Family. Claudiu believes that the best age for marriage is between 27 and 35 years old for a man, and 23 to 28 years old for a woman. He would like to have two children. Claudiu married his wife six years ago. A mixed blood, she was born in Bucharest and is 24 years old. She is a Business School student. Claudiu confesses that there have been conflicts with his in-laws early in the marriage, mostly caused by a lack of communication. On the other hand, Claudiu’s mother did not want her son to move out of her house. Claudiu does not wish to speak about his marriage, because “these are private things, and I protect my privacy. All I want to say is that I love my wife very much”. Claudiu and his wife do not have children yet, but he wishes that his children “be real human beings who respect the Christian moral values, get an education and be real leaders, regardless of whether they turn out to be boys or girls”. Claudiu lives in the same house where he grew up, with his mother, and the family of his brother. He mentions that the choice to live with extended family was not motivated by poverty, but by the strong family ties. Major decisions are made by common agreement, and all the members of the family participate in the process. The head of the family is Claudiu’s mother, but his own point of view is important for the rest of the family. Within his marriage, Claudiu says that decisions are also made by agreement between the spouses, although he tends to impose his own views. I never imposed my point of view, except when I had to, I mean, because my wife wouldn’t know how to do something, or when we’d go somewhere where my wife had never been, I had to impose my own views. The conflicts inherent in an extended family are nevertheless minor and shortlasting. Most of the times, these are caused by failing to respect “the rules of the house”, which are established by Claudiu’s mother: “for instance, sometimes my mom thinks that my brother forgot ‘to say thank you for dinner’ or he left his stuff around, you know, small things, but they are important for us. We don’t want to disturb the order.” The house is managed by the women: Claudiu’s mother, his older sister, and his wife. Everybody pools in the money needed to pay the bills: “we do everything together, it has always been so, there’s no such thing as cooking for oneself or buying detergent and only doing your own laundry, we do everything together”. Life satisfaction. Claudiu is able to identify indicators of the quality of his life, albeit subjectively: family harmony, a circle of friends, social appreciation, money. From all these points of view, he considers himself very happy. His only source of
Integrated Community Development Program
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