Source : Google
photo of Roma (Gypsies) people in Europe
Synopsis : Not
many people know much about the Roma people of Europe or in other countries but show racial discrimination toward them. The blog looks at their history and the
continuing injustice they suffer in many countries where they live.
When you are
in Rome and just come out of Termini, you will be assailed by women with naked
breasts and carrying an urchin in their arms who will follow you around until
you part with some money for them. They are followed by other kids in dirty
clothes and with dirty face who will try to distract you with something while
one of them tries to put his hand in your pocket. They are very quick in
picking your pocket.
The women and
the kids work as a team. While the women with naked breasts spill something on
you and then try to clean it up by saying permesso permesso, the kids go to
work. One Englishman was tickled by a bunch of kids to his surprise and was
very dismayed when one kid ran away with his briefcase. Many people visiting
Rome for the first time are thus victimized by these people who are called
gypsies. It seems that they are everywhere near the bus and train stations like
Termini. To them it is a derogatory word so they prefer the nomenclature of
Romani or Roma.
They wear
long colorful skirts and short blouse, some beads or costume jewelries and live
in gypsy camps in the outskirts of towns or villages but they move their camps
of tents when the pickings get slimmer. Often they find work in fields picking
the harvest in fruit orchards or other such jobs to make a meagre living but
they also make money by selling trinkets, homemade beads or embroidered clothes
and quilts. The older men and women often set up a tent where they read palms
or crystal balls for a fee. What they find in anyone’s palm or in a crystal
ball is anyone’s guess so my guess is that many are charlatans but I do not
blame them for making a living because they need to survive.
My initial
encounter with them in Termini left me with a negative impression but I soon
found out that I was wrong and they were indeed wonderful people who were
trying to survive in a hostile world the best way they can. One should not
judge all the Romas just because of a few who hang around Termini or bus
stations. So I started to think of them and about them more profoundly and came
to know that these people who are wrongly called gypsies because some people
centuries ago thought that they came from Egypt are actually nomads who came to
Europe hundreds of years ago from India. They multiplied and spread all over
Europe freely so you will find them in many countries.
They speak
many languages depending on where they are found but they have managed to keep
their native tongue their ancestors spoke in India or something similar to it.
They still count in Hindi but how much Hindi they have retained is hard to
guess. My guess is not much although these women were fluent in Italian and
also fluent in the language of the country where they are found.
They never
get assimilated into the culture of the country or try to where they are found
so they live separately in camps that they set up as temporary shelters. They
do not send their children to Italian schools so it is hard to tell how much
education they get at home if any thus depriving them of the chances of getting
good jobs and a more settled lifestyle.
The
governments of Europe consider them as a separate group of people who want to
remain separate from the population to preserve whatever identity they have and
their gypsy culture so they are deprived of what other citizens enjoy namely an
education, job or vocational training, housing, healthcare, old age pension and
care, owning properties and living a settled life.
Adolf Hitler
considered them subhuman and sent them to the gas chambers en masse so
thousands of them perished along with Jews and other unwanted people of Europe.
Those who survived have spread to safer corners but they still suffer from the
stigma of being gypsies.
Among the
groups the Nazi regime and its Axis partners singled out for persecution on
so-called racial grounds were the Roma (Gypsies).Drawing support from many
non-Nazi Germans who harbored social prejudice towards Roma, the Nazis judged
Roma to be "racially inferior."
The fate of
Roma in some ways paralleled that of the Jews. Under the Nazi regime, German
authorities subjected Roma to arbitrary internment, forced labor, and mass
murder. German authorities murdered tens of thousands of Roma in the
German-occupied territories of the Soviet Union and Serbia and thousands more
in the killing centers at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka. The SS
and police incarcerated Roma in the Bergen- Belsen, Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald, Dachau, Mauthausen,
and Ravensbrück concentration
camps. Both in the so-called Greater German Reich and in the so-called
Generalgouvernement, German civilian authorities managed several forced-labor
camps in which they incarcerated Roma.
It is not
known precisely how many Roma were killed in the Holocaust. While
exact figures or percentages cannot be ascertained, historians estimate that
the Germans and their allies killed around 25 percent of all European Roma. Of
slightly less than one million Roma believed to have been living in Europe
before the war, scholars believe that the Germans and their Axis partners
killed up to 250,000. ( wikipedia )
The degree of
persecution these poor people suffer even today varies from country to country
and the government’s attitude towards them so the question arises why these
people are persecuted and for what reasons?
To find an
answer, one has to look at the history of race relations in Europe going back
to pre-Nazi era when the white Europeans started to discriminate against them
because of their darker skin color and different ways of living. Some gypsies
are not dark at all because there has been some mixing of colors due to some
indiscretions somewhere in the past like the mulattos but the gypsies have
evolved somewhat and do not resemble their ancestors from India any more.
