My thoughts kept roaming, it must have been the mountain clean air I was not used anymore. I did not talk for quite a while, then my wife asks me a question no husband would like to answer: “what are you thinking of?” At first I wanted to say: a beautiful girl, I couldn’t possibly reply Aristotle’s Prime Mover, she might have said: “do you know what you and your Prime Mover should do?”
I was thinking we have to contact Rome Social Services to prepare the adoption papers as soon as possible.
“Now that I think of it my friend Angela has a lawyer brother and if I am not mistaken he previously handled an adoption case, right there in Romania”.
Wife, you're a genius, tomorrow we can go to his office so we can have clear ideas on what to expect.
The lawyer was a nice guy and he often took care of non EU citizens issues pro bono.
We got into his office and he kindly invited us to take a chair.
“Well you would like to adopt a child in Romania wouldn’t you?
We are trying but we have only bumped into difficulties so far. “I know, it is quite a long procedure and we still have half the work to do. The first thing to do is have all the documentation translated into Romanian and then have it officially signed it at the Embassy. When everything is ready I would suggest you to go directly to Romania and contact a local lawyer to handle your case”
How much will the whole thing cost?
“Do not worry, the cost of living there is 1/10th of the Italian one. And as far as I am concerned next summer I need to go there to sort out some issues and I am glad to accompany you.
Thank you we are very grateful but we will take care of travel expenses and your stay there, it is the least we can do.
“All right we will meet again when the documentation is ready so we can set a departure date.”
The social worker called us for a meeting at the International Service Office in Vittorio Veneto Street. After some introductory information she gave us the data we needed.
"Marco is six and a half years old, he has been in the orphanage since he was a few months old, he has a mother but he has never met his father."
Do you have some pictures of him?
"No, we don’t, we only have the essential data. At present contacts are very limited, Ceausescu was killed a short time ago and offices are being reorganised. The orphanage is Bretea Streioulu, a little village within Deva municipality, in Transylvania."
Well that means that we’ll pay a visit to Dracula!
"Please excuse him, he is always in the mood to joke." It is not easy to get there, as it is about 500 km from Bucharest, but it could be the right chance to visit some interesting places in Romania. If it is ok with you I am going to contact the Court of Minors in Bucharest to arrange a first visit in July.
Excellent! A lawyer with previous experience in adoption in Romania will come with us.
"Very well, then you already know everything regarding the papers."
We look forward to the departure date.
We went down the stairs and walk down in Veneto Street.
"Are we getting a cup of coffee?" Ok a cup of coffee in the legendary Veneto Street, but it does not look like the famous artists and actors’ meeting place it was in the Sixties.
"It is true, it also seems a little 'shabby'.
However ..... not even a picture, I wonder how Marco looks like
"You always said that we did not do it because we needed a child, but because we wanted to help someone, especially now that we can afford it economically, and… you worry about his look.
Well I am curious if he was a cute boy, I would be happier, well I think that this ‘blind date’ is a bit risky, but as you know danger is my job.
“I heard other couples say that they were not interested in the child’s appearance, but I am sure that deep down they were lying. I would be happy if he had good manners, then if he is good looking it is so much better”.
I was wondering what beauty is....;maybe it is the feeling I had when I first saw you. You were dressed in red, tight trousers revealing breathtaking curves…you were as my romagnolo colleague says a gorgeous gal.
"If it is a compliment I’ll take it, thank you, if it is not… and what do you mean by you were ?.....Look who’s talking! Have you looked at yourself in the mirror? When I first met you I said to my girl friend: he is not a real cutie but he has a nice body….it’s a pity otherwise it would have been nice…”
When you really like someone you tend to disguise you feelings, yours were just words my dear. In fact, two days later you called me; come on tell me the truth, if you think back did you capture my messages, the instinctive ones left unsaid? I am referring to the chemical ones linked to smell, because they are not there anymore, but you certainly perceived my desire to be with you.
