PETER G. VAJTAI, MD

Peter Vajtai was born July 1, 1949 in Szeged, Hungary and left us suddenly in a motor vehicle accident in Las Vegas, Nevada on May 25, 2020. The life he lived between these dates and disparate places was a remarkably deliberate and inspiring one.

Peter was born and raised in a humble home in a small country deeply wounded by war and foreign occupation. He was blessed with an uncanny ability to appreciate the good and hopeful around him however, and whatever difficulties his natal family survived did not blemish an otherwise peaceful and happy childhood that he would reflect on with fondness for the rest of his life.

Even as a child, Peter was a dreamer and an explorer. In early primary school, he spent several days outside on his own before his mother was notified of his absence from school. And once back in the classroom, Peter's attention would often have to be redirected from the world outside the schoolhouse windows. But Peter was also a smart and inquisitive child, and with age and maturity, he became a serious student.

After high school, Peter chose to pursue a career in medicine over art. He enrolled in Albert Szent-gyorgyi Medical University in Szeged in 1967, where he met his wife of 48 years, Dr. Eugenia Szontagh. Peter and Eugenia married in 1972 and had two daughters: Petra in 1974 and Zsoka in 1976. After medical school, Peter completed the grueling subspecialty medical training necessary to become a Cardiothoracic surgeon for the first of two times in his life. It was also around this time that Peter's attention was once again drawn to the world outside his immediate circumstances, and the impossible dream of a life in America began to quietly take shape. When an invitation to apply for a one and a half year Cardiothoracic surgery training program in Charlotte, NC arrived in 1983, Peter saw his opportunity and took it. He applied and was selected for the program and was soon on his way to North Carolina. He missed his wife and daughters, and they joined him in Charlotte a few months later.

In his own words, returning to communist Hungary after living in the United States felt to Peter like going back to living in black and white after having seen the world in color for the first time, and he was unable to tolerate it. He and Eugenia started making plans to visit the United States for a second time soon after arriving back in

Szeged. When Peter's formal request to go to the US temporarily for the second time was denied, however, he and Eugenia knew they would have to leave Hungary in secret, and permanently.

Peter and his family immigrated to the United States in the winter of 1985 with nothing more than four suitcases and $2000 cash. With no concrete plan or safety net, the family returned to Charlotte for a few months before leaving for Portland, Oregon in a gifted station wagon. Peter would eventually complete general surgery residency training for the second time in his life at Oregon Health and Science University and Portland became his family's American hometown. Eugenia would also repeat her medical residency training and both of their daughters eventually became physicians as well. All four members of the family became naturalized American citizens by 1997. After completing his residency training in 1993, Peter returned to Charlotte, NC for a two year Cardiothoracic Surgery fellowship training program. He and Eugenia moved to Las Vegas in the summer of 1995, and Peter was a wellloved and respected surgeon there until his death in 2020.

Peter loved this life and he lived it to the fullest. He has been called a child at heart, a consummate gentleman, an iconoclast, and (possibly his favorite), Papa Buddy by his granddaughter Georgia. And he was all of these things, and much more. He was the American Dream personified and in its purest and most idealistic sense. While his determination to forge ahead in the face of punishing work in often uncertain and risky circumstances was remarkable, what was truly extraordinary was his ability to do it with joy, kindness, humor, and a sense of peace that was often nothing short of inexplicable. He had an inner light, like a child, and it shined on and lit up everyone around him. He is and will be missed by all who knew him.

Surviving Peter are his wife, Eugenia Szontagh; daughters, Petra and Zsoka; granddaughters Charlotte and Georgia; son-in-law Tyler Thiesing; sister Eva Vajtai; niece Katalin Vajtai, and many more friends and family who he loved very much.

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