PressOne Quarterly #8

VOLUME 8

#TRAIASCACAPRAVECINULUI A MOVEMENT OF AFFIRMATION

Magic LIVING BEYOND OURSELVES

Duty of Honor THE IMPACT OF A SINGLE PHYSICIAN

CHERISHING ROMANIA

Subscribe to PressOne Quarterly at

WWW.PRESSONE.US If you’d prefer to pay by check, mail the shipping addresses and $50 per annual subscription for our quarterly magazine to: PressOne Quarterly PO Box 498065 Cincinnati, OH 45249

2

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Thank you for supporting independent media in Romania!

© 2018 / PressOne / All rights reserved December 2018

Welcome In his 1930’s book My Romanian Journey, British writer Sacheverell Sitwell marveled at the “limitless potential of Romania’s talented human stock and the unspoilt beauty of the land.”

RW Seton-Watson, British journalist and resident-expert in the Austro-Hungarian Empire wrote in 1948 about “the great energies and qualities of the Romanian people, perhaps the most naturally talented in all Eastern Europe“.

Every culture has it’s strengths and weaknesses. One of the challenges in realizing our potential lies in the popular expression “Sa moara capra veninului”. It means “I hope your Goat dies too”. PressOne commissioned GFK, a top market research firm, to survey 1000 Romanians to study the effect of envy on our culture. It affirmed that envy is a serious issue for 80% of Romanians.

PressOne decided to take action in dealing with our own envy issue. We gave 5 of our competitors a statue that says “Long live your Goat!” I hope you enjoy Voicu Bojan’s article on this humble start towards becoming a culture of encouragement and affirmation in our next 100 years. www.pressone.us

Romania’s potential is limitless when we help one another realize our unique individual potential.

3

Codruța Simina is a journalist for PressOne based in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. In her 14 years of work, she has been covering politics, public spending, education and health. Codruța is also the author of two poetry books and thousands of articles, but her following mainly appreciates her short, unimportant posts on Facebook.

MEET OUR JOURNALISTS:

CODRUȚA SIMINA

For the past few years, she has been slowly shifting to features and interviews, treading on the thin red line between kindness and humor that is inside every human being, which she believes links us all together.

4

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Codruța is 35 years old and in 5 years envisions herself fishing somewhere in the mountains, never catching any fish, but enjoying nature’s view in silence.

CONTENTS 07 / #TRAIASCACAPRAVECINULUI PressOne launches a movement of affirmation.

07

17 / MAGIC “It’s amazing to see how much people want to be a part of something bigger than themselves”.

25 / UNCONQUERED We are masters of our fate, captains of our souls.

33 / VOLUNTEER GRANDPARENTS Grandparents remind us how important it is to give.

25

41 / DUTY OF HONOR Dr. Andreea Moldovan has created the cleanest hospital in Europe – in Romania!

49 / AUNTIE MIA “To the best Mom in the world.”

63 / THE MAGNIFICENT SULIMANS A family from Bucharest built a new life in refreshing silence.

77 / FIRST BOOK

41

www.pressone.us

63

Actresses are teaching kids to go beyond memorization.

5

6

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

#Traiascacapravecinului VOICU BOJAN

PressOne launches a movement of affirmation.

7

#TraiascaCapraVecinului There has been a lot of talk about Envy in the PressOne office for the last few weeks. We have a saying in Romania, “Sa Moara Capra Vecinului”. It means “I hope your goat dies too”. It runs deep in our culture and is a means of coping with all the disappointment in our history.

It’s become clear it’s no laughing matter: rancor and spite are exhausting. They compromise relationships and, what’s worse, they leave you feeling miserable.

It is an aggressive form of envy that keeps us from realizing our potential.

So enough talk, time for action!

On Tuesday, November 6th, Mihnea, Trevor and I paid a visit to five editorial offices in Bucharest, and we chose to thank them by gifting each of them a personalized goat.

Our goats are statues as tall as a man – they look like the mother goat in the famous Romanian tale “The Goat and Her Three Kids”. They are made from fiberglass, with interior metallic reinforcement.

On the pedestals exists a text for each of the five media companies we chose in this campaign called Traiasca Capra Vecinului (Long live your Goat!).

8

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

To those complaining about the dissonance in the campaign title we say: it is deliberate. Let’s stop picking holes in things and let’s focus on the good achievements of those around us, essentially those we work with every day.

On the 100th anniversary of Romania’s Great Union, instead of celebrating with a serving of sausage, bean casserole and ribbon-cutting ceremonies, we thought something else may be appropriate. Let’s provide a gift to our rivals in a celebration of competition. After all, these are the people we watch and from whom we can learn a lot.

With help from our technical-tactical team (thank you, Trevor, Cosmin, Cristi, and Marius), we also made a site based on this idea, in the hope that others might emulate our small gesture.

Each goat was covered in a curtain on which the words “Shrug off the envy” were printed.

Photos: Voicu Bojan

9

#TraiascaCapraVecinului

Mihnea Măruță, PressOne editor-in-chief (left) and Teo Tiță, Europa FM news editor-in-chief.

With this campaign, we want to make you think about those whom you envy and who helped you become better or more competitive. Which means, in general, more appreciation for one another and less occupying our minds with the assumption that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.

Their goat is elegant and it balances two radio microphones. This is how the story unfolded.

10

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

As Mihnea says: Things have gotten to the point where we are publicly acknowledging our values only if they are dead or if they leave.

Too often we are ignoring the people who are near us, who inspire us and help us grow. So, let’s try to be more appreciative of others – our friends, our neighbor, our competitor or even our rival.

Since we are a press business, we started with media enterprises, in the hope that we may touch a nerve in our social consciousness and playfulness.

We began the tour de force of the unveiling of goatstatues in the morning, at Europa FM. Vlad Pietreanu, EuropaFM

Some of the members of the HotNews editorial team, in front of their Calea Victoriei office.

Driving past the corporatist landscape of Pipera, we reached downtown Bucharest and found the earnest, but friendly editorial team of Hotnews. Their goat is dynamic, on roller skates, and carries a rocket-pen in the back. It turns people’s heads when they pass by.

The Recorder offices are close by. Self-titled “young in years, experts in the job”, our colleagues pursue

We should envy them for that, at least a bit, because this is our pursuit as well. Instead we offered them a goat videographer, to encourage them.

We hope they enjoy owning it and feed it with awesome subjects.

Photos: Voicu Bojan 11

All the journalists of Recorder (those who were not in the field) came to the “unveiling” of their goat.

honest and impassioned journalistic work, with a focus on subjects of public interest.

12

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Ten Years in the European Union BARBU MATEESCU

How is Romania doing?

13

#TraiascaCapraVecinului

The guys of Times New Roman and their fur caps.

After lunch, we continued our tour and reached the dominion of the reinventors of Dacian wit: Times New Roman.

It was rather cold outside, so the guys went out wearing their famous fur caps and then went on with an enthusiastic Facebook live broadcast.

14

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Although their slogan is “God, past over the Romanians”, we did not past them by. Instead, we gave them a smiling, positive goat who sits with its legs crossed.

The fifth unveiling took place at the Pro TV headquarters, where we were welcomed by the team of “România, te iubesc”, which we also love sincerely, without a trace of envy, because their reporting has valor and substance.

Their goat is a Statue of Liberty holding a TV set on which “Gândește liber” (“Think freely”) is displayed.

The meeting was sincere and tremendously invigorating.

The gift-goats will be parked for a while in front of the five editorial offices, then they will be moved to greener pastures, in Herăstrău Park, so that passers-by are able to take a look at them. There’s an opportunity for selfies.

And, who knows, maybe they’ll go on a trip across the country, encouraging others also to love instead of “to loath” one another.

Photos: Voicu Bojan 15

Three reporters from the “Romania, I Love You” team accepted the goat: Rareș Năstase (second from left), Cosmin Savu (second from right) and Alex Dima.

MAGIC RALUCA PANCU

“It is amazing to see how much people want to be a part of things bigger than themselves.”

MAGIC

“We put down a chair and a hospital bed at the Galateca Gallery and vowed that we would not get up from the chair until we collected 100,000 text messages at 2 Euros each.”

18

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

In only 23 days, the campaign Together for MagicHOME, initiated by Melania Medeleanu and Vlad Voiculescu, reached its target. More than 100,000 people contributed to building a home where families of child cancer patients will be able to live free of charge during the treatment process.

