AUSTRALIA and ROMANIES

YVONNE SLEE

Printed by CC Press 1/26B Isles Drive Coffs Harbour

NSW 2450 Australia

This book was sponsored by the Sinti Romani Community organization of Queensland,

Australia.

Inc. Number: IA36508

For privacy reasons, some people‟s names have been changed in the book.

Copyright Yvonne Slee 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the author.

Other books by the same author:

Torn Away Forever

Sharon‟s Sins

Sharon Sins…Again

Sharon Sins Down Under

How far would you go to speak up for your culture?

Half-way around Australia and back is how far I went

with my family to help foster a better understanding of

the Romani people.

Yvonne Slee grew up in Germany and spent a lot of her

childhood at her Sinti grandmother‟s place, and after listening to her

grandmother‟s stories about her family‟s suffering through two world

wars and the treatment of Romanies in Europe, she resolved to do

anything she could to get those stories read so people could see the

racism Roma and Sinti endured. Yvonne lives in Australia with her

husband and three children and is a writer with four published books,

one of them a biography of her grandmother‟s life through two world

wars. She has done Romani Culture presentations in schools, arranged

a Romani History exhibit in the North Queensland Museum, a three

day Romani exhibit in Perth, WA and has spoken on many radio

stations in Australia about Romani history and culture. Yvonne is

always looking for ways to create public awareness of her culture.

Her books, published by Amber Press, include Torn Away

Forever, Sharon‟s Sins, Sharon Sins...Again, and Sharon‟s

Sins...Down Under. Yvonne runs an organisation called the Sinti

Romani Community of Queensland, Australia

(www.sintiromanicommunity.org) and is the sitemanager of The

Rromani Connection website (http://rromaniconnect.org).

1

Australia and Romanies

Plans were well underway for our trip to the annual Byron Bay Romani gathering, but I was thinking whether I, the three kids and my husband Dave, would go for the weekend or just a day. As it wasn‟t all that far to drive, we decided to arrive there early afternoon and return late the same night. On a Saturday morning in June, 2005 we set off. It was the Queen‟s birthday long weekend and a nice day outdoors. We drove through busy Brisbane, which took forever, or so it seemed, but once we hit the highway it didn‟t take long to get there. Driving in towards town, we saw the famous Cape Byron lighthouse standing proudly over-looking the sea. At a petrol station we asked for directions to the caravan park where the gathering was

to take place.

The caravan park owner, a friendly woman at the reception desk, showed us the way to where the other Romanies had set up camp. It looked like a good turn-out for the gathering. Some of them were sitting under a big colourful tent and others were tending a fire they had going. After introductions were made we joined them for a chat. “Sar san? Latcho deves,” said one of the Rom men standing by the fire. “I‟m Tatcho.” He wore a turban and a Romani style embroidered vest and told us he was a Romanichal. As we talked, we found out that he had lived in India for a year. We shared stories about our lives and talked a little bit of Romani. The cook who was tending the fire, used to travel with the British army all over Europe. He was a Rom from England. All the kids were madly running around the tents and looked like young foals jumping and playing, so free and happy, every now and again getting up to mischief trying to pull the tent pegs out. The cook shouted to them to behave and not to touch the tent pegs otherwise the tents would fall down. As he chatted to us, he was idly using a stick to turn a large roast wrapped in foil that was slowly cooking in its own juices in the hot ashes of the fire. A cast iron pot hung over the flames and in it, a lentil stew was bubbling away. Late in the afternoon when the food was ready, the meat was cut up on a big plate and the women laid out a table with salads, plates and cutlery. “Everyone dig in, shai te hav thaj te piav! Let‟s eat and drink.” said the host. “Eat people, eat. Enjoy yourself and forget about tomorrow for now.”

2

The food was delicious and afterwards, when the sun went down and the night air cooled, all the families and their kids warmed themselves around the fire. While cuddling into my kids and rocking my baby son Benny in my arms, we told each other more stories, sad ones, happy ones and hopeful ones, and tales passed on from one generation to the next. Then Tacho started singing Gelem Gelem. There was a real feeling of togetherness as we listened to the passion in his voice as he sang our Romani national anthem. After that, the music picked up and we all danced our worries away and allowed the stifling feeling of trying to fit into the gadje way of life drift away with the smoke of the fire into the night sky. The band played well into the night and we sank right into the music and let ourselves be moved by it. It was beautiful music Romani music that matched the beat of our hearts. When we were all exhausted and the kids had gone to sleep in an old caravan, we watched a Romani movie called Swing, which was very moving. The movie finished around midnight and after saying tearful good-byes and exchanging addresses, many of the Romanies walked off to their tents for the night. A wonderful feeling stayed with me and my family as we drove home, the feeling of the spirit of our Kali Sara watching over us, pleased to see her children happy and enjoying themselves. I enjoyed Brisbane for its scenery and the boat trips we made to the different islands. Once, we took a couple of Romani friends to Bribie Island in our boat. On the way over we spotted some dolphins and stopped to watch them for a couple of minutes, before heading off to an isolated beach for a picnic. While we ate, the kids fed a flock of pelicans that had landed on the beach near us. We seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, as we were the only people on the beach. As we talked with our friends, I was thinking of more ways to help the Romani cause. There was so much to enjoy in Australia, living side by side with Australians, but I also wanted our Romani culture to be visible. I knew this man who I had met on the internet. He said he was a Romani living in Melbourne. My husband and I had discussed opening a Romani café and this guy said it sounded like a great idea. After looking for suitable locations, we chose Melbourne because of its cosmopolitan lifestyle. But it was a big move again, and so soon after just moving from Europe. We decided to go ahead with the move anyway. Dave left his job to work in a restaurant/café for a while to gain

3

some experience in coffee making and food serving. I got to work thinking up the menus. Goulash, Sarmi, Cevaps, sausages on Turkish bread, salads and soups, to name but a few of the ideas I had. We packed up all our stuff and a removal truck came and loaded it all up and took it to a storage place in Melbourne. We then headed to Melbourne in our 7 seater van. The kids were restless and excited as we set off on the 3 day trip. Ben, my baby boy slept in his baby seat and seemed content sucking on his dummy in between food and toilet stops, which there seemed to be plenty of. Before dark, we stopped at a caravan park to sleep in a cabin for the night. We walked into town to get some food for the evening meal. After looking at a couple of places we ended up getting some noodles in a box from a Chinese take-away place. It stayed hot for so long the kids started getting impatient. They just wanted to tuck into it and when they eventually did, they complained that the sauce was a bit too salty. When we were full there was still some left over for the next day. We ate it for breakfast and set off again around mid morning. Sitting in the car for so long made our muscles stiff and we often had to stop and stretch. We saw some nice scenery at times, but mostly there was nothing in between towns, just endless roads going through dry bush land with gnarled trees and the odd dead kangaroo on the side of the road. That was when the kids got restless, so I would put on some music to listen to. We played Kal, some Loyko, then Romano Drom, along with other Romani music to break up the monotonous trip to

Melbourne.

4

THE CAFE

We had already booked a cabin there so when we arrived we moved straight in and got ready to meet this man who called himself a Romani. We rang him the next day and his manner was very strange. He was rather vague and unsure of things; however, we arranged to meet that evening at our cabin. When he arrived, he introduced himself as Mr. Kiri, then sat down and lit a cigarette. As we talked it became apparent that he wasn‟t very knowledgeable in Romani matters at all. In fact, everything he said was taken from websites on the internet that I had seen myself. Most of the information on those sites was a distortion of our history and culture. There was nothing relaxed or natural about him. He didn‟t feel like a Rom brother to me, let alone a Sinto. My hopes of working together with him went slowly down the drain as he kept making jibes about Romani academics that were well respected and which I had learnt a lot from. He seemed jealous of them and their knowledge and he was acting out this role of playing the big boss on the hierarchy ladder. He was also a very moody person. Anyway, we weren‟t going to let this sour fellow put a damper on

our intentions of opening a Romani café.

“What if he‟s not a Rom at all,” my husband said one day, “and he‟s just obsessed with Romani things and pretends he‟s one, because if he was one he would be nicer to another one of the same clan. Perhaps, because he has

lived in Australia all his life, he has forgotten the Romani way.”

I shrugged my shoulders and said maybe. As the weeks went by Mr. Kiri started arguing more and more and said some pretty spiteful things. He didn‟t want me to talk to the Romanies overseas at all, but I said they were my friends and I would talk to them if I wanted to. He told me at one stage, „we do our own thing here and have nothing to do with the other Romanies overseas‟ and that if I carried on talking to them then he‟d see me as his enemy. My Goodness! This was really getting bad. I told him to go away. He started using bad language, running my Romani family down, even my dead ancestors who had suffered under the Nazi regime. I shouted at him

never to come near us again. My husband also told him to stay clear of us.

