Roma celebrate St. George’s Day, their biggest holiday in the Balkans, which celebrates the arrival of spring, the farewell to winter and the awakening of nature.
President Petr Pavel and Eva Pavlová will receive Roma community leaders at Prague Castle on the occasion of International Roma Day. According to information from the Romea.cz server, a total of 20 Roma men and women are expected to attend. Almost half of them are graduates of the educational program Supporting the Social Inclusion of Roma through Community Development and Entrepreneurship, which was implemented by the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. The three-year program involved 80 participants from 11 regions of the Czech Republic. The names of the specific participants have not yet been published.
Berlin, Nurenberg, and Munich will hoist the Roma flag on their city halls.
Students from the Veliko Tarnovo region will celebrate International Roma Day – April 8. The event in the old capital will be held on April 3 /Friday/ at 2:00 p.m. at the Petko R. Slaveykov Regional Library. The main highlight of the program is the presentation of the book “The House of the White Swan” by the Roma writer, teacher and educational mediator Atanas Atanasov – Vakavliyata. Guests will have the opportunity to meet the author and get acquainted with his work, dedicated to the life, identity and values of the Roma community.
The Krakow somewhat belated celebrations of International Roma Day are taking place today place at the Multicultural Center at ul. Zabłocie 20. The program includes a debate, workshops, tasting of traditional dishes and a concert by Marek Balog – an outstanding Roma artist.
An article about the Erdelezi celebrations in Edirne, Turkey. With some rather unknown explanations of the festival (as the day of the meeting between the prophets Hizir and Ilias), and mentioning “purification” rituals.
Saint Georges day, also called Erdelezi, is one of the most iconic Roma celebrations in the Balkans.
An article on Roma in Lithuania in the context of the April 8th celebrations.
According to the 2021 census, 2,251 Roma lived in Lithuania. There are still many false prejudices about this ethnic group, which result mainly from ignorance and lack of education.
The current Slovak President Čaputová commemorated International Roma Day. She stated that Roma students would very much like Slovakia to be a more tolerant country that can give Roma children a chance and accept them.
She invited Roma students from universities and secondary schools from all over Slovakia to the palace.
Several articles on the celebration of the 8th of April in Brno, Czechia.
The Čakovec Cultural Centre in cooperation with the Association of Roma in the Republic of Croatia “KALI SARA” has set up two outstanding exhibitions for the Međimurje audience on the occasion of the World Roma Day. The exhibitions and the motivation behind this cooperation were announced in the introductory part of the opening ceremony by Maja Grubišić, head of the Roma educational and cultural centre, noting that World Roma Day is celebrated in honour of the first World Roma Congress held in London in 1971, during which world Roma community defined its political and social position for the first time.
Romea goes back to the origins of the April 8th celebrations: The first Roma World Congress in 1971 near London (April 7th to 12th). The Czechoslovaks were well represented at this first congress.
On Saturday, the city of Brussels organised an event to celebrate the international Roma day.
The Czech town of Liberec hung a Roma flag on the terrace of the third floor of the regional office building for the April 8th celebrations.
The Roma from that region were almost all killed during World War Two.
The celebration of the International Day of the Roma start today with a conference in the Brožík room of the Old Town Hall focused on the future of financing Roma art and culture.
“Unfortunately, Roma culture is still perceived primarily as community entertainment. This approach has far-reaching effects on many levels, of which, in addition to the social one, for those of us who deal with our culture professionally, the financial level is the most sensitive,” says David Tišer, Roma activist, director and director of the organizing association Ara Art.
An article in the Slovak press on the origins of the International day of the Roma. April 8 was established as International Roma Day in 1990 near Warsaw at the Fourth World Roma Congress organized by the International Romani Union (IRU). The choice of this day was related to the commemoration of the first worldwide Roma meeting in April 1971 in Orpington near London.
Now why did they put a picture of young Indian girls on the article? The picture is a stock photograph that has been used numerous times in conjunction with various topics about India. Bad journalism…
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