The cold
climate of Europe has something to do with it that helps remove the melanin
from their skin but they still retain a shadow of their physical attributes
they got from their ancestors. Some are quite pretty and look unlike the nomads
of India but the Gypsies no matter how they look, remain a distinct race of
their own.
They should not
to be confused with Romanians,
an unrelated ethnic group and nation, nor with modern or ancient Romans, also
unrelated.
The Romani (/ˈroʊməni/, /ˈrɒ-/), also known
as Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic
group, traditionally nomadic itinerants living
mostly in Europe, and diaspora populations in the Americas. The Romani as a
people originate from the northern Indian subcontinent,[61][62][63] from
the Rajasthan, Haryana, and Punjab regions of India.[62][63]
Source : Google photo of beautiful Roma girls in Europe
Genetic
findings appear to confirm that the Romani "came from a single group that
left northwestern India" in about 512 CE.[64] Genetic
research published in the European
Journal of Human Genetics "revealed that over 70% of males belong
to a single lineage that appears unique to the Roma".[65] They
are dispersed,
but their most concentrated populations are located in Europe, especially Central, Eastern and Southern Europe (including Turkey, Spain and Southern France).
The Romani
arrived in Mid-West
Asia and Europe around 1007.[66] They
have been associated with another Indo-Aryan group, the Dom people: the two groups
have been said to have separated from each other or, at least, to share a
similar history.[67] Specifically,
the ancestors of both the Romani and the Dom left North India sometime between
the 6th and 11th century.[66]
The Romani
are widely known in English by the exonym Gypsies (or Gipsies),
which is considered by some Roma people to be pejorative due to its
connotations of illegality and irregularity.[68] Beginning
in 1888, the Gypsy
Lore Society[69] started
to publish a journal that was meant to dispel rumors about their lifestyle.[70]
Since the
19th century, some Romani have also migrated to the Americas. There are an
estimated one million Roma in the United States;[6] and
800,000 in Brazil,
most of whose ancestors emigrated in the 19th century from Eastern Europe.
Brazil also includes a notable Romani community descended from people deported
by the Portuguese
Empire during the Portuguese
Inquisition.[71] In
migrations since the late 19th century, Romani have also moved to other
countries in South America and to Canada.[72]
In February
2016, during the International Roma Conference, the Indian
Minister of External Affairs stated that the people of the Roma
community were children of India.[73] The
conference ended with a recommendation to the government of India to
recognize the Roma community spread across 30 countries as a part of the Indian diaspora.[74]
The Romani language is
divided into several dialects which
together have an estimated number of speakers of more than two million.[75] The
total number of Romani people is at least twice as high (several times as high
according to high estimates). Many Romani are native speakers of the dominant language in
their country of residence or of mixed languages combining
the dominant language with a dialect of Romani; those varieties are
sometimes called Para-Romani.[76] ( Wikipedia
)
Source : Google photo of Roma people on the move
If the Roma
people arrived in Europe some 15 centuries ago and still retain their native
language, customs and traditions they brought from India, it goes to show their
resilience under the pressure from their host countrymen to assimilate as
second class citizens. Some have changed their religion but still retain their
Roma culture. Nearly a million of them immigrated to the United States where
they prosper and are free to practice their culture, traditions and language
while retaining their Hindu religion while some have become Christians or
Moslems.
They have
moved to Brazil in large numbers of over 800000 mostly from Eastern Europe but
also from Portugal where they were discriminated against. So there is a very
large diaspora of Roma people spread in many parts of the world although they
have not returned to India. Now that may start to change as the Indian
government considers them as of Indian origin so may grant them citizenship if
they wish to return.
In Italy I
tried to approach them to find out more about them but they did not want to be
approached so walked away fast showing mistrust. Given their persecution and
neglect in Europe, they are probably justified in their mistrust of other
people. I was told that they gather their various clans once a year somewhere
to celebrate their culture and traditions but also to find suitable mates for
each other so it is like a love festival with lots of songs, dances and
judicious amounts of homemade libations.
Source : Google photo of Gypsie love festival in Prague
How long they
will be able to maintain their separate identity as Roma people is anyone’s
guess but just remember that they came to Europe some 1500 years ago and still
remember what they learned from each previous generation. That is truly
remarkable.
I see a great
deal of similarity between the Romas and the Jews because both have tried hard
to retain their language, culture and religion and suffered tremendous
persecution because they are perceived as different from others. But there is
one notable difference.
The Roma
people no matter where they live now do not seek a separate homeland for them
but only seek recognition of their rights as human beings and their natural
right to live freely anywhere where they can retain their culture, language,
their belief system and their separate identity. They do not seek assimilation
because they are proud of being who they are so this persecution has to stop.
They are a
group of people who bring diversity to any country where the pressure to
homogenize is strong so they should be welcome. Their resilience alone is
commendable. The world should appreciate them and welcome them just like the
United States and Brazil did. The idea of colonialism and exclusivity is as
obsolete today as it was then.
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