Based on the success of the initial MagicHOME campaign, another €1,800,000 has been raised and construction of the building is almost complete.

“We have been helping families of children with cancer since 2007. This was the first time we tried crowdfunding. It was amazing to see how much people want to help and be a part of things that are bigger than themselves,” says Vlad Voiculescu.

The 2018 campaign Together for MagicHOME demonstrated that the solidarity of thousands of people is an extremely effective force for change.

PressOne sat down to talk to Melania Medeleanu and Vlad Voiculescu about their passion for cancer care in Romania.

SO HOW DID YOUR PASSION FOR CANCER CARE GET STARTED? Vlad Voiculescu: It began in 2007 when a 28-yearold friend of mine was diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphoma 3 weeks after her wedding. Even though this cancer could be effectively cured with an inexpensive chemotherapy (ABVD), the local hospitals did not have this medicine. I did some research and discovered that the World Health Organization has a list of essential, inexpensive cancer medicines. Sadly, the Romanian State health system does not have many of these essential medicines.

I went to a pharmacy in Vienna where I was working to buy three of the chemicals in ABVD. The Bleomycin cost €25, the Vinblastine cost €12 and the Dacarbazine cost €7. The drugs that would save my friend’s life cost less than €50 a treatment.

I purchased enough medicines for her treatment, packed them in a backpack and brought them to her in Romania.

MAGIC In a few years, we had a network of more than 400 Romanians filling up their backpacks with inexpensive cancer medicines and bringing them home to help cancer patients. Since we started, we have distributed these medicines to over 2,500 cancer patients.

The most painful part of this work was seeing children with cancer. In 2010, I saw the film about “The Hole in Wall Gang Camp” started by Paul Newman. I cried like crazy as I saw kids with cancer smiling and having fun. So I used my savings to start buying land in the village I grew up in with the dream of creating a similar summer camp in Romania. I managed to buy the land on the hill where I had so much fun playing as a child.

Melania Medeleanu and Vlad Voiculescu.

In 2014, Melania and I started our first camp on this land. We provided medicine and lots of fun for 31 kids. We called it MagiCAMP. MagiCAMP has doubled in size every year. After the Colectiv fire in 2015, we started ConnectivCAMP for child burn victims in 2016. In 2017, we added a BlueCAMP for children whose siblings have died of cancer. In the summer of 2018, we had a total of 272 children at our camps.

AT THE END OF LAST YEAR, PRESSONE MADE 10 NOMINATIONS FOR PERSON OF THE YEAR IN 2017 AND YOU TWO GOT THE MOST VOTES. HOW DID YOU REACT TO RECEIVING THIS TITLE? Melania Medeleanu: With a mixture of surprise and joy. I felt extremely honored because I looked at the other nominees that were chosen and any of them easily deserved this title.

If I consider Tibi Uşeriu, Carmen Uscatu or Oana Gheorghiu, or the other nominees, I would say that we are doing much less than what they are doing.

DO YOU FEEL THAT PEOPLE HAVE CERTAIN EXPECTATIONS FROM YOU? Melania Medeleanu: Yes (they both laugh). With every day that passes, I get the feeling that when people gain confidence in you, they also begin to demand more and more of you. This is a natural process. What we really desire, beyond meeting their expectations, is to have them join us.

Vlad Voiculescu: To join us, or any of the other nominees. There are many people who are doing a lot of good in our country. If everyone contributes a little, it can make a world of difference. We just need a little bit more trust in one another.

Summer Camp at MagiCAMP.

Photo: Lucian Muntean 19

WHAT DID LAUNCHING THE TELL US ABOUT THE MAGICHOME PROGRAM MEAN TO YOU? CROWDFUNDING CAMPAIGN

20

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Melania Medeleanu: First of all, it gave us the confirmation that there was a great need for such a project.

Vlad Voiculescu: For me, it’s an old cause of frustration (both laugh). It is easy to incubate ideas, but they linger for years because we are afraid to try things that have never been done.

Melania Medeleanu: It also meant a lot that so many wonderful people and organizations like JazzCommunication, Rogalski Damaschin, and the Galateca Gallery, worked together to develop the approach.

Melania Medeleanu: The idea was very simple. We put an empty chair beside an empty hospital bed belonging to a sick child and said that chair would be occupied until we had raised 200,000 Euros. We had no idea how long we would be sitting in the chair!

There were many people who thought we were complete fools. They asked us “Where are you going to find people who are willing to sit in that chair?”

Maybe the success of this campaign came from the fact that people understood that 2 Euros per month is not a lot. The excuse of not having enough money quickly faded away. It also only took just 30 seconds to send a text message with the word MAGIC to 8844, so the barriers to giving were removed.

MAGIC

“SOME WROTE PRAYERS, OTHERS SHARED THEIR STORIES.” Vlad Voiculescu: The people who came and sat in the chair were absolutely extraordinary.

Everybody had a story and everyone wrote in the little notebook that was placed beside the bed.

Many things just happened organically, without us having thought of them. The notebook, the teddy bears that gathered there on the bed. Some brought icons, others wrote prayers and others shared their own stories.

The stories were heart wrenching. We collected some of them to publish in the future but in the meanwhile, each person posted something on the campaign’s Facebook account and left a piece of their story there.

WHAT LEFT A LASTING IMPRESSION ON YOU DURING THE 23 CAMPAIGN DAYS IN THE CHAIR? Vlad Voiculescu: For me, it was the stories of those who came and sat in the chair. That’s for sure.

Melania Medeleanu: And all the objects the volunteers left there. At first, they left a book here and there in case someone wanted to read. Then they began leaving icons and teddy bears.

At the end of the campaign, we needed many boxes to gather up all the objects that had been left on the bed. There was no space left in the room. It was a room full of love.

Vlad Voiculescu: We’re going to build a storage shed beside MagicHOME where we can leave things for MagicBOX, a program which collects parcels of goods for poor children.

21

The Galateca Gallery Photo Source: Facebook

MAGIC

SO TELL US ABOUT MAGICHOME Vlad Voiculescu: It will be a home for families to live for as long as their children are in Bucharest for cancer treatment. Any family that has a child diagnosed with cancer and is coming for treatment in Bucharest can call us. We will help with transportation and accommodations and can provide absolutely everything they need.

We also have a meeting room in the house where parents and children can arrange sessions with psychologists or simply hang around and talk to one another.

After the success of our first crowdfunding campaign, we raised another â‚Ź1,800,000 and MagicHOME is almost complete.

IN ANOTHER INTERVIEW, YOU MENTIONED THAT YOUR BIGGEST DONOR IS AN INSTITUTION IN SWITZERLAND. WHAT DO YOUR PLANS LOOK LIKE FOR THE UPCOMING YEARS? Vlad Voiculescu: In Switzerland, if a person becomes rich and wants to leave their fortune behind, they do not leave a car or a family house, but rather a sum of money. They leave the money with this type of institution called a Stiftung. A Stiftung is a foundation with a set of guidelines established by the donor about how the money must be spent after they die. Each donor defines these rules according to their own values so that their family members can thrive and become better people.

We were contacted by a 60-year old Swiss woman whose grandmother was originally from Romania and left an impressive fortune in her Stiftung. Her grandmother’s stipulation was that this fortune would be used to support two projects in Romania.

MagicCAMP is one of the two projects chosen in Romania.

They told us from the beginning that they are not interested in making a one-time donation. They are interested in partially funding a sustainable project that has other sources of funding. They want to ensure that the project will be able to last for countless years.

This is why our crowdfunding is so important.

Donors want to support the things that Romanians are supporting and believe in.

HOW HAS THIS WORK CHANGED YOU? Melania Medeleanu: You redefine the meaning of a problem.

Vlad Voiculescu: What happens to all the volunteers that sit in the chair for MagicHOME or come to MagicCAMP, even if it’s only for a few days, is that it turns their world upside down.

After that, our priorities change and our fears slowly disappear. You realize that the problems we face are mostly related to trivial matters. It requires a little reset to put things in perspective and become grateful for what we have.

Unconquered BIANCA FELSEGHI

We are masters of our fate, captains of our soul.

Levi Polgar lost his right arm when he was six years old.

Unconquered

Levente Ioan Polgar shows off the Medal of Honour he received in 2017 from General Nicolae Ionel Ciuca, Romania’s Chief of Defense General.

26

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“Suffering is part of who I am. I can’t imagine living without it. Since I was born, suffering was a natural aspect of family life.

