Working with the Roma

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Rachel Norton is working with the Presbyterian Church’s Young Adult Volunteer Program, with the Roma (Gypsy people) in the Ukraine over the next year. Copies of her letters will be placed on this website Rachel's Letters Letters 1 & 2 Letter 3 Letter 4 Letter 5 Letter 6 Letter 7 Letter 8 Letter 9 Letter 10 Letter 11

Rachel Norton - Letter #1 (september 2006)

Hello from Eastern Europe! This is my first newsletter about my experiences working with the Roma people in Nagydobrony, Ukraine. I don't have too much to report yet. On September 4 I began a three week language and culture training in Monoslo, Hungary.

I can be reached at this rachelenorton@gmail.com and would love to hear from any or all of you!
Peace and Blessings, Rachel

Letter #2 (October 2006)

The last time I wrote I was in Budapest about to begin my language course. So much has happened since then!

I studied Hungarian language at a two-week seminar in a tiny town called Monoszló. Monoszló is like a fairy-tale village; it's nestled between hills, encircled by vineyards, and has little houses surrounding the church. The language class was made up of the other foreign volunteers serving in Hungary and Hungarian-speaking parts of Romania and Ukraine. I met lots of wonderful people! I was also able to spend time with Melissa, my friend from the PC(USA), who is serving in south-western Hungary this year. It turns out Hungarian is a difficult language! Who knew? Fortunately, in addition to studying, we played games, had campfires, and went on excursions to a nearby town, Tapolca, and the largest lake in Hungary, Balaton. We also ate. A lot.

At the end of the language course, other volunteers who already know Hungarian arrived in Monoszló for an additional seminar. Our primary tasks during the four days were to get to know each other and to think about the challenges of the work ahead. This is when I met the volunteers with whom I would be working in Nagydobrony: Alma and Zálan. Alma is Swedish, and this is her second year volunteering with the program. She served in a village in Hungary last year. Zalán is an ethnic Hungarian from Transylvania, Romania. He has just finished high school and is taking some time off before starting university.

And now, here we are in Nagydobrony! I was pretty overwhelmed during the first few days. We were so busy going places and meeting people, and I couldn't understand anything at all. I'm feeling better now that I have something of a routine going, and now that my work has started. What should I tell you about life here?

Nagydobrony is a small village laid out along one long, main road. Practically all of its inhabitants are ethnic Hungarians, so although signs are written in Ukrainian, that language is not spoken here. This is the bishop's home parish, so this town is the most conservative one in the region. In fact, it may be a small blessing that I can't understand the sermons the bishop preaches, as I think it would be difficult for me to swallow some of the theological positions presented. The congregation at the Hungarian church is very interested in us volunteers: people want to hear all about where we came from and why we're here. They are also concerned that we get enough to eat; even though we have all of our meals prepared for us at a local boarding school, we still often wake to find sacks of potatoes, tomatoes, paprika, apples, or grapes left for us by some anonymous parishioner. These people are very, very generous with the bounty of their gardens. We have food coming out our ears.

I want to tell you about the work we are doing in the Roma camp, but first I think I should remind you who the Roma people are in the first place. The Roma are an ethnic minority spread throughout Europe, and also in North and South America. Originally from Northern India, the Roma came to Europe in waves beginning around the year 1000. The common name for the Roma, "Gypsies" comes from the early misidentification of these people as Egyptians. Also, very early on in their history, the Roma became the targets of racism and scapegoat-ism; popular attitudes toward them have not changed very much in a thousand years. Because of their nomadic lifestyle, the Roma spread throughout the entire continent very quickly, and divided into numerous distinct subgroups, each with their own traditional dialect and dress. In Eastern Europe, large populations of Roma were enslaved from the fifteenth- through the mid-nineteenth-centuries. The Roma were also victims during the Nazi regime; many people died in Nazi concentration camps. Today, the Roma in the region where I work have lost their traditional language and no longer travel from place to place. Instead, they live on the margins of the majority society, suffering the consequences of racial discrimination and crushing poverty. Only within the last thirty years have majority societies begun to make real efforts to address the situation of the Roma people in their midst, and have the Roma people themselves begun to organize and become politically active.

