Trafika Europe 8 - Romanian Holiday

Mircea Cartarescu

like medieval fortresses, another one looks like a tram depot, a third one is simply a solemn vault in the middle of a yard with not one single flower. When the evening falls, the scene gets soaked in blood like gauze and becomes unbearable. Most gardens have white and pale purple four o’clock flowers that darken the evening air with their smell. In others you can only see weeds. At dusk the people who live here go out in the street and squat in front of their strange houses, being stranger and more enigmatic themselves. Most of them are gypsies sheltered in the ruins. They don’t have running water or electricity and pay no taxes. There are also Romanians of the suburbs, carpenters

working in undertakers’ shops, tool men in this or that factory, tram ticket sellers. They sit around in the evening, their sleeves rolled up. You can also see them on the balconies – young girls dressed like prostitutes hang undershirts, bras, underpants and flashy coloured unidentifiable rags. Dangerous looking tattooed men smoke while looking towards the end of the street. They all speak loudly, seem to quarrel endlessly, however there is something so melancholic in them, that one must admit they are the most appropriate dwellers of my street. You have to go along the street for a long time in order to reach the house in the shape of a ship. It is the

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