RO

Tatiana Țîbuleac was born in Moldova, she’s a Romanian, the wife of a British-Swiss citizen and she lives in Paris for 13 years. Through her books she has shown more than any passport could, that she is a complex writer, who can bring to live characters from different parts of Europe.

In 2019, her writing career, completely unplanned, took a surprising turn, even for herself. She won the European Union Literature Award for her novel The glass garden, her second book, and next to her name, they put “Romania.”

“I’m Romanian. I introduce myself as a Romanian writer. I’m from Moldova, but everywhere I went with my books, I introduced myself as a Romanian writer. I find it normal. I don’t believe in this separation. Writers from Moldova have always wanted to be a part of Romanian literature.”

And Tatiana Țîbuleac has managed that without even trying. She has never lived in Romania, but she writes in Romanian and is trying to teach the language to her children, born and raised in the French capital.

“My children speak 4 languages – English, French, Romanian and Russian. I like that they discovered reading in Romanian and I think that already is a good way.

I set my ambition not to get any other citizenship, I could have gotten a British or a Swiss citizenship, my husband being British-Swiss. But in the end, I’m still a Romanian in Paris.

Many Romanians try to cut all their ties. To me it wasn’t the case. Probably my desire to go to Romania from Moldova was so strong, that I say proudly that I’m a Romanian.

It’s my small love declaration, I think.”

Tatiana was born in 1978 in Chișinău. Both her parents worked in press, her father as a journalist, her mother as a corrector at a newspaper. And their daughter walked in their footsteps, even though her n’t father would have wanted a more secure path for her, such as medical school or law school.

“I used to love what my father was doing, but back then, journalism was harder to do that what I did. He used to tell me that I will freeze in the cold, that I will be sleeping in attics. In those days, you would sleep in someone’s attic, and do the story at the farm, the school, the kindergarten.

And I chose journalism, eventually. Those were some good years, I liked it a lot. The only issue I had was when I transferred to TV and I had to be a news anchor, I didn’t like that.”

She worked in written press for three years, then she joined Pro TV Chișinău, the first commercial and independent station in Moldova. There she was a reporter, an editor, but also a news anchor.

“I did the first stories of migrants from Moldova in Italy. I remember meeting people who had slept for a half of year tied up in trees, because they couldn’t sleep on the ground, so the police wouldn’t catch them.

There were touching moments for me and I think that is where I learned to listen to people.”

“I learned a lot from journalism and I have never regretted those years. I think that I would still be practicing it, if I hadn’t come to another country.”

After working in press, she collaborated with UNICEF and discovered people from different countries, who have broadened her horizons. She met her husband and moved with him to Paris.

“I’ve always felt like an outsider in Paris. It’s a difficult relationship with Paris and I don’t know why, because it’s a lovely city.

But there are places where you can’t or you won’t fit in. On the other hand, this is what made me feel good in Paris. I’ve never had an issue whether the French will see me as their own or not.”

“Today I’m here, tomorrow I won’t be, I take the best from today. Right now I fell very good in France.”

She didn’t know that her walks on the small Paris roads would open her path to literature.

“I had never felt the need to write literature. You can’t feel the need to write when you’re already writing all day long. My work day used to start at 6 a.m. and would end at 11 o’clock in the evening. All day long I would write or edit, I don’t see how I could have started to write a book at home, when I came home to sleep, or watch a movie, rest, do anything but write.

Writing began on this street.”

On Rue Montorgueil, right in the heart of Paris, the first arrondissement, her first writings that were different that her experience in press were being born.

It was in a vivid area, full of cafe’s and boutiques specific to Paris, a few steps from the out-of-the-box Centre Pompidou and Brâncuși Workshop.

“I stardet speaking to a florist at a flower shop here and she had a great story. And I thought of doing something with her story.

And I started writing some short things on Facebook. I wrote about 10 lines there and called it a modern-day fable. It was like child’s play.

And so many people read that thing, that I continued writing these modern-day fables. Then a website created a permanent column with “modern-day fables”, and somebody from that website said that we should put them in a book. And that is how I actually started writing.

That is when this shift occurred, from journalism to literature, although it was not literature yet. I called them fables because they had a moral in the end.

I wrote about a lot of people in this neighborhood. Things have changed now.”

The flower shop closed down, and Tatiana became an internationally appreciated author.

“With “Modern-day Fables” I started to get thousands of messages, more than I’m getting now, with two published books. People identified with the theme and would send me stories, they wanted to be in Modern-day Fables.

