European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 24, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse The shifting role of culture by Celestine Bohlen new York times in Prague Czechoslovakia Heaters reported a Sharp drop in attendance. In Budapest Hungary no new feature films went into production for the first half of this year. In Bucharest Romania fewer books were published this year than in any year of the communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu. As Eastern Europe assesses its first year in Freedom the verdict is that culture once a Refuge from communist reality became an unintended victim of its demise As it lagged behind the real life drama that was unfolding daily before people s eyes. Quot under totalitarianism culture was a Way of breathing normally Quot said Andre Plesur a respected Man of letters and Romania s minister of culture. Quot now reality has become so absorbing that the streets the television and the journals have confiscated the Public interest and people Are no longer so thirsty for culture on a higher for those who direct and produce who write and read the swiftness of the changes in Eastern Europe has been bewildering. Janos so Bolyai a hungarian film maker said he has Stilt not figured out How to capture the moment on film or How to draw the attention of a distracted audience. Quot last december i was shooting a film about the hungarian uprising in 1956, and i came Home switched on the television and watched the revolution in Romania. I thought what am i doing we Are sitting in the Middle of a Region where history is happening now. Maybe the Best thing is just to take a camera and go out in the forced to match history a relentless Pace the societies of Eastern Europe this year were left strangely bereft of guides. With the cultural world paralysed the Job of both witnessing and explaining events fell to the press and broadcasting which Many feel have generally proved inadequate to the Challenge. In virtually every country the press was the first to Benefit from the new conditions of Freedom. Censorship was lifted almost overnight information came flooding out of once secret sources and travel and foreign news became easily available. New newspapers opened old ones changed their names and people stood in line in cities and towns All Over the Region to buy publications offering everything from political analysis to pornography and scandal mongering. In Warsaw the old clandestinely produced Solidarity Broadsheet very quickly became the most popular newspaper when it gained Legal status. At the same time Tribuna Ludu no longer powerful As the Organ of the communist party began calling itself the country s Quot leading opposition since last december the number of romanian newspapers and journals has quadrupled to More than 1,200, and they now consume the bulk of the country s scarce Supply of newsprint at the expense of Book publishing. Quot before in Romania no one read the newspapers and everybody read books Quot said Darie nov Ocean a poet critic and translator of Spanish literature who became editor of the romanian newspaper Adeva Rul in december. Quot now it is the Page 14 a a a the stars and stripes yet Many feel the press in much of Eastern Europe has failed at its chief responsibility which was to provide people with the information they needed to make the choices they suddenly faced. Instead with some notable exceptions readers often got either a powerful dose of polemics or prose so dense that they still had to read Between the lines to find out what was going on. In both Hungary and Romania the newly elected governments complain loudly and frequently that the main newspapers Are Overly critical and biased toward the opposition while the opposition continues to lobby against state control of the most crucial medium of All television. This month in Hungary the two views clashed Over coverage of the oct. 26-28 taxi strike that opposed a 65 percent increase in gasoline prices and that ground the a country to a halt. A spokesman for the governing hungarian democratic forum argued that the strike might have been averted had the government had a a Loyal Quot broadcasting Channel to report the reasons for the gasoline increase while journalists published Long critiques of the pro government Bias of television s coverage of events. Skirmishes such As this often reveal a deep confusion Over the role of a free press. Some people talk about Quot too much Quot criticism of government As a dangerous luxury in societies where democratic institutions have shallow roots. Many newspaper editors see objective reporting As an abdication of their right to act As political players. Quot we cannot refuse our duty to give the Reader a political education Quot said Anton uncut editor of Romania libera the disillusionment continued from Page 13 democracy there Are procedures for settling such conflicts. But Here democracy is very though still proudly held up As a Model democracy has brought Many of its less admirable aspects to Eastern Europe. There Are homeless and beggars on the streets. Two men sat on a Busy downtown Warsaw Street holding up signs saying they were aids victims and needed Money. The metro stations and newspaper stalls in Budapest Are awash in cheap pornography. Sex shops Are opening. Crime is on the increase. For those in Power today the changes of the past year have brought one hard lesson the skills needed to fight communism Are not the same As those needed to effectively govern a country. Workers playwrights professors May make honorable dissidents but a ineffective politicians. Quot the parties born under communism had one Central goal a to overthrow communist control Quot said Ferenc Pallagi a hungarian newspaper editor. Quot they had Little