Propaganda Always Ends Badly

Language is a very powerful tool in the propaganda war machine that nefarious individuals unleashed upon the world with the promise that they were going to make their lives freer, richer, happier, and easier. Under the guise of cleverly worded and false narratives, masses across the centuries have been misled to march toward disastrous outcomes that took many lives and a long time to reverse if ever.

Take for instance the current weaponization of language around the globe where reality and biology are being attacked for political purposes and rational, logical people are required to accept the insanity of a few or they become societally marginalized, and potentially lose their jobs.

Linda Goudsmit wrote that …” language is weaponized, and perversion of pronouns in the English language has a particularly destructive political purpose.” That purpose is to destroy the individual, to force them to identify as the collective; “they, them, theirs,” is chosen instead of I, me, mine. https://goudsmit.pundicity.com/27086/the-politics-of-pronouns

Choosing such grammatically incorrect pronouns is not about respecting and accepting those who are odd in their behavior or who suffer from dysphoria. It is a push for the collective.  The drive towards communism could not be clearer. The Latin word “communis” which communism is derived from, means “shared,” “in common, collective.” The uniqueness of each individual is destroyed because all are forced to share the same thoughts and goals of the community, and no more individuality is allowed, it is forbidden.

The goal of destroying all children’s sexual identity, letting them transgender without their parents’ knowledge, aside from taking away the parental rights and their children’s ability to reproduce, is to turn them into slaves to the one-world government.

Globalist “values” and perverted sexuality are to be accepted as the new normal. This reality of the new normal will be turned into social policy, after which these insane norms become the law of the land in each country. Should you break this law, you are to be punished. It is already suggested by millennials that those who “misgender” them should be jailed because it is “hate speech.” Just asking questions can become hate speech and thus punishable by law. https://www.zerohedge.com/political/pronoun-lockdown-almost-half-millennials-want-jail-time-misgendering

Not even Trotsky, Lenin, and Stalin could devise a more devious way to enslave the masses through language and propaganda. After the successful Soviet Revolution in 1917, they declared their intent to establish a world communist society. They used propaganda and historical deception to convince the rest of the world to adopt communism. To that end, the international communist movement in other countries became an adjunct to Soviet policy.

A drive was launched by the international communist movement against “social fascism” as an effort by Stalin to eliminate the “right-wing” rivals in the Soviet Union. He had already eliminated the “left-wing” rivals. The Comintern (Communist International) instructed all the communist parties around the world to begin an attack against “social fascism.”

What was “social fascism”? It was an invented theory that social democracy was a variant of fascism which stood in the way of the dictatorship of the proletariat and advocated for a “shared corporatist economic model.”

Stalin saw the social democrats and the fascist forces as being in the way of his communist proletariat’s revolution. He launched an intense language propaganda to achieve his goals. Germany bought Stalin’s propaganda without question and the communists, and the socialists fought each other while Hitler’s fascists became more powerful. Eventually Hitler destroyed both the communists and the socialists in Germany.  

Only when Stalin realized his terrible role in the development of fascism in the world, did he change his ill-advised policy.  In 1935 all communist parties around the world adopted a united front tactic to fight fascism.

The Communist Party USA infiltrated and organized groups in their prime target, the “intellectuals.” When the communists used the word “intellectuals,” they meant teachers, writers, artists, scientists, doctors, and entertainers. With their help communism grew exponentially in the U.S.

The Soviet Union exported and built their brand of communism into countries around the world using propaganda language, financial assistance, apparatchiks, technology bribes, and other means. Soviet communism became a form of communist imperialism built on human misery and suffering.

According to communist dogma, the communist expansion had to continue until world communism was achieved and “true peace prevailed throughout the world.” What they really meant to do was to crush all opposition and then rule with an iron fist on a heap of helpless people.

Today, it is not Russia ruling over the world with an iron fist as Stalin had envisioned, it is corporatist billionaires and their NGOs.  Their goal is one world governance by the ultra-rich, bankrupting everyone else into poverty, and reducing population to a “manageable size” determined by billionaires who know what is best for humans and for the planet.