"You are so formal, go on confess you just couldn’t wait to ….. I must admit there are few things that women like: to be desired with grace and not brutally. Despite everything…. I liked you, and to me beauty is in the eye of the beholder”.
To me it is not enough, it equals to say that beauty is beauty. I don’t remember when I heard this definition of beauty “pulcher est quod visum placet" where visum is cognitum, so "beautiful is what we like, once we get to know it."
"Listen to the Abruzzi mountaineer… Latin quotes!" Unlike you I studied Latin because it was mandatory when I attended middle school.
"Thus everything is beautiful as long as you profoundly know it, isn’t it?”
It would seem so, something with harmonic forms is beautiful on the outside, but it becomes extremely beautiful if you get to know it. Otherwise you would not explain why gorgeous women date ugly looking men and vice versa.
“Yes my dear but this is just theory, in fact the first thing you are attracted to is someone’s looking and it is often what keeps two people together. In twenty years’ time when you are all aches and pains who will stand you? You are already a pain now, let alone in fifty or sixty years”.
The same thing applies to you as well. Anyway I believe things change at that age. Passion and love give way to a feeling of deep friendship.
"Do you mean that at that age love isn’t there any more and we can only be friends? Are you preparing the ground to say…..we are friends, then everyone can do what they want”.
No it is not what I mean! Love and passion are stuff for people in their twenties. Love in a young couple is a strong almost violent feeling, often implying the idea of possession, it is exclusive and it does not allow intruders. It is also a very fragile feeling, it makes feel joy and sorrow. Then years go by and passion fades away giving way to thinking and knowledge, thus love slowly turns into a profound feeling of friendship. Well nature is amazing. Body deteriorates over time but mind strengthens. Balance must always be there, whoever does not bend to Nature’s will goes off balance along the path.
"Funny, then in twenty years’ time I cannot have my breast done?”
Well I would not say that…. A little improvement that implies minor changes is all right, but as far as I am concerned nothing extraneous, such as silicon. I would have the feeling of touching an alien.
“Women find it difficult to accept the ageing process, if I could I would have plastic surgery makeover, can you imagine being 60 with a 30 year-old body?”
I wouldn’t mind that to be honest, but you could have had some identity problems. A 30 year-old body with a 60 year-old mind……it would not work, and then it would be only a temporary solution, then when the collapse comes it will be dramatic.
“What a nonsense, are you afraid I’ll run away with a 30 year-old handsome man and leave you alone?”
No I am not! How come? Nature gradually sets you free from body slavery and you would be so ungrateful as to wish to rejuvenate, look for an improbable love during a season you no longer belong to? A young couple love is functional to reproduction and conservation of the species, love is an irrational and instinctive feeling, why look for that kind of love again if you are not able to accomplish that task?
“Are you saying that as you get older you are not able to love?”
Well no I am not saying that, in my opinion you love even more. You make love to your partner drawn by a deep feeling of friendship where every loving gesture, every caress has a meaning, there is no compulsion, no idea of possession, but gratitude, you share understanding with your partner and this feeling of having so much in common is also sealed by a physical unity.
“You’ve almost persuaded me, so from now on I’ll call you friend. By the way… friend… I am starving, will you please come down to earth, so we can find a restaurant?”
I would eat a plate of pasta, or actually two plates as I like it so much. Sometimes I think I would give anything for a plate of spaghetti.
“Well my dear, I already knew that”
INFORMATION AND TELEVISION
It’s July and everything is ready for our departure.
“Shall we take the doggie with us?” Perhaps it is a good idea, he could help with the first contact, kids like pets.
“Dear Max we are in your hands…I mean paws”
Max is a Yorkshire dog who basically lives in symbiosis with my wife, he is stuck like glue to her, constantly with her, he is well trained, perhaps he surrendered to my wife’s strict discipline and to this respect she is more strict than a German; the doggie patiently puts up with her, or I may say we both do that.
