This conversation takes place in an imaginary location, perhaps heaven construed as the land of cafes and pubs, in which everyone who has ever lived is able to share their thoughts on Romania. It is a loud, noisy, boisterous conversation with many cheers, interruptions, and cigarettes. Please feel free to join in this ongoing discussion. If you decide to join, post your comments below and I will add you as a character. Alternately, you can post the comments of others below (with a link to the comment's origin) and I will add them as characters.
Ion Caragiale - Forgive me, kind reader. Allow me to request only that you do not interrupt me until the end. Can you promise that you will let me finish what I've only just begun? I'm counting on your promise before I begin again.
Alina - I can't promise that, Domnul Caragiale, because I'm afraid that you are preparing the telling of a long story, and it's too early for long stories. We will all fall asleep before we've been awake. Let's talk about what is happening in Romania right now instead.
Arthur Suciu - Twenty years after the Revolution, Romania is facing its first capitalist crisis. The celebration of its victory against the communist dictatorship is shadowed by the doubts regarding the system that we have chosen. These doubts, which tormented us at a time when the West was more confident than ever, return with unexpected intensity. And still, we must move on. Unlike communism, capitalism is in the habit of overcoming crises. Let’s brace up and take the challenge.
Alina - Passionately affirmed, Mr. Suciu. So what is Romania's main goal in the postcommunist period? What does Romania, and the Romanian government supposedly representing the Romanian people, want right now?
Ioannis Michaletos - Romania's main aim is to play an active role in the crucial geopolitical area of the Black Sea, traditionally dominated by the Russian navy.
D. Mitrany - All who have studied the history of south-eastern Europe agree upon the point that the condition sine qua non for the pacification of that region is the removal of the artificial national frontiers. The pre-war situation was so profoundly illogical in itself that it could not be defended on any ground whatsoever. That is far from being its most serious defect, however. South-eastern Europe is not unjustly considered a hotbed of disorder. Yet it is exactly that arbitrary racial division which is the ultimate cause of the constant restlessness prevailing in the region, and diplomacy has cultivated and exploited it as a source of opportunities for its own particular quarrels. As a consequence, the development of all the countries concerned has been retarded, firstly, because they were involved in unending feuds ; and, secondly, because the prominence of external problems enabled their oligarchic Governments to divert popular attention from much-needed intern al reforms. The present conflict has emphasized the fact that no country can afford to ignore events and conditions which disturb the tranquility of another. If there be anyone so impervious to principles of general justice as to deny the righteousness of the Rumanian case, let him at least consider the dangers accruing to his own country—indeed, to the world at large—from that misuse of power on the part of the stronger peoples which results in the obstruction of the natural development of the weaker.
Alina - Mr. Mitrany, do you mean to suggest that the pamphlet you published in 1917 still applies to the Romanian situation today? Are you referring to Moldova, or the EU? I'm confused. Maybe Domnul Caragiale should tell us his story after all.
Mariana Dan - You’re deaf as a log. I ask myself why you ever came here to cry over the human race.
Alina - Mrs. Dan, are you speaking to me or to Mr. Mitrany? Obviously, I am not deaf, though I cannot speak for Mr. Mitrany...
Mariana Dan- You’d rather be eating chicken livers with onion and drink a cold beer, to enjoy yourself while elsewhere a woman gives birth.
Princess Marta Bibescu - But that is the secret of Roumania—her profound resource, the key to her dual heart. Whoever judges her by only one of her faces mistakes her. Whoever loves her only for one of her beauties does not truly love her. Whoever criticizes her for her faults does not know how to offset them by her redeeming qualities.
Marian Chiriac - One of the greatest hindrances to democracy in Romania is nationalism. Any survey of modern Romanian history reveals a pattern of corrupt, manipulative leadership along with nationalist movements whose primary features are xenophobia (mainly directed at Hungarians and Russians) and especially virulent anti-Semitism.
Cheng Chen - The problem of illiberal nationalism in post-Leninist Romania seems much more severe... This phenomenon clearly contradicts the bent twig thesis and therefore begs a better explanation.
Iulian Tanase - For the past few years, I've been taking photos at cafes which I then drink in the morning. There are now over a hundred cafe photos; I could open a coffee-shop-photo any time.
Lucian Boia - The coffee houses have disappeared, but the cake-shop is still a characteristic part of the Bucharest scene.
Alina - I say, go for it, Mr. Tanase. As for Mr. Chen's comment, I can't help agreeing. Bent twigs don't explain anything, least of all Ceausescu's successful propaganda campaigns. When did Ceausescu's national communism become clear as day?
Cheng Chen - This nationalist tendency reached its peak in a major ideological offensive during 1971 in an effort to integrate the Ceausescu regime with major Romanian historical traditions and personalities.
Comrade Nicolae Ceausescu - We have also seen the “The Women Detachment”. Some of the comrades said that it was simplistic, but we would really like to have something similar. A very good theme dealing with the transformation of man. In general, the mentality of imperialism is faced with the new relationships, something we do not do. Our cinematography is crammed with adventure films, and the theater – with western plays. We have taken out the revolutionary plays and introduced plays without any content whatsoever. We do likewise in television, where we discuss a lot, but do not do anything. Before leaving I had a Secretariat meeting and there we decided to prepare a material for the plenary session to the effect that our propaganda was not satisfactory, that it did not correspond to the tasks of educating the youth and the people in general. I said this before going to China. What I have seen in China and Korea, however, is living proof that the conclusion we have reached is just. Consequently, from this point of view as well, it is a very serious preoccupation with educating the people in a revolutionary, communist spirit. Naturally, they criticize imperialism a lot, the Americans, the Japanese, who are “across the sea” from them, but in everything they compare the old with the new, they emphasize the efforts made to keep the fighting spirit awake. This is what they told us and what we noticed ourselves that it was their line in the field of ideological activity, based on Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong’s thinking.
Comrade Paul Niculescu-Mizil - It is also my opinion that we must highly appreciate the activity conducted by comrade Nicolae Ceausescu in his quality as chief of the delegation since this [visit] is a specially important moment in the political activity of our party and state. Romania’s relationships with
China, but not only Romania’s, but also those of the Romanian Communist Party with the Chinese Communist Party, have a great importance for our country, for our people. I think that these relationships and the way the visit took place have a general importance not only for the interests of the Romanian people.
Comrade Nicolae Ceausescu - Let us say at the same time that it is a manifestation of the international solidarity in the struggle against imperialism.
Christopher Lawson - The devastating earthquake of 4 March 1977 (which I also experienced) had caused losses to Romania of two billion dollars, killed at least 1,500 people, injured more than 11,000, and damaged 35,000 buildings, 33,000 of which had been built before the second world war. On 1st August, 1977, 35,000 miners from the Jiu Valley had protested against a new decree that raised the age of retirement from 50 to 55 and reduced the miners' pensions. Ceauşescu had agreed to the demands, then arrested the leaders, transferred 4,000 men and replaced them with Securitate informers that created a climate of fear which endured until December 1989