I felt somewhat like an impostor, because everyone would say to me “you’re such a kind, gentle, good woman”, and I’m neither kind, nor gentle, nor good. It was the wrong picture.

There was too much kindness around me and I couldn’t handle it. I felt like telling them that I’m not like that, stop writing to me, you’re pissing me off.

And I believe that that is exactly how “Summer”, my first book, came to be. Because “Summer” is exactly the opposite. I think I wanted to show that I am different, in fact. The writing in “Summer” represents me. I am “The Summer”. I am the woman in there. I am the boy, that is how I am.

“Summer” came to be after a summer I spent with my parents. They came to France, the children were small, and we showed them the country.

We went to the exact places that I’ve described in that book. And I, having a complicated relation ship with my father, I felt for the first time that I have somehow forgotten him, seeing him playing with my daughter. My father seemed a beautiful man, interesting, something I had never noticed, because we would always argue.

I had started writing these stories on my blog around that time and I got home and wrote a story that was the basis for the character of the mother in the book. It was a Jewish mother whom I had met at a hotel and she was dying. We spent a few days together, we chatted. We spent some time at the hotel, where she had came with her children, her head was shaved.

When I got home, I started writing her story. But I noticed that there wasn’t an ending to what I was writing, it wasn’t just a post or a story anymore.

I started writing every day, this masculine voice was in my head and I didn’t know what to do with it and I carried on. I wrote it in less than two months. The editor from Moldova Gheorghe Erizanu was visiting then and asked me if I’m writing anything.

And I said “I’m writing a thing, but it’s bizarre, I don’t know who might read it. Nothing llike this has ever been written in Moldova, a story where the child doesn’t love his mother, there’s a lot of hatred there.” And he told me to send it to him. I sent it on a Thursday and on Monday he told me that he was getting it ready for print.”

“The Summer When my Mother’s Eyes Were Green” received in 2018 “The Observatorul Cultural” award for prose and the FILIT award. She then became known throughout Europe after the first translation, in Spanish.

“I had a complicated relation ship with this book. I hated it. I thought that nobody wanted to see it. But we made our peace and now I somewhat miss a little kindness.

Everything is too cynical now. Everybody’s asking me about crisis, evil, death, depression. Now I’m on the other end of things.

In “Summer” I was Tatiana from Paris, in a way. In “Summer” I denied all that Moldova meant. In “Summer” I’m the cosmopolitan woman, living in Paris, connected to England, who knows galleries, paintings, because that is who I am.

I was often asked why I had chosen to write about two Polish and not two Romanians or Moldavians. I also asked myself those questions. And I think that’s how “The Garden” came to be. That’s where I had my revenge, I went back to Chișinău, in the Botanical, in my neighbourhood.”

The novel “The Glass Garden” confirmed and cemented Tatiana Țîbuleac’s success in Romania, as well as the rest of Europe and South America.

It was written, as was “Summer”, in Romanian, language being a character in it’s own, both in the book, and in the life of Tatiana from Chișinău.

“I think that “The Garden” had been in my head forever, it was inside me. With “The Garden” I had this dilemma, whether to write it in Russian or not. Because there were a lot of things coming in my head in Russian, it being the language of my childhood in a way, the language of the city and it was a book about the city, about Chișinău.

But I chose to write it in Romanian and I’m happy that I chose so, because it’s a story about the Romanian language, not the Russian language.

When I wrote this book, I felt that it was a moment of reconciliation between these two languages. Now I would have to re-read it, see how I position myself, because things have changed.

My father was more Rusophobic than I was. That was one of our reasons for arguing. He distanced himself completely from Russian language when we started using the Latin alphabet.

He felt Romanian and dreamt of the unification with Romania. After we started using the Latin alphabet, he didn’t touch Russian literature. He did what many are doing now, during the war.

In my case, it was difficult to separate myself from the Russian language, because I grew up speaking Russian, and he couldn’t understand why I didn’t have this burning hatred towards everything Russian. It sounds bizarre to argue because of language, but there were many cases, we weren’t the only family.”

Meanwhile, her father passed away, and Tatiana left Chișinău a long time ago.

Her family’s history and the region she was born in still follows her, because the war in Ukraine has profound emotional ramifications.

“Our name is Ukrainian, we had relatives in Ukraine. My mother lives in Chișinău. I never thought that I would ever see Russia killing children in Ukraine, given the historical bonds, but it is happening.