Well! What a bad start this was. Anyway, we found premises in Bridge Road that we could do up. We took over the lease and painted the walls on

5

one side red and along the other side we fixed a type of cane fencing to give the café a rustic look. We decorated it nicely with musical instruments which we hung on the wall. A violin, a guitar, a squeeze box and in the middle we put a big red chakra wheel, like the one displayed on the Romani and Indian flags. It looked really good. We had a small shop in the corner opposite the serving counter that had Romani trinkets, jewellery and Romani literature for sale, as well as Romani music CD‟s and pictures. The café had polished wooden tables and chairs, greenery scattered all around, old pots and climbing plants in the corners. Spotlights shone from the ceiling which gave the place a nice ambience. Also we had put up a picture gallery on one wall with all the Romani groups depicted in different surroundings and all displayed in nice picture frames; most of them nostalgic photos of our long road, „baro drom,‟ and our 1000 year old history. We also added a corner bench and seating area next to the front window for larger groups and there were a couple of tables on the sidewalk

so people had the choice to sit outside and smoke while they drank a coffee.

Romani musicians came to play in the café too. We got to know one quite well, Huso the violinist. He was from the Macedonian Roma group and he played with a guitarist, who was a really good singer. He knew lovely Romani songs and together with Huso, who was a very accomplished violin player, they were very entertaining artists. Because we were just starting out, we could only afford them twice a month to come and play to the

customers.

One day we had a crowded house and I danced. Although I was busy in the kitchen cooking, it was great to have a break and listen to the musicians and enjoy a dance with the customers. I got on well with Huso. He was nice to talk to and we chatted about our Romani traditions and culture and compared notes between our two different Romani groups. We saw the same things that were of importance for the Romani cause and these were keeping our culture going. He did his bit by playing Romani music and we had the café and Romani literature. Life was great as things were going our way and people liked our culture. But, sadly, it wasn‟t to stay that way. It didn‟t take long for the outside world to start doing the old discrimination bit. They‟ve always done it. What‟s changed? I wished attitudes had. I

wished I could change the world.

6

At first, people came and were quite intrigued. Sometimes I was called out of the kitchen to chat to the ones who seemed interested in our culture. Some days I got good tips from customers for the dishes I cooked. We had repeat customers who really enjoyed the food and liked the place, but there were other members of the public out there in Bridge Road who stared through the door and gave a puzzled look, then walked on. Some came into the café and asked us what was in the food and I told them, beef, chicken, paprika spice and then they‟d just leave. Why were they asking the obvious? Others stared through the café window with their noses flat to the glass, curiously eyeing us. My son Tim, who had just started school in Yarra, asked me, “Mummy. Why are people acting so weird? They‟re staring, but not coming into the café.” One morning, some men dressed in suits came in, sat down and looked around at the deco, then stood up like they were all stung by a tarantula and left without a word. Another time, a man came up to the counter and asked if we smoked the hubbly bubbly and if we lived in one of those old fashioned vardos. One customer, who had eaten in the cafe before, came in with another man and ordered one of our soups. The man told the customer, “Don‟t eat their soup because you don‟t know what‟s in it.” The customer replied, “That‟s ridiculous! They serve delicious soup. I had one last time I ate here.” The man shook his head and walked out saying that he wouldn‟t eat in a Romani café. The customer apologised for the man‟s remarks then left. When people began to see we were actually a real culture made up of everyday people and not the mystified, crystal ball gazing, tarot card reading, stereotyped Hollywood Gypsies that the media and entertainment industry had promoted for decades, some were quite astounded and others seemed a little disappointed. It was all too much for me to take. I felt rather depressed about the behaviour of some people and apart from our regulars, we started noticing fewer and fewer new customers. So, we made plans for a big party at the café and informed the public about it with announcements on the

local radio and newspaper.

The musicians came and the café filled with people. Most of them were the musician‟s friends, Romanies and Macedonians, plus the few regulars who liked our culture. I enjoyed that evening a lot. Everyone ate all the food that I had placed in a big warmer so that it could be served buffet style. We all drank whiskey and danced and laughed. I gave out tr inkets for good luck

7

and Romani books. After I had finished cooking, I changed into a lovely skirt and top then my husband danced with me as the musicians played their hearts out. We took photos of everyone and really enjoyed ourselves. But it wasn‟t enough to bring more customers in. It was getting harder to pay the high rent and we began to struggle financially. We couldn‟t even afford the musicians anymore. Huso kept in touch with us and was sorry that he couldn‟t help us out. The other band member said they could not play for free as it was quite a long way for them to travel. We concentrated on our lunch menus and made quick, small meals like filled rolls with Romani meatballs and salad and toasted or fresh sandwiches. We made cheese and meat platters with salads to go and thought up new fillings and sauces. We even added a big breakfast to the menu. My kids and I delivered menu leaflets all around the area and we got some more customers for a while, but then it faded off again. It seemed that everything we tried was in vain, as there were never enough customers to cover all the

running costs.

There was a Rom called Seb, who popped into the cafe a couple of times. He was a real goose without feathers, a Papin bi porengo as the Romani saying goes. Seb wanted to promote us in the same way he promoted the big franchises in the advertising company he owned, but with our lack of cash we couldn‟t afford his services and high prices, so he didn‟t come back. He lived in Melbourne‟s Docklands and hid his Romani identity for business reasons. I said to Dave later, “I didn‟t want help from a Romani anyway, who hides his cultural heritage away to make money.” He told us that he was scared to be seen in our Romani café in the first place in case someone thought that he was a Romani and that would be bad for his business. “Have some faith in your Romani culture, man,” I thought. “You were born a Rom, be proud of it. Life‟s not all about just making money.” I met a nice Rom who worked in a store down the road from our cafe. We got talking and he told me his grandfather was a Rom from Switzerland and he was proud of that. He said he‟d come to the cafe and bring his friends too. He was also working as a part-time actor. That was his passion, he said, working in theatre. He came and ate in the café and introduced his girlfriend to us. They made a very nice couple. Another time, when he

8

brought some actor friends with him for coffee, he noticed that my face was looking a bit gloomy and asked what was wrong. I told him that it was hard going for us. He said he couldn‟t understand why. The food and coffee were great. He said he‟d be in more often to eat and tell people that it was a good thing to have a Romani café here in Bridge Road. He enjoyed everything about it and came back again and again. Just like another customer, a young student who liked eating regularly in our café and listening to the Romani music we played on the sound system. We use to let her choose the music tracks and she told us about her life, like her trip to the Snowy Mountains to go skiing and her wedding that was coming up. She wanted to know things about our culture and was very interested in it. Other friendly people came to the cafe, including Sharma, the owner of the Indian Tandoori restaurant next door. He was always coming over to see us.

Sharma became a good friend. He read the Romani literature we had in the cafe and we talked a lot about our Indian-Romani connection. He‟d borrow a Romani book and take it back upstairs to a room above his restaurant and read it. He often brought over some delicious Indian food from his restaurant for the kids to eat and told us the problems he‟d had with some of the people out there too. It seems that he had suffered from racist slurs as well. The woman, who owned the boutique on the other side of our cafe, once blamed Sharma for the mice she had seen running around in her shop. She swore at him and said he was storing his kitchen leftovers in the outside toilet shed behind his restaurant and was flushing them down the toilet, which blocked the pipes and caused her mice problem. He said she was a stupid woman for thinking such a thing. What she had seen were bags of rice stored in a storage shed that was once a toilet room, but the toilet had been removed ages ago. He couldn‟t believe the accusation. “Well,” I said to him one day. “I‟ve given Romani literature out to all of the customers who asked weird questions so they‟ll understand what our true culture is and not stereotype us. I hope that works. What do you think?” Sharma shrugged and said, “Maybe, but if they are too lazy and can‟t be bothered to read the stuff, it won‟t do any good.” Sharma had been in business on Bridge Road for 17 years, but times were changing for the ethnic culture‟s businesses in Richmond. Where once terraced houses had stood, office buildings now dominated one side of Bridge Road with

9

accountants, solicitors and financial services being the main tenants. The cashed-up, money orientated young yuppies were buying inner city residential properties, doing them up and renting them out for very high prices. Many families had sold up and left. Tastes were changing. Upmarket bars and bistros were becoming popular. Quite a few of the older, ethnic restaurants were struggling, including Sharma‟s. After reading about our history in the Romani literature I‟d given him and seeing that many Indian words and Romani words were the same or similar, Sharma fully agreed with us that our two cultures were once one and the same 1000 years ago before the conqueror, Mahmud of Ghazni took our Indian forefathers away from India. He invaded areas of Northern India and took everything he could get his hands on; gold and rubies from the temples, elephants, men, women and children, even priests and holy dancers from the temples and of course, warriors and soldiers. Mahmud and his army of raiders ambushed, kidnapped and enslaved many people of North West India and took them to Afghanistan, where he created his empire and made these people work for him and his army. If they didn‟t he‟d kill them. His invasions happened over 20 times in quick succession. The people he took never went back, as is written in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Two Romani historians, Professor Ian Hancock and lecturer Ronald Lee, have written that when Mahmud‟s army was defeated by the Seljuks, our forefather‟s became misplaced and eventually ended up in Anatolia where they stayed for 200 years and crystallized into the Romani culture. When the Ottoman Empire grew, they were given a choice to stay and become Muslims or leave and go on further into Europe. Many of our ancestors chose to leave and the ones who stayed followed the Islamic faith and settled in what is now Turkey. The Romanies that moved on into Europe kept their old beliefs, often disguising them from the European religions to preserve them. Many Romani stories and legends are the same as in the Hindu book and our language has all the family words and hundreds more from Hindu language that we have kept. The goddess Kali, or Durga, still watches over us. We maintain the same hygiene rules as in India and we still have so much in common that our Indian brothers and sisters quickly recognize the similarities between us when we talk to them, because it‟s our mother India too. Sharma felt closely related when we talked about our lives and wanted our eating places to stay open forever, even suggesting knocking down the wall between his restaurant and our restaurant and

10

running them together, but the landlords would not have allowed either of

us to combine our restaurants.

