You can’t go home again
I wrote this on December 24, 2014. The first winter spent in Romania in eighteen years.
And so it begins. The moment I arrive at the airport, I take a breath, walk past the sliding doors, roll a cigarette, light it, and call my grandparents. I hear instant anxiety on the other end regarding the logistics of taking a taxi, something potentially going wrong. They’ve seen it on the news…it could happen again! I reassured them I’d be careful. Thirty seconds later I get a phone call. “Did you get in the taxi yet? No. Don’t get in yet. We know someone, I’ll try to find his number. We’ll call you back.” I wait and look around. The ashtray is full, overflowing with stubs. I smile because I know I’ve entered the land of chain smokers. I get another call back. “We can’t find the number. Just be careful. Make sure you find someone decent — vezi să găsești și tu un om serios.” “Alright I’ll do my best”, I reply more out of routine and reassurance than actual intent. I take the first taxi I see and get in. All is silent. His face is serious, hardened, and tired. After five minutes I start speaking about the weather. Banal but it’s a start. It’s been a while since I’ve spoken Romanian to a stranger. I found out he was from the south, a city near where I lived for a few years (both awful places really). He said I was lucky I’m going to the north because that’s where the traditions have remained alive around this time of year. I make it to the bus station and wait. It’s a nightmare already. I start rolling another cigarette. Everyone is loud, aggressive, panicking, anxious, complaining, blaming one another and others that aren’t there. The ones who do smoke are doing so continuously. The bus that I thought I missed was late. That’s what the upheaval was about. I managed to sit in the front, with another man that had a calm demeanour, a rare trait one carries in this country. I was half-confused, half-relieved to anticipate some quiet for the upcoming six hours. Yet throughout the journey I took note of the erratic bus driver crossing himself with his right hand at every church and religious monument on the road, but unsurprisingly not wearing his seat belt. There are churches being built more than ever before and crosses everywhere.
A few days have passed and the initial shock has worn off, of revisiting a place I left behind that I go back to once every couple of years. It’s intense being here. The environment, people, mannerisms, and the mentality are, for the most part, draining. I arrive at the building I grew up in and instantly feel saddened by the changes. No more trees, tall grass, and rose bushes. The trees have been chopped, the roses are gone. The benches in front of the building are gone. That’s where we used to play and later spend entire evenings talking, sharing secrets; the youth hiding cigarettes from the adults passing by. We used to run around weaving in and out of the greenery, climbing trees, picking cherries. That was then. Now it feels desolate. Everyone I knew grew up, is gone. I grew up, I’m gone… I look up and the sky is clear. I see all the stars, they’re a bit blurry (I’m not wearing my glasses as usual). But they’re there, shining in all their glory. I then look at the horizon, and turn. Mountains surround me. I smile. This is what I saw every day for years! Of course I love mountains.
It’s always different, coming back to the place I was born and grew up in; to the place I called home for the first nine years of my life. After that, home lost its meaning physically. A strange disconnect remains that is still convoluted. I am in the physical place I used to call home with all its memories. Now home, as cliché as it may sound, is in my heart. The physical place no longer exists.
On a lighter note, I’ve started reading the other Italo (Svevo). I’ve since discovered that I roll cigarettes like my great grandfather did. Only he used newspaper during the war instead of rolling paper. Also that Ceaușescu demanded that we grow and export tobacco (by the way, this Christmas Day marks twenty-five years since his execution). My grandfather and I listed some of the cigarettes locally produced during communism: Bucegi, Carpați, Mărășești (all the mountain ranges and hills were covered), Litoral (and the seaside too!). He also added the military ones: Naționale, Militare, Amiral. I said to him it must be strange to have his granddaughter smoke cigarettes the way his father did. He agreed. A non-smoker all his life, he doesn’t understand. (I don’t smoke in front of him of course.) Nevertheless, it’s a strange bond I’ve made to a family member, which I never had the chance to meet but one that has been so fondly mentioned in my presence… I just remembered I had my first cigarette in Piatra Neamț. Actually seven. They were shared with a friend when I was twenty after drinking vișinată and Mirinda, a disgusting combination. I had the worst hangover of my life and did not smoke again until I was twenty-four. That’s another story.
