needed to obtain “visas” and “authorizations” for free movement in the old kingdom of Romania. They were migrants, you know? Nomads. They just went and went. Because… our elders could tell you the stories, they always had trouble when a commune or a village didn’t want to let them in. The police was waiting for them and would just kick them out. You know? You’re not allowed to get bread here… so, when you get here, you’re not allowed in, you’re escorted out. They got visas, you come to the village for three days only, after three days, get out! Or if they didn’t want to let them in, they would just escort them to the next village, the next cop. Three days, a week, it all depended on the locals. And the police. If the police was nice, they’d let them in. I mean, it all depended on the people’s kindness. (Roma leader) After General Ion Antonescu came to power and applied the “Romanization” policy of his regime, during the summer of 1942 the Roma, and especially the nomadic groups were deported to Transnistria, together with the Jews, but to separate concentration camps. 1940-1944: the deportation years. This was the saddest period in the history of the community. The older Kalderash remember that it was General Antonescu who decided to deport them in 1942. All Roma families were supposed to be deported to Transnistria, on the basis of a census of the Roma population, their carriages and livestock. At first they were told that they will be given land and houses in Bug. They remember how all the families were gathered in Păuneşti commune, in the Bărăgan plain, with their tents, the carriages and livestock, all their belongings. After being counted and registered, they were taken in trains, cars, but most of them in their own carriages to the border. Their destination was a plain on the bank of Bug river, in Transnistria, an area where they were permanently surrounded by the military. The poor living conditions and the treatment they received from their guardians decimated the community during their three year stay in mud huts, suffering from hunger, cold, and disease. In 1944, the approximately 3,000 surviving Roma of the over 20,000 who had been deported�, started on their way to Romania together with the Russian army. The Kalderash representative, their leader, remembers that the return home was done on foot, because the Roma had been confiscated all their belongings: carriages, livestock, and especially the gold they had hidden in their carriages. It took six months for them to return to Romania, through blizzards, and often without food. Most of them were already sick, and there are stories about abandoned children and people dying of starvation on the way.
Integrated Community Development Program
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