“There are people out there that don‟t want Romanies in their street,” one local told us with an air of arrogance. He said, “They either like you or they don‟t. Bridge Road will decide and you‟ll soon know.” Another said, “It‟s no bed of roses out there you know. You are new and you‟re not even a local.” We were strangers, Romani strangers and it didn‟t matter how much we talked to the locals, how many people we introduced ourselves to, or how much we wanted to live in harmony with the others, it just wasn‟t going to work. Sharma kept calling in and often found us sitting alone and struggling to keep a smile on our faces. We were experiencing the beginnings of the „empty shop syndrome.‟ We ran so low on money that Sharma, thinking that we were starving, started bringing more and more food over from his restaurant. We still had to buy stock for the café and keep it in the cold room for when I cooked for the few customers that still came.

One week, we noticed that Sharma didn‟t open his restaurant at all. He hadn‟t visited us for a few days either, then one evening he showed up out of the blue, looking rather depressed. He said his business was suffering too; however, he did count his blessings with the 17 years his restaurant had operated. It wasn‟t something to sneeze at. He had made his nest egg, but was sad for us and how much Bridge Road had changed. He also told us that he and his wife had argued and that she had thrown him out and he was sleeping on the floor upstairs in a storage room above his restaurant. He was also drinking heavily every day. We felt sorry for him and we kept each other company. One evening, just as we were closing after a very slow day with just one lunch order and some coffee‟s and drinks to go, Sharma turned up with a bottle of bubbly. The kids were all in bed asleep, so we sat at a table in the cafe and the three of us drank the wine. When it was finished, Sharma reached into the shopping bag beside his chair and took out a bottle of whiskey, then got up and opened the café door for some fresh air. As we sat sipping our drinks and chatting, Mario the Italian restaurant owner from up the road walked in. He was very rude to Sharma and called him a Paki then said, “You‟ll all be gone soon.” We shouted back, “Get lost! You can kiss our butt‟s, you pathetic individual.” He just

11

gave us a short stare and left. Sharma said to us that word gets around quickly when a business is having a hard time, especially with Mario running his blog. It doesn‟t take long on Bridge Road for the vultures to

start circling.

The very next day we placed a „Closed for Refitting‟ sign on the door and covered the front windows with paper. We made plans to sell all our commercial equipment, but we needed to do it quickly and quietly, as we were already late with the rent. We didn‟t want the agent or the landlord to know of our predicament because they could exercise their right to give us a notice of eviction, then change the locks and lock up the cafe and sell all our things to recover costs. Everything we owned was in the place, even upstairs where we lived we had all our furniture there. An Indian restaurant further along the street had been struggling for some time. Suddenly a notice appeared in the window saying the landlord had taken control of the premises and was selling everything to recover costs. We didn‟t want this happening to us. Another business, a shop specialising in Turkish food was also having a hard time making ends meet. The couple that owned it had re-mortgaged their home to finance the business. They told us that even though they felt like giving up, they couldn‟t, because they would lose everything. They just had to keep plugging on, hoping that things would pick up, but their savings were starting to run low, so they were very worried about the future. It was a very sad situation they were in. We had used all our savings for the cafe so we didn‟t owe the bank anything, but for our three kid‟s sakes and our own we needed to get out before the agent took action. Over the next two weeks, we managed to sell all the cafe furniture and equipment. To avoid detection, we told the buyers to drive around the back to the lane and load up there. We then managed to sell all our personal furniture in one hit to a second hand dealer, who picked it all up late one evening. We knew that the agent walked by every day, which was rather nerve-wracking. The rent was well overdue and it was only a matter of time before the agent would knock on the café door and get the gist of what was happening. So, we packed up the rest of our things really

fast and hired a trailer to take it to a storage place.

I said a sad good-bye to Sharma and thanked him for all his support. He wished us well for the future. My husband took me and the kids to a

12

shopping centre and we waited for him there while he packed the trailer. As he was trying to remove a decoration from the front window, the agent walked by. Suddenly he stopped and tried to peer through gaps in the paper. Dave froze, then the agent stepped back, bewilderedly shook his head and walked off. That was it! Time was up! Dave left the few things that were still in the shop and quickly left with the last of our belongings on the trailer. Huso was sad and said he would stay in touch. He felt that the café was a warm and friendly place, a Romani place and now it was gone. We had only $2000 left to start over. It would have to be enough for a deposit on a place to rent and to pay for things along the way. All in all, we

lost over $50,000 on the café.

Where to now? I had been told there was a woman who ran a Romani School in Adelaide, so we decided to head off to Adelaide and check it out.

Maybe we could find our feet again there and my boy could join her school.

13

THE ROMANI DANCE SCHOOL

After a two day trip towing the trailer packed with our belongings , we arrived in the South Australian capital and found a caravan park in the forest just a half hours drive from the city. Not long after arriving at the park my son, Tim, disappeared. We looked everywhere, but couldn‟t find him. Even the park manager joined in the search. We started to panic, and then I had a brainwave. Maybe he mistook one of the empty cabins for ours and went into it and was waiting for us. We all started checking them to see if any were unlocked. When we checked the cabin behind ours we found the door unlocked and Tim sitting on the toilet in it. It was such a relief to find him and we all laughed at what he was up to. We went back to our cabin and unpacked, then had dinner before ringing the woman who ran the

Romani school to make arrangements to meet her.

It was quite interesting meeting MM the next day outside a pub in the city. She came with her family members and introduced everyone. Her daughter-in-law, Mia, from Serbia, who taught Romani language and dancing at the school, her son who helped run the school, her daughter who managed the school, the daughter‟s 2 teenage children and the son‟s and daughter-in-law‟s 3 children. I thought the daughter-in-law was the nicest. She was a bit reserved though and let the mother and daughter do most of the talking. After a bit of a chat, we went to the Romani School of culture, dance and language to look at it. The school was located in a small building in a side street not far from the city centre. There was a hall with a stage and all the musical instruments were sitting at one end of the room. A small computer area with some desks was situated at the back of the hall and a large book shelf full of books ran along a side wall. There was also a gymnastics room and a dining room. We all agreed to enrol Tim at the school and he was to start when my husband had found a job so that we could pay the fees. The following week Dave found a job and Tim went to the Romani School. We paid the weekly school fee of $140 and I drove him to the city every day

and picked him up every afternoon.

Being from another Romani background, he was a bit shy at first. Also, the other kids attending the school were nearly all girls and all were family members of MM‟s. I encouraged him to learn music, but it was slow going

14

as he didn‟t seem to catch on because the tutoring wasn‟t all that intensive. It was the same with the language. The few words he‟d learned weren‟t much at all. There seemed to be a lot of outings to the ice skating rink, the park and the arts centre. There was also quite a bit of dance practice and making animals out of paper mache then painting them. There were ballet lessons as well, which Tim didn‟t like because it made his legs hurt plus, he

was embarrassed as a boy at having to do them.

When Tim had been at the school for a couple of months, the students started practising for a performance that was to be held at the Ukrainian Club hall. Eve, my 3 year old daughter, was also going to participate and she joined in together with the other kids from the Romani school during practice sessions. On the evening of the performance, the three girls from the Romani School dressed up in lovely sparkling tops and dance skirts that were so colourful, just like the colours in Indian saris. The skirts were layered and flew out like butterfly wings. MM‟s daughter-in-law, who was the mum of the two pretty girls with long black hair, had worked for weeks designing the brilliant outfits and sewing them together on her sewing machine. She was a real dressmaker. The boys wore striking green, satin pants that billowed like Indian boy‟s trousers and crisp white shirts with traditional embroidery. All the kids looked very nice. My daughter, Eve, wore a shimmery, yellow dance skirt and a white blouse with a floral design and little puff sleeves. She had flowers in her hair and looked so cute, like a little Romani ballerina. After the Romanies had finished their dance routine, the Ukrainian children‟s dance group joined them on stage. The drums started up, the music played and all the kids danced together. Some were well prepared for the performance, but there were others that had to be prompted with their steps. We saw MM‟s daughter running around in the background, organizing the kids and making sure things ran smoothly. For the finale, the boys held up long sticks and the girls whirled around them in quick steps. When the performance ended, everyone in the hall applauded loudly. The children were rewarded with a performance certificate and a trophy badge. The dance lessons continued every week and one evening we went to the Romani School to watch the kids do dance

practice for more performances.