In the first month of the war, we were paralised.

For people in Moldova, the war feels different. People are hearing the loud explosions, they have children left for studying, they have vacation homes, they have friends staying with them in Chișinău, because they seek shelter.

To us, this war is much worse. It is the worst. And it is still not over. And it hurts me to see people thinking that it is over or that it’s better now.

I can understand going back to our lives, because you cannot constantly live with someone else’s misfortune, but last week Kiev was bombed again, and the events aren’t even the first ones on the news anymore.

People are vacationing, Europe is in vacation. But the war continues.

I fear tanks going into Chișinău, where my mother lives, but not only that. I fear that we are witnessing a war online and we’re not doing enough. I cannot understand how, in these days, such a war is permitted. Nobody is stopping it.”

When the war began, Tatiana took in her home in Paris some refugees from Ukraine and, for the first time, understood her family’s own past.

“It meant reconnecting to my grandparents past, who were deported, and, more than any trip to Siberia, these months I realized what it actually means to leave your home with a bag, a barefoot child and run. These stories started to take shape for me. My mother was born in a gulag, in Siberia.”

She hasn’t written in this period and she doesn’t believe that art should respond to current themes, but should be an intimate act, which you feel or not.

In fact, she does not necessarily plan on continuing her writing career, but expects things to go on in a natural way, such at it was until now.

“If I’ll write another book, it’s ok, if not, it’s still ok. I don’t want to be tied up by just writing. I want to believe that I can do other things as well.”

She does not live in the center of Paris anymore, but is living a quiet life on the outskirts of the city, where she is gardening and dedicates her time to her children.

“Home is where your family is, I believe. But I feel that I will change many places.”

She is part of an international community, more than a French one, and has a realistic perspective on the country in which she lives.

“Not all French people live like the wealthy in Paris. There are very poor regions in France.

This myth that everyone eats croissants for breakfast in France is not true.

There are families that make as much as middle class families in Romania.

I have not felt the French adversity towards immigrants, but it exists. This is a more open area, where you barely feel it, but the far-right has been on everyone’s lips during these elections. This scares me. I am an immigrant and am part of a community of immigrants.

Having this British side in the family, we saw what was happening with Brexit, when nobody thought that it will happen. When you talked to people, nobody was voting pro-Brexit, but eventually, Brexit happened.”

When she is not dedicating her time to her family, the Romanian writer travels a lot to promote her books. She closely follows Romanian contemporary literature, but says that “I’m not doing so well at the chapter of relation ships with other writers, it’s like a wall there.”

She would want for Romanians to appreciate more their fellow’s performances, and stop self-sabotaging.

She has a skeptical view of the world in which we live, through the prism of the terrible war, but manages to see glimpses of hope in common people.

“I’m not an optimistic person, rather the opposite. But I believe that optimism can be helped through some gestures of solidarity, a warm loaf of bread, a warm coat.”

“I don’t believe that we can live outside of community

I still see the kindness in people. I have seen some good people even in these times. I really don’t like it when someone’s good gestures are being doubted. As long as the gesture es made, for PR or otherwise, it’s a good thing.

I believe that people’s kindness comes out once in a while.”

***This story is part of the “France Week” series, a Cultura la Dubă project supported by BNP Paribas.

The post Tatiana Țîbuleac, writer: “The world thinks that if someone leaves, they must have a place to call home. In my mind it wasn’t like that.” appeared first on Cultura la dubă.

RO

20 years ago, the great German conductor Kurt Masur, while he was the musical director of the French National Orchestra, was naming as head of the orchestra a young lady violinist, of only 21 years old.

Sarah Nemțanu thus became the youngest concert master in the history of the National French Orchestra, a position she still occupies today.

100% French on paper, Sarah bears a Romanian name – Nemțanu – and has a Romanian-beating heart especially when she visits Romania.

“The first time I came to Romania and I heard people speaking Romanian, I thought everyone was my cousin. (laughing) It was like all the family was there, that was my feeling. I felt home.”

Her story is not only one of an accomplished musician, who has conquered the world’s greatest stages, but also a testimony of a universal Europe, in which millions of families break, in need, from their homes and grow roots in other places, that adopt them and give them wings.

Vladimir Nemțanu, born in Bucharest into a Jewish family, was a concert master in the George Enescu Philharmonic, and his wife had just graduated from canto at the Conservatory when they decided to flee communist Romania, that was under Nicolae Ceaușescu’s dictatorship.

