Quoting "Standards" <canela@xxx.edu>:
> e, e,
>
> such a heart.
>
> and what you're doing to mine...
well, the thing is ya know... we are very lucky. i didn't understand how lucky. our poverty, such as it is, is not really poverty at all. we have choices. many people in other parts of the world do not have any choice at all. not even the choice to leave.
i also found out what assholes our embassies are, over here. i met a man who has a brother in canada. his brother has been trying to get him over for a visit for something like seven years. he just got refused again... after travelling to bucharest... which is a hellhole... after standing in line at the embassy for days, after untold letters and attestations from his brother that his brother has the money to support him while he's there... and get this, after charging him something like 700 dollars... he had been saving it up for years... for the mere visa applications for him, his wife and his kid... remember, these people are very poor... well, after all that, they refused him. again. they refused to let him visit his only brother in canada. who he hasn't seen in 15 years and has been trying to see for 7.
not only did they refuse him the visas, but... goddamshit... they keep the money. they won't even give that back.
the man was distraught. his brother says, give up now. they cannot afford to try again.
i suppose they think he will stay in canada once he is there. for, of course, to apply to immigrate is a total impossibility. i asked him, did you want to stay in canada. he said, no. my home is here. so it was just a visit.
and so what if this man did stay in canada. or the states or whatever. what if they did that. for one, these are ethnic hungarians who are very persecuted here... the romanians don't like them. the hungarian villages and towns.... remember erdely is fully half of romania, before annexations, romania was a piddleshit little country... anyways, the villages and towns are forced to use romanian signage and hungarian schools are discouraged. end result being that the romanian are attempting to wipe out the culture.
and so what if some want to leave. they are despairing, mired in poverty. not from laziness or their own corruption for these are very hardworking people. but the grinding poverty. and the political repression. why is it that they cannot apply for refugee status, like many others can?
what does romania have that the states wants, for which it is necessary to leave the transylvanians to rot? oil? i dunno.
-e
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