Crossing Europe 2017 - Romania

The "New" Romania is not for all

Visiting Paul and Bianca's Family Project 

26 years have passed since I last visited Romania on a motorbike with my fourteen year old son Lars, on the back seat. In 1991, two years after the Romanian revolution, not so much had changed in most people's daily lives (or for the average traveller) compared to the pre-revolution Romania. Today, 26 years later, it is very different.

EU-money is coming in millions, cities are being refurbished, roads and other infrastructure improved and foreign investments have increased significantly especially over the last two - three years. In the outskirts of towns and villages enormous new factories are popping up side by side with the ruins of the rusty industry buildings from the past. According to the Financial Times, Romania is now the fastest growing economy among the countries in central-east Europe with GDP reaching 5.9% in quarter one 2017. Enough numbers, but some just to give you the big picture since it tells a lot about the possibilities for change, depending on national, political priorities. My mind though, is still fixed on the stories in Norwegian and international news media from the last decades about striking poverty, mentally ill and handicapped people in over crowded, sub-standard institutions and street children living underground and in the sewage system in Bucharest. But what about  the situation today?



Back in 2017 I am crossing the border to Romania from the north-west, from Hungary in direction Arad and eastern Transylvania, which historically is the northern, central part of the country. Transylvania is bound on the east and south by its natural borders, the Carpathian mountains and westward to the Apusenis. Transylvania is known for the beautiful scenery of the Carpathian landscape and its rich history. It also has major cities such as Sibiu and Brașov.

Heading towards my first Romanian destination, a small village by the name Minis, at the foot of the Transylvania Highlands, I am driving through the city of Arad and numerous villages, since I am avoiding the motorways. The landscape is beautiful, with wide maize fields, rolling grassland and autumn-yellow deciduous forests. The roads are far better than I expected and the buildings and family houses I can see from the road for the most part have fresh paint and well kept gardens. Every little village seems to have at least one church, properly cared for and some with striking beautiful decorations.

Turning north from the main road I am reaching Minis in late afternoon. I chose to visit Minis a little by a coincidence. I was searching for campsites on the Internet when I discovered that little Minis had one. As it turned out the couple running the campsite were also organising a local project to help some of the poor families from the villages near by, in their struggle to cope with poverty and to change their lives for the better. This time in Romania I am searching for significant positive changes, and how the "New" Romania has reached the less privileged part of the population. I will limit the facts and figures in this blog and let some real people, like Paul and Bianca and "their" families do the talking instead. 

Entering the small camping ground I am welcomed by a smiling, friendly Bianca (32) ensuring me that the camping is open and I am more than welcome to stay as long as I like. Paul (39) is busy preparing his self-made water-based heating system for the house (which he also has built by himself) for the coming winter, but he will join me in few moments, Bianca says. 

I install myself and my camper in the in the small, cosy, garden like camping ground. Paul comes with a beer and since I´m the only guest he´s got plenty of time to talk. After introducing myself as a Norwegian we have of course to finish and clarify the stories about the Norwegian "Barnevernet" (Child Protection Services) rumoured in Romania to "steel" children from Romanian families in Norway without a good reason. We manage to agree on the big picture about when public authorities needs to intervene to the best of the child welfare an security, so we can move on to Romania.

Paul tells me that he and Bianca has been working with the campsite and their family project for the last four years. They have in fact "inherited" the project from Paul's father and mother who started it back in 1998, together with the council of Arad County and the "Trandafir Din Saron Foundation" . For several years the project was supporting a children's home in Fantanele in Arad County, material and financial assistance for the street children, poor families, old people's homes and schools, hospitals and others. They also held Work Camps with many activities to repair buildings or the houses of poor families, schools and other social objectives.

After Paul and Bianca took the responsibility for the family project they have changed the strategies and priorities in many ways. Even though a lot of families and individuals had been helped in the past, many became dependant on public services, free housing, clothes and money and didn´t learn to help themselves, Paul explains. At the time they started, 50 families were receiving different kind of support. But for some of the families, money were spent for nothing. They got clothes, but never washed them and just threw them away when they couldn´t be used anymore. Some of the men drunk up all the money, they did not support their children and did not let the children go to school. 20 families had to leave the project because they were not motivated or able do their part of the job to learn how to care for themselves in the way they could. 15 families are now self-reliant and 15 families are still in the project making progress day by day, even tough the progress varies among the families. "I know all the families now, and what they are capable of", Paul says. "We have to make a deal with them, and a plan where we agree on the terms and conditions for our support, what they are capable of and what they have to do themselves. We cannot help them forever, and we must focus on their recourse and how they can get a new start and learn how sped money in the right way and support themselves". Term number one for getting support from the project is that the children must go to school". They must also do what they can to find any kind of casual or permanent job or making an income from growing crops, keeping animals, offer transportation services with a horse cart (many families have a horse).