They took advantage of The Most Favored Nation Clause, through which Ceaușescu allowed Romanian Jews to emigrate to Israel and The United States of America, and left for Israel themselves.

After a few months spent there, the two young Romanians were getting a chance in France. He got the position of concert master of the Bordeaux National Orchestra and she was hired at the Bordeaux Opera.

“When they got to France, they started a new life. They had nothing, they lived in a hotel for a while, until they rented an apartment. It really was starting from 0.

There were a few Romanians in the Bordeaux orchestra, there already was a cultural connection between Romania and France. And in the ’70’s, a lot of regional orchestras appeared. There were not so many French musicians, so they were completed by Romanian musicians.

Even to this day, the Romanian musicians communities in European orchestras are impressive. But especially in France, because there is this cultural friendship, there have been so many extraordinary Romanian artists who created in France, such as Ionesco, Enescu, Brâncuși.”

“It is the Latin side that binds Romania to France, our atoms intertwine.”

A year and a half after settling in Bordeaux, Sarah was born into the Nemțanu family.

“I’m the oldest of three children and first learned to speak Romanian at home. Then, when I went to school, French became my first language.

But I would say that until about the age of 12, at home I would speak Romanian. Especially when my grandparents were visiting, about a month every year, we would only speak Romanian. Also, my parents’ entourage was formed exclusively of Romanians.”

Although she was fairly young, Sarah vividly recalls her first visit to Romania.

“I went to Romania with my mother and sister when I was six, I have memories, but they are not nice. It was around 1987, my mother already had a French passport, but she was afraid that they wouldn’t let her get back to France, at the airport.

My memory is of my mother crying in panic. She was questioned: why are you married to a Jew? Why are you living in France and not here? I remember all the questions, it was something very violent for me.

Then, I remember it being cold, winter, a lot of snow. The only pleasant memory is riding the sleigh with my grandfather in Bucharest. That was cool!”

She pronounces the word “sleigh” (săniuță) perfectly in Romanian. More so, even though when we started the interview she said that she will be speaking French, because she does not manage speaking Romanian so well, Sarah mostly answers in the language that her parents taught her when she was a child.

As a child, information about Romania was vague, as it would have been for any other child to understand why her parents had to flee their own country.

“I have this memory of being in the car when Ceaușescu was executed, my mother stopped, turned up the volume and stood still. I knew that they had fled Romania because it was not good, but I didn’t understand why.

On the other hand, I was aware that they were happy in France, with a double culture, that they passed on to us, their children.”

Sarah and Deborah, her sister, took on their father’s passion for violin, while their brother became a jurist.

While Sarah leads the National French Orchestra, as a prime violinist, Deborah Nemțanu is, as well, concert master of the National Chamber Orchestra in Paris.

“I implored my father to teach me violin. He was very passionate, he would study a lot, and when we heard him play, we would run to him.

To me, the violin is like a voice. I’m trying to say something through music, through a universal language, without precise words. And people understand what it wants.

I can’t remember wanting to do anything else.

“The most wonderful thing that our father passed on was to be independent, self-critics, knowing on our own whether what we’re doing is right or not, listen to ourselves, without anyone else telling us that we were off-key.”

From 16, Sarah moved by herself in Paris, where she graduated from the Conservatory. And recently she was made a violin teacher at the prestigious school. She enjoys teaching the youth and says that she got this gift and this joy from her father.

She was also a violin teacher for Melanie Laurent, the actress, for the film Le Concert, directed by Radu Mihăileanu.

Sarah Nemțanu is the one playing the music in the film – Tchaikovsky’s concert for violin and orchestra – and had enormous success, along with the film. Le Monde were saying at the time: “Sarah Nemțanu, the true violinist from The Concert”.

“Radu is very precise, he knows exactly what he wants and what I loved was that he made the entire final scene of the film on the timed rhythm of Tchaikovsky’s concert, he first played the music and built the script based on the musicality of the work.

I had never seen that. Usually, in films, they add the music after the shoot.”

As a head of orchestra, she works directly with Christian Măcelaru, the Romanian musical director of the French National Orchestra. He believes her to be one of the finest violinists of the world, who could easily transition to a solo carrier.

But Sarah loves working in an orchestra and can not see herself doing anything else.

“I knew that I wanted to be a concert master. In my mind, I could’t see myself playing alone. My father was a concert master. When I finished school, I loved going to rehearsals when I knew that the orchestra was also there.

