Well, looking for a place to stay in Budapest if you are Rom and even if you have a steady job is not easy, if not impossible.
The Czech pianist Tomáš Kačo, a Rom who was born in a family with 11 children. He grew up in the ghetto, personally experienced prejudice against the Roma. Nevertheless, he was able to succeed, including the opportunity to perform at the legendary Carnegie Hall. According to him, the key to change is an open mind: “Whether it’s a different food, a different smell, a different race, whenever there is something new and different, they are afraid of it,” says the pianist and composer about the Czechs. According to him, it is important to realize that both parties are to blame for every problem: “I don’t want to say that this is just a majority company, that it is not open. The same thing works with the Roma, the minority, they are not open either. They have barriers, prejudices given by their parents.”
Aleksandar Damjanovic, chairman of NGO Montenegrin Cultural Network, CKM, founded in 2009 to spread loyalty and respect for the country’s state symbols made a blunder: He wanted to include the Roma community in his “Montenegro without division” campaign, but he did not find an adequate costume. Yes really.
Roma responded saying if the smallest problem faced by Roma was traditional costumes, they’d be really happy there. In any case, the Council of Montenegro’s Roma signed a joint Memorandum on cooperation, as announced the president of the Roma Council, Mensur Šalaj.
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