I will be leaving Romania in two days. When I decided to come here, I really had no idea what to expect, or how the Kindness Continuum might fit into the experience. Like many children of the 60’s and 70’s, I grew up during the Cold War, and as a result learned very little about the countries on the other side of the Iron Curtain. While I loved history, I tended to focus on American History in high school and college rather than European or World History, so I learned the bare minimum about world events that did not directly involve the United States. I was curious about Russia and the Soviet Union, and in college took Russian as a foreign language (sadly, I remember almost nothing…), Russian literature, and 20th century Russian (Soviet) history. None of this dabbling taught me much of anything about the countries that were, for the most part, closed to the United States during the Cold War years – places like Yugoslavia, Albania, and Romania, for example. I knew they were run by dictators and that most Americans couldn’t go there to visit, but that’s about all I knew.
It turns out that Romania, as I had suspected, has a very rich, textured, interesting and complex history. 
Situated between Ukraine, Moldova, Hungary, Serbia and Bulgaria, and bordering the Black Sea, it is divided by the Carpathian mountain range which runs in a backward “L” shape through the country. As Romania struggled through the centuries to define and govern itself, the location of the region made it vulnerable to invading forces from the north, west and south, and as a result the region over the years was controlled and influenced by various outside invaders. It was part of the Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Habsburg Empire, and the Astro-Hungarian Empire. This meant that the country became a political football of sorts, and the geographic borders of Romania changed frequently, with lots of different ethnic populations, religions and languages criss-crossing in and around the region, settling here or there, constantly incorporating new and different social and cultural norms into the preexisting ones. The mountains form a natural barrier, isolating some parts of Romania from other parts and further influencing the economic and social development of the different regions. These regions in turn were and still are influenced by the cultures, economics, religions and social norms of the different countries that border them.
All of this history is important when trying to understand or explain present-day Romania. As in Tanzania, I am here for only a blink of an eye, and bring with me a perspective and knowledge base that is extremely limited as I look around, absorb what I see and hear, and try to make sense of it all. What I am learning barely scratches the surface of truly understanding this country, its history, and its people. I have been watching and listening, however, and have had an added advantage of traveling with my brother and sister-in-law, whose connections to this interesting place go much deeper than mine.
My brother Daniel’s connections to Romania begin right around the time of the Romanian revolution, when their dictator, Nikolae Ceaucescu, was ousted from power (1989). Daniel visited the country several times in the 1990’s as a professional from the University of North Carolina School of Social Work. This was shortly after Romania became a democracy. After communism was toppled he was on the front lines with many others who witnessed the immediate aftermath of the dictatorship and he forged relationships with Romanian social work institutions in an effort to help the country get back on its feet. During Ceaucescu’s brutal 25 year reign millions of people had needlessly suffered (and died) while the dictator and his wife consolidated their absolute power and lived a life of unbridled luxury. (As a point of reference, his position on The Kindness Continuum would be at the far extreme near Hitler)
My sister-in-law Simona is a Romanian by birth, and 1/2 ethnic Roma (gypsy). She left the country after receiving her Masters in Social Work at the University of Bucharest to pursue a second MSW from the University of North Carolina. She and Daniel met along the way, married, and Simona eventually became a naturalized US citizen. But her Romanian roots run long and deep, and most of her family have remained in the country. She and Daniel have been visiting her home town of Reghin about every other year, and often travel to other parts as well, such as Cluj, Bucharest, and other regions.
I was fortunate to be invited along on this trip to visit Simona’s family, and they have graciously and generously shared their stories and their love for this beautiful place. It has been fascinating to listen to them talk about the changes that have occurred over the last 25 years since they have been coming here, and it has been great fun to be introduced to the country and its nuances through their eyes and experiences. While barely scratching the surface of what there is to learn and know, I would, nevertheless, like to share just a few of the snippets of the many conversations we have been having about what they have noticed on this trip as compared to previous trips. Maybe this bare minimum of information will pique your curiosity and questions as it has mine.
- A communist dictatorship had been in place in Romania at least since the end of World War 2, when Europe was arbitrarily divided up by the Soviet Union, the United States and England at the famous (or infamous, depending on how you look at it) Yalta Conference.
These generic looking apartment buildings constructed during the Soviet era were all over Bucharest. Romania ended up under Soviet influence, and a dictatorship was immediately installed. Twenty five years ago the vestiges of the failed communist dictatorships were still very apparent. Daniel personally witnessed some of the thousands of street children living in abandoned buildings and underground sewers at that time. Packs of wild dogs made streets and neighborhoods unsafe. Children in orphanages were just beginning to be rescued from a life of cruel indifference. Today there is little overt evidence of the rampant neglect of children, although despite the assertions of some who live in Bucharest, it isn’t quite clear that the problem of street children has been fully resolved. We still see stray dogs about, but they are not nearly as prevalent or numerous as they once were.
- As we drive around the countryside, Daniel and Simona have noted the improved infrastructure and the apparent improvement in overall standard of living of many Romanians. Villages and towns appear to be much cleaner, with new paint on the previously run down buildings and repairs to crumbling foundations. Since we are here in June, there are bright flowers virtually everywhere, with many window boxes and flower gardens in every yard.