At Fiumicino airport we boarded a Yliuscin aircraft, it does not look very nice, both the lawyer and my wife are a bit worried.
"Will it make it to Bucharest?"
Do not worry, it will, don’t let the aircraft appearance trick you, here in Italy aircrafts have to meet specific requirements in order to operate, they are checked by a specific commission.
To tell you the truth, given the situation in Romania, I also had doubts.
Two hours later we landed at Bucharest airport and after exhausting checks, which could have been faster offering a few dollars, we finally got out.
The lawyer had two friends waiting for us: a girl and a guy.
"Hello Dana how are you? Fine, thank you." I’d like you to meet my friends Antonio and Maria. "
Dana was a very pretty girl and I was surprised as she spoke Italian very well, we got into the car and headed for central Bucharest.
Ah by the way I am Antonio, Tito is my nickname.
At the airport I had the feeling of being watched, I perceived a sort of suspicious atmosphere through their thorough checks, through the agents’ glances, probably a legacy of Ceausescu’s former communist regime.
"This is the main square, a few months ago here people were shooting in full revolution, the hotel is in front of us, it is not a four star hotel, but it is a good place."
As soon as we got out of the car we were surrounded by a gang of kids, all stretching out their hands.
"Italian"? 10 Lèi …. 10 Lèi ....."
They spot us everywhere!
Dana had to sort things out. I do not know what she said to them in Romanian but they stopped asking.
"They are mostly Rohm children, there are also kids who ran away from home or have been abandoned. Many of them are homeless and to keep themselves warm in winter they shelter in Bucharest sewers”.
Dana thank you so much, we’ll see you tomorrow to hand over the documents to the Court of Minors.
What shall we do lawyer?
"I would suggest to rest a little, then we can meet for dinner at the hotel."
I expected ten days without spaghetti and I realized that as soon as we sat down at the restaurant.
What is ciòrba?
"It is a very good soup."
Then I’ll have ciòrba and steak so at least I know I’ll eat the meat.
"Lawyer, my husband is a squeamish and on top of everything he is lost without pasta."
Well I also want to taste some goulash.
It is the first time that I visit an East European country, I mean a Communist country, and it seems things are not easy here .......but you are Communist?
"No I am not, when I was a lad I used to like that party. You know, in the 70s ..... I had the feeling that they were those who wanted equality, social justice and I was led by a feeling of revenge against the people with power than by a belief. Businessmen were not employers but they were depicted as criminals, masters in the worst sense of the term, exploiting the working class. And to a young idealist what is more appealing than the idea of fighting against the bad guys? So I joined the pack, followed the trend, the wealthier my friends were, the more comrades they became. Then there was the positive side, the political vote at school. We needed to be equal at all costs even in our heads. Collective farms multiplied because property was defined as a theft.”
I have to admit that intentions were good but if the outcome is what we see now here in Bucharest, there is a glitch in the system.
Talking about the famous slogan "property is theft" it seems it belonged to Proudhon French philosopher and sociologist, and not to Marx. They hated one another, because Proudhon had dismantled the "Capital" even before Marx completed it. I understand that Marx could not bear Proudhon, listen to what the latter said about Communism, I wrote it down on a piece of paper because it is terribly harsh.
As far as man is concerned:
"Communism originated from the idea that man is a fundamentally bad being, homo homini lupus, he does not have any right to exercise or any duty to fulfil toward his fellows, only society makes him and dignifies him and turns him into a moral being. This is nothing more than human failure made it as a principle, it is repugnant to the definition of the human being and it implies a contradiction”.
As far as society is concerned:
“In Communism society, state is outside and above the individual. Hence, the former is the only one which can undertake an action. Nobody else has liberty of action. The power is centred on an anonymous autocratic, unquestionable authority whose benevolent or vengeful providence distributes punishments and rewards from above. It is not a society, it is a pack led by a hierarch who – by virtue of law – owns right, freedom, human dignity.