15

However, it was becoming evident that the Romani School placed a lot of emphasis on teaching dance and music and not much on Maths and English. Tim needed to learn reading and writing as well. These subjects were important for getting a job in Australia. Also, the Romani language that was supposed to be taught had fallen by the wayside. It was all very quiet on the academic side of things. Often the kids just sat at the computers playing games. Dave and I were getting a bit worried about my son‟s learning. We attended another dance performance held in a park and we had a dinner party with MM and family members at our place. I cooked several traditional Romani dishes and everyone enjoyed the food. Another time, we spent an evening at MM‟s daughter‟s birthday party, where Tim played the drums and the girls danced and MM‟s daughter sang, then Tim danced with one of the girls. It was all very beautiful and I took pictures of it all. MMs daughter told us that Tim was a great asset to the dance troupe

as there was only one other boy among all the girls.

Even so, a decision was made by me and my husband to take my son out of the Romani School because of our concern at the lack of teaching English and Maths. Unfortunately, dancing on its own wouldn‟t get Tim a job later in life so we put him in a public school where he soon caught up to the other students. It was sad that we had to do it. MM didn‟t take too kindly to the fact that we took Tim out of her school. She didn‟t want to lose the only other boy dancer from her dance group. MM totally ignored us afterwards and even when we rang her, it seemed she had her mobile programmed to „unavailable‟ when our number came up.

Anyway, it seems that there isn‟t any true Romani school in Australia, where Romani history, language, dance and music, together with the state‟s curriculum, are taught, which is a shame. Gadje taunt our kids if they don‟t know how to read and write, so our kids must learn in public schools. If they are educated and have good jobs, then it will be easier for them to teach others about our history and culture. Being a Sinti Romani I have to think of what‟s best for my kids. I teach them the meaning of their cultural heritage, our traditions and history and this I do every day. To live in peace and harmony is important. I don‟t bring them up to fight, but to ta lk, think and use their heads when they speak up about Romanies. They must have a

voice out there, a Romani voice.

16

After 7 months of living in Adelaide, we made a decision to move on. The Romani School hadn‟t worked out, MM was ignoring us and we couldn‟t

get used to the stifling dry heat that never seemed to let up all summer.

17

A SLIGHT DETOUR

We decided to head for the North of Australia and the tropics. Cairns to be exact. We wanted to go via Melbourne to see Huso again, but unfortunately, due to personal circumstances, we ended up having to stop in a small town called Bacchus Marsh, about 50 kilometres outside Melbourne, and rent a house there. We met up with Huso and also a photographer from England called Amy on Roma Day, 8 April 2007. It was a nice reunion and I made Sarmi for everyone. Amy was on holidays from London and we talked of future plans about how we could educate Australian society about Romani history and culture and be a part of their society. Huso felt that he was taking part when he played his violin at wedding functions, but he knew that very few Australians understood our true culture. Amy thought she could help by taking photos of Romanies in Australia and explaining to the public our Romani culture and history. I‟d made a Romani calendar for 2007. It was a good one and people liked it. Although my writing was at a standstill with books, I enjoyed writing and creating a magazine, the calendar, cards and important newsletters for our culture. There was so much to be done if our culture was going to be understood and recognised. It was a gigantic undertaking. If I didn‟t plug away at it we would be a forgotten culture in Australia and my kids would have no cultural identity. I could not let this happen. Our cultural identity was far too important to let it go under, Down Under. After managing to survive for a thousand years we should know by now to never let go of something good and meaningful, our cultural identity. Sara Kali is happy

when we stand up and carry on.

While in Bacchus Marsh, I arranged to meet a woman from Melbourne, who had emailed me saying she was interested in playing a part in the Romani cause. When I met her, she was not what I had expected. In fact, she was what the Hindu‟s would have called, „a demonic spirit, a very nasty person.‟ She gave me the creeps and I knew that after only meeting her once, I never wanted to see her again. Later on, she proved to be a sick, nasty, racist; a totally mad woman. Everyone in our close-knit Romani circle on the internet would be outraged by her lies and spiteful attacks towards all the hardworking, good, truthful Romanies. We wanted to, (in

Romani language) trade la ka o beng - send her to hell.

18

I‟m always trying to achieve a better understanding of our culture and want respect and equality for Romanies. It is the truth that‟s our most important weapon. We must not sway from that and hold onto it and our culture. We must undo the damage that outsiders have done with their misinformation. For far too long, they wrote whatever they felt like about us. Romanies were never consulted about their own culture. We were held back and couldn‟t read or write the language in whichever country we were pushed into. Stories were concocted about us, most of which was romantic and barbaric rubbish that had nothing to do at all with our culture. The gadje stereotyped us in their books and in the media to make money and they still do it today. Bad things happen to us because of how we have been falsely

portrayed. It has brought about racist attitudes towards us.

When our 6 month rental lease had finished in Bacchus Marsh, we packed up and, once more, headed off to Cairns. What a trip we had. We saw so much nice scenery along the way and when we hit the tropics, wow, it looked beautiful.

19

THE CAIRNS MUSEUM ROMANI EXHIBIT

The air smelt of flowers and the rainforest we drove through was so moist it was like being in a steamy greenhouse, very humid and warm. Unfortunately, my kids, Tim and Eve, got the flu in the caravan park we stayed at in Cairns, so we raced down to the 24 hour surgery. The doctor put them on antibiotics, even Ben just in case, and after a night of fever and vomiting, we let them rest and gave them plenty of fluids and dry food and took them for little walks in the fresh air around the caravan park. It put a bit of a downer on our arrival here, but I think it was a flu they had picked up from Victoria. I had it 2 weeks before they caught it, the last reminder of

what you get living in the Melbourne area.

Anyway, we looked around for a house to rent and after 10 days we got a phone call that we were accepted for one of the places we had applied for. It had a swimming pool, which was nice. Something we never had before. Dave started work and we settled in and made plans to explore the tropics. We wanted to see all the areas around Mossman, Port Douglas, Daintree and more. There were so many interesting places to visit. I started my weekly chats with the BBC every Monday again. They especially loved the crocodile stories and stories of the wild animals that roamed around the place. It was fun telling the listeners about this place in the tropics. The two older kids started school and I only had my little boy, Ben at home with

me.

While Dave was at work, I looked after the home and watched the kids in the pool. I taught my oldest son, Tim how to swim and Eve how to tread water. They loved the pool and spent lots of time in it. I also spent quite a bit of time thinking how I could introduce the Romani culture to this part of Australia. I wanted to do some sort of exhibit, but wasn‟t sure of how to go about it. Then, after seeing a newspaper article on the North Queensland Museum, I had an idea. Maybe we could have a display there. I told Dave about my idea and we went to the museum and spoke to the director about it. We explained to him that we would like the exhibit to show that our Romani ancestry goes all the way back 1000 years to our old homeland India and this is why we have Asian genes, which we have carried with us all that time in our blood. We needed help to bring this exhibit to fruition.

20

The director happily agreed to display our exhibit and to our surprise, his assistant, a professor at the James Cook University, who was going to help co-ordinate the exhibit, was also a Romani. We all got to work on it. Dave started researching local Romani stories in the library, looking for anything about Romanies working on cane farms, gold fields etc. He found an old newspaper article on Romani musicians coming to Cairns early in the 1900s to play their squeeze boxes, and some old photos of Romanies working in the cane fields and livery stables around the local area. The museum combined all this with our history and the holocaust, as over 1.5 million Romanies died in WW2. There were other display boards featuring Romani music and food, as well as a display cabinet with Romani ornaments and artefacts. There was even a mannequin dressed in traditional

Romani clothes and Romani music playing in the background.

I think it was the best display ever done in Australia on our culture and we advertised it everywhere so people would come to see it. The ABC radio station in Cairns did an interview with me and as it was April the 8

th we

talked about the exhibit and international Roma day. The interview went well and the presenter asked for our Sarmi recipe which I promised to bring in later that week. Also, the local paper took a picture of the display and wrote an article about Romanies that covered the serious plight of our people after I had sent their reporter lots of information to use for a write-

up.