My life philosophy is that we all form a chain in which each is a link, we are very different, but only together we can form this chain.

When we will accept that each has his own personality, then everything will be alright. The main priority is the common good, that of the orchestra.

And I love the orchestra, I love the orchestra repertoire, and it shows and my colleagues see it.

I am both head of the orchestra, and part of it, I’m a crossroad that creates connections and this is owed mainly to my education.”

I ask her how many Romanians there are at the moment in the French National Orchestra and she effortlessly answers:

“- Oana, Teodor, Eduard, so 1,2,3,4.

– 3.

– 4, counting me.

– Do you count yourself?

– Of course. (laughs)”

With a Romanian conductor at the helm and a Romanian-born concert master, the French National Orchestra took on an important project, dedicated to the great Romanian composer George Enescu.

The entire work of Enescu will be recorded during the next 10 years at the prestigious record label Deutsche Grammophon.

“In Enescu’s music you can find images from his childhood, birds singing, a violinist playing on the street.

I believe that George Enescu wrote so that he would never forget his memories and did it in the smallest details regarding folklore.

It is, obviously, also classical composing, savant music. But in his music there is always this transparent veil of folklore, which he managed to integrate.

Romania is making all these great efforts to be a European country in all aspects and I believe that the artists are te first that succeed, artists are the first creating connections between countries. Enescu did this perfectly.

In his music there is a lot of freedom, but it is in a special frame, a deeply personal one. This is truly special at Enescu. And that is how I see freedom. We are free on this Earth, but we are also limited on this planet.”

Last year, Sarah Nemțanu opened the International George Enescu Festival, along with the George Enescu Philharmonic, which her father had led, 44 years prior, as a concert master.

And as of this year, Cristian Măcaleru took the helms of the festival as the artistic director. They both wish for a refreshing of the event, but also more attention to young Romanian musicians.

“The Enescu festival is truly impressive. What I find to be a shame is that there is but one such festival in Romania.”

“All the funding goes to one place. I wouldn’t see a single event once every two years and then nothing. And, as we mentioned the youth, if there were larger investments in the system, I would like to see professors from all over Europe teaching in Romania.

Sure, there is the Enescu Contest, but the stakes there are a prize. Who is helping the young artists for the rest of the year, who is teaching them?

At the Enescu Festival I’ve met wonderful young people, volunteers, staff. The youth want to learn, they are fascinated by the European educational system.

Unfortunately, there are many leaving. The best of the youth are leaving Romania.

Here is where I believe that the Enescu Festival with Cristian Măcelaru as an artistic director will bring changes.

It is an enormous hope. It is something I feel.”

Sarah lives in one of the most bohemian neighborhoods in Paris – Montmartre. She walks daily, on her way home, on the wavy streets that were once walked by the great European artists – Monet, Manet, Renoir, Picasso or Van Gogh, and is at home in the vivid atmosphere of the place filled with tourists, right next to the Sacre Coeur Cathedral.

She is the mother of two, a wife and an artist who enjoys live through everything she does. She loves cooking, jogging with her husband and traveling. She lives a typical Parisian life, but equally loves each of her trips to Romania, which she sees as a fundamental part of her identity.

“I’ve went to Romania each of the last 6 years and every time I felt like home. It is something that cannot be explained, can only be felt.

I feel like home, I even took Georges there, my son.

Romania is at a European crossroad, it is a unique country through the fact that it is Latin in the east, and this gives it a special identity and in the same time it is a country of adaptability.

That is why I think many artists leave the country and are very evolved culturally.

And if we were to mention musical particularities, I think that the Romanian style has a certain elegance, something that my father absorbed and passed on.”

Sarah Nemțanu is the result of a family of Romanian migrants in France, in the same way as thousands of children are born in Romanian families overseas, and take on different paths than what their lives would have been, would their parents have stayed in Romania.

Art, in this case, has fundamentally contributed to the conservation of a cultural identity that Romanians carried along in their adoptive countries.

In a world where foul history repeats itself and millions of families are forced to flee from war or dictatorial regimes, Sarah is a believer in the good in everyone, and the power to bring a little light around us, be it through art, or through simple gestures.

“I believe that when you do good and are positive, there is an effect around you. For example, I have some friends that are constantly complaining about Paris taxi drivers, that they’re bad, this and that. I often take a taxi after concerts and I only meet wonderful taxi drivers, really nice.