My goodness what a nonsense! Marx was right to be upset.
Furthermore history proves that the progress of justice is proportional to the development of liberty. It is the opposite of what happens to Communism, religion and to every formal organisation which tends to absorb personality into society or state.
What is certain is that people have aversion to forms of association used and needed by animals, such as pure communism. Man, free being par excellence, cannot accept society unless he can enjoy a particular condition in. This particular condition is different from sociability and superior to it: it is defined as Justice. "
"In fact, Communism is also driven by a sense of equality and social justice, but those conditions are so far-fetched and grossly established that it seems to me they are exclusively limited to wealth division and distribution of goods”.
This low level form of justice made sense at the beginning of the century, but now it has certainly fulfilled its task. I feel like laughing when I hear Mr Cossutta saying he is a communist.
Either he does not know what Communism is, or he is just fooling himself. To me he looks a right-wing social democrat
"Well, there is also Mr Bertinotti that aims to re-communism. I did not understand whether Lenin’s Communism or another social organization system.
If that were the case he should invent a new word, as Communism is a very specific thing, otherwise nobody understands anything. "
Dear lawyer, this is another Italian flaw, we like – as I say – fishing in muddy waters, we like unclear things, approximation. By nature we are very tolerant even when we shouldn’t be so.
In regards to language for example: one can present himself at the election as Communist Party without having any feature of real communism and the odd thing is that he gets a lot of votes.
A Greek philosopher of which I cannot recall the name, did not speak with people because he was convinced that it was impossible to communicate with words. I am not saying to reach those extremes, but at least if I say "table", I hope that whoever is listening to me understands that I'm talking of a flat top supported by on or more legs. Every word holds a precise meaning otherwise it is a total chaos.
"I never thought about this aspect."
In fact it does not take much to deceive people: an adjective placed in the right position and bingo…. Take for example the CD acronym, which stands for Christian Democracy, where I come from we use Christian referred to a person, meaning poor Christian, poor thing.
The message my mother gets is that CD is only Andreotti’s Christian Democracy, the others instead are beastly democracies.
It is odd but all the parties which name themselves with the term democracy are often the ones that hardly put it in practice. I believe it is peacefully accepted that we have chosen the democratic system with all that it implies referring to political and economic liberty. I think that Democracy is neither Left nor Right nor Centre, Christian, Muslim, beastly. It is simply a form of government choice for our society.
Parties - as the term itself implies, mean parts only playing a role within the Democratic system. The sheer fact that they name themselves with the term Christian Democrats or Left Democrats necessarily implies that they deny the Democratic system.
To avoid any misinterpretation – for example to confuse Christian Democracy or others for the Democratic System - it would be advisable to remove the term Democracy from party acronyms.
"Lawyer please do not give him encourage him to carry on, otherwise we’ll still be here at midnight and tomorrow we have to get up early to go to Court".
"I must say that it was a pleasant evening. When we are stuck in a set routine we never deal with these subjects. Both politician and media, except for a few cases, do everything to draw away people’s attention from politics The greatest majority does not care, they have the impression that all politicians are all the same, that all is based on give and take of personal favours”.
And then we are all fooled and we don’t even realise it. They managed to persuade us that our vote is worthless, it does not matter who you vote, nothing changes. This is the result of the proportional electoral law, basically these savants say: you little thing you cannot grasp anything about politics, just vote for my little parish and I’ll take care of the rest. After the elections occur – in which everybody obviously won – consultations begin, and they go on for months. Regardless what you told them to do they negotiate with others and find alliances to decide what to do and how. A year later they argue, just like children throwing tantrums and they start all over again.
The funny things is that in forty years they oiled the political machine so well, that through the type of information we receive, it is impossible to understand whose fault it is.