We set a milestone in Cairns with the Romani exhibit. Presenting our culture in such a public place to have it better understood was a great achievement and to top it off, as it was such a popular exhibit, the director left it in the museum for 6 months, instead of the 2 he had intended. It was well worth our effort and I‟m sure Kali Sara was pleased with us. We invited some people we had met through the museum for a Romani dinner and chat and I did a talk in front of 30 people at the museum about the

display and our culture.

My family and I were enjoying living in Cairns. We swam in our pool and lay in the sun and on weekends we drove to beautiful beaches lined with palm trees gently blowing in the tropical breeze. The water looked so welcoming on the hot and humid summer days, but we couldn‟t go in

21

because of the deadly box jellyfish and crocodiles, which was really frustrating. We felt close to nature in the lovely North Queensland tropics but, the Romani Cause was beckoning. A group of Roma living in Perth, WA had asked me if I would like to come to Perth and work with them on Romani issues. I thought, “There‟s more work to be done there.” This Roma group, the Arlije, were mostly Muslims and had the strong influence of the Osmanic/Islamic cultural traditions, which differed somewhat from other Roma groups. Coming from Macedonia and Turkey, they were spared the violent persecution by the Nazis in WW2. They conformed to these countries rules and regulations and lived there in relative safety. Some of the Arlije Roma didn‟t even know about my Romani group, the Sinti. There aren‟t many of us left, some estimates say 80,000. So, maybe it‟s difficult for some Arlije to comprehend the terrible discrimination other Romani groups have gone through after leaving Anatolia hundreds of years ago. The Romanies who left were hunted down by racist governments, tortured by the church, denied entry into numerous European countries and when they did get into a country, their babies were forcibly removed by various governments and given to Christian families to raise. Romani people were enslaved, Romani women were taken away and sterilized against their will and then there was the holocaust, where over 1.5 million Romanies lost their lives, which left generations scarred for years to come. Would the ones from this group who were untouched by these things understand? Some, like Huso, did and others at least tried to. After all said and done, we all originated from India. On the whole, the Arlije Roma were a sedentary group because they adopted the religion of those countries they lived in so they could stay there. Other Romani groups however, chose not to conform and went further on into Europe. They didn‟t want to adopt any European religion back then as Hinduism was still very much in their blood.

There was one Rom in particular from the Arlije Roma group who sent some documents to us to show us his credentials. Lots of pictures, Romani and Indian flags and legal sounding jargon mentioning the United Nations and some world congress he had attended. He said it would be good for the Romani cause if we could work together. Wow! It sure sounded promising. No more plugging away alone as was so often the case. He also spoke of getting a Romani school started and teaching Romani, as the young Romanies would not know their language otherwise. Here again was the

22

opportunity for my kids to learn and me to work alongside the other Roma. I thought, nothing ventured, nothing gained. But one thing concerned me a little. Mr. E said that I could work as his personal assistant. I wasn‟t happy at all about this idea of his, especially after I had attended a Romani seminar in London earlier in the year where I met other Romani activists and scholars, including Professor Ian Hancock, who all treated me as an equal. Anyway, I thought, „I don‟t want to be just a mere assistant to this

Rom in Perth. After all, I‟m an activist in my own r ight.‟

It took a couple of months for us to make a decision about moving to Perth. Mr. E said that there was a large Roma community in Perth who met regularly at a couple of venues north of the city. The prospect of meeting Romanies and working with them to have our Romani identity acknowledged by Australian society was an opportunity which I couldn‟t

pass up, so we decided to go.

Once again, we packed up our things for yet another move. We departed Cairns and the lush tropics of North Queensland that had been our home for 18 months and headed off to the world‟s most isolated city. The trip was going to be a long seven thousand kilometres through the bush and desert. I drove one car which pulled a trailer loaded with our things and Dave drove the other car with the caravan in tow, which was to be our temporary home for the journey. The cars broke down a couple of times and we helped each other out by jumpstarting the engine. My car overheated and Dave always had to top up the water in the radiator. We stayed in touch with each other with our walkie-talkies. It was a slow three weeks drive across Australia from Cairns to Perth with many stops. Every night we set up the caravan and a tent as well and in the morning we would pack it all up and drive on. We had to contend with all sorts of weather; rain, wind and dust storms. I recall one evening, as my husband was putting the tent up at Eucla, Western Australia, the wind blew so hard that it took all of us to hold it down until he could peg it into the hard, rocky ground. He just finished it before a thunderstorm hit. Crossing the desert was a 3 day drive. It was quite far between petrol stations and sometimes we didn‟t see a car pass us for an hour or more. We made sure we refuelled at every stop and I remember when the other cars went by, the drivers gave a wave, so we started doing it too. Before arriving in Perth, we stopped for a night in a

23

little place called Southern Cross. We had dinner at a hotel called The Palace and met the proprietor of the place, a man from Belarus. We got talking about where we came from. I told him I‟m Romani. He liked to hear that and said it was nice to have Romanies travelling through and asked us what we were going to do in Perth. I told him I wanted to do an exhibit on our culture and meet other Roma there. He opened a bottle of wine and offered us a glass and gave snacks to the kids. He excitedly told the people around him that he had Romanies visiting his hotel and raised his glass to toast us. He reminisced about his life in Belarus. He missed it a lot and remembered the Romani people he‟d seen there. His family was poor, so he went to Australia to make a new life. He had done well for himself, but seemed rather homesick. He said not to forget him and gave us a bottle of his wine from Margaret River and lots of his business cards. We‟ll never forget his hospitality.

24

ROMANIES IN PERTH

The next day we finally arrived in Perth and after settling into a caravan park 10 kilometres north of the city, we decided to make our presence known. We rang Mr. E, the Rom, who said he would welcome us on our arrival. He invited us for lunch at his home the following day. We were greeted at the door by Mr. E and his wife. He was a short, rather rotund man with dark skin and could speak Romani. His wife had a warm smile, but looked tired. She had cooked a nice lunch with pork, chicken and vegetables. We also had tasty chicken noodle soup and some yellow, green and red bell peppers in olive and garlic oil cooked in the oven and we drank soft drink and delicious Turkish coffees made by Mr E‟s wife. She was a hard working woman and Mr. E had a habit of clicking his fingers when he wanted her to bring something. To me, it looked like his attitude was, „a

man‟s word is final.‟

After lunch, their son popped in with his very pregnant wife. He was a talkative Rom. I asked if he spoke Romani and he said he didn‟t. His wife Liz was sweet and had a nice character and I got on with her immediately.

She gave me her address and told me to visit her which I promised to do.

When we were shown around the house by Mr. E, we noticed lots of pictures of himself hanging on the walls. Some were even hung in large golden frames. It looked like some Hollywood star‟s home where the actor plasters himself all over the place for everyone to see. Me and my husband had a little giggle about it, as it seemed a rather vain thing to do. Mr E took us downstairs to a room under his house that served as his office. The walls were full of photos of Mr. E posing with people he had met in Europe and Australia. I recognised some of them, Romani musicians and Romani people I had seen pictures of on the internet. Mr. E pointed them all out to us saying that he knew all the people in the photos very well. Later on, when I got to know Mr. E a little better, I realised that he was on a big ego trip, and was always trying to impress me with name dropping. After explaining all the photos to us he rang the local MP‟s office and asked to speak to the MP. He told the MP that he would send his personal assistant, which is what he called me, to help him if he needed it. I was gob smacked at that. What was he doing? The MP told him he already had a secretary.

25

Mr. E sat in his armchair with a supercilious grin on his face, pretending to be Mr. Big Shot. I thought it had to be a joke, because I didn‟t come all this way to Perth to be his secretary. I came here to work with him for the Roma cause. I had to put him straight on this, but it was going to be easier said than done. I told him I wanted to do something together with him to benefit our cause. I was an activist, not a secretary.

We found a house to rent and the kids went to the local school which was just across the road from our place. We hadn‟t heard from Mr. E for a couple of weeks, then he rang out of the blue and said that he wanted us to make Christmas and New Years greeting cards with his name and contact information on them wishing a Happy Xmas and New year in Romani language. He said there was a Holocaust memorial standing in a park in the city where Romanies are remembered along with the Jews. He wanted a photo of the memorial on the card, which we thought was rather odd. We wanted to look at this memorial ourselves, so we drove to the park to take photos. Mr E brought a Romani flag, which we held up with him to one side of the memorial. Dave made the card using a graphics program on Mr. E‟s computer. He told Dave how he would like the card to look. He wanted to have it perfect with all of his credentials on it. When Mr. E was happy with the card he took it to the printers and had 100 made, then posted about 40 off to various government officials in Perth and Europe. The rest he put

away in a box in his office.

