It’s Not About How We Ignore It, It’s About How We Learn More About It…
Romanians and the Rroma, and the relationship I had with learning more about the second largest ethnic minority in the country I come from.
Hi, my name is Andra and I am Romanian. Yes, I come from that country that most people in Western Europe hate. We are considered poor, uneducated, and thieves on most days, but I promise we’re not. As with any country in this world, we have a good and a bad reputation, but oftentimes the bad reputation is what prevails. It prevails mostly because we’re all ignorant to an extent - myself included, because I can’t pretend I know everything there is to know on this planet, and I don’t ignore certain triggering or let’s say more negative news. I am at fault for this in many ways, and the current climate and recent, or not so recent events have shone a light on each of our ignorance. We can stop pretending we care, because our actions clearly speak for themselves, and this is why I started reading more about the issues that come from Romania, or from Eastern Europe, because I can’t hide behind the fact that as a country, racism is deeply ingrained in our conscience.
I am guilty of it, my parents and grandparents are guilty of it, and by the looks of things future generations will be too. I spent weeks being ashamed of myself for not seeing it earlier, but I have come to realise that shame won’t change a thing, but exposing it, learning about it, and understanding where it stems from will ultimately lead to change. So, I went on a quest to find out more about a specific side of the Romanian population that we consider brings in the bad reputation across Europe. I’m sure you all know what I am talking about, but also as a starting note, they are not all at fault, and we are at least in part responsible for creating the environment that pushes them to perpetuate this bad reputation and behaviour.
The official name of the population varies from country to country, but from my findings, Rrom/Rroma (with or without a double R) or Romani seem to be the most often found online. It was agreed in 2000 that they would be called this way, from the pejorative name all populations had attributed to them, however, I have noticed that in many countries, they still appear traditionally as “Gypsies”. According to research, they prefer not to be called on the latter name, which indeed has bad connotations behind it and is often used, especially in Eastern European territories as an insult, for both people coming from the respective populations, but also for people that perform behaviours commonly associated with the Rroma population.
My take on this: not good. Through reading more about their respective population, and through common knowledge from neighbours and family, I have come to realise that it is a population that cares deeply about its traditions, and as it often happens with people who are misunderstood, they are often marginalised because they are simply not understood. It is considered that the Romani population originate from Northern India, presumably from areas such as Rajastan or Punjab. This assumption is based on analysing the population’s genetic heritage and language, which has clear roots in Indian languages, and shares basic lexicon with Hindi and Punjabi, shares phonetic features with Marwari and its grammar is close to Bengali. Genetic findings from 2012 confirm this assumption and show that the population has most likely migrated as a group around 1,500 years ago due to conflict in the area, and/or simply in search for a better life. They now have populations in most countries around the world, but a lot of their traditions and customs originate in their nomadic behaviours. However, no matter where they go, they face discrimination and persecution.
In Romania, the Romani population constitutes one of its largest minorities. I cannot help but realise, while writing this sentence, how eerily similar the words Romanian and Romani are: there are only 2 letters between them, and for most people there is no research that goes into identifying which one is which one. I have been called Romani instead of Romanian, probably more times than I wish to count, and it has always been met with annoyance from my side (as we are two very different populations) and with disgust from the person uttering the word.
I think it’s important to note that it’s not hard to be ignorant - it’s actually quite easy - but if a person comes in, especially for an interview, just google the country to be sure, it shows that you care. Now, back to our story at hand. Making up the second biggest ethnic-minority in the country, they make up around 3.3% of our population (which is roughly 621,000 people according to a 2011 census). Of course, many Rroma don’t actually register properly for land, or even for an ID, so although the numbers are probably not as accurate as I’d like them to be, this is still a good approximation. I remember growing up in a nice neighbourhood and being told not to come home from school on certain streets because Rroma people lived on them. The way we were told to avoid this was treated with immense secrecy. I grew up with horrific stories about people I have never met, and I haven’t fully wondered how or why these have surfaced.
