From Hungary to Denmark: Where Daniel's Story Begins

Daniel Lund was born Daniel Kalászi on 21 November 1990 in Miskolc, Hungary – a country in political and economic upheaval, navigating the early years after the fall of communism. Within days of his birth, he was placed in an orphanage. He would live there for the first 2 years of his life before being adopted by a Danish family.

Today, at 35, Daniel lives in Copenhagen. He leads a team at an NGO that rescues animals in Denmark and runs his own side business. But before all of that, there was a hospital in Miskolc, an orphanage, and a long journey north to a country that would become home.

A beginning he doesn’t remember

Daniel has no memories of the orphanage. What he has are photographs – taken by his adoptive parents, who travelled to Hungary twice: first to be assessed, then to bring him home. The images are his only window into those first 2 years.

In the early 1990s, Hungary was a country under strain. Unemployment was high, money was scarce, and orphanages held many young children whose biological parents simply could not provide the lives they wanted to give them. Daniel was one of them.

A family built on openness

One of the most powerful aspects of Daniel’s upbringing was the openness around his adoption. There was never a moment he was “told.” It was simply known – woven into family conversations from the beginning.

He grew up alongside an older sister, also adopted from Hungary, though from a different orphanage and not biologically related. Together, they shared a beginning that was rare in the Nordic adoption landscape, where most adoptions came from further east – India, or other parts of Asia.

As Daniel grew older, the questions evolved. Why didn’t he look like his parents? Why did he sometimes act in ways that felt distinctly his own? His adoptive parents made space for every one of them.

What he knows

Daniel has the basics: his birth certificate, letters from the orphanage, the application papers his adoptive parents filled out, and the names of both his biological mother and father. He knows the hospital he was born in. He knows that his birth mother had been there before.

Recently, while preparing for this interview, he came across his original Hungarian social security number for the first time. A small detail. But also a thread.

To search, or not to search?

The question surfaces from time to time. There’s curiosity. There’s a sense of responsibility – a feeling during COVID that he wanted his biological parents to know he was okay, that he had a good life. And there’s a quiet awareness that the path isn’t simple.

The Hungarian authorities, he’s learned, are guarded with information. He could go the official route, requesting that the government reach out on his behalf. Or he could simply get in a car, drive south, and begin searching himself.

But underneath all of it is something steady: Daniel grew up loved. He adores his adoptive parents. And while the questions about roots and origins surface from time to time, they don’t define him.

What comes next

This is just the beginning of Daniel’s story. Over the next 3 episodes, we’ll explore his childhood and what it meant to look different from his family, his thoughts on nature vs. nurture and the Danish values that shaped him, and the experiences of his adult life – including the unexpected ways his appearance and his adoption story intersect with the world around him today.

🎥 Watch Part 1

🎬 Daniel Lund Pt.1: From Hungary to Denmark is live on the Kindred Ponderings YouTube channel.

Join the conversation

Are you an adoptee carrying 2 homelands within you? Or someone still weighing whether to search for the people who gave you life? We’d love to hear from you.

Daniel’s story is shared with his permission as part of a 4-part series on Kindred Ponderings.