There’s no point in saying that I desire good for myself, since I don’t know what good is.”

Levente Ioan Polgar exhibits the sense of detachment caused by a man who has long been at war with his fate.

Levente lost his arm in a train accident when he was six years old. Now, at 37, he became the first person with a physical disability to participate in the 6633 Arctic Ultra Marathon – perhaps the world’s most challenging competition.

He lives in Aiud, where he is well known.

Everywhere he goes, he’s greeted with “Hello, Levi!”

The professors and students of the University of

Alba Iulia helped Levi raise 3,200 British Pounds – the registration fee for this year’s extreme ultramarathon in the Arctic Circle.

Levi is not a novice at ultra-marathons. He has run almost 200,000 kilometers, about the same mileage your car might have when you decide that it “did the job” and it’s a good time to sell it.

“I don’t go to the Arctic Ultra to confront my demons. I want to see what will win: my muscles, or my brain?

All ultra marathon runners have a problem.

We feel completely at home in the midst of suffering. We don’t share the pain in our hearts. We all have a hidden suffering. The pain of running is our medicine.”

CHILDHOOD Levi was born in the heat - a hot summer day in July. As a child, he was frequently ill with asthma and ear infections, causing him to be all too familiar with Romanian hospitals.

Levi fell into a coma and spent the next two years of his life in a hospital. He developed sepsis and the doctors told his family that the possibility of living was little to none.

He started school when he was six years old, but he never completed the first grade.

Photo: Levi Polgar, Personal Facebook Page

“In first grade, there was a classmate that used to tease me a lot. It got to the point where our families got into a big argument.

My classmate’s father worked on a horse cart and would horsewhip me whenever he saw me walking down the road.

I lived on a street next to the Aiud train station. The train tracks crossed right through the street and there was no pedestrian footbridge.

Levi Polgar before his accident at six years old.

27

One day, the oldest daughter of my classmate’s father pushed me in front of a train. The train was driving in reverse,” recounts Levi hurriedly. He does not want to dwell on the most difficult experience of his life.

Unconquered

“At that time, Gentamicin was hard to find.

Astoundingly, they managed to get their hands on some. I think I took so many antibiotics that the hospital I was in is still suffering from a depletion of resources caused by yours truly!

I had five operations and endured many medical mistakes. I would gladly erase those two years of my life.”

He says that he forgave those who harmed him and accepted personal responsibility for his fate. It was the only way to stop himself from obsessively asking the question why.

“I didn’t finish high school. I dropped out.

There are no heartwarming stories to tell.

The truth is that I was a hooligan. I’m sorry to say it. But without the boy I was then, the man I am today would not exist. The past needs to be respected.”

THE SECOND SUFFERING

28

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

As a teenager, Levi got involved in judo and bodybuilding, which is how he bulked up to 230 pounds. At 19 years old, he moved to Hungary where he began working on construction sites. To impress his co-workers, he would lift up two sacks of material at the same time, each one weighing 100 pounds.

After spending eight years away from home, he returned to Aiud. He began to spend days at the bedside of his dying grandfather. His grandpa was the man who raised him and taught him the importance of assuming the consequences of your actions.

“It’s very difficult to lose the only person who believes in you. The person who has taught you so many things. The person who can tell you when to stop.

What to do next? It felt like I had too many loose ends to tie up. That I was consciously disadvantaging myself. Grandpa’s death was a wake up call to take responsibility for my life. That’s when I started running, leaving my vices behind and dropping the extra pounds.”

INVICTUS Ever since he began running, Levi started raising funds for different causes. Since 2015, he has been organizing a marathon in Aiud. The donations collected from the participants help fund two NGOs that run social and charitable programs for children.

Levi has also helped raise money for Romanian military veterans who participated in the Invictus Games. In 2017, 15 wounded Romanian soldiers made their debut at the Invictus Games in Toronto.

ESPN wrote a great article on these Romanian heroes injured in Afghanistan.

Prince Harry formed the Invictus Games in 2014 after his military service in Afghanistan. The Games allow wounded war veterans to compete in 20 different sports and find new strength in their injured bodies.

“I did not leave Romania as an angel and turn into a little devil while in Hungary.

I was a little devil when I left and I came back the same way,” affirms Levi.

Back home in Aiud, Levi got Hepatitis A at the same time his grandfather died. He faced great suffering for the second time in his life. That was when he decided what he would do next.

We are Unconquered – Article published by espn.com.

Photography and reporting by Ioana Moldovan.

Levi (in white), together with the Invictus Caravan.

Invictus was written in 1875 by William Ernest Henley after he had one leg amputated and was undergoing multiple surgeries to save his second leg. Henley spent his whole life in poverty, but his poem has inspired millions of people. In the darkest hour of World War 2, Winston Churchill ended a speech before the House of Commons with the closing line of Henley’s poem:

“I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.“

29

“Invictus” is a poem by William Ernest Henley that was published in 1875.

Unconquered

UNCONQUERED Invictus is the latin word for unconquered. It is a perfect description for Levente Ioan Polgar.

“The biggest burden in my life is not that I lost an arm or failed to finish high school.

It is that I live in a country where the government offers us nothing.

It would be easy for us to stew in self-pity or hatred for living in a system that seems to actively work against us. But it is far better to be the masters of our own destinies, no matter the cost.

If we think of our ancestors, they would rise from their sleep, grab their swords and set out to fight. We pride ourselves in being patriotic, but in reality, we don’t do very much at all.

Do you have a Romanian passport? Then we need to do something about it. It’s our country, not that of our neighbor’s. It’s as if you lived in a house and others came to clean, paint and care for it. We forget that it’s our responsibility.”

30 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Every time Levente Ioan Polgar runs in an ultra marathon on a rough, hilly terrain – he sees it as an opportunity to prove that he controls his own destiny.

Step-by-step, mile-by-mile, the runner establishes a rhythm in which all of his thoughts fall into place, ultimately finding a path towards coherence. When he reaches the finish line, says Levi, all the colors are in the right place, like a solved Rubik’s Cube.

Levi has a type of optimism that makes you feel ashamed when you dwell on the obstacles in your own life.

Going out for coffee with him is a true reality check.

32

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Matilda Ziegler, 71, worked as a nurse, but today she’s a “volunteer grandmother”.

Volunteer grandparents IULIA MARIN

Grandparents remind us how important it is to give.

33

The Senior’s Club, Day Center for Retirees in District 4 of Bucharest.

“That’s who I am now, I’m the on-call grandmother.”

In a Bucharest hospital, a baby connected to a variety of medical devices squeezes the finger of the elderly woman who has just bottle-fed him.

“The little one doesn’t want to let me leave,” she says, full of emotion.

34 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

The heart monitor is a testament to the power of affection. After being held and coddled, the child’s heart rate has decreased and his blood pressure has returned to normal.

The scene is a tender illustration of the strong bond between grandparent and grandchild. Even if the grandparent is a volunteer.

“THESE GRANDPARENTS HAVE REMINDED US HOW IMPORTANT IT IS TO GIVE.” Mihaela Ungureanu is the Director of the District 4 Social Assistance and Child Protection agency in Bucharest. Four years ago, Mihaela decided that it would be a good idea for the seniors in her

District to have a place where they could meet and enjoy each others company. She named it “The Senior’s Club.”

On March 26, she welcomed us to the club. Seniors in the club were imitating the dance moves of a young instructor, busy swinging his hips to Latin vibes.

Last year, as the club was growing on a daily basis, Mihaela Ungureanu had a new idea. What if some seniors in the club could learn foreign languages, origami and dance and then teach these activities to the children who were in the care of Child Services?

“We started the program “Volunteer Grandparents,” with the recognition that many of the grandparents who attend our Seniors’ Club do not have grandchildren living in Romania. Some of them do not have grandchildren at all.

Alternatively, many of the children in the care of Child Services never had the chance to be doted on by grandparents or even hear a bedtime story read to them by a grandparent.”

Volunteer Grandparents The program “Volunteer Grandparents” had its debut in a shelter for homeless single mothers.

More recently, the program made its way to the Marie Curie Children’s Hospital in Bucharest.

“The experience of feeling useful and having responsibility was extraordinary for our grandparents. Naturally, the children were so happy to have the grandparents to engage them in their own unique way.” recounts Mihaela Ungureanu.

“In the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of the Marie Curie Hospital, there are many small children with complicated medical issues that require lots of medical attention. The children need to be cared for, but more so than anything, these children need affection,” explains Mihaela Ungureanu.