You see, Romania - as any country where Romani people chose to settle - enslaved their populations, while other countries in Europe (I’m looking at you England, Switzerland and Denmark) actually put them to death in the medieval era. There were others, such as Germany, Italy and Portugal who were expelled. There are countless reports of children being abducted from their parents, women trafficked around the world, Romani branded with hot irons and other atrocities that all across Europe we are guilty of. In an effort to assimilate their populations, some countries banned their native language, and others forbade them to marry people of the same ethnic origin. One of the most devastating series of persecutions occurred during WWII, when the Rroma were one of the first targets of Nazi atrocities, according to the BBC.
If you think that because I come from Romania, I learnt this in history, please note I did not. Looking for information for this article put this population in a whole new light to me. In the city I come from, I remembered the Rroma living on the same street as my grandparents as ‘craftsmen’, very skilled coppersmiths, who lived in large numbers in big houses and never had just one child. I was fascinated by their colourful skirts, like a uniform they all had, by their braided hair with red fabric in it, and by their larger than life personalities, especially when in an argument. There is so much I didn’t know, and yet so much I knew about them. They can be warm and helpful people, and in most cases people who are willing to talk to you about who they are and what traditions that may seem weird to you mean to them.
They are people who remember you being nice to them as if it’s a promise to you and the future generations of your family, but they are also people who if you did not treat them well will not forget but might forgive. It bothers me still when I am called a Rrom (singular form of Rroma), but not because of racism, mostly because not enough care is given to where the person does come from. My Romanian roots are very important to me, and the traditions I grew up with are as well, so I cannot 100% understand how, as a population that is so warm and welcoming to others, we can be so mean and horrible to ethnic minorities in our own country. Most Roma families live on the edge of poverty, and on the edge of the city/town they might live in. They are marginalised throughout society, but we, as Romanians are annoyed when we are associated with their name, yet we do not do enough to help them out of their situation.
I am sure I still have a bias that I am working hard to manage, but it’s not like we as a country have truly helped them in many ways, and this not only makes me sad, it makes me angry. We can always find some support, but one particular thing to do is to keep on learning. I can’t change where I come from, or how I thought certain things, because they are all done through the lenses of biases that we learn throughout life. But what I can do is change my perception on issues in society, and produce, even a small ripple effect in people close to me to also change that perception. Every change starts with a step, and this is mine.
As an ending to this article that was particularly sad to write, I want to bring to attention an organisation truly close to my heart (please note most posts are sadly in Romanian, but I will link the ones in English related to this), called Girl-Up Romania. One particular post is this one about learning about the Roma culture, just as I have seen in many places on the subject of Black Lives Matter: recommendations of films, series, art, books are very important steps to take in challenging our perceptions and prejudices about anything in this world. I particularly recommend Mundi Romani – “a documentary series about the Roma communities around the world”, and Sam Roma – “which illustrates the conflict between the perception of the Roma and the reality of their everyday lives”(I’m doing a direct quote from their Insta post, because they couldn’t have put it better into words). There is also a great TED talk that actually sits at the basis of my initial pitch for this article, which you can watch here. All that I have learnt, and all that there is to learn is a constant journey, and I can’t pretend that I am perfect, or that my journey was and is a linear one, but I do hope that through the snippets of information in this article you have learnt something new, and it has challenged the biases that you may have about the Romani population in this world, or even about Romanians in this world, and next time you think about calling them a pejorative term, it makes you think twice before using it.
Written by Andra Maier
Working in fashion teaches you a lot of things, but it leaves little space for creativity outside of work, because we are ‘always available’. Having a creative space is something important in my ‘switching off’ process, and writing comes easiest, especially in busy times. I love everything fashion and food related. If I am not found writing or scribbling, I am found reading the latest fiction releases, fan-girling over Harry Potter or some pretty shoes, and writing for my blog. Being able to express myself outside of work boundaries is freeing and incredible, and honing the creative spirit is one of the main resolutions I had for 2020.