I rarely think of Zsófi, maybe once every two or three years. Always in the winter. It fills me with a strange satisfaction how vividly and in detail memories emerge from somewhere in the depths. About that old meeting single in december.
Zsófi is a type of nut that is very difficult to crack. At least it was then – and I don’t think it has changed now, whatever the effects of the last thirty years. Today it is perhaps easier to approach – but that’s it.
Zsófi is a cave, not just a cave.
Five of us went out to Zsovye that winter day. Name order: A., G., M., Zs. – and me. The sun was shining beautifully and the Dacia 1310 handled almost a hundred kilometers to the King’s Forest without any problems, and even then it drove carefree on mountain roads rich in potholes and serpentines, which were mostly used by forestry tractors and trucks with passenger chassis The meta transporting the miners, which received the corresponding maintenance. We all knew the area, but none of us had been there before – we could read a map, but getting lost was out of the question.
Needless to say we would have invaded Zsuvi based on the descriptions and what others have said.
The twenty-five-year-old experienced, enthusiastic, and self-proclaimed Cave solves it all on his own, right? But.
We didn’t pitch a tent, because the weather was fine, and then we’ll sleep in sleeping bags, as usual, we decided. We put on our muddy work clothes (we don’t usually wash them, because a good salubita is so hard of clay that you don’t have to stretch it yourself, but jump into it), put on our rubber boots (boots? er…), put the bag on our backs with sloss (back gear ), and we set out towards the belly of the mountain. The approach to Zsófi was a bit tedious, we drove down a mine shaft for about a quarter of an hour before we reached the entrance to the cave – that is, it was stumbled upon by miners looking for bauxite. The excitement was even greater when we found the entrance.
I don’t want to bore anyone with technical details. But I would like to mention a few little things, just so that the dear reader might have an idea of Zsófi.
As a first step, you need to go down seven meters on a rope. trivial. Then it will be hard on the way back, you will look like a dead seventy tired. But we don’t know that yet. Six or seven years before that, Zsófi was completely closed off from the outside world (he started digging in 1986), everything is muddy, the shoe slips in, sinks in, slips out, and the fist stays in the hand. You can’t fall much, about ten meters in worse places, but that’s enough. Continued: M. skips chasm, Zs. Also, I’ll come, but I can’t find a support for my left hand (I’m an idiot, I was and will be). Tingling begins, I relieve myself properly. A. says he will do it next. He starts, walks, grabs something, the thing breaks away from the wall, remains in A’s hands, our partner falls 2 meters. Is he having New Year’s Eve this year? He stands, pulls himself together – he was an army paratrooper, he could fall. In the meantime, I will have an idea of \u200b\u200bhow to move on, I will overcome the obstacle, and Zs will follow me, it is easier for him.
And so on.
By the time we reach the end point (since then it is no longer the case, many brave people went there and found a way forward, as the Internet says), we will be very tired. That’s right, all that remains is to make the return trip. Up, since we’ve been slipping.
And we will do it. Meanwhile, I vow every minute to stop this craft (I will, but only years later, for a different reason). Somehow I fight my way up the mine shaft. From there, you just have to go out, set up the tent, hide in your sleeping bag, and sleep, sleep, sleep…
The methodology is unusual. We usually wait for each other, but this time it happens differently: the one who climbs the rope packs his things, waits for the one who comes after him, and then gets out. I finally arrived, Zs was waiting for me. It started. It takes about a minute and a half to pack up. I see the light of his carbide lamp flickering down the shaft of mine, I follow him between the two pairs of bars.
And that’s when something happens that I’ll never forget – maybe that’s why I remember Zsófi so vividly. An out-of-body experience.
I go forward, and in the process I see myself, from behind, about ten paces away. In orange overalls (the only one I own), blue sneakers (yes, that’s what the reader is thinking), a seatbelt and a few carabiners hanging from me, my flashlight sways…
Approaching the entrance to the mine shaft, I return to my body. I’ll watch out for a white glow. Freshly fallen snow reflects the moonlight. It’s winter outside with a complete set of tools. with Zs. , we try to pull the tent with zombie movements – the support is still working, but the ground is frozen, and it is impossible to knock on the tent peg. That’s it, let’s say, let’s hide in sleeping bags and slide into the tent unstretched. We can stay till morning, we are made of stone and iron…
who else. At dawn, the forester wakes you up: Good morning! what about you? They sleep like a front!
If so, we’ll aim for Püspökfürd. It is nearby, next to Nagyvárad, and there are a lot of thermal water baths, after which we deserve to warm up. We soak ourselves in thirty-degree water, snow falls on our heads in the outdoor pool, build snowmen on the concrete edge of the pool …
I look at the night from my new, barely occupied place. Looking back with a thousand eyes. At that time it was probably mercury vapor lamps, now something else lights up. If I’m looking for the aforementioned G., M., and friend, I have to look. A. and Zs. They lie east of me, about four or five hundred kilometers away – but I can still see them in their presence on Earth. Zsófi is now just a memory, I don’t care. Snow now remembers. The world is changing, it must change. God forbid that every new year be a copy of the previous year.
The author is a poet, writer and translator.
(Cover image: Our image is illustration. Image: Carol M. Highsmith/Boyencabeer/Getty Images)
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