The king's complexion, hair, and moustache are blond. He dresses elegantly, has a natural charm, although he is sometimes nervous. His courage is undeniable, just like his intelligence and intuitive capacities…”! Countess Géraldine Margit Virginia Olga Mária Apponyi de Nagyappony, or as she is now known to all, Queen Geraldine, would often recall these words spoken by Joseph Soares. The girl who had spent her adolescence and early youth in one of the most beautiful castles in Hungary, in Zebegeny, together with her sister Virginia, had often dreamed of the boy who would steal her heart.

His behavior must have resembled the stories about men she had heard in the conversations of the Aponys. With the images of a girl torn by the unexpected and the image of a man who seemed interesting through stories about her, she drew in her mind's eye her portrait of King Zog. With a sweet concern within herself, the countess traveled to Albania to meet him. It was the last days of December and the King had organized a ball on the occasion of the New Year.

Dressed in a long, elegant dress, her hair lightly combed, the Hungarian countess anxiously awaited the sight of the man she had traveled so far for. Raised among books, she firmly believed in the power of first sight. If his eyes would penetrate her body immediately, then there would be a story between them. When Princess Sanije tells her that the moment has come to meet the King, she is stunned. He was only a few meters away from her, somewhere at the end of the crowded hall.

"We were reaching the end of the hall, when suddenly I saw in front of me a tall, slender man, very elegant, who was talking to a head of a foreign mission. He turned to me and meeting his gaze for the first time, I felt a surprising unease. He had sky-blue eyes, penetrating and captivating...", Geraldine would later recall that moment.

The king would smile at her, thanking her for coming from afar, and asking her about the journey. But Geraldine could not give any answer. Suddenly she felt herself overcome by a spasm of emotions, feeling that she had just met her future. "I could only stammer out an answer. Many people approached to greet her, but the sisters, the princesses, surrounded us as if to protect us from the curiosity of the crowd.

The King introduced them in turn, then handed me a glass of sparkling champagne. Our fingers snapped and at that exact moment the lights went out. The shock was so strong that I dropped the glass; it shattered into a thousand pieces, as the twelve strokes of midnight were striking,” Queen Geraldine later recalled.

It was 1938 and a girl raised in salons felt overwhelmed by the anxiety of a meeting that she had been waiting for so long. The King immediately understood her silence and to get her out of the situation he invited her to eat…! In an evening that would last a long time, Zogu and Geraldine seemed to find each other immediately. Under the splendor of a royal dinner, she was the most beautiful splendor that night in the Palace. Many historians or biographers have tried to build a picture of that meeting, which would forever change the life of the King of Albanians.

But the most touching story is that of Geraldine herself, who until the end of her life carefully preserved the details of that evening like pearls on a precious bead. Josephine Dedet is one of the best biographers of Queen Geraldine's life. A lover of history, this French journalist was immediately drawn to the figure of the Albanian queen when she first read about her. When she was little, her story seemed like a fairy tale to her. Dedet's parents were friends with Geraldine's French half-brother, Guy Giraul.

Josephine Dedet: "They fell in love at first sight"!

"She always spoke of him with deep love and passion. They had a difficult life in exile, but love helped them to overcome it with courage and bravery." For the first time, Dedet would meet her in Ranburg (South Africa) in 1996. Before this meeting, they had exchanged letters, to which the queen responded very politely. He asked Josefina about everything, her childhood, her meeting with the king, Albania or life in exile. "Thanks to the long letters exchanged between us, we had begun to be close to each other.

Finally, in 1996, I went to meet her in South Africa, where she lived with her son, Leka, and his family, and with her sister, Countess Virginia Apony, whom I had previously known in France,” says Dedet. During the week she spent there, Josephine would receive more answers to the questions that arose from her letters. When she told Geraldine that she wanted to write a book about her, she was initially hesitant, because of a book that had been published in Great Britain, which she had been disappointed by.

But the questions asked by Dedet, her dedication to this story, made her receive the blessing of Queen Geraldine. “Geraldine, Queen of the Albanians”, is the name of the book that was first published in France in 1997 and would be reprinted again during these years, enriched with other chapters, including the last years of her life spent in Albania. On August 6 of this year, it was the 100th anniversary of the birth of Queen Geraldine.

While in Albania, this anniversary passed in silence, for a figure who has become a worthy ambassador of our history, Hungary, her birthplace, will remember her through an event, where the Hungarian edition of the book about her life will be presented. Under the publication of the Hungarian publishing house "Europa", on September 8, an event in honor of Queen Geraldine will be held at the Karolyi Palace, where more than 250 people are expected to attend.

For Josephine, the memory of a figure like Geraldine is a reminder of our historical memory. While writing the life of this woman, she felt how her stories have the ability to perfect a person, with the energy they carry within. Dedet fanatically preserves every detail of the meetings with this extraordinary woman. The most interesting part of the stories in this book is her life in Albania. And although she only lived the life of a Queen in the Royal Palace for one year, this life would be everything in what later happened to Geraldine's life.

“Living in Albania for a year left a deep mark on her life. She fell in love with the country and during her years in exile she never forgot it. When I asked her once; 'Do you ever think about Albania?' She immediately replied: 'All the time', and that was simply the truth”, recalls Dedet. According to her, her love for King Zog was a rare love. “They fell in love at first sight. She always spoke of him with deep love and passion. They had a difficult life in exile, but love helped them to overcome it with courage and bravery”, says Dedet.

When they married, King Zog was 42 years old and Geraldine was only 22. He had been single for many years and had a knack for getting through to people. He immediately recognized her heart, and she devoted herself entirely to him. She would be his strength during exile or illness. Raised in a high-class family, Geraldine knew the diplomatic language well and used it to navigate many situations in a difficult life such as exile.

For Dedet it was a fortune to write about this woman, who will remain long in history. The return to Albania of the royal family was also the peace that finally came to Geraldine's soul. Despite being Hungarian, she would not leave this life peacefully without setting foot in Albania once.

The book written by Dedet resembles a romance in many of its chapters. The love story of the King and the Queen and their strong bond during the years in emigration, resembles a story that you can only find in books. Dedet wanted to give through this book everything that happened inside a woman's heart, her beautiful hours of desire, but also sadness. The hours after the first night of meeting, are described by Dedet as hours filled with forebodings.

“If the initial hesitations have all but disappeared, she now experiences, without yet defining the exact nature, the tortures and tribulations of a soul in love. Her clumsiness, the broken champagne glass, the particularly unattractive color of her dress, all these come to mind and make her blush with shame. After having had the impression for a while that she was living a few privileged moments, she is now convinced that the King has liked her. Finally,” Dedet describes the first days at the Geraldine Palace. When she wakes up the next morning, she finds a large bouquet of red heart-shaped carnations on the table.

With this gesture, the King had shown that he wanted to win her heart. Days later, when she entered his office to meet him again, he left everything behind and stood up to kiss her hand. This was a gesture he never made. Wanting to avoid the unnecessary questions of a conversation filled with emotions, he directly asked her the question that had been tormenting him for days: “Do you want to be my wife?” “We knew each other a little, but I could not resist the seduction that emanated from his whole person: I already felt myself in love.

"Unable to analyze my feelings, I knew that I had never met a man like him," she later recalled. She would take ten days to think about it, and after ten days she would return to the Palace to leave only as his wife...! Geraldine's memories, for journalist Dedet, are the beautiful memories of a woman who turned her love for a man into a great love for a country...!/ Memorie.al