I swear I can tell you in which country I am just by the way peoples' faces look like when they walk in the streets. Any traveler will know what I'm speaking of.
Here in Romania, it seems as if the entire country is gripped by one collective bad mood. Make that very bad mood. People almost glare at you. The fact that they hardly even smile at Alan emphasises just how unusual it is to smile at a stranger. Not that this deters me most of the times. When people make eye contact with me on the street -- and it's funny, but they do -- then I smile. Very rarely do I get a smile back and if, it's a shy and quick one, as if they were doing something shameful. The only exception are mothers and very old people, but they don't smile at me, they smile at the kids. So there's that.
The other day, I walked up Strada Roma with Alan and David in their Lil' Limo double stroller. We get a lot of interested and baffled looks with this stroller. It seems to be a very unusual thing to have.
So we walked along and I see this woman coming down the sidewalk in our direction. Dark, short hair and slim figure, rather arresting looking. She is carrying a toddler on her hips and next to her walks an elderly woman, pushing a stroller with another toddler. She looks up, sees me and the babies and gives me this warm, wide smile. It felt so good to be smiled at like that. I gave her a big smile back and felt a little rush of joy. So simple to make me happy. And I thought - how nice! Finally someone who's not ashamed of smiling! There is hope for this people!
And as she walks past me, she nodds and says, in a perferct American accent, "Hi", and then continues to listen to the woman next to her talking in English.
Well. My little rush of happiness got a bit dampened by the fact that it was, in fact, not a Romanian stranger smiling at me.
But that disappointment just lasted for second or so. Then I started looking forward to our next visit to the States for yet another reason: lots of smiles there. Nice.
Posted by claudia at October 6, 2003 11:47 AMHi!
You don't know me.. and I don't know you.. but I start reading your blog since I discovered it on the net.. about 10 days ago. I loved the picture of David & Alan in the sink.
I have a dog, called Misha, so all the examples I give are related to him. When he was small, every time I took him for a walk in the Herastrau park or just near our house.. lots of people stoped and smiled and talked to us.. even couple of times there was 2 people arguing and they stopped and play with Misha .. and started to smile to each other.
I think it is sad that you feel like this about romanians.. They know how to smile and they know how to be friendly.
I can't wait to read the new messages in your web log.
Have fun!
Anca & Misha
Posted by: Anca & Misha at October 6, 2003 12:45 PMHi Anca and Misha,
Thanks for reading the blog! It's nice to know that people do.
Don't get upset about the missing smiles. It is striking to a stranger how little people smile on the streets here - especially compared to the States, where even policemen will smile broadly at you. I've had many visitors comment on that.
I didn't mean to imply that Romanians are not nice or friendly. The Romanians I've met all were very nice people and smiled a lot. Just as one is walking down the streets, people really don't smile very much.
Now, Herastrau is a different thing altoghether. Maybe because people go there to enjoy themselves?
Greetings from Dorobanti,
Claudia
Posted by: Claudia at October 6, 2003 12:55 PMHi,
Europeans of my long-ago acquaintance often seemed better able to recognize "auslanders" in their midst than Americans are. Possibly because we Americans are such mutts ... But how pleased they are at such recognition seems to vary. I was usually greeted more pleasantly in Munich than Paris, for instance. I'm not sure how that limited experience reflects on the general bon hommie of either place. Maybe the Parisians are as nice to each other as Bavarians -- but less open about it in front of the Yank?
Posted by: Pouncer at October 10, 2003 08:17 PM