The support is tailored for each family depending on their needs and recourses. "We see that everything in the family situation is linked", Paul says. "A place to live, sleep, eat and be secure is fundamental. Some get help to buy animals, some to build a new house and some money to cover school expenses for the children. Primary schools are free, but they have to pay for clothes, books, food and all except for the teacher. Normally it costs around 250 Euro for a child to start in school. These expenses are a huge burden for families who have little or no money at all."

Paul explains that the rural areas in the country and villages far from the main roads are lagging largely behind in the development process. Many places are going from bad to worse. While one village with a factory establishment nearby get a welfare boom through new job opportunities, many small villages, based partly on exchange economy and partly on selling crops from a small piece of farmland, eggs or meat on local markets, are losing opportunities since the old economic system doesn’t work anymore. EU regulations, and supermarket chains are changing the market terms and many villagers are left with noting, not even a slight hope for a better future. No wonder some give up. Knowing that more than 50% of the Romanian population lives in small villages in rural areas, it's obvious that challenges fighting poverty are enormous.

The next morning Paul takes me to see some of the families supported by the project. We drive trough villages and open farmland with scattered sheds, houses and small farms. In the middle of "nowhere" we turn from the main road onto a gravel road and a little later we park in the courtyard of a small farm. We are met by Merca (54), a nice friendly, lady reminding me more of a Norwegian School teacher than a poor farmers wife (excuse my prejudice from seeing too much poverty around the world). 

Merca says her husband Coste (57) are not at home and has gone to help his brother and his family. Coste lost his arm in a work accident 20 years ago and lost his job. Since then they have been depending on social support to survive and to care for their two children. They receive one hundred Euro pr. month from the local welfare office, not enough to survive, but the children are grown up and have their own family now and are doing OK. With support from the family project Merca and Coste are slightly improving their life.

Merca shows me around and tells me they moved to this piece of land seven years ago. They got some animals and built a small house with the support from the family project. The old house gives shelter from rain and snow but it is more like a shack than a real house. A German contributor to the family project has donated a prefabricated house they hope to finish soon. It will give them more space and be warmer in the winter. Now they´ve only got walls and roof in the new hose, but they need more help to get electricity, windows and a lot more. 

Paul adds that he has to struggle a lot to get a company to do the job finishing the house for a decent price, since it its far from the nearest town, and they have to pay for travel time and transportation, and not only for the construction work.

Merca and Costa grows some vegetables for themselves, but most of the farmland is for growing maize and crops to feed the animals. They have a horse for transportation, three pigs, 10 ducks an 10 hens and chicken. They used to have 30 chicken but the fox killed 20 of them one night before they could stop it.

Life is tough in many ways, but Merca says the most important thing in life is to keep her health. She hopes to live 20 more years to see her children and grandchildren make a good and happy life for themselves.

Paul makes some appointments with Merca about the new house, before we say farewell and we leave for our next family.

A few kilometre from Merca and Costes small farm we stop by a single house in an open field close to the road. Nobody seems to be at home, but the doors are open and Paul wants to show me the inside of the small house. It’s just one single room, with a small table, closets, two beds and a wood stove. Not much for a whole family.

The last family we go to see all are at home and busy working on their new house, which they are building with support from the family project. 

Cristi (40), Sofia (44) have been living with there with five children age 8 to 17 (two more children have moved out and got jobs) for several years in the old the old house. It only consists of a combined living room and bedroom and a kitchen. 

Cristi has only casual jobs, mostly in the woods, transporting firewood with his horses. The income he get from this work is far from sufficient to cover the expenses for food, clothes, school and for the house. Quite recently they got water in the house from a new well. The old one used to freeze in the winter. Temperatures can fall below -15C in this area, Paul has told me. Thanks to the family project and their own hard work (according to Paul) their situation is slowly improving. All the five children goes to school, and hopefully they will get a job when school is finished. Before we leave, Cristi wants to show me the stable and his horses. The horses are maybe the most important resource for the family to get some income. 

We leave the family and their building project, after taking a family picture outside their house. On the way back to the campsite my feelings are mixed. Paul and Bianca's efforts running their project and trying to give all the help they can to their 15 families, gives some hope. But how many families get a similar opportunity? I know there are lots of other projects in Romania run by local counsils, churches and Romanian and foreign NGOs. But either looking at statistics (there are 5 million jobless in Romania) or trying scale up the situation in the villages I have seen (in some distance from the main roads and the new factories) tells a story about poverty that seems to be bottomless. However, Paul and Bianca shows me that private engagement and projects like this do matter. Paul and Bianca are not professionals, but have been working as volunteers in different social activities since high school. Paul used to be a businessman, making good money, but that didn´t give him any meaning in life. Moving from Arad to Minis, running the camping and the family project has been a right choice for him and Bianca, so far.

If you want to read more about the families, the history and the funding of Paul and Bianca's family project, you can use this link: http://routeroemenie.nl/en/tds or the link on left column of the main blog-page. There you can also find ways to support Paul and Bianca and their families.