash, bread and stuffed cabbage at the festival. After dinner there was live folk music for dancing on the basketball court in the yard. Anne and I danced for a while, then the music changed over to a loud European techno rock hip hop mix that we found impossible to dance to (but which was not stopping the hundreds of teenagers and twenty-somethings now descending on the festival site), so we left with Steve and Jola and drove down to the town of Lipany where we had a hotel room for the night.

We went back to Emil’s house in Lucka and visited and had a big Sunday supper with the family, including several shots of Slivovitz as an appetizer. We shared (and left with them) the many photos of Grandpap Duran and his descendants that we had taken with us (Thanks, Mom). We also left a variety of wine, candies, dried fruit, t-shirts, caps and other gifts from Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. I think we were able to honor their hospitality properly, and lighten our traveling load considerably. We said our goodbyes after supper. It was just the right amount of time to visit and to enjoy the hospitality without being a burden.

Jacob in Seattle gear

It seemed that Teresa very much enjoyed seeing photos of her brother and many of her relatives that she had never gotten to meet. We told stories of all the relatives and Steve would translate back and forth and it was a very fun visit. We did not learn any specific stories about Grandpap Duran since no one who knew him was still alive, but it was wonderful to get a sense of the place and the people from which he came, even if the place had not been kind to him at the time .

Emil Jr., Stephanie and Anthony

 

Three generations.

 

Folk Dancers