Once I had a taxi driver that had came to see me at a concert. He was 50 years old and he listened to classical music on the radio, he had just enrolled in music school, to learn an instrument. I invited him to a concert, he came, waited for me at the end and cried.

To me, this is real life. If you do good, keep a positive attitude and don’t let all the negativity in the world influence you, than everything will be better.

***This story is part of the “France Week” series, a Cultura la Dubă project supported by BNP Paribas.

The post Sarah Nemțanu, outstanding French violinist, born from Romanian parents: “To me, the violin is like a voice. “ appeared first on Cultura la dubă.

Magda Mihăilă, pe numele complet Maria Magdalena Mihăilă, are 32 de ani, este manager de comunicare la o prestigioasă asociație mondială din domeniul sănătății, dar în timpul liber face stand-up comedy în franceză, engleză, spaniolă și română, în diverse țări din Europa sau în SUA.

S-a născut la Adjud, județul Vrancea, fiind cea mai mică dintre cei 5 frați. La 2 ani s-a mutat cu părinții în satul Vârlănești, județul Bacău. A copilărit acolo până la 8 ani, când a fost luată în grijă de sora mai mare, care locuia la Târgu Ocna, pentru a putea merge la școală.

Școala și dragul de ea au adus-o pe Magda la București, la Facultatea de Jurnalism și Științele Comunicării. A studiat comunicarea și încă din studenție a început să călătorească și să-și trăiască visul de a vedea întreaga lume. A plecat cu bursa Erasmus la Lyon, apoi a lucrat în domeniul comunicării la Bruxelles.

Acum locuiește și lucrează într-un orășel cochet și bogat din Franța, la granița cu Elveția, dar profită de orice ocazie de a pleca din localitate pentru a urca pe scenă și a face oamenii să râdă.

Pentru că adevarata pasiune a Magdei este să facă stand-up comedy.

Povestea ei nu este, însă, despre stand-up, ci despre cum o fetiță care a crescut într-un sat din săraca noastră Moldova, a ajuns să cunoască lumea, iar lumea să o cunoască pe ea.

Magda, ești din Târgu Ocna. Cât de des s-au făcut glume legate de orașul tău și faptul că vii acolo?

Până să apară “perversa de pe Tg Ocna” nu prea știa multă lume de oraș, așa că se limitaseră doar la glume despre moldovence. Dar înainte de Târgu Ocna am locuit la Adjud și Vârlănești, unde cea mai mare glumă era existența mea de zi cu zi.

“Când am emigrat, am descoperit ce înseamnă

“Partir c’est mourir un peu”.

Magda Mihăilă

Copilăria ta a avut vreo legătură cu umorul?

Una dintre cele mai pregnante amintiri din copilăria mea e cea cu mama spunând bancuri. Oricât ar fi fost de obosită de la munca fizică la care o obliga viața la țară, când aveam musafiri, se transforma și devenea centrul atenției. Spunea glume, întâmplări amuzante din viața ei și a celor apropiați.

Unele rude veneau cu un carnețel și o rugau să le dicteze glumele ca să le poată repovesti și ei mai departe.

Cum s-a născut dorința ta de a face stand-up comedy și ce ți-ai mai dorit să “devii” de-a lungul vieții?

Când eram foarte mică, îmi doream să fiu “deșteaptă de buruieni”, adică cineva care știe numele tuturor plantelor și utilitatea lor. Îmi venise ideea pentru că mama îmi spunea denumirile în latină atunci când o ajutam la plantat sau mergeam la cules de plante medicinale.

Apoi am trecut printr-o fază fatalistă în care îmi era frică să-mi doresc să fiu ceva anume, pentru că mi se părea că oricând se poate întâmpla un accident care îți dă planurile peste cap. Probabil mă uitam prea mult la Știrile de la ora 5.  (râde)

Prima dată când am văzut un show de stand-up comedy live aveam 20 de ani și m-a intrigat fenomenul. Mi-ar fi plăcut să fac asta încă de atunci, dar am renunțat repede la gând pentru că fratele meu, care e actor, mi-a spus că e foarte greu.

Apoi a urmat un rol într-o trupă de teatru pentru expați, pe când locuiam la Bruxelles. Faptul că am primit un rol fără replici (eram asistenta reginei și trebuia să dau din evantai) m-a frustrat. Atunci am început să mă gândesc mai serios la stand-up comedy, pentru că mi-ar fi dat posibilitatea de a-mi da eu mie rolul principal, pentru care să îmi scriu singură replicile.

