La Multi Ani

La Multi Ani

On the first of January, 2007 Romania will officially become a member state of the European Union. This is a big deal here. It is something that the government has worked toward for over a decade and it marks the acceptance of Romania and Bulgaria as partners in a democratic, capitalistic and western looking union.

For two years there has been a large timepiece set in the heart of Bucuresti counting down the days, hours and minutes to the accession. The parliament has passed new and updated previously unenforced legislation which will become effective on Monday. Many speeches and great fireworks will commemorate the New Year and the new era for this country. Yet a large number of people are apprehensive about the changes that will come with the requirements of unification and with those thousands of new laws and regulations required to comply with European standards.

No one knows for sure whether travel will be easier, whether it will be easier to work in Europe. No one is certain the effect that being a partner with the rest of Europe will mean, and many people see the changes that they have had to make and will make a cost higher than they are willing to accept. Yet there is a sense that Romania has always been a part of Europe and that is where this country belongs.

Depending upon which view of the country I see, to me Romania is either a nation in a hurry to catch up to the development and progress of the other former Eastern Bloc countries already admitted into the EU, populated by dynamic people determined to make a success of themselves and their homeland, or it is a backward place, full of antique ways of thinking and of working, inhabited by a people content to accept the status quo and unwilling to trust in themselves or their countrymen. It is a country headed in two directions at once and the EU accession is a symbol of the steps toward progress and dynamism.

Nancy and I spent Christmas in the backcountry of Maramures with a knot of 13 other friends and volunteers. It was a traditional Christmas filled with singing “colende multi Americane” and being invited into homes for good food and strong drink. It would be wonderful to be able to preserve the best of these traditions as well as encourage steps toward a more progressive society. Progress that abandons a sense of place and history is not good, however traditions that maintain poverty and a degradation of the environment are not good either. The challenge facing Romania is to somehow keep the best of the traditions while changing toward a more prosperous, clean and equitable country.

I raise my glass of tuisca to Romania on the acceptance into Western Europe and wish them well on their balancing. La Multi Ani.