Initially, 37 volunteers registered for the volunteer program in the Marie Curie Hospital. Now, the number of volunteers has reached 400.

Many of the infants in the Intensive Care Unit are from impoverished parents from around the country. These children remain in the hospital for weeks or even months at a time. Frequently, familial circumstance does not allow for the babies’ parents to remain with them.

Mihaela Ungureanu

Photos: Lucian Muntean 35

Some of the first activities of the “Volunteer Grandparents” captured on camera. Photo: Archive of the General Directorate of Social Assistance and Child Protection, District 4.

36 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

The Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in the Marie Curie Hospital.

There is a three-week training program for the grandparents. They get drilled in the hospital’s procedures for hygiene and infection control, under the supervision of Cătălin Cârstoveanu, head of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

“These grandparents reminded us how important it is to give and have brought much attention to the importance of volunteer work. It was extraordinary to see how many people joined this volunteer team to ensure that the children are wellcared for,” said Mihaela Ungureanu.

“HE FELT THE WARMTH OF HUMAN TOUCH DURING HIS LAST FEW DAYS ON EARTH.” Mrs. Matilda Ziegler (71 years old), is the first volunteer grandparent we met.

Before she retired, Matilda was a Neurological Intensive Care nurse. But she was drawn to the program for another reason - as a child she was raised in a foster home.

Volunteer Grandparents

“Here in Romania, we should develop many more volunteer programs so that people could visit seniors’ homes, foster homes and centers for children with disabilities. I know that not everyone feels comfortable working with disabled children. But we shouldn’t differentiate between a healthy child and a child with disabilities,” she says.

Matilda’s first ‘grandchild’ was a 20-month-year-old boy with Down Syndrome. He was the “oldest” child in the unit and had many complications. His new grandmother fed him with a syringe because he could only be tube-fed through his mouth.

“When I went in for the first time, the nurse asked who wanted to spend time with him and I volunteered. When I took him in my arms, he felt my warmth for him. He immediately calmed down! I felt extraordinary in his presence. I didn’t see the fact that he had Down Syndrome, I saw a little boy.”

The little boy died just days after Mrs. Matilda held him in her arms for the very first time.

“He felt genuine love during his last few days on earth… He was so dear to me,” she says.

His death did not discourage Mrs. Matilda. On the contrary, she continues to volunteer at the Neonatal ICU department of the Marie Curie Hospital today, firmly believing that children experience healing and recovery, in part due to her presence.

37

Mrs. Matilda, former nurse.

Photos: Lucian Muntean

“We spend two to three hours with them. We change them, bottle-feed them, sing to them and play with them. We make the sounds of a dog, a cat, or a rooster. And we see them light up. You see joy on their face. That’s the most important thing!”

Volunteer Grandparents

“IT WAS THE FIRST TIME I HELD SUCH A SMALL CHILD IN MY ARMS.” When the seniors hear that we would like to learn more about their experiences as volunteers, one by one, they come and speak to us about their “grandchildren.”

All of them agree that this experience has changed their lives for the better. All of them agree that they are always eager to get to the hospital.

I go to the hospital half an hour early. I love her very much! You know, this project has changed my life, her life and now I can say, our lives…”

As the volunteers at Marie Curie Hospital get ready for the morning feeding, Lina Truță, (79 years old), comes over to tell me a secret:

As I walk out the doorway, another volunteer grandmother, whispers to me:

“You know what, Miss; I’ve never had a child! For the first in my life, I have the opportunity to change diapers…”

She slowly leans back on the chair. She is serene and looks as if she has just rid herself of a great burden.

38 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“For me, being that it was the first time I held a small child…my legs felt weak the first time I rocked her in my arms. Now, she is always on my mind. It breaks my heart to know that she is alone. I can’t wait to go back and see her.

“What you see here is kind of like an experiment between an elderly person and a child. Two separate souls that are in need of affection. Remarkably, the affection is reciprocated! We feel the affection as do the children!”

Lina Truță (79) says she first held a baby in her arms just a few weeks ago when she began the volunteer program.

Maria Maga, 69 years old.

Two of the retirees, Mrs. Ioana and Mrs. Maga, work as team caring for a baby with serious medical needs.

Ioana Antonescu (73) has ten grandchildren from her three sons and two daughters. But that was not enough for her.

“We’re going to see our granddaughter,” they laugh.

The volunteers confess that the complicated medical devices and wires were intimidating at first, but the nurses encouraged them to be ambitious.

Mrs. Maga says she enjoys relearning the songs of her childhood, as she sings to her granddaughter.

Her co-grandma, Mrs. Ioana proudly adds, “She is only three and a half months old and already beginning to play with her fingers and toes.”

Sometimes, they are alarmed by a sneeze or a hiccup.

39

“One day, I was feeling very anxious but the nurse calmed me down: She said the baby’s blood pressure is lowering because she felt so safe in my arms. I stay here with my little girl, I sit with her until she falls asleep. That’s who I am now, I’m the on-call grandmother.”

Photos: Lucian Muntean

“I began coming here because I never had grandchildren. Now, I’m attached to this little girl. For four hours a day, I hold her and sing to her. We learn a new song everyday. The nurses say she now only goes to sleep if she is rocked with the gentle sounds of music.”

Now, they all hold the children in their arms with wires connecting the baby’s heart to a monitor.

Once they step in the hospital door and wear their green dressing gowns, these women turn into professional grandmothers — meticulous, preoccupied, rigorous.

40 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Andreea Moldovan teaches Romanian doctors how to prevent nosocomial infections.

duty of Honor IULIA MARIN

Dr. Andreea Moldovan has created the cleanest hospital in Europe – in Romania!

41

Andreea Moldovan teaches Romanian doctors how to prevent nosocomial infections.

In the last 10 years, over 15,000 physicians have left Romania, exasperated by the deficiencies in the Romanian healthcare system and the significantly higher salaries in Western Europe. They also had the feeling that things would not improve anytime soon.

42

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Seven years ago Dr. Andreea Moldovan returned to Romania after working for three years in Switzerland. She was not naïve, but she was very determined to bring the same infection control standards she found in Western Europe to Romania.

In 2011, Andreea Moldovan became the Coordinator of the Department of Prevention and Control of Nosocomial Infections at Saint Constantine hospital in Brasov. In 2013, after just two years of Andreea’s leadership, the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized Saint Constantine hospital with the “Cleanest Hospital in Europe” award.

Validated with this international recognition, Dr. Moldovan has been systemically working to share the knowledge she gained abroad to save hundreds of lives in hospitals across Romania.

NOSOCOMIAL INFECTIONS Nosocomial infections are infections that patients acquire while in the hospital. In the United States, the Center for Disease Control estimates that 5 to 10% of hospital patients acquire an infection while in the hospital, leading to 90,000 deaths per year.

Many of these hospital born infections are resistant to antibiotics.

In Romania, the problem is still taboo. Numerous analyses in specialized publications and the media reveal the prevalence of infection in Romanian hospitals. But the numbers are underreported because both physicians and the hospitals fear the risk of sanctions.

Solutions to reducing hospital infections in Romania never get off the ground because the State does not want to recognize the problem.

Duty of Honor

FAMILY OF PHYSICIANS Born in 1973 into a family of doctors from TîrguMureş, Andreea Moldovan dreamed of following in her parents’ footsteps from a very young age.

In 1998, she graduated from medical school in her hometown with a GPA of 9.61 out of 10.

After completing her residency, she specialized in infectious diseases and continued to work in Tîrgu-Mureş.

The turning point in her career came in 2009 when she received an honorary scholarship from the “Hôpital Cantonal de Genève” through a program sponsored by the International Society for Infectious Diseases.

For two and a half years, she worked alongside of Didier Pittet, Professor of Medicine and the creator of a protocol that significantly reduces the rate of nosocomial infections in medical clinics. At that time, the World Health Organization had just named him the External Lead of the Global Patient Safety Challenge. Dr Pittet still holds that position today.

His protocol became known as the Geneva Model and is considered the gold standard in measures taken to prevent nosocomial infections.

Andreea Moldovan arrived in Switzerland around the same time when these procedures were becoming standard practice for Swiss doctors.

She specialized in caring for patients who had weakened immune systems due to transplant surgery. As a result, they were more vulnerable to potential infections.

During this period of time, Andreea’s husband, Bogdan Moldovan, was studying multi-organ transplants at the same hospital in Geneva while their daughter was registered in a local school.