“Un tip din Australia, care face stand-up de foarte mulți ani, mi-a sugerat să spun, atunci când vorbesc despre familia mea din România, că sunt toți în fața gării, la cerșit.”

Când ai început să faci stand-up, cu ce te ocupai în paralel?

Începutul în stand-up a coincis cu întoarcerea mea la București pentru un contract de doi ani într-o corporatie din domeniul auto.

Ce au zis colegii corporatiști când i-ai invitat la spectacolele tale?

Nu i-am invitat niciodată oficial, dar pentru că oferta de evenimente din București e destul de limitată, au aflat destul de repede, din evenimentele de pe Facebook, iar unii dintre ei au venit să mă vadă. Cei cu care împărțeam biroul nu au fost foarte surprinși, fiindcă îi făceam să râdă destul de des.

Cum ai fost primită ca femeie în această lume a stand-up-ului, dominată de bărbați?

Am început să fac stand-up în 2015, când mai erau doar alte trei fete care făceau asta în Bucuresti, în mod constant. Pe atunci, eram privite un pic ca un exponat de circ, un soi de urs pe monociclu.

Din partea publicului, am simțit că atitudinea era de “hai să vedem dacă o femeie ne poate face să râdem”, pe când atunci când urca un barbat, atitudinea era mai degrabă “hai să vedem dacă acest comediant e amuzant”.

Când am revenit pe scenă în București, în 2018, am simțit că publicul din cluburile de comedie s-a obișnuit între timp să vadă femei pe scenă, a scăpat de filtrul sexist și asteaptă glume bune și atât.

Din partea bărbaților din domeniu am primit reacții diferite, unii mi-au dat sfaturi, m-au invitat să fac parte din spectacolele lor și m-au încurajat să nu abandonez, chiar și atunci când aveam seri mai proaste.  Alții mi-au spus că se râde la glumele mele doar pentru că sunt femeie, alții insinuau, atunci când urcau după mine pe scenă, că tocmai se petrecuse ceva între noi în culise. Daca n-aș fi lucrat în același timp într-o industrie dominată de barbați, probabil m-ar fi șocat, dar eram deja, din pacate, obișnuită. 

“Pentru mine, stand-up-ul este cel mai egoist act de altruism.”

Ai numărat câte show-uri ai avut până acum? În câte limbi și în câte țări?

Când stăteam în România, urcam ori de câte ori mi se dădea ocazia, uneori de 5 ori pe săptămână. În ultimii doi ani și jumătate, de când m-am mutat în Franța, am avut peste 100 de spectacole în engleză, franceză și spaniolă, în 10 țări și pe două continente.

Ce satisfacție îți aduce un show de stand-up?

Pentru mine e cel mai egoist act de altruism. Faptul că atunci când sunt pe scenă oamenii se lasă duși de poveste și râd, îmi dă, pe de o parte, bucuria de a ști că i-am facut să uite pentru o vreme de probleme, dar îmi și crește nivelul de adrenalină și mă simt validată.

Cum ai fost primită peste hotare?

De cele mai multe ori, în public sunt expați și e o conexiune foarte rapidă între noi – din orice țara am fi, multe frustrări sunt similare. Iar felul în care am ales să le vorbesc despre România le arată o imagine sinceră, mai îndepartată de clișeele cu care au fost obișnuiți în ultimii ani, fie ele negative sau siropos de pozitive.

Cum percep străinii glumele și autoironia românească?

Nu știu dacă umorul meu e românesc. Am crescut cu seriale americane, telenovele din Mexic și bancurile, de cele mai multe ori, porcoase, spuse de mama. Poate e românesc curajul de a aborda subiecte de care altora le e teamă, curajul de a merge cu autoironia până la durere.

La mine în familie, dialogul se transforma de multe ori într-un “roast”. Mă bucur de fiecare dată când imi spune cineva, după spectacol, că a aflat ceva nou despre România sau când descoperă că, până la urmă, lumea asta e un mare sat.

Primești des sugestii de lucruri pe care ai putea să le introduci în numărul tău?

Da. Și e destul de enervant, pentru că îmi scriu singură glumele, inspirată de propriile mele întâmplări și frustrări.

Sunt mai deschisă când vine o idee din partea altui comediant cu experiență, deși am avut și surprize neplăcute. Un tip din Australia care face stand-up de foarte mulți ani mi-a sugerat să spun, atunci când vorbesc despre familia mea din România, că sunt toți în fața gării, la cerșit.