The Roma people of Nagydobrony live in two settlements at the edges of the village. Alma and I work in the South camp, where about fifteen families live. There are small houses made of mud-brick lining the dirt road. The building Alma and I work in is located at the entrance of the camp. It was built by Dutch volunteers five years ago and serves as a multi-functional community center.

The project Alma and I are working on is starting a pre-school program for the children in this camp. We have about twenty-five children, ages three and up, who come to us every morning. Our goals for the program are to teach the children some basics, like the alphabet, the numbers, the days of the week, the colors, the senses, etc., and also to prepare them for the behavioral expectations of that will be placed upon them when they enter elementary school. The children need to be taught to sit still, to follow directions, to wash their hands and faces, to say "please" and "thank-you," and so on.

We have been running the program for three weeks now and have found some surprising challenges. Almost all of the children in our older group are old enough to attend the Roma school, but they don't. We hope that most of them will begin school soon. There are some children, however, that will probably never attend school. I don't fully understand the reasons why not. We have been told that their families do not have enough money for proper clothes and shoes, yet they are wearing clothes (albeit shabby ones) when they come to the preschool. Why are these not adequate? We have been told that many parents do not see the point of sending their children to school, but we have never met these parents and do not know their versions of the story. One of our pre-school children is ten years old. He does not know the letters of the alphabet or the names of the colors.

Another surprise is the developmental levels of the younger children. For a while we didn't understand why some parents were sending their 18-month-olds to our program. Only recently did we realize that these children we thought were toddlers are actually three years old! They don't yet know how to talk! They can hardly walk! They have pacifiers in their mouths! I think part of the reason for this developmental delay is that children are often left all day in the care of their only slightly older siblings. It is not uncommon to see a five-year-old caring for a three-year-old, for example. Therefore, the children are chronically under-stimulated. I find this situation especially motivating for my work in the preschool.

Just as expected, I have fallen in love with our preschoolers. Like children everywhere, they are loud, and obnoxious, and frustrating. But they are also cute, and silly, and loveable. And I want so desperately for them to succeed!

This is an awfully long letter, and I congratulate you if you've read the whole thing thus far. To conclude I'll share with you something I've been thinking about very much since my arrival here. At our opening seminar in Monoszlo, a guest speaker spoke about the experiences that lead her to begin her service work with the Roma. She was half-Roma herself, and had spent her entire life feeling ashamed and hiding that part of her identity. She was volunteering at a children's leprosy home in Bangladesh when she realized that her mixed-race identity could be viewed as a great asset, rather than solely a hindrance. She was in the position to act as a cross-cultural bridge between the two groups. She suddenly felt called to return home to Hungary and start a project with Roma children.

I've been asking myself: who are the people I want to serve? Where is the "natural" place for me to be? The people most like me, (i.e. relatively wealthy, well-educated white people) don't need the same kinds of help that people less like me do. And what does that mean? To help me figure these things out, could any of you out there offer any advice about how to get into human rights work? How does one get a job doing non-profit work? Also, for any seminarians out there: could you tell me a little about what kinds of degrees are being awarded at your schools in addition to the MDIV? Thanks!

In my next letter I'll tell you all about a conference I just attended in Oradea, Romania! Also, I'll write about the peculiar situation of Hungarian minorities in Ukraine! And, funny anecdotes about village life in Carpathia!

Much Love to all, Rachel

P.S. Is there anyone out there who has not yet contributed to the Young Adult Volunteers program, which supports my work here? If you'd like to, you still can! Just write a check payable to The Presbyterian Church (USA), with my name and fund number on the memo line.

Also, if you want to be removed from this list, just let me know. Or, if you1d like me to send this email to another address, you can tell me that too.