 

 

Learn Spanish, Russian, and Mandarin Chinese

I remember sitting in my Russian language class, taught by a wonderful, soft-spoken teacher, while my eyes glazed over because the language sounded so much harsher than the lovely sing-song Italian language which I adored and learned on my own after I learned German in school.

I would sit in the back of the class not just because I was one of the taller females but because I wanted to do crossword puzzles away from the teacher’s prying eyes. I did learn Russian, but she was teaching us Russian language for business and trade and, years later, I wished I had paid more attention. Some of my classmates were happy that they finally learned the Cyrillic alphabet and got a passing grade.

A former university colleague started a program for elementary schools in the area, using high school students to teach young American students Spanish under the guise that Spanish-speaking people have a hard time learning English and, it won’t be long before they will dominate society, and why not make it easier for the rest of us by learning their language? I found that statement dubious since she was making it in the 1990, but it appears that she was right.

There is nothing wrong with countries adopting the language of another conquering or invading society, especially when the invaded country does not have an official language. It had happened many times throughout history and especially during the Roman Empire. Although the administrative language was Latin, the conquered tribes mixed their local dialects with Latin which resulted over time in the Romance languages of today, i.e., Spanish, French, Italian, Romanian, Romansh, and Portuguese.

Given our economic situation right now, perhaps we should learn Mandarin Chinese as well as Russian.

Cultural Marxism and Euphemisms

Cultural Marxist academics, their sycophant students, and the main stream media are at war with America – a war of violent Marxist ideology and a war of cleverly chosen words and euphemisms that appear time and time again in many college courses, high school classes, in propaganda literature, newspapers, conferences, and in the manufactured news. Cultural Marxists are regular guests on all the alphabet soup networks masquerading as real news, spewing their hatred, their disdain and disrespect for our President, and their calls to renewed violence in the streets through their masked Black Shirts.

As David Horrowitz said, “Worse yet, this is the dominant culture in our universities, in our media, in our judiciary, in government, in unions, and in the shadow political universe of non-profits, with billions of tax-free dollars at their disposal.”

Language is a powerful tool of discourse, mass political indoctrination and agitation. Marxist Democrats are quite adept at using inflammatory language and deceptive euphemisms to suit their nefarious political ends.

In any kind of ideological and political war, the first victim is truth, replaced with lies, dressed cleverly by rhetoric, obfuscation, and intentional debasement of language.

George Orwell wrote an essay in 1946, “Politics and the English Language,” focusing on language which “is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.” Such language, often vague and meaningless, concealed the oppressive ideology.

Taking private property from farmers and other owners is thus called “transfer of population” or “rectification of frontiers.” The process of sending people to gulags to die becomes “elimination of unreliable elements.” “Pacification” attempted to defend the indefensible acts of bombing and driving out locals from their ancestral lands and giving the land to a population protected by the intentions of the elites.

Orwell pointed out that “the great enemy of clear language is insincerity.” The less sincere the speaker or writer is, particularly politicians and journalists, the more they “disguise their intentions behind euphemisms and convoluted phrasing.”

Academic writing is resplendent with “pretentious diction” and “meaningless words.” According to Orwell, “In certain kinds of writing, particularly in art criticism and literary criticism, it is normal to come across long passages which are almost completely lacking in meaning.”

Concurrent with “Politics and the English Language,” Orwell published “The Prevention of Literature.” The two essays reflect his alarm over the victimization of truth in the distorted use of language. Orwell pointed out the “deliberate use of misleading double-talk language among those he identified as pro-Soviet.” He predicted the type of literature under a future totalitarian society – “formulaic and low grade sensationalism.”

Analyzing some of the euphemisms conceived by today’s progressives, and I only scratched the surface, we realize that Orwell’s words from sixty years ago are still true.

“Undocumented worker” is an obvious mischaracterization of illegal aliens who are invading our country with the approval of corporatist elites in both Democrat and Republican parties. These individuals do have documents from their countries of origin and have broken the law by crossing our borders illegally. Not only are they not repatriated, they are given equal rights with Americans so that corrupt politicians can stay in power in Democrat states like California. These people become illegal voters even though they do not speak the language, do not understand our laws, our Constitution, and do not care that they are helping transform our country into the hell hole they’ve fled. So long as they get undeserved welfare and Social Security benefits, they will vote Democrat in perpetuity.

