Bianca Origina

Let's Help Bianca
Sighisoara, Romania

April 22, 2008

The first time I saw Bianca she was standing on the bridge alone, begging. After I gave her some money, I watched her for a few minutes and took these pictures.

She has no shoes on this day, only socks. One student stops to give her some money. Most people just walk by. Some other students laugh at her.

The next day I saw her again. I gave her a little money again. Then I saw another, older girl who I had seen at the train station twice before. Each time I gave her some food. I asked her about the little girl. She said her name was Bianca. Just then I saw a car drive up, a Mercedes, and park in front of the church. The driver got out and walked straight into the church. I quickly asked Bianca if I could take a picture of her in front of the car. She happily agreed. I asked the older girl from the train station but at first she didn't want to be photographed so I took this picture of Bianca alone.

April 23, 2008

Then the girl who I had seen in the train station seemed to understand what I was doing and why I was taking the picture. She came over and called another child over.

Then I took some more photos to show where they are.

Now I am starting a project to help her and other children. I have already spoken to some of the local business owners and managers and they have agreed to help. My first idea is to send students with laptop computers to the church plaza where these pictures were taken. Then when the children have a free moment in between asking for money and food, they can learn some computer skills and English.

One hotel has already agreed to have a donation box for tourists. Another business owner has agreed to collect and manage the funds until I can get an official organization started.

Today is April 25, 2008.

Later in the day I met two women from the local community who agreed to walk over to Cathedral plaza to see if Bianca was there. Here Mihaela is showing her how to type her name into the laptop.

April 27

Mihaela and I planned to meet at 10:20 on the side of the bridge opposite the Orthodox cathedral so she could show me what the "gypsy church"services were like. When I came onto the bridge I saw her kneeling down talking to Bianca. Then when Mihaela saw me she stood up.

Then I asked her to ask Bianca if she would like a hug, so Mihaela asked. Bianca had a puzzled look on her face. Mihaela had to explain to her what a hug was. Mihaela was unsure whether to give her one or not so I encouraged her to just put her hand on her shoulder. You can see the results.

Here is a boy who begs for money from the tourists. He could not type his name into the computer without help. He doesn't even know the entire alphabet in Romanian.

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Later in the week I met Alina who started helping me. Here she is showing the laptop to a young mother who cannot read or write.

Then we met another mother who could not read or write. We explained our idea and let the kids take turns taking pictures. None of the children and teens in the pictures could read or write either. Two of the teenagers could almost write their own names, but needed some help. The mother could not write or spell the name of her own daughter.

Here you see Alina again in the lower right.

April 30

Today I was sitting down when I saw this horse and cart arrive. About 8 people got out. In the next picture you see some of the children and one teenager who came from the cart.

They saw that I had food and wanted some so I gave them each something to eat. Then the older one started asking for money. I tried to explain with sign language and a combination of English and my limited Romanian that I was afraid the money could be used for smoking and drinking and I would only give food. The teenager was unhappy and left feeling resentful that I would not give any money. Later Alina joined me and we saw the same teenage girl again with her the small girl on the left, who is the niece of the teen. We showed them the picture I took.

Alina also showed them how to type their names into the laptop. This was the first time they had ever done that. With Alina translating for me I asked the older girl how she felt when I didn't give her any money. She said she felt bad. Then I asked how she felt when she had worked doing something and earned something in return for he work. She said she felt good.

We then talked to her about many things. We explained our ideas to her and told her that she could help tourists learn Romanian and she could get paid for it. She could also learn some English and teach younger children and get paid for that. She listened carefully to our ideas. In Romania such children have not gone to school and it is very unlikely they will go to school, so my idea is to teach them in any way that fits their current life and also encourage them to work for a living and learn some skills.

When the girls' family came back, we went over to meet them and introduce ourselves and our ideas.

Later we ran into the older girl in the picture with the Mercedes. Her name is Georgiana. She seems to be related to Bianca, but it is very hard to know what is true, as stories often change. But it does seem that some of the people in the picture with the horse and card above are related to Bianca, possibly even her mother and father are there. In any case, Alina and I have made a lot of progress in earning the respect and trust of the children and the parents.

Then Alina and I went for a walk and I saw more evidence that she has a lot of friends and can talk to people from all levels of society. (She reminds me of something called MBWA - Management by Wandering Around - which was made famous by Tom Peters, the author of "In Search of Excellence".)

When we got to the bridge, there was Bianca, off in the distance. I took this with the zoom. The next picture is with less zoom and the next is with no zoom.

Sighisoara is a beautiful city, but seeing Bianca sitting there alone, and thinking about her future if not enough people care about her enough to really help her spoils much of the beauty for me.

Before we walked down to see her, we stopped to talk to Georgiana, who had a cut on her face from a fight she had been in. I asked what happened and we sat and talked to her. Then some of the other girls who we had talked to before walked up and stopped to see what we were doing. Then I showed everyone the pictures in my laptop. You can see how interested they are. As I have noticed for a long time, children and even teens are fascinated by computers and laptops. This makes them an ideal teaching tool.

After a while we walked down to see Bianca.

Here Alina is tickling Bianca.

Later the others joined us and I offered to buy everyone something to eat. They all chose a banana. I don't have time to post all the pictures of our walk to the store now but here are a few.

At one point we stopped for a small English lesson.

Here is Alina passing out the bananas. Everyone was happy and, being happy, everyone was well behaved. This supports my belief that if you take care of a child or teenager's needs, their good behavior will follow naturally. By the way I also reminded Alina as she was teaching that it was important that we make learning English fun and not painful. I explained to her that I don't punish, threaten or hurt people when I teach English or computer skills. I believe this philosophy will work especially well with the Gypsy children and teens who are not accustomed to sitting in a chair for long periods of time, but instead are accustomed to a high level of freedom. This freedom, though has come at a cost to them, so my idea is to find a balance between fun, freedom and education.