Viktor Orbán turned up at the Dragačevo trumpet festival in Guča, posed for photographs with anyone who asked, ordered a cold beer and sat down at the grill. Visitors were surprised, the clips are spreading, and the headlines describe him as the star of this year's festival.

What those headlines usually leave out is one small thing: Orbán is no longer Hungary's prime minister. He lost power in the April elections after sixteen years, and in May Péter Magyar took over the office. The man strolling through Guča with a smile is an opposition leader, not a head of government.

The difference that changes the whole picture

This is not a detail for a footnote. When a sitting prime minister of an EU member state comes to a Serbian folk festival, that is foreign policy in traditional dress. When a former prime minister does the same, it is something entirely different - it is a politician maintaining the network of friendships left to him after voters took away his office.

Witnesses say he was cheerful and in good spirits and turned down no photo requests. „The man is a real legend, smiling and in excellent spirits, he did not refuse any photos,” said one visitor.

Every politician who does not refuse a photo knows exactly why. It is the cheapest campaign there is, and in Guča the cameras are held by the voters themselves.

Cold beer as a political message

After walking through the festival, Orbán stopped at a local hotel where he ordered a cold beer and local specialities - grilled kebab and a wedding-style pie. The image is perfectly tailored. Not one frame of it looks like public office, and yet every frame works politically.

This is a format Orbán has mastered over the years. While Brussels described him in the harshest possible terms, in the Balkans he moved like a guest of the house. That is not an accident, it is a position that was built - and that position evidently survives lost elections too.

What is left of a lost mandate

The question worth asking is why a man with no office still gets a reception as if he had one. The answer is that influence and power are not the same thing, and in the Balkans that distinction is understood perfectly. Offices change every few years, connections stay.

If anyone expected that losing an election would also mean leaving the regional stage, Guča gave a fairly clear answer. The trumpets played, the beer was cold, and the smile worked exactly as it did before.