to say about the virtually All the newly elected governments have been shaken by Public frustration Over the Lack of economic Progress and the belief that they have failed to Root out main opposition newspaper in Bucharest. Quot we Are trying to decrease the ratio of opinion to information but until the i political situation settles Down in Romania the political i commentary will have to continue. Besides keeping an j equal distance from All political Points of View is in itself a i political Point of i nationalism an increasing Force in politics in the Region j puts additional pressures on the press. In Yugoslavia j newspapers in the rival republics of Croatia and Serbia j provide shamelessly one sided coverage of ethnic i disputes. Defending the rights of a free press in one breath the editor of a romanian nationalist newspaper in the next i asserted that anyone who challenges the romanian View of history is an the hungarian foreign minister Geza Jeszenszky got involved in a similar debate this fall when he publicly lobbied against the Sale of a major Budapest daily to a swedish newspaper which he said in an open letter Wal Quot hostile or simply indifferent to the hungarian in some countries a particularly the Balkan nations of Romania Bulgaria and Yugoslavia a Freedom of the press has already proved to be a fragile notion. When bands of miners descended on Bucharest in june to clean the capital of anti government demonstrators one of their first targets was Romania Liberia. With a Man later identified As a former member of Ceausescu a secret police in the Lead a group of miners used threats of violence to shut the j paper Down for three Days. Quot yes there is Freedom of the press Quot uncut said. A but former communists from positions of authority. J Confidence in the parliaments political parties and j other new institutions of the fledgling democracies is j declining. Turnout at elections has been disappointingly j Low. Governments Are earning a reputation for indecisiveness. Poland a Solidarity movement which kept the Candle i of Freedom alive for 10 years has split bitterly Between 1 empty shelves Are common in Eastern Europe. Orphanages and Homes for handicapped children Are filled to overflowing throughout Romania. Adopting romanian children t Good is it when the journalist is afraid to print the truth Ause of death threats or miners Are ready to Stop the uses this paper has proved to be uncomfortable for s in much of Western Europe people have to buy eral newspapers to get a full Range of political opinion difference is that Eastern europeans have less Prience at sorting them out. He changes that Shook the Region last year stunned maoists too. Editors say they still have to fight off a Dency by their reporters to climb on a Soapbox or to verbal formulas that have no meaning he transitions for romanian journalists was particularly go Given the extent to which the press had been promised by the Ceausescu regime. Quot Freedom came a typhoon Quot uncut said. Quot the journalists were not ready had to recoup our moral sense and even the romanian Guage itself which had been strangled by any Eastern european countries Are Only now piling with Laws dealing with press ownership a How to Artize the press How much foreign investment to allow dhow to Monitor state involvement. Any of the new newspapers and journals that sprang in the Early months of democracy Are expected to fail Der the weight of Market forces. In Hungary foreign press magnates have already bought shares in several major dailies but there is some certainty about How Many hungarian newspapers will revive the coming Competition Over readers advertisers. Most of Eastern Europe a new governments Are omitted to continuing state support for the arts but Ain the debate Over How Aid is to be distributed has Only gun. One Issue for instance involves who should take a possibility for supporting provincial theater the Central verment or local jurisdictions. Movie and theater prices be gone up but Many fear that if they go up much higher enhance will fall off even More sharply As people turn to e wide selection of entertainment now available from eos and Cable television. After the first Rush to print once forbidden books by ssi dents and leading cultural figures Book publishers Are so finding it difficult to keep up with the demand for mass Arket foreign books. An added problem in Many countries that writers such As Czechoslovakia a a president Vaclev Vel Are now so deeply involved in politics that they have time to write. Eastern european film studios Are also up against stiff reign Competition As Hollywood Box office hits open in ies like Budapest within weeks of their release in the United states. Having recently won Freedom from Norship no one wants to now step in with a new set of Strols. Still Many worry How their National cultures will revive the trend to commercialization. Quot we Are a Small country and a Small language area Quot id so Bolyai the hungarian film maker. Quot the wrong a would be to have some kind of control. The right Way is help our hungarian films. We have no other i Walesa and Mazowiecki Camps he government of president Vaclav Havel in Echo Slovakia while praised for its liberalism stands used of amateurism and delay in steering an equate economic Reform program through a lament. Hungary a coalition government led by prime minister usef Antall is near collapse following its recent management of the gasoline Price increase. It was ced into an embarrassing Retreat by the taxi Drivers Cade. He political situation in Romania and Bulgaria both by Reform communists is far from settled. Quot the situation confronting Eastern Europe today is Hout parallel a said Tamas Rona a successful irate businessman in Hungary. Quot the last 