Sándor Lengyel

Abstract

I met the name of Sándor Lengyel (1914–1990) for the first time when I received a notice from Eötvös University that my application to enroll as a student of chemistry was denied. For the reason, my poor performance at the entrance examination was given. The notice was signed by the Dean of the Faculty of Natural Sciences, Sándor Lengyel. This notice caught up with me in early August 1959, somewhere in the Mecsek Mountains where I was participating in a camping trip of the high school from which I had just graduated. The notice had a devastating effect on me. My first thought was, how will I be able to find my wife? I always imagined that my future wife will be another student. I was not completely inexperienced though in receiving such a notice. Four years before, my prior acceptance to the local high school was annulled at the last moment before the start of the academic year. Then, the reason was that my late maternal grandfather used to be a shop owner. This time, as I found out eventually, the reason was that the second husband of my mother used to be a shop owner. To me, he was my stepfather, but we never went through an official adoption procedure.

Road of Contradictions