After completing his internship, Dr. Bogdan Moldovan received a job offer in Belgium, but the couple decided to return home.

“There was the dilemma of going back to Romania or going to Belgium, where my husband had received a job offer. My husband and daughter wanted to return home, and I submitted to the majority vote.

I wouldn’t leave Romania now, because I get the feeling that things are starting to move, slowly but surely. I don’t know what the future has in store, but I believe that alongside of our colleagues who are more and more supportive, we’re going to manage to do something,” says Dr. Andreea Moldovan.

Subscribe to PressOne Quarterly at

If you’d prefer to pay by check, mail the shipping addresses and $50 per annual subscription to:

43

PressOne Quarterly PO Box 498065 Cincinnati, OH 45249

Photo: Lucian Muntean

WWW.PRESSONE.US

Dr. Didier Pittet and Dr. Andreea Moldovan

DIDIER PITTET SAVES LIVES WITHOUT ANY SCALPELS OR PHARMACEUTICALS “From the beginning of the 1990s, it was clear that the overwhelming majority of nosocomial infections were transmitted by our hands. So we were confronted with the issue of identifying the critical moments of when medical staff needed to wash their hands,” explains Dr. Didier Pittet, who was in Bucharest March 13-15, 2018.

five particular instances with the use of a hydroalcoholic solution – not the traditional soap and water.

THESE FIVE INSTANCES OF PRACTICING HAND HYGIENE ARE: • • • • •

Before touching the patient; Before giving the patient an infusion; After coming in contact with biological liquids; After touching objects that have come into contact with patients; After ending an interaction with a patient.

44 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

When Pittet began studying this issue, the World Health Organization did not have a standard of good practice for hospital hygiene.

Having observed that the typical hand washing process was too time-consuming, the Swiss doctor developed an alcohol-based solution that would be permanently available to medical staff. His concept is as simple as it is efficient. It has reduced the rate of nosocomial infections by 50% in the hospital where he worked in Geneva.

His method, formally called the Geneva Method, entails that medical personnel clean their hands in

The Swiss Professor of Medicine, Didier Pittet.

Duty of Honor

A SISYPHEAN TASK When she is asked how her team in Brasov was able to to reach such a high standard of hygiene in just two years, Andreea Moldovan states that it was a “Sisyphean task” which necessitated lots and lots of patience.

“I have a small team of three people and we use the water torture method – one drop at a time. It’s been an extremely laborious task, hindered by resistance, refusals and arrogance from people who like do things their own way.

We made it through this period, slowly, like how small snowballs get rolled in the snow and are suddenly sizeable in mass and consistency. But it’s a routine that must be consistently sustained,” she explains.

After her hospital won the award, Andreea Moldovan did not rest on her laurels. She continued to work while studying to become an epidemiologist.

Andreea has given over 60 lectures in public and private hospitals all over the country. The purpose is to convince the hospital administration and medical personnel to adopt clinical protocols for ensuring good infection control, which have been bearing good fruit for years in the West.

“I took up this cause as a debt of honor. Not to be egotistical and keep the knowledge to myself, but rather to pay it forward, to pass it on to others. I did this alongside of a team of colleagues with whom I’ve been collaborating more and more closely.”

If you balance the material costs and health benefits, this is a no brainer.

And when patients die of preventable illnesses, there is a moral cost that we doctors must carry on our shoulders,” she says.

So in that case, why is the snowball effect so difficult to initiate?

“There is resistance to anything new, over anyone who comes in with new information other than what we previously deemed to be good. This reluctance to accept the new exists in absolutely every single domain.

45

“They tell me that because I work in a private clinic, it’s easy for me to talk about

I responded that I’m familiar with the price of solutions and materials because that is one of my responsibilities in the hospital where I work. These solutions cost just 2000 to 3000 Euros per month, while a week in the hospital for a patient with MRSA or other complicated infections can cost 25,000 Euros.

Photo: Lucian Muntean

She would like the Geneva Model to become the standard of care in Romania so that illnesses provoked by nosocomial infections become exceptions and not the norm. But Dr. Moldovan says she has met many skeptical physicians during her presentations throughout the country.

disposable materials and high quality solutions, because my hospital can afford them.

46 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

In addition, if this information comes from someone in a private hospital with more resources, it becomes even harder to accept. Fortunately, I’m seeing this less and less in the lectures that I give and in the hospital meetings I attend.

The fact that we have so few epidemiologists is also a problem because they are the primary specialists who are expected to intervene in cases of infections or epidemics.

A medical epidemiologist proves to be very timely when making the observation that something is going wrong. But it is often a battle of one physician against many who are more powerful.

There are many hospitals where professors of medicine consider themselves to have a larger breadth of knowledge and do not give the epidemiologist due importance,” says Andreea Moldovan.

In addition, medical training has not kept up with the times, she believes.

“I passed the epidemiology exam last year.

I was given a case study from 1945 and other case studies from the the 1980’s and 1990’s! But medical references and clincal protocols have changed radically since those eras as well. “

“Romanian Hand Hygiene days” conference speakers.

“I GET THE FEELING THAT THINGS ARE STARTING TO MOVE, SLOWLY BUT SURELY.”

“Our colleagues in Geneva are extremely open to teaching us from their experience and sharing their protocols with us. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel as there is one that already works.”

47

At the Bucharest conference organized with Professor Didier Pittet, the doctors welcomed the participation of the new Health Minister, Sorina Pintea. According to them, she had been on the list of participatants even before being appointed, when she was still the manager of the County Hospital in Baia Mare.

“I had the fortune of getting on a good path right from the beginning.

Photo: Lucian Muntean

Andreea Moldovan describes herself as an optimist.

She says that compared to the situation five years ago, when multiple roadblocks were put in her way, she is starting to see more specialists taking interest in her lectures.

Now, Andreea Moldovan hopes that the force of her arguments — based on studies and models that work — will cause a systemic change.

Auntie Mia RALUCA PANCU

- What did Auntie Mia teach you?

- To be a good kid, to live. Many other things.

(Costin, 12) Auntie Mia, is a blond, blue-eyed woman with a soft, tender voice that fills the room with gentleness. To her 40 children, she is the best mother in the world.

Twenty years ago at the age of 43, Mia Scarlet and her husband took 6 street children into her home. Since then, she has helped raise 170 children. They all come from families where domestic violence has left deep scars.

Today, many of Mia’s children have graduated from university. Some have started their own foster homes.

None of them have forgotten who saved them.

These children and their families are expanding the virtuous circle of goodness founded on the love of one woman: Mia.

Mia Scarlat shows us a letter: “For the best mom in the world.�

The door of the Chiajna house is open, a sign that Mia Scarlat is waiting for us. We walk in and follow the sound of her soft voice, which leads us upstairs.

As we make our way up, our eyes fall on all the drawings, paintings, diplomas and pictures of smiling children that take up every inch of free space.

They all whisper of joy.

This 5 story house is now home to 40 children. The white-washed walls are invisible under framed landscapes, butterfly decorations and vases full of flowers. The waves of color overwhelm us with hope.

50

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

We find Mia surrounded by a group of children to whom she is reading a story.

Before she manages to greet us, another group of children arrive home from school. They throw themselves at her, smothering her with affection.

They hug her, tell her they love her through words, actions and smiles.

Auntie Mia One of them, a handsome little boy wearing a blue vest, hands Mia a letter:

Mia’s tone changes when a lively little girl in pigtails comes into the room, throws her arms around Mia’s neck and kisses her.

“For the best mom in the world. I love you with all my little heart.”

Underneath her square lens, Mia’s eyes begin to water. “Look how nice his writing is…” she shows us the letter once we have settled in her office.

There is not a bare spot on the wall in Mia’s office.

It is full of pictures of her and her husband, as well as paintings, article clippings or simple words that fill in the spaces between the children’s diplomas and trophies.

HOW DID EVERYTHING BEGIN? Mia sighs. She is not a stranger to the pain these children have experienced. She also endured a childhood ridden with domestic violence.

“I was one of these children, I lived a very hard life…a childhood without beautiful memories, just lot’s of suffering.”

Photos: Lucian Muntean 51

Auntie Mia “This is love,” smiles Mia.

“God somehome carried me through turbulent waters so I could do what I do today.

I first tried to kill myself when I was 12 years old.

There was so much pain all around me and I couldn’t bear it anymore. Now I work with children who have tried to commit suicide at 7 years old. I know what it means to get to this point of despair. Studying psychology has helped me understand the issues even better.