Mr. E worked as a boiler maker when he immigrated to Australia in the sixties with his wife. He retired a number of years ago and bought a take-away chicken shop, which his wife ran. She cooked every day and evening without a holiday for two years, then Mr. E sold it because a fast food place opened across the road from them and took away a lot of his business. He also had 2 brothers. The older brother‟s name was Cino. He could sing beautifully and was kind to my kids. He once told me he felt homesick too and thought hard about why he came to Australia to live, as it was so different to his home in Macedonia and he felt a bit lonely here. Mr. E brought Cino over to Australia in the mid 90s and arranged for him to marry a Polish Australian lady who couldn‟t speak Romani. They communicated using broken English and Macedonian. I said to him that sometimes I felt homesick for Europe too. We have to stay positive. Maybe

26

he, along with other Romanies, would come to Holocaust Memorial Day in January to lay flowers there. He said he‟d like that. Unfortunately, that day never eventuated, despite many pleas from me to Mr. E to organise it with

the Roma community in Perth. He said no one was interested in doing it.

The weeks went by and Mr. E showed no signs of wanting to do anything with me for the Romani cause. The only times he rang was when he wanted my husband to come over to his place to either look at a new computer he had bought, carry boxes of bathroom tiles upstairs or go to a car dealer in town to check out a Mercedes Benz, which Mr. E had no intention of buying. He told us he was often busy on the phone talking to some Roma in Europe. He complained that his phone bill was sometimes $1000 a month. He was tied to the phone so it seemed, always having some important discussion about opening a Romani radio program in Melbourne, or getting this or that certificate to help him look good to some embassy official or

politician.

One day I suggested we all organise an exhibition on Romani history and culture and get local Romanies to perhaps lend some artefacts or pictures to display at the venue. We could do one with our own musicians, food and lots of display boards with articles and pictures on them, much like we did in Cairns, only this time bigger with a PowerPoint slideshow playing on a screen. We could even invite a government minister to open it and advertise it to get people to come and look. Mr. E frowned. He wasn‟t at all interested and said that it sounded too much like hard work and that he was getting a headache just thinking about it. I wasn‟t going to let his negative reaction deter me. One way or another, Perth was going to have a Romani exhibition, even if Dave and I had to do it on our own.

Mr E‟s wife was a nice woman and I got on well with her. There were times though, when she looked really fed up. She said that Mr. E does nothing and just wants to be served all day long. He won‟t do any housework and won‟t even get up to answer the phone. She had to bring it to him. Mrs E wanted more time to herself to learn how to use the computer to write and make her voice heard on Roma issues, but Mr E had said, “Books, books, books; who needs more Roma books. Just write letters and send them to all the embassies so they recognize Roma are there and need

27

rights.” Mrs. E said her husband was lazy and didn‟t want the woman have her say. The Hindu‟s have a saying for Mr. E‟s ways of thinking. „Life is a

duty... where is the wife?‟

One evening she rang me and asked if we wanted to go dancing. I told her of course we wanted to, so we agreed to all meet up the following night and go to a hall where they played a mixture of Balkan and Romani music. Mrs. E and I had dressed in saris which were very colourful. She had lent me her spare sari and I felt so good wearing these Indian clothes. We danced a lot that night and the kids joined in too.

I was trying hard to get on with Mr. E. He would phone us saying that he had this idea or that idea on how to help the Romanies in Europe or Australia and that we must come over as soon as we could to type letters for him. So we‟d go over to his house and sit in his office in front of his new computer while he rambled on about nothing in particular. These meetings weren‟t constructive in any way for the Romani Cause. Dave often ended up writing an email full of idle gossip to one of Mr. E‟s contacts in Europe. I invited Mr. E and his wife for my birthday. I had cooked many Romani dishes for dinner and Mrs. E praised my food, but Mr. E whinged about the beef goulash because he had high blood pressure and wasn‟t supposed to eat beef. I said that there were other dishes to choose from. He picked a little of each one and ate them then we all had trifle. After dinner I played a CD of Romani music from „Princes Amongst Men.‟ Mr. E recognised the songs and said he had met the musicians once during one of his trips to Europe. He often told me he liked Australia and how good he has it here. He‟d always remind us that he had two houses, one which he rents out and the one he lives in. He could afford to travel, splash out at weddings and see his brothers and relatives who lived all around him in Perth, which made him happy, but his wife got homesick sometimes, because she missed her family and relatives back home in

Macedonia.

We got the feeling that Mr. E looked down on us, as he often pointed out that we moved around too much, didn‟t own a house and didn‟t have enough money to splash out at Romani weddings, so therefore, we couldn‟t go to any, as you were expected to give a good amount of money as a gift.

28

To him, we were a couple of stray cats who were just trying to help the Romani cause, but doing this was impractical. He said we needed to step up the ladder and own a house, a nice car, big screen TVs etc. to be taken

seriously.

I thought, „You can‟t take it with you when you‟re gone,‟ but in this material world, what he said was true and sadly, it seemed that most people thought the same thing. But I have this motto; a Hindu saying that goes like this; „You come into this world for a purpose and when you learn what it is, then you do your best to fulfil that purpose and be able to say before you die, that you will leave this world behind a better place than when you

came into it.‟

Now, if Mr. E was going to keep on criticising me and my family, then maybe I would have to start avoiding him. We went out dancing again with him and his wife as we did want to get along with them, but half-way through the evening, he put cotton wool in his ears and said that the dance music was too loud and he wanted to go home. His wife looked apologetic when we all left early, as it cost us quite a bit of money to get into the

venue and we wanted to stay longer and dance some more.

Come to think of it, we would have had a lot more money to our names and would never have been scoffed at by Mr. E if we hadn‟t listened to him in the first place and spent a small fortune moving to Perth. He didn‟t think about any of that. He was just a self-centred person who talked a lot and did

very little.

I spoke on the phone with Liz, Mr. E‟s Romani daughter-in-law, and she really wanted me to visit her as she felt lonely after giving birth, so I took the opportunity to bring her baby boy a toy and her some flowers and have a good chat. She had come from Macedonia just over a year ago and her English was slowly improving. She had never been taught Romani and spoke Macedonian to her husband and child. She felt so far away from Europe and missed her mum and family there very much. She told me that it was hard for many Roma women here because in most situations, only the husbands had their relatives living here and the women were alone at the mercy of the in-laws. A fifth wagon wheel, that‟s what it‟s like for them, therefore, the women need to stand up and be strong. I felt for Liz,

29

because Mr. E, and even his wife, had been harsh on her for a while after the baby was born. It was quite mean the way they talked about their daughter-in-law. They once said to me that Liz was always whinging that she was homesick and that she should be thankful and respectful for being taken out of the poverty she had lived in with her family in a small house in a Roma settlement in Macedonia. Liz was not allowed to visit her home overseas because Mr. E said they had spent enough money getting her over to Australia and added that if she really wants to go, she should get a job and save the money herself. I thought, „Poor Liz! How could she work and look after her little baby.‟ Liz watched my little girl, Eve, playing on the floor and remarked to her that she had lovely hair and was a pretty girl. She then said to Eve to come and sit beside her. Eve did so and Liz put an arm around her and quietly said, „Always stay close to your mum and when you grow up, just remember, don‟t trust the men who want to take you far away from your mum. Stay close to her. Trust me on this.‟ Eve nodded and said she wouldn‟t leave her mum, ever. I think Liz was lamenting her own

situation with what she had told my daughter.

I was invited by Mr E‟s wife one day to a party that her husband‟s sister, Anna, had organised. Apparently, her grandson was having his initiation into manhood and Muslim Roma celebrated the occasion with parties. This one was to be for women only. An area in the living room had been decorated with lots of thin net curtains in boy‟s colours and blankets on the floor. It was a symbolic way of remembering the boy‟s younger years. The women had put on a feast of delicious Romani food and served colourful alcoholic drinks for the adults and soft drinks for the kids. Most of the women were dressed in gold and shiny red sequined tops and colourful skirts with frazzles and sparkling glitter on them. Some women wore gorgeous saris. One of them was Liz. One girl got me up of my seat to join in a dance by wrapping a long dance scarf around me. We did so much dancing. Mr E‟s wife and Liz danced too. They appeared to be getting on with each other that night. I think it was because Mr E wasn‟t there. It was a very relaxed and fun occasion, all the women together, letting their hair down and having a great time. I went again a couple of days later for further initiation celebrations. This time, the men joined the women to eat a meal cooked by the host and listen to a Romani band play. There was plenty of beer, whiskey and soft drinks and we had chicken and side dishes

30

to eat. The boy was dressed in a kind of prince‟s outfit and they held his hands and danced around in a small circle. He appeared to be in some discomfort after his medical procedure, but he put on a brave face and plenty of money was pinned onto him to help him with his future

responsibilities as a man.

