A working group engaged in organization of the Hungarian Office on the basis of the Ethnocenter of the Komi-Permyak district of the Perm region, was established, aimed at strengthening of the Finno-Ugric collaboration.
Apart from the members of the Center, the group includes the group supervisor, teacher of the Hungarian language Silard Tot, Candidate of Philological sciences, teacher of the Finnish language Larisa Ponomareva, as well as the leading specialist of the Kudymkar district administration KPO Nikolai Petrov.
It is worth mentioning that the offices of such kind are already in function in some other Russian cities, including Udmurt State University, Saint Petersburg, Khanty-Mansiisk, Yoshkar-Ola, Yekaterinburg, Saransk, Petrozavodsk, Syktyvkar and Perm. The Hungarian offices are supplied with books, digital data media and technical devices by the Moscow Hungarian Cultural Center, which is a branch of the Institute of Balashi in Budapest, a huge establishment, which is aimed at the popularization of the Hungarian culture abroad, as well as support of the scientific and cultural relations of Hungary with other countries.
According to the plans, negotiations concerning organization of the Office are now being held between the Hungarian Cultural Center as one party and Ethnocenter and the branch of Udmurt State University in Kudymkar as another. During the last two academic years, the Komi-Permyak Ethnocultural Center in Kudymkar takes part in active collaboration with the Department of Humanities and Law Subjects of branch university of Udmurt State University, where the Hungarian language is taught. For example, on the 4th of April a musical event with participation of students of the Finance and credit department, who study Hungarian, took place on the basis of the Ethnocenter. The students performed a mini-concert of Hungarian songs.
It is worth reminding that in the Kudymkar USU branch 60 students, studying in three different departments, are taught Hungarian.
The initiators of the Hungarian Office hope, that a new international level will increase the amount of visitors of the Ethnocenter in the future, which is, from the Kudymkar’s perspective, situated not quite close to the city center. But this is only half of the picture: in spring and autumn it appears very difficult to get to the establishment because of the Kudymkar bad conditions of roads, let alone impossible without rubber boots.
Text and pictures: Silard Tot