I wrote an article about a Belgian interior design artist living in Romania, Martine Claessens: http://www.romania-insider.com/today-is-a-beautiful-day-martine-claessens-said/111462/
Before the food is served
It’s Monday evening, raining cats and dogs and China celebrates 64 years since People’s
Republic of China
was proclaimed. Old, shiny generals, smiling Romanian politicians and foreign
diplomats shake hands, chit-chat and warm up before the food is served. Romania ’s
Government is all gathered on the stage next to the Chinese Ambassador. “Red wine
for everybody, except for Mr. Antonescu who takes white wine,” says Ponta in a joking mood,
all shiny and happy. Mr.Antonescu shows no reaction to this joke and the ceremony
goes on smoothly.
At the end, when I look at the key for the wardrobe,
I discover that it has a picture of Hannah Montana attached. Apparently not only my
primary school cousins are so fond of her, but the Chinese Embassy also has a little
something for the American teenage symbol.
The snake under the rain
When people arrived at the protest on this fifth Sunday, they were kind of surprised. Everybody feared there would be very few people coming, but despite the heavy rain, there were hundreds of people who gathered at the Titan metro station, the meeting place.
But the bigger surprise came a bit later, when the
protesters ended their march in Piata Universitatii. After almost three hours
in the rain, there were thousands of people who arrived. What happened is that every time the march
passed by a metro station, other tens of protesters with dry raincoats joined,
so the snake’s tail grew bigger and bigger.
The best part was when the snake, hidden under hundreds of
umbrellas, was passing through very narrow streets, chanting “Uniti Salvam
Rosia Montana”, while amazed eyes were gazing from the windows, what the hell was going on, on their streets, on such a terrible day.
The Empowering Sunday
Monday, September 23. I wake up, go buy a coffee, it’s a bit chilly outside. I choose a bench where I can sit and drink my coffee.
It’s ok, it’s a normal day, people walk by, most of them old people, because at this
time of the day the young generation is already working in an office somewhere.
And while I am watching all this developing without any big surprises, I suddenly
remember the yesterday protests, tens of thousands of people marching through
the neighborhoods and it seems surreal.
There is a rhythm for everything and once you get used to
it, you’re just playing along. It was the same with the protests. Yesterday was
the fourth Sunday evening when people gathered to protest. It was beautiful,
energetic, but probably less surprising then two Sundays ago.
You get the real meaning of such a gathering only on the
morning after, when life gets back to its normal pattern. Only when you see people
walking on the streets without paying attention to the one next to them, people
in a hurry, people not caring much about anything else than what they have to
do for the few hours, the surviving race, then you understand the beauty of
thousands of people becoming aware that they have a voice and using it, playing the
drums, making such long walks to neighborhoods where they've been only a few
times in their lives, enjoying the long walk, singing, shouting, talking to
other people.
I’m not trying to create a mythology of these protests, nor
make them seem as a big street party, which is very useful in the lack of a street
carnival. But they represent a huge change in the dynamics of social and
citizen life, in Bucharest and Romania . Like I
said before, this is an empowering practice, an exercise in being more tuned to
the political decisions which affect you, directly or indirectly and more connected
to the ones around you, being more than strangers simply walking by each other.
25,000 are not comfortably numb
15th day
of the protests
There have been 14 days of protest so far and I have had my
doubts, after seeing that during this week the number of protesters decreased
drastically to some very few hundreds. Was it just a short-span fashion? Was it
just cool to be there on the streets? Was it only the ego of some activists who
wanted to feel that they are doing something? It’s easy to assume and state
that if people truly care they will stay on the street every night until they
get what they want.
But I was wrong. Probably we don’t have yet the dedication
to be there every night. But the fact that people did show up on this Sunday
evening, young parents with their very young children, old couples holding
hands, people laughing and shouting, and not only a few of them, but tens of
thousands, that was close to a miracle. Growing up in Romania in the last
twenty years, there were tons of skepticism, making fun of, resignation,
indifference, sorrow, a lot
of anger, but an anger kept in your room, in front of the TV, or a newspaper,
feeling really powerless. At least that was true for me and the people I have
seen around me.
And now people walked out of their rooms and gathered with
other people they didn’t know and they felt part of a community after being
deprived of this feeling for so many years. Being part of a community is not just an
extra-feature you may have it or you may it have not in your life, but it’s
something essential to empower you and make you feel less vulnerable in front
of all the shit that is taking place in this country. (and I mean mostly
political shit).
The sky was beautiful and blue, there were birds flying and
a small moon has witnessed the whole protest.
Some of the protesters were very young. When I got in Piata
Operei at 3.30pm, there were about nine people there, most of them 20-years old
students at the Faculty of Medicine, writing slogans on papers, carrying flags.
One of them, Dragos, just returned from his grandparents’ house and brought some
apples which he offered to us. “Should I offer the policemen also some apples?”
he asked.
A lot of the protesters were young parents with kids. I
didn’t even know there are so many beautiful, young parents in Bucharest .
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