As time went by, I found myself going it alone again writing protest letters when Romanies were treated unfairly in different countries. Mr E had an annoying habit of running other Roma groups down. I argued with him about his attitude and told him we should be trying to help Romanies who are less fortunate than us. I said a bit of compassion was needed and that he shouldn‟t run others down because they lived in poor conditions, or wanted to have a better life in another country where they might find work and get their kids some schooling. One Saturday morning, while I was selling at our market stall we had, I spotted Mr. E walking around. He saw me and walked over to where I was and promptly started shouting at me about the fact that I wouldn‟t work as his secretary. He didn‟t like it that I had an education and ideas of my own. His secretary would have to work for free and do whatever he thought of at the time. In his opinion, I should do as I‟m told. I said to him that his shouting wouldn‟t intimidate me. He stomped off in a huff and after that, I had nothing more to do with him. Later on, I found out that he was talking about me behind my back to other Romanies. About a month had gone by when, one afternoon, I received a phone call from Mr. E‟s brother, Mr. I. Mr. E had spoken only briefly about him, saying that he worked at some kind of radio station. There seemed to be a little bit of rivalry between them. Mr. E once said, “My brother does his thing and I do mine.” Mr. I rang to ask me if he could do an interview with me about Romani history on his Romani radio program which he presented once a week in Romani and Macedonian at Perth‟s ethnic radio station. I agreed and he picked me up that evening and drove me to the station. The program was broadcast live and the interview went well. Afterwards he asked me and my husband if we would like to co-present the program with him. Dave and I said that we would like to give it a try. During the weeks that followed we conducted interesting interviews on Romani history and culture and even did a test to get our broadcasting tickets. It was quite a satisfying time working hard to help the Romani cause with all the important material, interviews, articles and information

31

we had put together to help create a better understanding of Roma and for the messages we gave out to other Roma to join in and speak proudly of their Romani roots and have their voices heard. We also planned to do another Romani exhibit, like the one we did in Cairns. We collected material and together with Mr. I, filled in an application to get a grant from the council to fund the exhibit. In the meantime, Mr. I had lost his license for speeding, so we drove him and his wife around. We went to a couple of dances with them and to a Hederlezi celebration where Roma musicians played. Things were going along smoothly when, suddenly, overdue bills started arriving from the radio station‟s accounts department demanding payment for the Romani Radio Program airtime. Mr. I was the presenter of the program and had paid the bills for his airtime for 25 years. He even received government allowances towards the program to keep it running. Now, for some reason, he had let the bills go into the red and wasn‟t paying. It was hard to believe that we were now responsible for the bills. My husband and I were only there as volunteers to help him with his program. We sent a reply to the station‟s accounts manager saying it was not our responsibility to pay and told her to sort it out with the program‟s presenter. We also had a word with Mr. I and he said not to worry about it and that he‟d fix it. He told us that the accounts manager was crazy and that he just hadn‟t got around to paying. Well, things went downhill from there. He never contacted the manager and let the bills go further into the red. We were bombarded with demands for payment, which we forwarded to Mr. I. Our relationship with him became somewhat strained and if it wasn‟t for planning the Romani exhibit together with him, we probably would have left the program there and then. The radio station‟s manager was now saying he would close the program at the end of the month if the bills weren‟t paid. It was all rather stressful.

Not long after arriving in Perth, we met a friendly Indian couple, Rishi and Shruti, through the school my kids went to. They did a radio interview with us on the similarities between Indians and Romanies and talked about our history and the invasions by Mahmud and his army where he forcibly took our Romani ancestors from their homeland. Shruti and I had word lists with words that were the same in Hindi and in Romani. The interview was recorded at the station, then Dave edited it and it was broadcast the following week on the Romani Radio Program. Dave also uploaded it to

32

You Tube where it can still be heard today. My Indian friends took me out to a Birth of Rama celebration held at one of the Indian elder‟s houses. It was a great experience. The whole ceremony was so enlightening. I really liked the part when a fire was placed in the middle of the floor in the living room and was fed with gee and food. There was chanting and music and the decorations surrounding the God were so colourful. We danced and ate holy food after the god was blessed in the puja they held. At another ceremony of the Hindu god Krishna, that I went to with my Indian friends, I was able to bathe him with gee. It was a wonderful experience and each of us rocked the deity which was surrounded by flowers, then we held our left hand out for an offering of roasted nuts which were blessed and later, after the Swami had talked about Krishna and the different morals of each story, we listened to the temple music; bells, drums and singing, then danced and ate the vegetarian food that was prepared by the volunteers. I felt at peace

and promised myself that I would visit India one day.

My family and I went out a number of times with our Indian friends to a beautiful temple in South Perth and to a vegetarian Indian restaurant overlooking the Swan River in the city where you give a donation instead of paying them. We also went to each other‟s houses and Shruti showed me how to cook more vegetarian dinners. We had interesting discussions on Indian and Romani cultures and discovered that we shared the same outlook on many things, especially morals and attitudes. My Indian friend‟s daughter and my Romani daughter often dressed up in saris and Romani clothes and danced together. We all gave each other little gifts and I gave Romani books to my friends too. It was so nice to have them there in Perth

as our friends.

Meanwhile, the situation regarding the Romani Radio Program took a nasty turn. Dave and I turned up at the station with our kids as usual one Tuesday evening, ready to do the program. We had little contact with Mr. I in between shows and organised things just before going to air. After going into the studio, he said the management was going to stop the program after this one, because the fees had not been paid. We were angry with him that he hadn‟t paid the fees after he had promised he would. He kept repeating that he didn‟t have the money. During a break in the program, I went out to the waiting room to check on my kids. After a couple of minutes sitting

33

with them, I got up to walk back to the studio and ended up slipping over on the wet floor that had just been mopped by Mr. I‟s wife, who was the station‟s cleaner. She saw me go flying and just watched as I struggled to get up. She was a moody, unhappy person who never said much and just nodded when her husband told her to do something. No sign had been put out warning of the wet floor. It turned out that I had torn a ligament in my knee and I was in a splint for 3 months. I was in absolute agony for ages. The wife never apologized and her husband showed no sympathy towards me. They even lied to the station about what had happened, but the station manager said she was negligent and she lost her cleaning job. After that night, Dave and I had no contact with Mr. I until the funding had been

approved for the Romani exhibit.

A few weeks later, we had a phone call from the Roma musician we knew asking us if we could help his cousin, a 19 year old Romani girl who had come to Perth from Macedonia on a sponsorship visa to marry a young Romani man who lived in Perth. Under Romani law, the couple were married at a Romani wedding ceremony in Macedonia the previous year, but to comply with Australian law they had to register the marriage with a marriage celebrant at a registry office in Australia. Unfortunately, not long after the cousin had arrived in Australia, things turned sour and her future husband‟s family literally threw her out of their house and said that their son wasn‟t going to go through with the marriage registration now as they and the son had changed their minds. Her cousin and aunty looked after her, but the Australian government said she had to go back to Macedonia before her 6 month visa expired, or marry the man who sponsored her to come here. He refused to have any contact with her. The girl was living in fear of having to return to Macedonia, as her family, mainly her father, told her not to come back until she was married. Apparently, against the wishes of her family in Macedonia, she went to Australia as she was in love with the man and thought he'd go through with the wedding. She said she couldn't go back to Macedonia as her father and her family will shun her and make her an outcast. She'll have no life there, not even the community would accept her, therefore she wanted to stay here in Australia and live her own life. We tried to help and got her in touch with a visa specialist and he said the only way she could stay in Australia was with a 'protection visa'. She would only get one chance at this visa and she had to prove that she

34

would suffer in her own country if she went back. We did what we could by filling in all the forms and sending them off together with support letters. The next time we saw her was at the Romani exhibition. Her cousin was one of the musicians who played there. They were nice, friendly Romanies who came to support the exhibit. We were told some weeks later that her visa application was declined and that she had returned to Macedonia. While I was laid up with my leg in a splint, my Indian friends kindly visited me and brought homemade chai (Indian tea). After 10 weeks the splint was removed and I had to do leg exercises with a physiotherapist at the local hospital. I limped for months afterwards. Mr. I never contacted us until we received the approval letter for the funding of the Romani exhibit. He rang and said he wanted some of the money from the grant to pay for his radio program and other things not associated with the exhibit. After arguing about the amount he was wanting, we agreed to pay him some for the airtime he used to promote the exhibit. (Mr. I must have paid his radio fees as his Romani radio program was never taken off the air.) On the afternoon of the day before the Romani exhibit, Dave did the hard work of setting up the display boards at the venue. We put up pictures, songs, poems, paintings and write ups on our history and culture. We had a PowerPoint slide show with music and commentary playing and Roma musicians came and played on the opening day. The multicultural shadow minister opened the exhibit and the Director of the Office of Multiculturalism gave a speech. I made all the food for lunch and also did a talk. Dave took videos of the opening day and edited all the shots into a short feature which he later uploaded to YouTube. Mr. I‟s younger brother, Cino (the good singer) was there among the Romanies who attended, however, his other brother, Mr. E, and his wife, never showed up, even though we had sent them an invitation. My Indian friends came and I excitedly showed them around the exhibit. During the exhibit we didn‟t speak to Mr. I or his wife because of how insensitive they had been to me. Besides, he was too busy strutting around having his photo taken with the guests. Even though the Romani community had been living in Perth for decades, our Romani exhibit was the first of its type held there to show Romani culture and history to the public in a way that they could see that

35

we have an identity of our own. After reading the articles on the boards, a lot of visitors, including Romanies, came up to me and said the exhibit had given them an opportunity to understand a lot more about Romani identity and culture. All in all, I think it was a great success. Looking back on it, I could only describe our time in Perth as a bittersweet experience. Bitter, because as a woman, I was discriminated against by the older Romani men and being the big chiefs of the community they had the final say on matters. I also felt there was a lack of empathy from some of them for my Sinti Romani group, mainly due to the fact that they had very little comprehension of what the Sinti had gone through in WW2. Mr. E and Mr. I were always competing for attention and only showed interest in the Romani cause if they could promote themselves with it. I came to realise that their aims and mine lay on very different paths. The Romani

school that Mr. E had often talked about opening, never eventuated either.