It is in my nature to help the poorest, the most vulnerable and the helpless. As as child, I had to defend my mother and my brother from the beatings they received. I’ve been fighting domestic violence since I can remember.“ And yet, it was not the childhood trauma that spurred Mia into action. It was the images she saw of Romanian orphanages in the 1990s. Images that she cannot forget even today.

In the early 1990’s, along the support of her husband, friends in Romania and in the United States, Mia decided to help the suffering children.

But her efforts would prove to be fruitless.

52

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“The corruption in the country was so widespread that many of the supplies we were providing were not getting to the children. I have pictures of the children who would stare into our eyes with so much pain and make signs so that we’d understand that the food was not getting to them. They wanted us to give it to them directly, on the spot, so they could eat it right away.

I would go back the next day and realize that the children did not get to touch any of the things we had brought to them.”

Given that the government made it impossible to help the children in State custody, she set up the Mia’s Children Foundation, designed to help another category of very poor children. Mia shows us portraits of Joan and Darrell Castle, the two friends who, in 1998, helped her set up an American NGO to help children living in the streets.

53

Auntie Mia

“Joan and Darrell understood the suffering of these children, especially the Roma children who experience so much discrimination. One day while visiting them in the US, they said to me, “OK Mia, it is time do something for these children.”

After returning to Romania, I remember very clearly the day when a voice within asked me, “what are you doing for those around you?” The answer was right outside my front door. I could hear the street children outside the window.

These children were not considered abandoned, legally speaking, because they still had a living family member. However, these children were living as if they had been abandoned.

Many of them lived near the garbage dump or on the street. Even if they lived in a house, they were always very dirty, always hungry. They did not know how to play because no one took an interest in their games.

At that moment, I knew that my calling was right here on my own street.

54 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

EDUCATION AND ENCOURAGEMENT

As Mia began to learn about the difficult situations facing each child at home, she found the children asking a common question – “If our parents did not want is, why did they have us.”

“I realized that I could not answer that question. Instead, I tried to change the focus to how they could change their lives through education.

That’s why, when September 1st rolled around, I said to the children, ‘Look, let’s make a deal. I will buy you everything you need, notebooks, books, school clothes, school bags, and go with you to your first day of school. We’ll go together and enroll you in school. After school, we will do lessons together at our home.’

Many of the children did not want to leave our home in the evening, so we let the little ones sleep in our bed and I slept on the floor next to my husband.

Eventually so many kids were in the home, we began to rent apartments. We rented nine apartments that we could use to wash, de-lice and clean the children. Today, all of these children have gone to college and have a family of their own. They are children for whom the eyes of the mind have been opened”.

At the beginning, Mia was more like camp counsellor than a mother. She bought six bags of toys and then invited the children to learn how to play together outdoors in a meadow and open spaces between buildings. Mia would organize games from 9:00 in the morning until 6:00 in the evening.

She stops recounting her story when a little blueeyed boy walks briskly into the room.

“We taught the children how to be kind, to play together, to draw, and how to talk respectfully. We talked about the differences between kind behavior and hurtful behavior.”

Then two other boys of the same height come to Mia with the same request, addressing her in a very polite manner.

- Mrs. Mia, can I go outside if I dress warmly enough?

- If you dress warmly, yes. (She turns to us). He had chickenpox. Be careful!

She smiles at them sweetly. They give her a hug.

Just a few seconds later, a little girl with bangs approaches Mia and hands her a drawing.

is just one part of the children’s needs. Simple words of encouragement can have a tremendous impact on them.

“This is for you,” the little girl says.

Mia replies,“This is beautiful, let mommy give you a kiss. She’s a future ballerina. Her older brother is teaching her. We’re going to put on a show, right?”

The week after Mia’s husband died, the Zmaranda family promised Mia that they would make sure that she was not left alone and that all the children would have a roof over their heads.

The Zmaranda family provided the funds for the current 5 story home. It was built in just three months, a miracle in Romania. Mia says that money

“If I see they have a fever and ask if anything is hurting, they will answer yes.

When I ask why they did not tell me, they give me a blank stare. For them, suffering is normal. No one has ever asked them if something hurt them or not.”

Mia’s face lights up once again when another child appears in the room. It’s Matei, a tall and slim boy with curly hair and glasses.

“My talented dancer. What did you do today?”

“Do you want to see him dancing?”

55

Within minutes we are participating in a contemporary dance show that Matei puts on for us together with two other children, Flori and Albert. Mia’s home has a special room where the choreographies and the theater performances are staged.

Photos: Lucian Muntean

“We visited six museums and tomorrow we’re going to the Botanical Garden. We’re going to do some of experiments with the biology teacher. And they will take us to a place where there are many butterflies.”

At the same moment, an elaborate preparation of Easter eggs is underway in another room.

Sitting at a long table full of books, colorful boxes and pencils, children of many ages complete their work under the watchful eyes of a Jesus Christ icon.

58 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“TO RESPECT THE RULES, TO BE GOOD, TO BEHAVE WELL” Serene, talkative, eager to meet us and to introduce themselves, Mia’s children finish each other’s sentences when you ask a question.

Their daily program does not differ from that of a small family.

“I color, paint eggs, clean up, help out in the kitchen and assist the little ones with their homework. So first I do my homework, after that I do activities and when I’m done, I study some more,” says Mona, who is in the seventh grade.

She and all of Mia’s children go to church on Fridays and Sundays and say a prayer after each meal and before bedtime.

- What did auntie Mia teach you?

- To respect the rules, to be kind, to behave well, to get along with each other,” says Lucian, who is carefully studying our voice recorder while speaking.

Lucian hands over the recording device to his friend: “Come on, little Cristi, it’s your turn.”

“Little Cristi” is, in fact, older than Lucian. He’s 12 years old and likes soccer.

- Do you have a favorite soccer player?

- Stanciu, Budescu, Ronaldo and Messi. And Nadelcu plays well too!

Photos: Lucian Muntean

59

Auntie Mia

I WANT, I CAN AND I MUST

KEEPING THE HOUSE CLEAN

In her relationship with the children, Mia Scarlat puts an emphasis on three verbs that she considers essential: I want, I can, I must.

Although she has too few people helping her, Mia does not complain.

For her, there is no such thing as a child without potential. So each of the 40 children work on growing their talents in one or more activities: singing, sports, theatre, painting, dancing or anything else they feel a desire to excel at.

All of these activities are listed on a well-organized chart.

She applies the Japanese system: each child contributes to cleaning, setting the table and cleaning it up. In addition, the older children take care of the younger ones.

In this way, explains Mia, each child learns “to value cleanliness and objects.”

“We do not have the financial means to hire people and sponsorships are on the decline,” she says.

As for volunteering, “it’s just a beautiful fairy tale,” says Mia with a touch of heartache.

“Many volunteers come a couple times and then they disappear. But I understand.

Life is still hard here. People work a long day and worry about paying their own bills. Things need to be more settled before people have time to look around and see what they can do for each other.”

Our conversation is interrupted by Nicoleta, who is preparing to go to a rehearsal for her first concert with the Conservatory Choir.

60 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“I perform psychological assessments on them, I observe them and take notes.

Everyone has a unique intervention plan.

In this way, I can make sure they get what they need.

This is what our education system should do,” explains Mia.

Mom and daughter hug each other.

- I love you.

- And I love you!

We love her so much. Every single night we say “Goodnight” to her and after we eat, we always say “Thank you for the meal”.

(Costin, 12)

Alba Iulia has devised its development strategy in partnership with the World Bank.

The Magnificent Sulimans VALENTIN ȘCHIOPU

‘This is the place for people who enjoy camping out in nature, gathering around a campfire in the evening, perhaps enjoying some mulled wine, some soft guitar. This is the place to discover refreshing silence.’

Traditional Homes in Apuseni.

64 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

In villages tucked away deep in the Apuseni Mountains, there is a saying: “A house will stand as long as it is inhabited.”

In these places, the villagers never complain about the harshness of winter. Nor are they overwhelmed by the burden of loneliness. It is the sadness of collapsing homes that reminds them of the people who temporarily left for the city and never came back.

When villagers leave the homes of their birth in order to make enough money to care for themselves, they leave everything in order: a tablecloth, a cup on the table, and their work clothes hung on a hook by the door. It is as though they just left for a long weekend.

Over time, their uninhabited homes crumble, one after the other, year after year, next to the hiking trails that only tourists – most of them foreigners – venture out on.