There is new construction going on all around us that was totally unexpected by Daniel and Simona, and more people now have cars, making the roadways in towns and cities much more clogged. New communities on the outskirts of Bucharest are inviting people to move out of the center of the city and into brand new residential complexes. Such development was virtually unheard of as recently as 5-10 years ago. One of the sad byproducts of this new development in Bucharest is the disappearance of the old craftsmen and artisan shops that used to occupy the center city. Replacing the artisans and glass blowers are gentrified restaurants and cafes, interspersed with strip clubs and porn shops. Sadly, the glass district that made downtown Bucharest so distinctive is completely gone, and the larger glass factories have moved elsewhere, no longer open to the public.
This is a very large, new housing complex outside of Bucharest. A planned community of this size and scope simply didn’t exist 25 years ago. - Ethnic tensions continue to be present, with the Roma population suffering the most in terms of overt discrimination. Many Roma families have given up their traditional practices and dress in an effort to assimilate more easily with the mainstream Romanian culture.
In Transylvania, the Roma culture is alive and well. The dress of the Roma women is very distinctive and beautiful. Given the historical shifts in populations and cultural influences, it is not surprising that there are tensions between different groups. For example, there is also tension and competition between the Hungarians and Romanians, leftover conflict from previous struggles over land and people. Simona’s two young nephews, who are Roma, have suffered bullying in school, and the society seems to still have a long way to go before it will be able to move up on The Kindness Continuum with regards to ethnic discrimination.
- There was rampant corruption during the Soviet era, and there are signs that it is still a problem. As in many countries, once corruption takes hold of a governmental structure and becomes part of the bureaucratic fabric of daily life, it is almost impossible to eradicate fully.
While we were in Cluj, there were active protests going on about the corruption and the government’s seeming unwillingness to do anything about it. This was interesting to me because in Tanzania such open protesting against the government is being actively and sometimes brutally suppressed. At least in Romania it appears that people are free to protest, so the government (in my humble opinion) gets Kindness Continuum virtue points for that.
“When injustice is legal, insubordination is your duty”
As I wind down my travels and prepare to return home, I am grateful for the kindnesses I see all around me, and hopeful for our future. But I am also mindful of the fact that we still have a long way to go if we are ever going to achieve world peace. The pushing and pulling that governments and world leaders put their people through for no reason other than to line their own pockets and consolidate power and influence (to what ultimate end??) does so much harm to the people just trying to live their lives. Power hungry leaders who do not have the best interests of their constituents in the forefront when they are making policy decisions, are profoundly impacting societies and populations and the world at large. I do worry about what the future holds even in the face of my hope that we will find a way to reconcile our need for personal gratification and power with our need to attend to the greater good.
I had the occasion (a professional meeting) to visit Bucharest in 1971. I had earlier spent most of a year in Warsaw snd some time in (then) Czechoslovakia, Hungary and other Eastern European countries.At the time I was shocked at even in comparison with these places how backward, poor and repressed Romania was. We stayed most of a week with a family who had been forced to take us in to provide housing for the conference, were very unhappy having us, and tried their best to make us feel unwelcome. With some good reason — the only way to make room for us was to turn over their living room as a bedroom. Public transportation was even shabbier and less reliable that that of Warsaw seven years earlier. Restaurants were a joke: the menu promised all sorts of alluring dishes, but none were ever available; all they had were the omnipresent cevapcici (with lots of accents) — meatballs. When we left we were driving through to Oslo, our destination for the next year. Our first night was in Budapest, also a Soviet bloc capital but what a difference. In the context of our stay in Bucharest, Budapest seemed like the liveliest, most sophisticated, modern and rich city of Europe.
Interesting perspective on the Romanian experience then vs. now, Peter. Thanks for sharing your experience from the earlier days of the Ceaucescu regime. I highly recommend a return trip if you have the opportunity. You were there 20 years before my brother, and I am sure you would be even more amazed than he at the changes.
It’s been interesting and informative to follow your travels and I thank you for the time and effort it takes to communicate with your blogees.
An observation you made in Romania 2 gives me some pause, however. You noted: “Twenty five years ago the vestiges of the failed communist dictatorships were still very apparent. Daniel personally witnessed some of the thousands of street children living in abandoned buildings and underground sewers at that time.”
To what sort of government and socioeconomic system should we attribute the many thousands of poor children and homeless families in our own country? Not to mention the hundred of thousands living under so-called democratic and capitalist-oriented countries in Central and South America? (Leaving aside the even huger toll on other continents.)
And where does the USA rate on the Kindness Continuum since it’s business, banking, military and spy agencies dominate many countries suffering child poverty, family dislocation, joblessness, gangsterism who live under governments installed and funded by our country’s elites?
Whose failed systems account for that?
John you raise important questions that I hope to explore further in future blogs. One interesting fact that I didn’t include in the Romania post was Ceaucescu”s prohibition on both birth control and abortion. He wanted each family to have at least 5 children. Although he was only in power 25 years this policy, along with others that made it next to impossible for families to thrive, had to have contributed to the proliferation of unwanted and/or uncared for children.
In our interconnected world it only takes a handful of people to wreak havoc on millions of families who have no say in what’s happening to them. The Yalta Conference after WWII was one such incident. Our current immigration policy of separating families is another, our tendency to exploit a country’s resources (including our own) at the expense of families for corporate gain is yet another.
My observations about Romainian history and its repercussions aren’t meant to imply that the failed communist system here doesn’t have a more functional counterpart somewhere else, or that such an overtly repressive system is the only one we should worry about. Thank you for making that point explicitly.