The sweet experiences I had in Perth were meeting other nice Romanies, doing the Romani Radio program, holding the Romani exhibit and making friends with the Indian couple. I also did a small presentation on Romani culture at my children‟s school using a PowerPoint slideshow and artefacts that the kids could look at and handle. They were pretty interested and asked quite a lot of questions. It also gave my children a chance to be proud of their heritage without being insulted and stereotyped. I don‟t want my children to live in fear of speaking up for their culture like our forefather‟s did. So it was that after 18 months of living in Perth we, once again, packed our things, said good-bye to our Indian friends and headed off on another long trip. This time, it was to Coffs Harbour on the NSW coast. We spent 10 days on the road getting there, stopping to look at things along the way. While staying overnight in Port Augusta, SA, we met a friendly Rom named Jens, who lived in a small on-site caravan. He talked about his life in Australia and how he‟d ended up with only enough money to live in a rented caravan. He hated having to go to the showers and toilets that everyone used and when it rained he got wet having to walk to them. He said it depressed him having to live like he did, and watching all the caravans and people coming and going made him feel even more

36

depressed, because he would never be able to travel again. He was alone, divorced and on a pension and the highlight of his life was to see his grandchild every two weeks. His only bit of freedom was his car, which he drove in to his grandchild‟s, but he was a bit worried about driving it because there was a problem with the automatic. He asked Dave if he knew what could be wrong with it. Dave showed him a little trick to make the transmission last longer and go better. He happily suggested that Dave look for a job in Port Augusta because they need specialist car mechanics here, but Dave told him it was too cold in the winter for him and the family, and besides that, he had a job in Coffs Harbour to go to. The next morning we said good-bye to Jens and continued on our way.

37

BACK ON THE EAST COAST

After arriving in Coffs Harbour, we moved into a rented place, Dave started his new job and the kids went to school. We lived there for 6 months, then bought a nice home overlooking a valley at the back of Coffs Harbour. My kids had to change schools as well to one closer to our new place. Coffs was very hilly and had very pleasant scenery and pristine beaches; not a bad place to try and introduce our culture too. The annual Harmony Day celebrations were being held in the Botanical Gardens and we took the opportunity to set up a small Romani exhibit there. It was a busy day and a number of people stopped and looked at the display board and read the leaflets. We also took part in a school book drive by donating Romani books and sent a proposal for a Romani display to the new Coffs Coast

museum that was opening in 2012.

About 7 months after moving to our new house, my 11 year old son encountered a problem with a teacher at his school. The word Gypsy had been written with a small g in two of the homework sheets she had given out. My son said that Gypsy should be spelt with a capital G. In front of the whole class, she dismissed his comment and said that Gypsies were people that travelled around all the time from place to place. My son said that was wrong and that Gypsies were a group of people called Romanies and it must be written with a big G. I gave her a Romani information booklet on our culture, but she dismissed it and ignored the fact we were a true culture. It appeared that she didn‟t like being told she was wrong or didn‟t want to know the truth. Either way, there was a total breakdown of communication. The behaviour of the teacher only changed when our friend, and activist, Ian Hancock, wrote a letter to the school and we had a meeting with the head master and the teacher. Afterwards, the teacher invited me to do a talk on our Romani culture in her classroom. If we hadn‟t taken any action, teachers like her would continue to reinforce the Gypsy stereotypes to the school children in their classrooms. There are 12 million Romanies living in the world and 25,000 Romanies in Australia. I would say this teacher‟s attitude towards Romanies had been reinforced by false images from books written by non-Romanies and the stereotypes and myths that have been created by outsiders and the sensation seeking media reports such as the one that appeared in a major Sydney newspaper titled, „Beware. This is the

38

Gypsy season. Elderly people being ripped off by „gypsies”. The so-called „gypsies‟ were actually an organised gang of Irish travellers that had come to Australia to run scams. „Speaking with an Irish accent...‟ the media report had said. Gypsy car parts, Gypsy bikers, Junket Gypsies, Gypsy blouses. It just goes on and on... Outsiders using our word in the most ludicrous ways. It makes us furious and we would be so much happier if this stopped and people realised how wrong it is and the harm that it is doing to our culture. No wonder so many Romanies are scared to speak of their identity as they‟ll not be understood and are worried about being ridiculed. We need to speak up though, and it would work if more and more

do so.

Sometimes it feels like we need many hands like the goddess „Kali‟ to undo the damage of all who do us harm. As the Hindu‟s say, „Don‟t do to others what you wouldn‟t want done to yourself. And let it be your bad karma if

you choose to do wrong.‟

The public are more than willing to embrace Romani music, dance, and art, but very few know who Romanies actually are. People, going about their everyday lives, often come into contact with Romanies without knowing they have. We own houses and work in all kinds of jobs, such as furniture making, car repairs, advertising and animal rescue centres, to name just a few. We study and have Romani academics and our own Romani language and speak numerous others. We have fashion designers, restaurant owners, cooks, photographers, film makers, poets, writers and activists. We come from many different Romani groups, like Carol for instance, a Greek Romani whose ancestors moved throughout Queensland in the early 1900s looking for work, camping at places like Nudgee Beach waterhole on their travels. There are Romani human rights activists like Professor Ian Hancock, Ronald Lee, Yvonne Slee, Valery Novoselsky and others who work together for our Roma rights. It‟s so important to keep our culture alive and be able to speak for ourselves without fear of discrimination. We live in Australia, a multicultural country that supposedly sees its diversity as its strength. For the Romani culture to be included fairly in Australian society, the schools and the media must portray us in an honest, factual way. And they must start listening to Romanies themselves. So speak up,

be brave and just do it.

39

Let there be:

Understanding and Communication

Equality and Fairness

Respect and Empathy

Peace and Hope

Te avas baxtale - May we be fortunate!

40

ROMANIES

Gypsy romantic mystery, hiding in the night.

melodic haunted melodies, and magic witches flight.

Spells and potions, gold and wine

Gypsy women dancing and everything so fine. Day occurs, the dream is over and Rromani appear to you The "Gypsy" is gone and the fantasy you long for has all

but disappeared from view. This is not what you desire, to see something you do not wish;

for if you would see the injustice of day, the fantasy cannot exist.

Oh how tragic and oh how sad to not be willing to see or truly listen

to the wrong and oh so bad

of the countless deaths, screams and suffering from this fantasy so

very long, this fantasy still presently going on, this fantasy gone mad.

Oh how tragic and oh how sad, only time and history it seems will reveal of the children's cries and the media's lies, that you still cannot

recognize;

what is fantasy and what is real. These illusion's that steal the truth, of a thousand year old race,

that is just as beautiful and equal to all and deserves an equal place.

These fantasies and deceiving ways that keeps all humanity blind

from seeing what most Rromani people live each day,a thousand years

of attempted genocide. Why do you hate us so; you do not even know our name?

41

And now because they have written it Rromani,the Romanians have

found something else to hate and blame. No matter where we travel, no matter small group or grand, you think

we are some savage pest,

interfering on "your" land. We tell you where our homeland is, we come

to you to work but what man do you think will hire us, when they are taught to hate

fear and hide and thus not even recognize our equal human hands?

You send us to these public schools as children with "special needs"

as though our children do not understand have hearts, good minds or

even bleed.

Bottom of the barrel, garbage of the world, nothing to contribute,

every single man, woman, boy and girl. How would you feel if you were the one, how would you feel and be,

If out of all the races you were chosen to be Rromani? To be viewed without the world even knowing that we hold our head up

high,that we know we are not the fantasy

but a humble person of love, peace and equal dignity. For once, will you open up your hearts and minds to see of the real

truth and history of not the Gypsy fantasy but of the true and

indigenous Rromani.

Tamara Demetro Karldarash Ministi Vista Rromani

42

Here are some helpful links you can visit:

http://www.sintiromanicommunity.org/

http://rromaniconnect.org/

http://www.kopachi.com/

http://www.radoc.net/