The Magnificent Sulimans

ENTER THE SULIMANS Five years ago, a young, married couple from Bucharest took their children to escape the “concrete jungle.” They say it came down to a simple life choice: keep on playing the role of ‘adapted human’ or build their dream. A dream that did not include an Ikea instruction manual.

They settled in Cheia, a small village belonging to the commune of Râmeț, located in the Trascău Mountains. They bought two crumbling houses and some land for only 3,500 €.

Just a few days ago, I was thinking about how it’s been five years ago since we moved here. The time flew by so quickly, but that’s because my time here is full.

Since then, lots has happened. If I think about it all, about all the people who have come through here, time seems limitless.

It’s like an accordion, you open it up and it suddenly becomes extremely wide,” says Gabriel Suliman.

Give some and you’ll receive more!

On August 6, 2013, the Suliman family made the 90 minute trek up a hiking trail from Brădeşti to their new home. The path through the forest, marked by blue crosses, follows a small stream that used to turn the wheels of twelve water mills a century ago.

They carried their belongings on horses provided by the man who had sold his land.

“We didn’t have anything. We didn’t have a home or water but we said that if we’re all together and if we’re happy, everything else will take care of itself.

Gabriel Suliman with his daughter, Alice.

Photos: Raul Ștef 65

Inside the Suliman’s house.

FAMILY LIFE For the first couple of years, Gabriel and Cristina Suliman and their children, David and Alice, made their home in the former village school. During that time Gabriel learned how to ride horses and craft objects he never imagined he would ever be able to make. They disassembled the two old homes, beam by beam, and relocated them to the land they bought using a tractor and oxen.

68 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

The family has now expanded to have three goats, one horse and a mare that was born on Easter Sunday. They also have two dogs, a cat, and five hens.

All four family members work on the land they own.

Alice, the youngest member of the family, arrived in Cheia as she was learning to walk. She is now seven years old and believes she lives in wonderland. She picks dandelions for her mom and keeps her own herb collection. She explains to the photographer which of the herbs can be used in food.

David is 10 years old and knows how to make claystone. Last year he harvested and extracted the clay himself, using a shovel and pickaxe. He built a stove with it, but his father was not entirely

impressed and helped him to rebuild it. He wanted to make sure it would not crack after a few months.

Every three weeks, the two children go to boarding school in Râmeț, where they spend five consecutive days. Gabriel hitches up the horse every Monday morning and returns on Friday afternoon to pick them up.

Cristina stays with the kids throughout the week as there are no teachers working the evening shift.

The boarding school has six bedrooms with 20 beds, just for the three of them.

During the two week period when they are not at school, they study at home in Cheia. Cristina, who is a certified Waldorf teacher, follows a curriculum planned by their school teacher, however, her teaching methods are based on the Waldorf system.

The parents plan to send them to high school in Sibiu, Alba Iulia or Cluj.

Gabriel and Cristina, who both have degrees in Psychology, say their decision to leave the city is not a sign of their eccentricity. They simply felt the need to be much more actively involved in their children’s lives.

The Magnificent Sulimans

“Most people head off to work at 8:00 or 9:00 in the morning, then drop the children off at school, daycare or their grandparents. In our new life, we are with them all the time.

We live through every life experience together. When it’s time to play, we play.

When it’s time to take care of the chores, we all have a responsibility.

This is important. I think it was the case with the peasants. They didn’t go to work for eight hours at a time. Everything was done with their children alongside, even if all the kids did was sit in the shade as the parents worked.

I believe this is essential for children, at least in their first seven years, maybe even until they are 14 or 15 years-old and start to feel a desire to move away.

Photos: Raul Ștef 69

I have no idea if they’re going to come back to Cheia once they’ve finished their studies. But even if they don’t return, I will have peace of mind because I know they were able to enjoy childhood. I didn’t come here out of obligation, but rather out of the desire to spend time with my children.

There is no greater pleasure than family,” says Gabriel Suliman.

ESCAPING THE BIG CITY Before moving to the Apuseni Mountains, Gabriel worked as a graphic designer for a multinational company in Bucharest. He didn’t know the neighbors in his block apartment. Once in a while, he would meet one in the elevator and make some small talk, without disclosing anything personal.

70

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

“This would happen 365 days a year, year after year. You would never learn anything about people, it was all so impersonal.

Whereas here, there are few of us and it’s a much more intimate experience. There are things that you can’t ever experience in the hustle and bustle of city life. Life in the city is not bad, but I have this feeling that humans were not made to live in a small, crowded space while breathing filthy air.

We are like sardines, squeezed together yet in our own little boxes. We don’t even have a small piece of land to grow flowers.

And yet, just look around us, there are thousands upon thousands of hectares of abandoned land waiting to be occupied,” says Gabriel.

He made promises that he would one day take his children on the hiking trails discovered during his youth, with a tent on his back. Trails through Bucegi, Făgăraș, Piatra Craiului or Iezer-Păpușa.

He kept postponing the trip until 2012, when he traveled to Făgăraș to find some old cottages he could renovate for the growing tourist trade.

But a friend in Făgăraș threw him off his plans when he said, “I found an abandoned village in the Apuseni Mountains. It’s perfect for tourists. You can’t access it by car, it’s exactly what you’re looking for.”

Spurred on by his curiosity, Gabriel got on a train and went to discover the area. In Cheia, he set up his tent precisely in the same spot where he now lives. When he woke up and looked towards Piscul Vulturului (Eagle’s Peak), a rocky vertical wall that stands guard over the valley, he felt his decision was already made for him.

The Magnificent Sulimans A week later, he received a phone call: “You called me last week about land in Cheia. If you come back, I’ll show you around and you can see what’s available.”

The man had thought that he was the victim of a prank. A popular show about Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent was on TV at the time, so when a Mr. Suliman called him to ask about land in Cheia, he thought it had to be a joke. Plus, who would actually want to buy land in a forgotten village in the middle of nowhere?

“It had drizzled all night long and mist was making its way out of the forest. The cliff was shrouded in a light that I can’t describe in words. I knew this was the place.”

When the Suliman couple sold their apartment in Bucharest, they felt an immense relief to be free of debts. They had no idea what was waiting for them in Cheia, but they were not the least bit worried.

Laure Praja, nicknamed “Grandma”, was the first person Gabriel met in Cheia. He asked her if she knew whether anyone in Cheia was selling land.

She wanted to know for what purpose. To move his family, he told her.

Grandma was waiting to welcome the family to Cheia. “She is an extremely strong woman with incredible grace. She took our enthusiasm for the move with a healthy dose of skepticism, but she was thrilled to have someone else to chat with,” Gabriel says.

The woman sent him off with a son-in-law’s phone number. When he called, he was confronted with a definitive no. “I have nothing to sell”, said the man on the other end, almost rudely.

Gabriel returned to Bucharest unsure of what to do.

Back in the day, there were 70-80 families in Cheia.

Today, aside from the Sulimans, there are three other people. On Easter Sunday, it was just the four of them at Mass, along with a monk and a few nuns from the Râmeț Monastery.

The Suliman’s family home built in the traditional style.

Photos: Raul Ștef 71

The Magnificent Sulimans

David puts on a traditional outfit in the guesthouse.

MOUNTAIN TOURISM The Sulimans are not alone in their passion for the Romanian mountains. When they finished restoring the two small homes, tourists started to appear.

Last year, more than 1,500 people crossed their “threshold.”

72

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

A Belgian rode over 2,000 kilometers on his bicycle just to meet them. He admitted that the journey was a type of initiation for him.

A group of Czechs camp out on the Suliman family’s land every year and help them with the farm work.

They are in awe of the Apuseni Mountains’ beauty.

Grandma Praja remembers the area was much more deforested in her youth, but nature has once again established its supremacy and the forests have grown over the former pastures and over all the other traces of man.

“I find houses that have crumbled under things, rotting from year to year. They look like they’re out of a horror movie, like the Blair Witch Project. But once upon a time, they were beautiful households with vast spaces for growing grass and making hay.

Each year, the tourists return and find yet another home buried in the ground. Then one day, they found us and the kids. It was like witnessing a rebirth.

They were fascinated by our story, they found it exotic. But we were absolutely dying to make the move. We did it out of necessity.

