A cellist in Ivan Fischer’s orchestra has a US problem
mainThe Budapest Festival Orchestra is due to fly to the US tomorrow.
On the eve of departure, an Iraq-born cellist who has lived in Hungary since 1985 was told by US consular officials that he could not fly.
Conductor Ivan Fischer called the State Department for ‘a long conversation’.
The US Embassy in Budapest later confirmed that the ban did not apply to those holding dual nationality. The cellist has Hungarian citizenship, so the orchestra can now fly to the US with all its members.
Report here (in Hungarian).
Fischer can finally thank Viktor Orban for something. And not just for his fat paycheck that allows him to live high on the hog in Berlin while he b1tches and moans about Hungary from his high and mighty globalist elitist perch.
What does Orban have to do with this?
Trump + Orban = Lovefest
You might want to read the news from time to time. Not just “Fake News” (CNN).
Obviously Trump has more in common with Orban than with, say, Trudeau. That said, what is the connection with this story? Also, when I tried to search recent news with those two (…) names, I mostly came across untrustworthy sources such as Breitbart. Any links will be appreciated.
Very odd comment. Of course he can still say his opinions about politics and the government even if his job and his orchestra are subsidized by the state. Hungary is still a democracy, at least on paper, correct? And saying one’s opinion is what people can do in democracies.
That has nothing to do with “a high and mighty globalist elitist perch”. Only with the very basic concepts of democracy and freedom of speech and all that good stuff.
Interesting that after all the carping about the Chinese orchestra – which is almost certainly just a matter of the players applying for the wrong visa – here you had a real outrage in the making in connection to Trump’s executive order. Fortunately the Iraqi-born Hungarian cellist is spared.