Florin and Pitâr

During my four months in Romania, I met many people who were COVID skeptics. Florin, our Suceava guide, questioned the motivations, incentives, and behaviors of governments, doctors, hospitals, clinics, and vaccine manufacturers. He took the vaccine because his work required it.

Florin got into guiding to supplement the wages he earned as an electrical engineer. And because he loved and knew Romanian culture, history and the land. During a hike in the Rarau Mountains and just before I took the picture on the right, Florin had said to Rebecca, “let’s engage in the spirit of the forest.”

Pitâr, the owner of Homemade, the restaurant we lived over, said protii or rubbish to all of it, COVID science, the vaccines, even masking. University educated, entrepreneurial, and worldly, Pitâr was proud of never masking, even in front of the police. Homemade’s yogurt marinated chicken wings, Tuica, a Romanian plum liquor high in alcohol, and decor made it a place of succor for us.

I remember one night when Rebecca and I hosted a group of Fulbright friends who were visiting Timișoara on the way to Budapest. Pitâr brought out two bottles of wine and asked which we preferred to start with. Rebecca mentioned the Wedding at Cana story about serving the cheap wine last and asked if Pitâr knew that story. He smiled and after gently chiding Rebecca with “Homemade does not serve cheap wine,” Pitâr gave us a brief and, as I discovered later when I checked it out, accurate description of John 2:10.

A funny thing happened to me in Romania

No, Florin and Pitâr did not change my mind. Not even after a glass of Tuica. Maybe after a second glass but I never chanced that experience. My contributions to our conversations were twofold. One, I described why I accepted the evolving science about the efficacy of the vaccines, masking and distancing. And two, I asked questions, such as why don’t you believe the science? Why don’t you accept government restrictions? As I think back on this two-step movement, it is almost too easy to miss. No tightening of my stomach or other signs my body was preparing for battle. Somehow I had relaxed into a mode of curiosity.

Why did these smart, educated and professional Romanians think the way they did? And COVID was not the only conversational flash point with my Romanian friends.

In November, on the way back from Budapest, I asked our tour guide Sergiu what he thought of Hungary’s prime minster Viktor Orban. “I like him,” he said, “he acts for the people, something Romanian leaders do not do.” Initially, I was taken back. I don’t know much about Hungary’s leader but what I do know emphasized his authoritarian actions. So I started asking other Romanians about Orban, including Pitâr. Most gave me a version of Sergiu’s answer.

Since I returned from Romania I have reflected upon why it was so painless for me to loosen my combative disposition on these areas of disagreement. Two answers – I was a guest in their country and was 5000 miles away from Donald Trump which made him more a mouse in the room than an elephant – were true but did not satisfy.

A reminder…

I discovered the answer a few days ago as I was scrolling though our pictures from Romania. I taught my two online West University of Timișoara classes on Saturdays, back to back. One Saturday I asked Rebecca to take a few pictures. You can see one of those pictures on the right.

On this day, I had asked a Fulbright colleague to talk with my students about Romania’s Roma or gypsies.* Ioanida Costache from Stanford University was in Romania to study Roma from a human rights perspective. She was hosted by the Elie Wiesel National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Bucharest.

This picture reminded me of what I loved about my almost 40 years in a college classroom. I knew Professor Costache would challenge my students’ ideas about Roma. Mine as well. But what happened during the class – was happening the moment Rebecca snapped this picture – was an exchange between one of my students, Alexandu, and Professor Costache. The exchange was a bit testy as Alexandu was often like the elephant in that picture above and not the mouse. The other 25 students had remained silent during the lecture but Alexandru’s question and comments had given them permission to become engaged. What followed was conversation from different perspectives on Roma, exactly what a teacher wants to happen.

I am not interested in changing your mind

At some point during my teaching career I started telling students on the first day of class that I did not care what their political point of view was. I was not interested in changing their minds. I taught at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa. A small liberal arts school of about 2000 students and 180 faculty in a town of about 8000. Although I never posted political signs outside my office door, I did put them in my yard about two miles from campus. And I was the advisor to the Luther College Democrats. So I assumed that if a student paid attention to any of this she knew something about my politics. But I didn’t want a student to worry about whether our political differences might influence his grade. To reinforce this, I asked students to put their Luther ID and not name, on all assignments and exams.

When I said I didn’t care what their politics was, I meant it. I believed my primary classroom task was to teach them how to think about politics not what to think. This meant everything in the class – the reading assignments, papers, exams, and discussion topics – were built around analysis of multiple perspectives.

That’s why I loved the last 30 minutes of that Roma class. And I believe that why it was so easy for me to ease into a curiosity mode when conversing with Florin, Pitâr and Sergiu.

I had to get away from the political heat of America to remind myself there is another way to be in the world. I way I had been as a teacher. Somehow I had lost that.

Do I wish Florin and Pitâr agreed with me on COVID related stuff? Yes. Do I think there is more bad than good about Viktor Orban’s authoritarian grip on Hungary? Yes.

But those wishes are secondary to my understanding that the world is big enough to commend our diversities.

I am not interested in changing your mind, really.

*Gypsy is a pejorative term for Roma.