Some people congratulate us, they say that this is the good life, whereas others, who are deeply entrenched in the system, have adverse reactions: what idiots, look at what they’re doing to their poor children, they have no one to play with…”

73

Gabriel says hiking trails in the Râmeț Gorge help select his clientele for him. It’s not just anyone who can end up there. It’s why he doesn’t make an effort to equip his guesthouse with modern amenities. The house is heated with stoves he built himself.

“There is more to the Romanian mountains than just Bucegi or Valea Cerbului, where most of Bucharest goes for their picnics and barbecues.

There are so many other places worth visiting.

Go see them while they still exist.

Maybe the Apuseni aren’t as imposing as the Făgăraș Mountains, but the trails here can take your breath away. This is the place for people who enjoy camping out in nature, gathering around a campfire in the evening, perhaps enjoying some mulled wine, some soft guitar.

This is the place to discover refreshing silence.

Those who come here are passionate about mountains, they are intriguing people. We get to know them, we learn from one another, and finally, we all strive to become better people.”

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8 76

The actress and journalist, Andreea Lupescu, teaches rural children how to use stories to inspire play.

First Book CODRUลขA SIMINA

Actresses are teaching kids to go beyond memorization.

77

The children at the school in the Mărişel commune are preparing for their first-ever reading workshop.

A young boy holds his arms toward a book, as if he were sweeping it up into a warm embrace. There is nothing extraordinary about the setting, yet many children in Romania have no idea what a library looks like.

78

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

A team from the Curtea Veche Association in Bucharest visits rural schools once a month. Their mission is to share their love of books with school kids and to donate books to the school’s library.

Volunteers play with the children and inspire in them a passion for reading. They ask questions – questions that are different from the kind they get in the classroom. They encourage children to ask questions and think creatively. This is a radical change from the communist pedagogy where there is just one right answer – which still dominates public education.

The Curtea Veche Association and their partners, Azomureș, have donated over 60,000 books to kids and school libraries in the past four years.

Mărişel, a mountainous commune near Cluj, is located at an altitude of 1,300 meters and offers

clean air to both its inhabitants and visitors. It extends across the valleys, which, in the past, were home to Avram Iancu’s brave entourage.

In fact, an oversized painting of “The Little Prince of the Mountains” nostalgically guards the great hall of the general school.

Gathered at the Cultural Center, the children enthusiastically applaud their guests, who come bearing gifts of books and toys.

After a brief introduction they are divided into groups and the workshops begin.

The Kindergarten and First Grade classes are grouped together, a total of 15 curious little faces.

They happily rearrange their desks and set their chairs in a circle.

A frayed map and two presentation boards, one featuring animals found in the Romanian mountains and the other of a local cave, are the only images on the otherwise barren walls.

First Book

The workshop coordinator, Andreea Lupescu, introduces herself as an artist, actress, and journalist. She competed on the Romanian version of X-Factor and sings in a band called Dekadens.

The workshop begins with some words of encouragement. Words that these little ones may never have heard in the classroom: I want you to have fun, I want you to enjoy this!

For the children, her green hair, with the small gold crown around her head, is captivating. It’s something they’ve never seen in Mărişel. They hang on to every word uttered from the young woman’s mouth, as if she were a fairy tale character.

With their eyes closed, they listen to a passage from the book they all receive at the end of the workshop: Alice in Wonderland. Andreea invites them to imagine the sounds of the story.

Fifteen children start to imagine a different place.

First into a breeze, then raindrops, and then into the waves of a sea they have never laid eyes on.

Somehow, they can almost touch it with the tips of their fingers and see it beyond their blinking eyelids.

Each time the green-haired lady asks a question, the children are eager to answer.

79

It’s a desire for questions that demand more than simple right or wrong answers. It’s a desire for an opportunity to express themselves in a manner other than reciting memorized information.

Photos: Raul Ștef

The bright-eyed wonder bursting out of these kids reveals their desire to be questioned.

First Book One by one they get their say and, together, they create a story where Alice and the Rabbit are joined

by Barbie, Batman, Spiderman, and Sofia, by lions and tigers, along with a wizard and his apprentice.

“The wizard’s apprentice was very ugly and had three heads and was dressed in black but his pants were blue and his boots were brown,” says a little girl breathlessly.

“Wonderful, lets give him a name since you’ve just described him so well. What should his name be?”

The little girl gazes at Andreea Lupescu’s hair, riveted, and says quietly: “Alin”.

By the end of the story, Alice becomes their own composition. At the end of the workshop, they will receive the novel so they can read it at home.

Out of sheer delight, they spontaneously write on the blackboard: We love you, Andreea. Very much.

“I’ve been doing the workshops for about two years and the results continue to evolve – I always hang on to the children’s ideas because they know what they want.

Children are very eager to play and equally eager to say whatever crosses their minds.

82

PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

Every time we do an activity that involves imagining new characters, the entire story changes. They become very engaged.

Also, kids from rural communities are usually very open, very warm, and they are less constrained than those from urban centers,” Andreea says, at the end of the workshop.

While she speaks, the kids collect a layer of glitter from the ground and throw it in the air one more time. It is the first time they get to play with “fairy dust.”

“Children often tell me that they’ve never thought of a story in this way. In the workshops, they learn how to turn a story into a game. The activities aren’t very complex, but they have a unique objective: to introduce them into the story.” Andreea Lupescu

Photos: Raul Č˜tef

83

First Book

Actress Valentina Popa gives away the children’s version of The Odyssey after helping them act out a scene from the story.

84 PressOne Quarterly | Volume 8

In another primary school class, a scene from the Odyssey takes places. The kids are re-enacting the scene when Ulysses and his fellow warriors find themselves in a cave with the sheep and the Golden Fleece. Eventually they encounter the Cyclops. Except in this case, the warriors find milk and cheese inside the cave, because the kids have decided that the warriors must be starving.

The theatre workshop is run by Valentina Popa, an actress at the Very Small Theater in Bucharest.

Alexandra Mihailciuc, an architect and visual artist, coordinates the workshop that focuses on drawing.

At the end of the day the children will receive the book their workshop was based on.

The project coordinator, Valentina Roman, says she came up with the idea for these workshops while she traveled around the country promoting the books published by Curtea Veche. She discovered that there is a serious decline in literary reading:

“We realized that if kids don’t read, there will not be a new generation of readers to come. So four years ago we began to focus on the next generation of readers.

That was when the Curtea Veche Association was established, with the mission of promoting reading among children.”

The program has reached over 200 communities.

Valentina Roman was exposed to a fragment of the “other side” of Romania, in which kids have never even seen what a story book looks like.

“Often times, these kids receive their very first book from us. Apart from their school manuals, they have no other books at home.

The books we give away are the children’s version of great classics. That’s because we want kids to be able to understand and play with them.”

Valentina Roman, Project Coordinator.

“We give them these new books, they are surprised by the smell of the pages and the beautiful illustrations. They’re amazed that there is such a thing as books with pictures in them. Most school libraries have very old books without those colorful illustrations.” (Valentina Roman)

We asked Valentina if she had ever imagined there were children in Romania who had never seen a bookstore?

“We were recently in a village an hour from Bucharest. We went, donated books, and asked what they wanted more than anything else in this world.

But it can, in time, make its way through the hundreds of communities around the country, where a seed of hope still remains.

85

Well, some wanted to go see another country, or to get a laptop…but these three wanted to see what a bookstore looked like.

She also says that the Association’s work is like a drop of water in an ocean: an NGO cannot cover the entire country.

Photos: Raul Ștef

Three of the kids raised their hands said what they wanted most was to see a bookstore. That was their dream.

And that’s when we realized in big cities, we walk right by bookstores without giving them a second thought. We can’t even imagine what it means to have never walked inside of one.”

VIDEO

pressone.ro/video

THE PRESSONE WAY The PressOne way is our belief that the best stories are born when public interest meets a journalist’s personal curiosity.

It occurs when an undiscovered, inflammable substance is sparked by a personal approach.

The PressOne journalist starts with an original idea or approach of a known topic.

It continues with thorough documentation, which is achieved by thinking of the reader, not of somebody’s political or business interest.

And is completed with a combined package of “text & image” meant to provide a unique satisfaction to the reader as they have been respected, not lied to.

Subscribe to PressOne Quarterly at www.pressone.us If you’d prefer to pay by check, mail the shipping addresses and $50 per annual subscription for our quarterly magazine to: PressOne Quarterly PO Box 498065, Cincinnati, OH 45249 Thank you for supporting independent media in Romania!

© 2018 / PressOne / All rights reserved

www.pressone.us