Te gândești ca la un moment dat să poți trăi doar din stand-up?

Mă gândesc la asta des, dar eu încă nu sunt pregatită pentru pachetul complet.

Până să ajungi la un nivel confortabil de succes în care singura teamă legată de ziua de mâine să fie “Oare o să pot fi amuzant?”, nu “Oare o să pot plăti chiria?” e o perioadă în care e nevoie de tot felul de compromisuri. Ori să fii plecat des de acasă, ori să urci pe scenă alături de alți artiști, care nu îți plac foarte mult, ori să faci multe spectacole neplătite sau plătite prost, până când află suficientă lume de tine.

Pe lângă asta, îmi place jobul meu și deocamdată prefer să fac stand-up cât de des pot, chiar și în concediu.

“Nu mi-e poftă de un cartof copt, mi-e poftă de mama încă în viață, care să se îngrijoreze pentru mine și să pună cartofi în cuptor când eu încă dorm, ca să fie sigură că îi am gata când mă trezesc.”

Călătorești foarte mult. Ți se face vreodată dor de țară? Dacă da, de ce anume?

Mi-e dor de oameni foarte des, unii încă sunt în România, alții au emigrat. Îmi e dor de lejeritatea comunicării, senzația aceea de îmbrățișare pe dinăuntru pe care o am cu oamenii care au făcut parte din anii mei de formare, în copilărie, liceu și facultate.

Când am emigrat, am descoperit ce înseamnă “Partir c’est mourir un peu”. De la distanță, ai revelația că oamenii în viața cărora nu mai exiști fizic își duc viața mai departe și fără tine, exact cum faci și tu. Nu suntem de neînlocuit în viața nimănui, iar legăturile pe care le păstrez cu oamenii cu care mă văd rar, le consider un privilegiu.

Uneori mi se face dor și de mâncare, dar mai degrabă de ritualul care înconjura un anumit fel de mâncare și cine eram eu când îl mâncam.

Nu mi-e poftă de un cartof copt, mi-e poftă de mama încă în viață, care să se îngrijoreze pentru mine și să pună cartofi în cuptor când eu încă dorm, ca să fie sigură că îi am gata când mă trezesc. Nu mi-e poftă de șoric, mi-e poftă de tata încă în putere, care punea deoparte bucățile alea mai subțiri pentru mine, chiar dacă asta însemna să strice o parte din producția de slănină din anul ăla.”

Unde e „acasă” pentru tine?

Pentru că am avut o copilărie atipică și de la 8 ani m-am mutat cu sora mea, iar pe părinți îi vedeam doar în vacanțe, senzatia de acasă e foarte difuză și nu o asociez cu locuri.

Acasă e oriunde mă simt în siguranță să spun ce gândesc, pot să-mi dau jos armura, știind că cineva mă va înveli cu dragoste. M-am simțit de foarte multe ori singură și înainte și după plecarea din România, dar cred că experiența de emigrant mi-a dat mai multe unelte pentru a-mi construi un acasă propriu de fiecare dată.

Cum e viața la granița dintre Franța și Elveția, cu vederea spre Alpi și printre văcuțele care arată ca în reclamele Milka?

E un loc idilic, am facut downshifting fără să am asta în plan. Merg la job cu bicicleta sau pe jos, urc mai des pe munte, pentru că e foarte aproape, merg pe plaja lacului Leman vara, ca să-mi potolesc dorul de mare. Dar, ca orice loc idilic, devine foarte repede plictisitor, așa că profit de aeroportul din Geneva și de trenurile rapide din zona destul de des, ca să ajung în locuri noi. Oriunde aș sta, rămân o călătoare.

Ce te-ar putea face să te întorci în România?

Gândul că nu e pentru totdeauna. Îmi place iluzia că pot să aleg în ce colț de lume stau și pentru cât timp, fără constrângeri. M-aș întoarce dacă aș fi implicată într-un proiect interesant, care m-ar face să explorez o parte adormită din mine. Sau dacă cineva drag ar avea nevoie de ajutorul meu, iar mutarea ar aduce o schimbare. Dar, în general, nu văd o mare diferență între a alege în viitorul apropiat să mă mut în Spania sau să mă mut în România. Ar fi o alegere bazată pe oportunitățile pe care mi le da mutarea, de a fi un om mai bun, mai fericit.

Spune-ne ceva amuzant.

O să rog fiecare cititor să închida ochii și să se gândească la viața lui sexuală. Atât.

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