“Although there is a wide choice of newspapers to choose from no-one clearly and simply explains how things are; then they complain that people do not buy and read newspapers”
Wife, if you think that you can be informed by reading newspapers, you are really naïve, they often tell the opposite of what happened. I had the chance to verify it by listening to Radical Radio Live from the House of Parliament, where you can listen to all the sides of the story, and I can assure that it is better than going to the theatre. There is no Santoro calling Ruotolo .....? Ruotolo .....? just to interrupt a politician as soon as he tries to hold a sensible speech. So the best you can do is to begin a sentence uttering subject, verb but you are not allowed to mumble the object. If Santoro does not like you utter a verb, an incoming call interrupts you.
Listening to Parliament Live is sure fun, and in addition to that you realise what kind of people you sent to the House. You can get the satisfaction to verify how big politicians are glaringly criticised by fighting minorities, but the next day there is no hint at that in the press. To keep people in the dark you do not necessarily have to lie, you just have to carefully omit some parts to overturn the situation. This is the method carried out by almost all national newspapers.
As for TV programmes it is even more fun. Years ago they showed electoral programming where at least you could roughly grasp a party government programme. Then they realised there was virtually no audience and without investigating the reason for it, they stop broadcasting them.
Electoral programming were replaced by debates where there are no rules, everybody speaks simultaneously, interrupting others and often the situation degenerates in a total chaos and it is impossible to understand anything. To complicate things they invented “par condicio” (equal conditions) which is the tool to legally discriminate a political force and deprive TV presenters’ responsibility. Before listening to debates I would like to know how every single political force is planning to govern and deal with certain issues such as drug, artificial insemination, labour, employment, euthanasia etc.
Instead we are compelled to watch a total bedlam, a nonsense where politician have nothing to say or suggest
Lawyer do you pay RAI tax?
“Yes I do, but to be honest for the kind of service they supply it would be better to throw TVs away."
What makes my blood boil is that time dedicated to political information is normally very limited, even during electoral campaign. In this period debate standard time is the following: a 30-minute political programming with minimum of five guests, often at midnight because before they broadcast some silly cows show or ‘unresolved mysteries’ or something similar and the usual question is this: MP we have two minutes, please tell us how you would like to govern Italy and how you think of solve issues of employment, justice, drug, scientific research, artificial insemination, abortion, unfair competition, the de facto couples, industry, the greenhouse effect, waste disposal emergency, immigration, etc .... etc. .. the poor thing inevitably utter meaningless things, and three minutes later we are all pleased and happy to cry together with Raffaella Carrà show because uncle Peppino could hug his daughter he had not seen for forty years.
As a nice guy from my village says: “why is that?”
We have three Rai channels which are almost the same thing, we pay Rai tax, they also make money out of advertising, why one of the three channels cannot allocate time for political programming? Would you like to sort out the par condicio (equal conditions) issue in Italy? Well let’s suppose that in Italy there are 15 parties in the elections. Two months can be allocated for the electoral campaign
Every night at 8.30, primetime hours, each political party has 2 hours to explain to the Italians how they would like to govern ITALY. The daily schedule is extracted at random and reversed in the second, third and fourth round of programme.
Each political party would have a total of 8 hours to manage as they please: they could set up employment agencies, distribute pasta, and given the significant presence of altar boys in Parliament, they could celebrate a Mess, or talk about politics and problem solving.
"How come....! Would you allocate the same time for everyone? I mean for parties with 2 or 3% of votes and with 18%, 20% or 25% of votes? "
This is another joke with curious implications and it does not only apply to Italy, for example: a party - with 25% of votes that previously caused troubles in the management of public affairs – is given 25% of TV time for the political campaign to carry on damaging Italy and deceiving voters.
According to their logic, logical thinking is based on what the majority of people say:
Thus if 99 morons state that something is right and one only states that it is wrong, democratically and pseudo logically the 99 morons are right.
