Remember Me (Thilbo - Bagginshield)

The Hole in the Flag

Romania, 1989
7th Life
The factory worker and the doctor
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It was dark when Toma Izbaşa arrived home, unwrapping his scarf from around his neck and shrugging his coat off his shoulders. He often left work late - the hospital he worked at was small and under-staffed, so there were usually few doctors on duty. Most days he worked long shifts, sometimes arriving before the sun rose and leaving after it set, but there was little he could do.

Removing his shoes and placing them by the door, Toma yawned and stretched tiredly as he made his way to the kitchen. He was starving, having not eaten anything in several hours, and grabbed a large chunk of bread with some butter before moving on to the living room, careful to turn off any lights he had turned on.

The candles in the living room slowly flickered to life as he lit them, blowing the match out before setting it down in an ash tray. He chewed lazily on the bread for a moment, listening to the quiet sound of the wind, before turning and opening a nearby cabinet. He rummaged through it for a minute or so, the piece of bread hanging from his mouth, before pulling out a small radio made of bright orange plastic. Sitting down on the couch and setting the radio in front of him, he turned it on and, lengthening the antenna, carefully adjusted it until the static was replaced by clear voices.

It was one of the Romanian government's official stations, Toma realized, giving an update about tomorrow's weather. He frowned, and began fiddling with the dial, watching as the station number changed and various voices flitted through the speaker, not all of them Romanian.

There had been several patients at the hospital that evening who had seemed anxious about something, whispering to each other under their breath. Toma hadn't been able to catch anything they had said, and they had been reluctant to speak with him about it. It appeared to be something big, however, as the trend continued for the rest of the night with patients muttering to each other and giving the entire hospital an uneasy air.

If it was something that was creating that much tension, Toma knew that the official state media most likely wouldn't be reporting it. They rarely did if they felt it might disrupt the general populace, though word had gotten out somehow, which led Toma to suspect the various Western radio stations that were broadcast throughout Romania.

There were several of them that Romanians could tune into, listening to news stories that were censored by the government. However, they were difficult to find, and one had to be careful when doing so, as the state had recently begun cracking down on those illegal stations and punishing those who listened to them.

It had been over forty years since communism came to the country, and over twenty since Nicolae Ceauşescu became leader of the Socialist Republic of Romania. Things had appeared well at first, with Ceauşescu seeming to be more lenient than his predecessor, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej. However, in recent year things had taken a turn for the worse. It seemed as if everything was slowly becoming rationed - first food in 1984, then petroleum and electricity in 1985. Buses now used methane propulsion, while taxis had been converted to burn methanol. Each household was restricted to 20 kWh of electricity per month, and anything over that was taxed. In addition, at night only one in five streetlights was turned on and for those with televisions there was now only one channel which ran for just two hours a day. Heating and gas had also been turned off, and a curfew was put in place on Sundays - every day, the shops had to be closed by 5:30pm.

It was obvious that the people were becoming unhappy. Two years ago, a riot had erupted in Braşov, a city in Transylvania, during which a large group of factory workers had stormed the city's Communist headquarters. There had only been a few small demonstrations since then, but the discontent could be heard in how people whispered quietly to each other. From what Toma had heard on Western radio, it appeared as if the rest of the world believed the reign of communism in Romania would soon reach its end.