TE20 Migrant Mosaics

Carmen-Francesca Banciu

Took something from here and set it there. Arranged this or the other thing. Practiced piano. Wanted them to catch me doing something useful. I never knew what they would find undone. I would check the kitchen. The bathroom. Got increasingly nervous. Would start shaking. Sometimes they were a day late. Then when they finally came, and I had forgotten to empty out the garbage. I would go get the strap. Order had to prevail. As well as discipline. One had to be able to rely on a comrade in every situation. I wanted to please my parents. No. I was imbued with the importance of becoming a New Human. In our house all adults were busyworking on this. I was always considered to be awonder child. My father liked hearing this. Iwas following inhis footsteps. Not a son. But still. In our tribe. Even our entire city had its eyes on me. That is what theyused totellme. I couldn’tafford todisappointall thesepeople. I grew up promisingly. My opinions were childish, but “healthy.” I was even allowed to correspond with foreign countries. I had a friend in the Soviet Republic of Moldavia, Svetlana Vrabie, which means sparrow in Romanian. Svetlana Sparrow. A Russian- Romanian constructed name. It corresponded to what Moldavia represented. I wrote to her in Romanian but with Cyrillic letters. Even I wrote in Moldavian. Moldavian was a Russian invention. The war had been over for some time. In the meantime, the Party allowed it. And the Fatherland ordered. Patriotism should flare up in us. Next to internationalism. And with all due respect to the Big Brother, the New Generation should not forget that Moldavia is Romanian soil. Even if it is a long-term loan. They tried todrum this into us, without straining our relations to the Soviet Union. 236