Refugee

By the age of six, John Varda had already been twice a refugee. A member of the Hungarian Székely, traditionally thought to be descended from a son of Attila the Hun, his community was thrice relocated under treaty agreements as the countries of Eastern Europe jockeyed for territory, both through alliances and brute force. They were finally settled in Tolna County, Hungary, after World War II. From the ages of eight to nineteen, John was a first-hand witness to the Communist experiment, as Hungary's Russian liberators became their totalitarian masters. He remembers the hardships of being a farm family forced into the collective by high taxes and the ever-present fear of retaliation should they even whisper disapproval of the government. To be accused of having capitalist notions could mean years of imprisonment. On his nineteenth birthday, he crossed over the border into Yugoslavia, fearing that his support of the failed 1956 Revolution would land him in Siberia. After months of brutal incarceration in a Yugoslavian refugee camp, he eventually was transported to Italy, where he applied for migration to Australia. After so many months of poor and insufficient food, he had lost so much weight that he was required to remain in the UN Italian refugee camp until he had gained weight and could pass the required physical examination. On his twentieth birthday, he set foot on Australian soil, where he faced new challenges: learning a new language and becoming accustomed to new foods and a new social culture, as well as discovering that, in Australia, football had very odd rules and was not played with a round ball.