“Our core values” is Democrat double-speak for demographic and cultural suicide. We allow every unvetted flotsam and jetsam from around the world into our country, disregarding the interests of the American public, their safety, health, and well-being under the guise of “that is not who we are as a nation.” The Democrat Party and the leftist agenda are now making the decision of who we are as a nation and as people, without bothering to consult the rest of America.

If we want to uphold law and order, our borders, language, and culture, we are “bigoted.” The meaning of “bigoted” has been stretched and bastardized to now mean pretty much anything the left wants it to mean. Yet it seems that leftists are truly intolerant toward those holding different opinions. They often turn their intolerance into violence, silencing the opposition and their right to free speech especially in the bastions of liberal academia around the country.

Additionally, if you disagree with any goals of the leftist agenda, you are “racist.” The real meaning of “racism” as described in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities, and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race,” has been lost in the leftist double-talk.

If you want legal immigration and national borders, safe from criminals, gangs, disease, and jihadi intrusions, you are a “xenophobe.” All foreign-born individuals who are now proud American citizens and prefer that immigrants follow the rule of law just like they did, are accused of xenophobia, “undue fear of what is foreign and especially of people of foreign origin.”

If you condemn militant jihad, hijra, and Islamic violence, you are an “Islamophobe.” That word silences the opposition so that the liberal goal of unrestricted Islamic invasion continues.

Liberals call themselves “progressives” even though their goals have nothing to do with progress but with regression to a totalitarian and oppressive communist society which has failed everywhere it has been tried. Liberals are repackaging the Bolshevik effort t by saying that communism was not implemented the right way.

“Liberalism” does not really represent the meaning of the Latin word, “liber” (free). Liberalism is disguised incremental socialism that will eventually lead to global communism.  “The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But under the name of “liberalism” they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”

People accept the word “global citizen” without ever asking themselves what it entails. A “global citizen” is an individual who lives in a country that is no longer a state; it has no borders, no sovereignty, no national identity, no passport, and no national history.  Yet most schools and colleges advertise that their students have been brainwashed and prepared for global citizenship.

On campuses around the country, “snowflakes” are cowering and hiding in their “safe spaces” in fear of reality that contradicts what they’ve been told and taught since they were born and led across a stage and given participation trophies.

The word “inhumane” (without compassion for misery or suffering; cruel) has been trivialized to excuse any breaking of the law without punishment and repercussions. In the mentally disordered liberal brain, suffering the consequences of bad choices, decisions, and subsequent criminality has become cruel and “inhumane.”

The word “diversity” is no longer used as being diverse and different; it is now a liberal code word for perversity which must be acknowledged by the other side, encoded into law, and enforced by the courts.

Homosexuality hides behind the word “gay” which previously meant “happy.” Different types of deviance are disguised behind the words “cross-dressers.” “Gender fluidity” can be interpreted as any sexual anomaly and psychological confusion – anything flows.

“Multiculturalism” is the code word for Cultural Marxism agenda and the transformation of your country into a tower of Babel of illegal immigrants who have no intention of assimilating or accepting the invaded culture, its laws, its history, and its language. It is considered “inhumane” to force such illegal aliens to assimilate and contribute to society in a meaningful way.

Liberals force their ideas, plans, and global agenda on the rest of us in the name of “civil society.” This represents the globalist elites backed by power, influence, and money to socially engineer our lives any way they wish because they know best what is good for billions of people around the globe and the faux science backing them “has been settled.”

The laws and cries of “equal opportunity” coming from various special interest groups are not really asking for “equality,” they are asking for preferential treatment. And “social justice” is not asking for justice, it is asking for government sanctioned stealing, taking private property and money from those who worked for it and earned it, and giving it to those who did not earn it and are not entitled to it.

Social Security is not an “entitlement,” it is money that people have earned and contributed into a fund for decades in order to provide them with income in retirement.  It is theft when Social Security money is given to illegal aliens as soon as they set foot on our soil.

