My Zugló years — a petrol station, a big car and Sunday football among the statues

My father's memories from the 1980s, with Gábor Ihász and Lajos Kocsis. He told them; I wrote them down. — János Szabó

The petrol station on Népstadion út in the 1980s (illustration from the Zuglói Éveim music video)

Between 1979 and 1986 I worked at the petrol station on Népstadion út in Zugló, Budapest. In summer the smell of petrol and the dust hung in the air together, and the cars kept coming from morning till night. On one of those summer days a big car pulled in. The driver wound down the window, and there sat Gábor Ihász — "the old Fradi face", as the song puts it.

We got talking about football: the old pitches and, as he told it then, his father's whistle at the Fervas gate. And I said what came to mind: let's organise a match before the sun goes down.

A Sunday-morning game in the Olympic Garden, among the statues (illustration)

The matches found their home in the Olympic Garden next to the national stadium, where the statues stand. It was not a wooded park but a big grass pitch. We played across it, towards two goals — we laid the full-size goals flat on the grass, and those became our goals. Usually it was five plus one a side, on Sunday mornings, summer and winter. We never asked for the pitch; we just went.

Friends came, acquaintances, from wherever they lived. We played at different levels, but we all laughed in the same voice. For years that was our little league, in the shadow of the statues.

A small corner bar on a summer evening (illustration)

Before and after the games the stories flowed in the bars: Katica Presszó, Tücsök, the old beer, one table, one round. Gabi laughed, and every trace of stardom disappeared from the circle. He needed no decoration, no title, no spotlight. He was a wonderful man; we joked a lot together.

A player's silhouette with a ball, against the light (illustration)

Then came Lajos, "little Kocsis". A genius with the ball — quiet, sure-footed. Few words were needed: it was enough to watch how he touched the ball.

A winter game on the snowy pitch next to the stadium (illustration)

They were truly beautiful times, and nobody was in a hurry to go home. I stayed a simple lad, a boy from Zugló — the fun and the football, that was the whole road. Népstadion út still keeps the dust. When I close my eyes, the car pulls in.

These memories became the song Zuglói Éveim ("My Zugló Years"). Watch the video here: https://youtu.be/_V2aG9a1c-M

Based on the lyrics of the song Zuglói Éveim and my father's account. The images are illustrations made for the music video, not period photographs.