Bunissima

This is an old card I have found in my family’s “archive”. It was used during the communism to measure the food you got, mainly the bread, flour and oil. The people who lived in the contry side were forced to give either milk, eggs, meat and fruits alltogether, or cereals, depending on what people were cultivating and growing in different areas.

You could’ve gotten each month one kilogram of flour (= 2 pounds), one of oil, and the same with sugar and maize. I also find out that in the cities you could have gotten 5 slices of real salami per month. Really?

Make no mistake, there were things to buy… like milk, beggining with 4 or 5 am in the morning, because if you got there later you risked of being milkless for your indolence. On the other hand you could just come and stay there with a chair from the evening before or late at night so you be the first on the line when the milk is on the race.

And powdered egg. And… pig heads, that must have been a real feast. And soy salami, why, you all need to be vegetarians cause we tell you to. If you did not turn vegetarian because you could only eat soy salami, you would definately do it because of refusing to eat the pork heads. Maybe some pork legs would do. Or, as people called these pig feet, Adidas. The name compensates for the lack of style. Oh, and a bread a week. Really, no you need to go on a diet, the diet of all people that are equal.

Same things, from a different angle:

My great grandfathers lived in the country side. So did my granma, with them. There was so little food sometimes that they wouldn’t know what to eat. One day, while she was sowing the ground, my great grandmother caught a deer by the foot. It did not run, it did not make any noise. That was a good thing, because you were not allowed to hunt. Not even kill your own livestock, whithout announcing Big Brother, except for pork. And people were afraid anyways to do too much. They ate the deer. They told us kids, just in case someone would ask, that it was a pork they had cut. They burried the skin so that not even dogs would find it.
To make a living my grandma was making tuica (she would sometimes exchange tuica for food). At that time it was illegal to do it without approvals or just illegal, I don’t remember exactly. And since the officialities could not get their presumtion confirmed from grown up traitors, they thought to ask the kids. I can remember even now the tall imposing policeman that asked “Is your granma making tuica?” while we were looking up at him for the dwarf-sized kindergarten chairs. I ignored him. My littler sister, just a kid of 3, could not defend herself, even if the teacher was insisting on him to leave us kids alone. So my sister admitted that it was true. The officialities never knew about this. The policeman had suddenly become a good friend who came to visit often, to pick up his payment.
I don’t recall too much more. All I really remember is seeing the pork head and thinking it was so disgusting. And that soon after the revolution you could buy oranges, without actually having to wait for 3 hours in a line while making room with your elbows. That was enough for me as a kid to understand that something was better. Plus the school vacation, wich suddenly got bigger!

Tonight I have learned a new trick. If you are a foreigner and also maybe a future tourist in Romania this will serve you very well. Oh, and even if you are not, it still should serve you. If you ever arrive on Otopeni, late at night, with no bus and no friend to pick you up, don’t forget two things. Both of them gravitate around the drivers and their affinity with taxi companies. If they are not a taxi company employees, you will get ripped off in one way. If they are, you might get ripped off in the other way.

Fact one: you have to pay much much less than the taxi drivers will ask from you. They will most likely ask double from romanians, wich means they will ask four times as much or even more from tourists. So, bargain with them from the beggining. I mean, just tell them how much you will give. Bargaining means that two opposites meet in the middle, and that communication is happening. Drivers don’t bargain. They just get you.

Fact two: even if some taxis actually have a meter so you can see the right amount, and they can’t cheat you on the price by telling you stories, there is a technological trick, that is a meter remote control. They will just embigen (as heard in Simpsons) the price, by pressing a small remote control that they keep hidden in their pockets. This apparently happens with the all legal, company based taxis.

I am not making this up. The taxi driver who told me all this, also told me that he never forgives the foreigners. Read: he rips them off. Now, if you will doubt about the remote control part, you should seriously think about not getting ripped off as a tourist, because nothing bounds the unofficial drivers (the ones that don’t work for a company, but for themselves co.) to be honest. And never ever tell them that it’s your first time in Romania. In fact, tell them that you know how much it’s worthed because you’ve just done it a couple of months or weeks ago, and they will soften a bit.

And another thing: don’t let them fool you when they start to communicate with you. In any possible way except the fare. It’s just a psychological trick to make you feel comfortable with them, as well with emptying your pockets for being dumb enough to listen and talk nicely to them.

Exista oameni care se dedica totalmente jobului lor. Cei mai ai naibii vor fi intotdeuna cei care sunt siliti, prin natura lucrurilor, sa vanda. Si nu vorbesc de acei salesmen, imbracati la costum, cravata, cu laptotp impresionant si cu maniere impecabile, sau femei super sexi dar super professional, de la care barbatii cumpara orice salivand in gand.

Exista oameni care vand pentru a supravietui si atunci lucrurile devin agresiv de simple. Vinzi si mananci, sau nu vinzi, nu mananci. Acesti vanzatori devin niste poligloti versatili, abili negociatori, perseverenti pana la hartuiala, avand mereu aerul unei politeti desavarsite. Te trezesti salutat la orice pas in aproape toate limbile de circulatie internationala, daca nu intelegi, vei avea o escorta cu ochii stralucind infometati de castig, pana cand incepi sa vorbesti in romaneste. Si pentru ca nimeni nu intelege o asa limba, te lasa in pace. Si ochii si limba. Uneori si mana care te va fi luat gentil de maneca hainei pentru a iti da ragazul necesar sa te decizi ce vrei sa cumperi.

Sunt intr-un fel ca si martorii lui Iehova. Adica, fiecare om are dreptul sa creada in ceva, dar ei pur si simplu vor sa iti bage pe gat o chestie la care tu nici macar nu ai avut timp sa te gandesti. E o lupta in care victimele, adica cei haituiti, posibilii cumparatori, trebuie sa devina ei insisi the bad guys, spunand nimic sau “dispari”, in orice limba. Atunci vei auzi “fuck you.” Si pentru ca esti intr-o tara islamica, unde esti, evident alb si cel mai posibil crestin, taci si inghiti.

Editare intarziata (de a doua zi, that is): Craciun fericit to all the infidels out there.