Page 22 - Priorities #50 2011-June/July

22
Csaba Hrotkó
Why did I choose the Priory? Well, the Priory kind of chose me! My uncle, Father Christopher, helped me to immigrate from Sweden to USA, as I was a Hungarian refugee there. I escaped from Hungary in 1956, at age 14, freshman in high school, to Austria and then I was taken to Sweden, where I lived with a Swedish family and went to school there. In the meantime, the communist Hungarian government found out I was in Sweden and forced my parents to request my return to Hungary, as I was still an under-aged teenager. Luckily, the US government granted my immigration visa at the same time,so instead back to Hungary, I traveled to New York ,on a beautiful Swedish Cruise ship, the
Gripsholm, and then to Woodside to attend the Priory.
I have a lot of great memories, stories about the years I spent at the Priory, so I’ll talk about them when we meet. I always regarded the “Fathers” as kind of “Giants” of life, I call them the “Oaktrees” of knowledge, and two mantra’s kept me going throughout my life:
“Errare humanum est” and “Ora et labora”!
I have a beautiful family, son and daughter, I retired from TWA
airline, and now I spend my time in retirement in LA and Europe. In the meantime, I dabbled in the film industry as a stage and film actor, and presently I am involved with the Hungarian Theater here in LA.I am also working on a project to bring a new musical to stage regarding St. Elizabeth’s life.
James Ruffo
I attended Bellermine and I struggled and my parents thought some of my friends were too much of a distraction. They had heard of a new high school that had opened in Woodside. It was run by Benedictine Mocks who has escaped from Hungary. The problem was, I was going into my sophomore year and they only had a freshman class, and
only 7 students at that. So, I had to repeat my freshman year. At the rateIwasgoing,IwasgoingtobebaldbeforeIevengetoutofhigh school.
I had to board, wear a tie and had school on Saturdays. They were strict. I had to take 4 years of Latin, 3 years of Spanish as well as algebra, geometry, chemistry and the usual college prep subjects. All our teachers had PHD’s. Imagine learning Algebra from a professor with a PHD in nuclear physics and after he taught the class went to work at Stanford’s linier accelerator! I was still struggling to the point that in order to keep up, I painted the lamp over my desk blue and after lights were out I would turn this little lamp on and was able to study in an almost full moon like setting. I had a little trick up my sleeve. The housemaster would walk slowly up and down the halls and if you got caught with a light on, you would end up having to do chores. So, I would sprinkle a little salt on the hall floor. I could hear the crunch when he was coming. Every night I would spend an extra hour studying. Needless to say I was always exhausted. And yes I did get caught. One night the housemaster took off one shoe and I thought he was further down the hall than he was. I only heard every other crunch.
After I graduated from Woodside priory I decided to attend a junior college first. I selected the college of San Mateo. Mainly because they offered courses in pharmacy which San Jose City College didn’t offer.
When I was 18 I had to register for the draft. I was now about 22 and received a notice from the Selective Service to report to Oakland for a second physical and if I passed, I was on my way to Fort Ord. The Cuban missile crisis was building up. Well maybe I could not ready very well but I wanted to choose my own fate.
At the time I was working for a kitchen cabinet manufacturing company and was working my way up as a production planner. One of my co-workers was a Bird Colonel in the Marine Corp. I told him