40 years re so bad both politically and economically that the a formation to democracy and capitalism will be Riby under mounting political and economic troubles Many Inion shapers Are looking to the West to provide the in it Long has promised. Quot unless the West starts something like the Marshall a Quot Rona said referring to the american financial sue program for Western Europa after world War ii astern Europe will not be Able to make the transition r a Long Long time to by Celestine Bohlen new York times moved by pictures she had seen of the desperate conditions in romanian orphanages Linda Tregaskis went to Bucharest Romania from Austin Texas for the first time last july to find a year old child to take Home with her. She recently came through a crash course in the ordeals of romanian adoption with flying colors a and a 2-week-old son named Charles Michael. Her Friend from Rochester n.y., who had come hoping to adopt two or three babies under 1 year old is leaving with a 7-year-old daughter a 2vf>-year-old son an infant and prospects for adopting a fourth baby not yet born. A it is funny Hovy it works out Quot said the new Mother who spoke on condition of anonymity. Quot you cannot predict which ones you will fall in love in the last few months the adoption of romanian children by people from the West has been steadily increasing after a halt last summer As the Bucharest government established new regulations. Veterans of the process say the new rules instituting formal court proceedings in the place of president Ion Iliescu s personal signature Are still ragged and the experience exhausting. But those who go Are prepared to put up with anything so Long As they can leave with a healthy child a prize that is increasingly hard for adoptive parents to find in North America and Western Europe particularly for single mothers like Tregaskis. The plight of romanians abandoned children a offspring of a communist system that first forbade abortions for most women and then made it economically impossible for them to care for Large families a has opened up new reserves in the worldwide search for children in need of Homes. Under pressure from Relief organizations the romanian government is now trying to coordinate Aid for the 130,000 children left stranded in 379 institutions of whom almost half Are considered mentally or physically handicapped. A recent report produced some chilling findings of the 32 hostels for handicapped children not one is considered fit for use and yet the children remain. Calculating the shortages of food clothes materials and medicines the government estimated it needs $27 million in immediate Aid $100 million for the Long term. Foreign adoptions properly controlled Are one Way to Rescue some of the children although proportionately the numbers Are Small. No National figure is available but the flow seems to be steady. Last summer 67 families from Canada went to Bucharest As a group and left with 130 children. One estimate put the number of adoptions by americans by september at 160. Since january when the draconian anti abortion Law was lifted the number of births in Romania has fallen and the number of abortions has soared. As a result fewer newborns Are available for adoption and some organizations Are turning their attention to nerdier children. As they tour the orphanages and asylums the new parents Are walked past cribs of children a often wet unwashed and with running noses a and asked which one they want. Older children besiege foreign visitors calling the women a mama Quot and asking to be taken away on a plane. Quot it feels like shopping for shoes a Tregaskis said. Quot it can be an awful experience saying no not this one not that at the hotel president in Bucharest a former guest House of the romanian communist party that has become a popular Campground for adoptive parents the War stories told around dinner tables Are All about the bureaucratic bungling Petty corruption and 19th-Century working conditions that plague the collection of the necessary adoption papers. The court procedure can take As Little As 15 minutes or As Long As five hours. In one Rural town the proceedings ended up including five judges and a full jury drawn from citizens called in off the Street to pass judgment on Why one american family that already had four children wanted to adopt two More. In this baffling Maze the prospective parents have nowhere to turn but to each other. They complain that the United states and other embassies provide conflicting sometimes inaccurate information and that in Many cases their romanian lawyers know Little More than they do. Those who come to adopt come prepared to stay for weeks sometimes months. Not knowing How old their child will be they arrive with clothes and diapers for All Ages and then Swap among themselves. Other essentials include dollars and cigarettes the most acceptable form of currency in Romania s current economic crisis. Quot when i came i was handing out Candy bars and packs of cigarettes Quot said one frustrated american. Quot now i am up to $20 Bills and by tomorrow it May be 50s.�?� still the costs Are relatively Low. Tregaskis figured that she spent $5,000 for everything including one round trip ticket hotel room taxis taxes and various fees. Lawyers fees which include a mandatory $606 state tax can Range from $1,000 to $2,500, but after bitter experience Many new parents advise doing without lawyers altogether. To save Money people can also live in private apartments where they can stay for $20 or less a night. But often they find the hardships of romanian life More than they bargained for a sometimes no refrigerator and elevator and now in parts of Bucharest water Only at certain times of the Day. Or 24,1990 the stars and stripes a a a Page 15