Liberals created special and protected categories for some races and ethnic groups such as calling Hispanic women “Latinas.”  To my knowledge, Latium was a region in the former Roman Empire, thus those people could be called Latinas and Latini. Black people are now “African Americans” even though most of them have never set foot in Africa nor were they born there. Caucasians don’t call themselves European Americans. There are Africans who are American citizens and have every right to call themselves African Americans, including Caucasians from South Africa. These special categories are not necessary; they are divisive and counterproductive, treating the special group as a group that cannot survive without the force of government.

It seems that liberalism is not really freedom; it thrives on divisiveness, separation, and inequality. They use deceptive language, euphemisms, and lies to implement their goals and policies in the name of “democracy” even though we are not a democracy, we are a constitutional republic. But liberals count on their blind followers to be ignorant of history and civics.

Immigrants Should Make America Better, Not Worse

Corey Stewart, PWC Chairman
Wikipedia photo

Prince William County Chairman, Corey Stewart, Republican candidate for Governor of Virginia, said during a press conference, “On behalf of the Board of Supervisors of Prince William County, I’m requesting the Trump administration to identify, detain and remove the 7,500 criminal illegal aliens that we have handed over to ICE over the past 10 years.” According to Stewart, the criminal aliens were handed over by local law enforcement to ICE under a program called 287g. “Of the 7,500, 1,000 have been rearrested.”

A mob of protesters stormed the board meeting on Tuesday, carrying signs in Spanish and English that it did not matter where or how you came from, we are all immigrants and we are all Americans. Speakers who advocate open borders argued that those arrested had not committed a crime and should not have been detained. http://wjla.com/news/local/prince-william-county-residents-speak-out-against-immigration-proposal

The fact that illegal aliens crossed into our country without visas and proper documentation is a crime. The last U.S. Census attributed the large population increase in Prince William County mostly to the illegal alien migration to the county.

Fredy Burgos, a Republican Party activist, posts regularly on Facebook examples of crimes committed daily by illegal aliens in Prince William County. Despite the protesters’ claims that illegals do not commit crimes, reality and police records speak otherwise.

In addition to illegals, counties in Virginia have to deal with the middle of the night surprise of forced resettlement of refugees in small communities that are ill-prepared to handle the influx of uneducated, illiterate, third world individuals who have no skills, do not speak our language, are often unwilling to learn it, do not understand our culture, do not accept it, do not share our religious values, and do not respect nor recognize our Constitution.

Legal immigrants throughout history have made America better by assimilating into one culture, the American culture. Back then there was no welfare state and no welfare generosity and dependency. But today’s immigrants are often here for economic benefits, welfare, and social security thanks to the leftist Open Borders policy. There is no economic boom to struggling communities who are forced to accept such refugees or close their eyes at the massive influx of illegals. In their media-driven narrative, leftists conveniently leave out the cost of welfare use, education of their children, and criminal justice system costs that counties incur in dealing with illegal aliens and refugees.

Looking at just one program, SNAP (food stamps), of the refugees who arrived in 2015, 92.5 percent received food stamps and, of those admitted in 2011, a whopping 60 percent are still receiving SNAP today. Take a trip in northern Virginia to Walmart on the days that SNAP benefits are distributed, and you will see a mass of illegal humanity, speaking languages other than English and wearing burkas and other ethnic costumes. https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/orr/arc_15_final_508.pdf

Our great-grandfathers had arrived here for the opportunity to make a better life for themselves and their families or future families. They had to go through Ellis Island, weeks of quarantine for infectious diseases, and some were even turned away because we wanted to keep the American public safe. And those immigrants, who cleared Ellis Island, worked very hard, built railroads, ports, tunnels, bridges, dams, roads, parks, highways, interstates, skyscrapers, and entire cities. As my good and patriotic Virginian friend had suggested, there should be “no immigration without verification and assimilation.”

Repealing the Open Borders mentality is essential. Becoming a U.S. citizen is a privilege, not a given right. Immigrants should benefit America in some way by bringing in skills and trades that are helpful in strengthening America. Immigrants must be an asset to our country, not a liability. Nobody should become a burden by drawing from our welfare system and from our social security funds built up by American workers who contributed with every paycheck into these funds. Taking social security funds without contributing to them is theft from the American people.

