Reaching for the stars: Hungary’s weirdest Guinness World Records

Budapest, Hungary – “Record breaking is a serious business”, the Guinness World Record Association warns on its website. Be that as it may, it can sometimes be hard to maintain a straight face while scrolling through the list of those broken records.

Here’s our selection of the most impressive, wacko or just plain weird Guinness World Records that Hungary can brag about (they were either achieved in Hungary and/or by Hungarians).

The weird ones

The world’s largest dance by couples took place in Budapest in 2012, gathering exactly 5,188 people (or 2,594 couples) slow-dancing by the banks of the Danube river. This performance beat by less than 100 couples the previous record held in Paris in 2009.

On a similar note of collective effort, the most people chalk drawing simultaneously involved nearly 5,400 people in Budapest as part of a bid to raise awareness about the environment.

Not impressed yet? Hungarian national Kovacs Gyorgy, a bartender for TGI Fridays in Liverpool, holds the record for the most flips of a bottle on the back of the hand in one minute (146 flips!, see video below).

Hungary can also boast the largest collection of tea bag covers (743, achieved by Marta Menta Czinkoczky, who was collecting them for seven years). Meanwhile, the first artificially inseminated rhino was a calf born in the Budapest Zoo in 2007.

The sporty ones

The longest career as a sports commentator went to Gyorgy Szepesi in 2006, who worked for Magyar Radio since 1945 and covered more than 15 Olympic Games. On a similar note, the longest career for a football referee was broken by Csernyi Geza in 2007, an active referee for 57 years since his first match in 1950.

Let’s head to the basketball court: the farthest forward flip trampette slam dunk (6.18 meters) is the work of Balint Huszar, with the help of a mini-trampoline, as you can see in the video below.

Also basketball-related, Hungarian national Anna Malik holds the record for the longest time spinning a basketball on a guitar (13.23 seconds).

We’ve written about it in a previous article: Hungarians rank as the second nation in the world when it comes to Olympic medals won per capita. Quite naturally, their Guinness World Records also reflect their incredible sports achievements.

Aladar Gerevich, member of the winning Hungarian sabre team from 1932 to 1960, holds the record for the most successive gold medal wins in Olympic history (6). The record for the oldest ice hockey player at a Winter Olympic Games (male) is co-held by Hungarian athlete Bela Ordody and German national Alfred Steinka, both 48 years old at the time of the 1928 Olympic Winter Games in St. Moritz, Switzerland.

The artsy ones

The world’s largest panoramic postcard was created at the Millenaris Park in Budapest. It covers an area of 86.4 square meters, measures 14.4 m in length and 6 meters in height and depicts eight Hungarian cities.

But Hungary is also a country famous for its groundbreaking inventions: Hungarian journalist Ladislo Biro created the world’s first ball-point pen with his brother George in 1938. One of the first organisations to use it, due to the fact that it didn’t leak at high altitudes, was the Royal Air Force itself.

Let’s now head to the big screen: the title for the most married Hollywood stars is co-held by Hungarian-American movie celebrity Zsa Zsa Gabor who, along with Elizabeth Taylor and Lana Turner, was married eight times in her lifetime.

The foody ones

Let’s end on a yummy note: the Mofarguru restaurant in Budapest boasts the largest food menu with 1,810 different items on it. Unfortunately – or fortunately for those of you who have trouble making up your mind in restaurants – it’s too late to taste it as the venue has since closed down.

Last but not least: the Hungarian village of Sajóvámos, located in the north-eastern part of the country, recently broke the mouth-watering record of the world’s longest sausage in history, measuring no less than 2,431 metres long.

Hungarian village breaks record of world’s longest sausage