My snowman and I

In the earliest memory that I have of my life, I'm a 5-year-old boy building a snowman. It's incredible to think that so much time has passed and that I still have this moment so vividly in my mind. I had just collected a heap of snow, which I was forming into a big ball with my tiny hands. It was a freezing cold afternoon, and my fingers were very cold, but I was happy.

But that day, I had started to feel happy long before this moment. My parents had picked me up from the kindergarten a bit earlier than usual. That could only mean one thing: something special was waiting for us. So that's why I had a smile on my face the whole way. We went to the place we used to go to every winter: an enormous house, a kind of a resort, on top of a mountain. Around it, only forest, expect for one clearing covered with snow, where we used to sledge down. The house was so high on the hill that it was difficult to get back up. Inside the house, I was impressed by its huge fireplace and the animal heads on the walls. It took us about two hours to get there from Budapest. This place is called Törökmező. That's the place of my earliest memory; the place where, with my cold hands, I am building my first snowman.

It's a magical place for me, with a lot of memories from my childhood. Once, when I was already seven years old, I asked a girl what grade she was in. These are the typical questions of a kid who doesn't know much about age. She answered that she was in the first grade. But of course, she was referring to the first grade of secondary school and I, with my childish innocence, thought that she was talking about primary school. It left me wondering: "She's a bit too old for primary school. How can anyone fail the same grade so many times?" These are the kind of things that make this place special to me. Some day I'd like to go back there. I know that on the one hand it would destroy the illusions I have of those days, but it would be nice to go and relive a lot of memories. And who knows, maybe to build another snowman.

Levente from Budapest, Hungary.