Given all the violent Islamist attacks on American citizens in the last years, we cannot afford to trust blindly, we must verify immigrants’ ulterior motives. “Can they prove that they are who they say they are? Can they prove that they are not criminal? What is their intent in becoming an American?”

Even though leftists claim that the demand to assimilate is “fascistic,” assimilation is necessary for numerous reasons:

1.       Do the potential immigrants’ world views match the views of our founding documents?

2.       Do potential immigrants intend to become Americans, or are they just drawing financial benefits, taking advantage of our American compassionate nature and generosity?

3.       Will they protect and defend the Constitution and support American independence and sovereignty?

4.       As Dr. Savage says, will they support our “language, borders, and culture?”

5.       Are they interested in subverting America’s power, authority, and institutions with the intent of dividing our great nation?

6.       Do they understand what it takes to be an American?

7.       Do they want to be productive citizens?

We stand with legal immigrants who came before us and with those millions who are still awaiting the disposition of their backlogged files, immigrants who want to come to the United States legally, but live too far away. To now skip them and instead allow law breakers, border jumpers, and fence climbers to become American citizens is a slap in the face of every formerly legal resident alien who became naturalized American citizens after waiting years and years, meandering through legal hoops, learning history and civics, passing citizenship readiness tests, proving that they have what it takes to become an American, a privilege earned, not a right.

America welcomes legal immigrants with open arms and generosity but, if there is ever any doubt, after proper and thorough vetting, then, as my Virginian friend had suggested, “when in doubt, leave them out,” they don’t have what it takes to become an American.

 

Our Disposable Society

Photo: Ileana Johnson

In our throwaway society, where nothing is sacred anymore and is discarded with the speed of an unwanted darkening banana peel or a lit cigarette butt out the window of a moving car, the miser in me keeps coming out periodically.

Animals, love, life, family, relationships, marriages, appliances, trash, things recyclable, valuables, and trash are thrown out or disposed of mostly on purpose with no remorse and with a faster speed than you can say “I do.”

I sheepishly admit that I was washing Styrofoam containers and plastic forks from McDonald’s back in 1978. Why throw away perfectly reusable items, I thought, when I just landed from the land of poverty, misery, and long lines for food? We had rusty flatware on our table and chipped mismatched plates. My Grandpa used to wash her plates in a little tub of hot water boiled on the gas stove. And sometimes they still had dried food stuck to them from the previous meal. I tried to scrape it off and wipe it with a towel when she was not watching. I could not afford to be choosy or hurt her feelings.

My husband at the time made fun of my miser side because he could not possibly understand even though he visited my childhood home. No matter how many times he took me to the grocery store to see the laden shelves of abundance, my miser inner self could not comprehend so much food and I was certain, it would be gone the next day.

To this day, I wonder when we might have to be without food, water, and electricity, or things that everyone takes for granted, like toilet paper and vitamins. So I used to go from room to room and turn the lights off that my husband had left on and I still do today. Why waste energy? What if we had to be in the dark again like we were often under the socialist/communist regime that planned enough for them while the rest of us had to struggle hungry, cold, and in the dark after sunset?

I recycle today every piece of paper, plastic, glass, and aluminum that crosses my kitchen and my pantry. I even cut the plastic circles that hold bottles in place for fear that some wild animal might get stuck in them if the plastic winds up in a dumpster.

It pains me greatly and I do not understand how someone can throw a live human being or puppy tied in a garbage bag on the side of a deserted road, miles and miles away from a city, and leaves them there like trash, to suffocate and die? Isn’t the way we treat our helpless, animals, children, and old people, an indication of how civilized our society is?

We discard aborted fetuses, humans who are perfect and want to live because progressive society views that as a “choice.” We dump the elderly in nursing homes and seldom visit them. We depend on strangers to be good to them. We visit at holidays out of sheer guilt. There’s an influx of visitors at the nursing home around holidays, I suppose they don’t want to be left out of grandma or grandpa’s will.

We dispose of marriage quicker than we planned the lavish weddings – we get divorced at the drop of a hat. Nobody tries hard to get along anymore; everyone seeks instant gratification and personal happiness. If you ask, nobody is able to give a cohesive definition of what that personal happiness is. But rest assured, it revolves around the “me, myself, and I.”

