”So, about 3 years ago I decided to leave for Britain. GREAT Britain. I was almost 25 and until I was 23 I never wanted to leave. I wanted to stay, to change, to be the change as they say. To change people, change the system, the world, the Universe, fuck knows. I wanted to do something meaningful. Until I understood that meaningful is overrated, that too little actually give a crap about your meaningful, even if it concerns them.
So, I left. Full of hope that I will come to a more civilized world.
The first person that asked me where I was from looked at me the same way I look at a dead mouse. The same way anyone looks at a dead mouse. And he was not British.
I would soon understand why.
Unfortunately, there are too few of us, the good ones and too many of them, the ones that make Romanian = a dead mouse. By good ones I don’t mean highly intelligent or sophisticated, I’m neither. I just mean people with common sense. The ones that make Romanian = a dead mouse are the ones that are always looking for the easy way. They come with the “I’m the boss” mentality and cannot get it through their thick heads that the Universe is not revolving around them. That you have to earn everything, from respect to the 10 pounds per hour you want.
The Romanians I met here are (most of them, I do know decent people as well) want better wages than the English, even if they don’t speak the language. AT ALL. They make children so they can live off the benefits. They stage domestic violence so they can get a free home. They don’t work but are rude to the cashier that works at 11pm on Friday and make fun of her. And, of course, they know freaking everything.
I met some people that were in the UK for less than a week and were working in a hotel. They were already complaining about the hard work, the hours, the fact that they had to walk a long way to work… yet, I could not help noticing that everything in their bathroom (towels, soaps, shampoo, you name it… even the soap holder) had the hotel’s brand on it. And they even offered me bed sheets!
Boyfriend used to work for an agency that sent him to a company. After about 2 weeks, he applied for a job at that company and got it but the manager told him “if you hadn’t have been with the agency before applying, we wouldn’t have given you the job because all the Romanians we worked for only caused problems”. Meanwhile, he got promoted but that’s not the issue. The issue is that he could have lost a good job that he is good at because he is Romanian and because someone before was too.
I often have arguments with a friend of mine regarding Romanian’s right to work in the UK. To be honest, I hope we never ever ever ever EVER get it. We deserve our faith. To be more honest, I am more often ashamed than proud to be Romanian. I have no desire what so ever to come back and as soon as I will be able to, I will run away from London as fast as I can. Somewhere where Romanian is not spoken at every corner, somewhere where people have not heard of us yet.”
Well, I am full of hope that that those few of us can change the misconceptions of people. Thank you Liana!
Please don’t hesitate to write me at andreirox@yahoo.com. Every story that you have, good or bad, with romanians or foreign people, tell us what happend to you. It matters, I know so.
Well, Romanians rulles!
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