Romania's changes

Taxi drivers in Bucharest are famous for talking: about politics, the state of Romania and generally putting the world to rights. They're often better educated than the national average and also earn considerably more than the average salary.

This makes them an interesting sounding board for one important question: how has Romania changed in the years since the revolution in 1989?

"The changes were superficial, sometimes non-existent," said taxi driver Vasile Ursu. "In fact, things have changed for the worse, never mind changes for the better." He sounds disappointed with the gains brought by the revolution, and perhaps he has good reason to be. By rights, he ought to have retired.

"Before the revolution, I was employed by the state," Ursu said. "Now I'm a pensioner, with a miserable pension. I do this job to have enough money coming in, in order to survive on a day-to-day basis."

Freedom, but no benefits

Ursu isn't the only one facing a challenging work schedule. Barbu Predescu said a taxi driver's normal working day can run up to 16 hours.

"I work at least 12 hours, up to 16 or 18 hours - it depends - every single day, including Saturdays and Sundays," Predescu said.

When asked what had changed since 1989, several taxi drivers all said the same thing: nothing had changed for the better.

"We have our freedom, but what have we done with it?" one taxi driver said. "People left to go abroad, breaking up families back home. We've created problems in other countries because the major percentage of Romanians isn't integrated into the social life there."

Even young people aren't optimistic.

"In Ceausescu's day, you had a place to work, if you got married they'd give you a house," said Paul Botisteanu, who was just 7 years old when the revolution happened. "Nowadays, if you get married, what do you do? Where can you go, when monthly rent is 300 euros ($450) for an apartment?"

Only one of the eight taxi drivers DW spoke to had anything positive to say.

"There were some changes for the better, but I'd struggle to tell you what they were," one man said. "What should I tell you, that now I can leave the country? How, exactly? Or that you can find goods in shops? Well, what do I have to buy them with?"

Seeing things through rose-colored glasses?

Intellectuals and the middle classes would never think of claiming that life before the revolution was better. They usually dismiss this kind of talk with one word: nostalgia.

"No, I'm a realist," a taxi driver said. "Don't confuse nostalgia with realism. That's simply the reality of the situation. I'm not at all nostalgic."

Despite their protestations, many of the people DW spoke to might be viewing the past through a rather rosy lens. After all, the Ceausescu regime was the most brutal and repressive in the whole of Eastern Europe.

However, their pessimism is absolutely incontestable. If this is the response of a very ordinary and rather well-off selection of the working population, then it's an utterly damning indictment of the political changes - or rather absence of changes - that the country has seen since the revolution of 1989.

Author: Tom Wilson (sac)
Editor: Andreas Illmer