The “selfish-me generation” throws away everything that is old, including their country, their citizenship, their culture, and their Constitution. Anything they do not understand but has been drilled into their heads by socialist teachers as evil must be discarded. If it is repeated enough times, it becomes their “social justice and equality” playbook.

We discard and abandon children to foster care like a used-up toy because we are too busy or too unable to care for our own offspring.

We euthanize those among us we do not wish to bother with anymore, and we abort the result of loveless hookups because nobody wants to be inconvenienced by a human breathing inside them.

We dump our friends on a whim – they just don’t share the same politics and ideology of the moment and are therefore no good. People we disagree with are suddenly poisonous snakes.

Yet grown Americans keep that one collegiate t-shirt from years ago, with holes everywhere, or that ratty disintegrating blanket one used to drag around for comfort as a toddler, or a favorite dog’s or cat’s toy. Those are holy objects that cannot be thrown away.

We keep that first car, often on cinder blocks, rusted out, and covered with weeds, spiders, and cobwebs. Sometimes rabbits, coons, and the occasional rattlesnake make their nests inside.

We keep that old moldy dresser that belonged to great-grandma because it’s an antique and it might be really valuable someday and fetch a big penny at auction.

We could feed an entire small country daily with the amount of food thrown away in locked dumpsters around the country, perhaps composted, incinerated, or buried later in the landfill.

Beautiful books of wisdom are recycled or buried all the time, in the drive to become a paperless society and to save the trees and the planet from progressive Armageddon. Who has time to read and learn something useful when there is the Internet?

Electronics are discarded as well, perhaps recycled and some buried in the city landfill. Valuable metals, plastics, and glass tubes get buried with them as well.

We throwaway a perfectly running TV that nobody wants in order to make room for a flat screen and top of the line smart TV, so smart, it can report anything you do to the mother ship.

And nobody has landline rotary dial or key punch phones anymore. They worked even when power went out. Those are dinosaurs, thrown away long time ago with the trash, not even recycled. They are buried somewhere in the city dump. When the smart grid goes out and it will eventually do, nobody will have a phone to communicate and answer that 3 a.m. call.

This disposable society mirrors the trashing of our culture in general, of our borders, our language, and our national identity. “We went through darkness so you can find the light." Why are you extinguishing it?

 

An American in Cluj

“Bucura-te, Tara scumpa, imbracata de parada,
Ca, din alte tari straine, vin prieteni sa te vada!     -  Vasile Militaru, 1936

Our paths have crossed years ago at the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science, a residential school in Columbus, dedicated to gifted students from around the state who wanted to be challenged by an enhanced curriculum and by the combined expertise of teachers with doctorates in their respective fields.

His interest was not necessarily math and science, Darius Roby loved foreign languages and the wonderful programs offered there by two foreign women, who taught five different languages. His mentor was my colleague, a very inspiring and entertaining teacher from Venezuela, who supplied their fantasies with stories of world travel, especially France, and mysterious places. Her enthusiasm was contagious!

Darius was born in a town close to the Mississippi Delta, a poor region left behind by its own making but rich in culture and music; it is “dotted by antebellum homes and destitute black communities,” as Darius wrote. He described the poverty as self-inflicted by people who “live hopelessly chasing the Pie in the Sky that democrat candidates always promise them and never deliver.”

But his ancestors lived over the past two hundred years in the “Red Clay Hills” area where “Appalachia begins, more ethnically mixed,” where great cotton plantations give way to more forested and hilly regions where small farmers grow crops like corn.

Darius pursued International Studies (Social and Cultural Identity) at Ole Miss and, after graduation in 2010, decided to make good on the promise to see the places that he had spent years reading about in his history books. Europe to him was not just France, Great Britain, Spain, Italy, or Germany; it was Eastern Europe as well with its long history dating back to the Roman Empire. He wanted to see where the “backwoods gravel roads led to and what was on the other side of the hill,” so he chose Romania to study at Babes-Bolyai in Cluj, the Faculty of European Studies.