This theory humorous feature - namely to allocate TV time on the basis of the previous elections – has the following result: Prodi, Berlusconi, Fassino, Fini need to have 8 hours to explain how they would like to govern Italy, whilst Di Pietro, Rotondi, Craxi, Emma Bonino can do it in two minutes.
It equals to say ..... those are fast and smart guys, unfortunately we are a bit slow and thick, please give us some extra hours on TV, please be good!
They insult themselves, calling themselves thick.
Alas we are the real thick ones allowing this pseudo democratic practice. If I am not mistaken in a sport or electoral competition they all start at the same starting blocks, with the same rules. If a political party is admitted in the election in compliance with the in-force law, it has to have the same TV time as the party which reported the highest consensus in the previous consultation. Theoretically every political party has to have the possibility of getting 51% of votes.
"Dear husband, I do not think that Italians would be willing to bear such political sermons every evening for two months, the audience would plunge immediately."
I would not say so, I am actually surprised RAI and Mediaset big brains have not taken it into account. Could you imagine Mostella - who after exhausting his exorcisms and invectives against the Radical devil and after sanctifying embryo and spermatozoon powerful life along with Pera, - forced to talk about plans and real issues?
That would be fun to see him on TV live, to watch him together with Archbishop Milingo and exorcise Capezzone swearing he has never used a condom in his life and he is not a murderer! The fact is that the vast majority of these gentlemen has hardly something to say, they are third rate professionals able to only argue against someone. They are frightened to have 8 hours available for them to hold a speech to the Italians, because after promising a few assessors’ seats, distributing some pounds of pasta they would conclude with pride declaring to own 3-4-18% of Italians’ votes;……the famous hard shell or structural consensus almost all parties have.
In a mature democracy the hard shell is non existent, it is actually the denial of democracy itself. Whenever we understand that a political party with 3% of votes could reach 51% of consents in a legislature term we will be citizens and not subjects at last.
We – poor Italians – are so thick that the more these gentlemen fool us the more we vote for them. For example in a referendum we expressed 84% of votes against political party public financing. What did these three-card players do? In Parliament instead of obeying to the sovereign people they doubled the amount allocated for party financing, giving a clear example of democracy and rule compliance. What would a standard person expect?
Well ….at least not to find a shadow of these people at the next elections, but they are still there. They learnt this game extremely well.
Italians are not citizens, but in the best assumption they are soccer supporters, there’s no difference between a Milan’s supporter and a political party’s supporter: they are both dominated by the need to belong to the pack, which by nature is not led by reason and it confuses its wishes with facts. Unconsciously you identify yourself with the Christian Democracy or Communist Party’s pack….and so on. If the pack fails it feels like a personal defeat.
In the worst case Italians are part of a business or ethnical clan
Italian parties’ Massari (no offence for the true Massari) are fiercely opposed to referenda especially if it concerns the electoral law, because it can jeopardise their survival.
“It’s a disaster! A national catastrophe! But how can it be possible, how can the sovereign people’s opinion be a disaster for democracy? Basically Massari are saying: you sovereign people don’t have a clue about politics, don’t bother us, we are in charge and we have to operate otherwise you won’t be able to secure a position at a the Post Office for your son. On the other hand, there won’t be political parties which organise peace parades against the American devil.
Italian Massari are so persuaded to be in a true democracy. Firstly they don’t have any trust in the sovereign people. When the people has the chance to rule on something, Massari do the opposite. Secondly they don’t even have the dimmest idea that with 2% of votes they could reach 51%. They know they are not in a democracy but in a partitocracy (party-controlled system). Their idea of democracy is the one of a business or ethnic clan. As a consequence they fiercely support the proportional system and consider your vote something they own.
The opinion vote in Italy is not considered and I wonder – in principle - what is the difference between these Massari and the Taliban clan leaders in Afghanistan
Poor naive Italian ....! He would like an electoral law to approve a single-ca