It did not take long for Darius to fall in love with Romania - discovering her beauty was curiosity, enchantment, and serendipity. On his semester abroad in France in 2009, he decided to visit Moldova but had to spend one day in Bucharest because his connecting flight to Chisinau was canceled. A year later he found himself in Bucharest and, instead of hopping on a flight to Cluj, he decided to take the long route by train, the trip of a lifetime.

“The grey, rather depressing communist architecture around Bucharest’s Gara de Nord [northern railway station], the farms of the Wallachian Plain, the smell of petroleum and heavy industry in Ploiesti, seeing the Carpathian Mountains for the first time and instantly falling in love; passing Brasov and getting my first glimpse of Transylvania was a special moment – seeing little villages that would do any postcard justice, shepherds in cojocs standing on the hills watching over their flock, and familiarizing myself with the new names whenever the train would stop: Sighisoara, Medias, and Campia Turzii.”

Arriving in Cluj by taxi, passing by the old synagogue, the Roman Catholic cathedral, Darius marveled at the Hapsburg architecture, so different from the Wallachian architecture, Darius knew he was in for a fascinating adventure.

Learning Romanian seemed easy to Darius after having spent seven years studying French and two years Russian, but remained a “source of grief.” While the French congratulated him when he spoke French to them, even though he made mistakes, punctilious Romanians made sure to correct him or switched to English every time he made errors. Darius understood first hand that education socialist style was not the feel good, let-me-give-you-a-trophy-for-trying American style education, but it was based strictly on merit and achievement, impatient, you can either do it or you don’t, and much too harsh for westerners.

He met Romanians who lectured him on how Romanian is a Latin language and he should not make certain mistakes. There was so much pride in their language that a Westerner could easily mistake good intentions of perfection for arrogance.

But Romanians are friendly, warm, and kind, ready to offer comfort to someone in need, and very forgiving.  Darius discovered that “Romanians truly appreciated the small things in life because they were not spoiled by them. They might go about their business with frowns on their faces but they will go to the moon and back for you once you become a part of their circle of loved ones.”

Small things in life were lived and appreciated more, Darius discovered.  After four to five months of cold winter, when most fruits were hard to find, it was a special treat to find new potatoes in spring, cartofi noi, or late summer plums, prune.  

When the snow has barely melted on the ground, it is heart-warming to celebrate “Martisor” on March 1, pinning a symbol of spring tied with a red and white string on a favorite girl’s lapel.

He quickly discovered that Romania is a “bureaucratic paradise” and cultural rules of etiquette are quite different. While filling out paperwork for residence permit, for school, and other documents, carrying bags and books, Darius used his foot to shut the door to the health clinic. That simple act of necessity in America earned him a rebuke from the doctor who yelled at him that he disrespected her by closing the door improperly.

Upon finishing his M.A. in July 2012, Darius was offered a job as Chief Editor for the English and French pages of “Clujul Vazut Altfel,” an NGO that promotes the cultural, historic, and touristic attractions in the region as well as the ethnographic value of Cluj County and Transylvania. The salary is nothing compared to what he could make in the United States, but his work brings him a sense of contentment not unlike the Romanian joie de vivre.

“Clujul Vazut Altfel” organizes excursions to villages and cultural sights in the surrounding areas, a wonderful educational experience worth far more than many boring days in the classroom. www.en.cluj.com

Romania is a gem of history, its cultural, historical, and natural wonders are truly breathtaking. “Almost every village has its own treasures – from Roman castra found in the middle of a cow pasture and fortresses that once defended medieval Moldova from the Turks, to waterfalls with stories that have long ago passed into legend. Six years have not been long enough to discover them all - I do not think that a lifetime would suffice.”

NOTE

Darius Roby’s travel blogs can be found at the following links:

http://uatoday.tv/opinion/bakota-the-place-that-no-longer-exists-on-maps-473638.html
http://www.moldova.org/along-lesser-traveled-roads-trip-to-moldova-part-one/
http://www.moldova.org/along-lesser-traveled-roads-trip-to-moldova-fortress-soroca-part-two/
http://en.cluj.com/rosia-montana-where-history-and-industry-meet-progress-and-conservation/
http://www.moldova.org/darius-roby-orheiul-vechi-a-window-on-the-past-2/