Living in desperate situations, the children in Cârligu Mare need our help
Cârligu Mare Village, Buzău County. Somewhere in the limits of Bărăgan, on the alleys of the village, sometime before the Annunciation, a few children return from school. Among the shattered houses, who seem to run-down hill after their masters who are gone by now, the church’s steeple is in plain sight. Father Marian Tudor awaits us at the gate, dressed in his priestly robe. He took over the parish a year ago and ever since that moment his mission amidst the Cârligu Mare people has become a long series of terrifying encounters.
The poverty, the illnesses, the hunger, the cold, the wicked hostile childhoods, the unfortunate families are his real job, his mission. Having learned about these cases from a message found on a social network, we have decided to move on to the details. What should we visit first? The most desperate case? The poorest family? Those two savage children, brought up by their mentally ill mother and father? The girl who was diagnosed by doctors with 11 years of live when she was 2 years old, but who was stubborn enough to catch her eighteenth birthday being all bedridden? Or perhaps the shanty where the boy taken in placement was found frozen last winter?
Maybe we should go to the poorest family... but how can you tell which of them is? We take a look on the left side of the road, then on the right and we leave it to chance. No matter where you go, you can sense the sadness that reigns there, slightly warmed by a ray of springtime’s sun.
We choose one end of the village ... (the goal of this journalistic material is intended to draw attention to the desperate situation of Cârligu Mare and to sensitize people who want to provide aid).
’’Father, do you have diapers for the little ones?..’’
Cârligu Mare was once a real commune. Now, the village belongs to Glodeanu Siliştea and its greatness has been lost, leaving a scattered village in the plains. Near the foundations of ruined houses, children are playing with bugs. One may see a fatty rat pass by, from time to time, from a hole to another. At the latticed windows of a shack, two children are standing almost naked, and the cries of a baby are heard from inside the house. We enter the courtyard, accompanied by Father Tudor and immediately a woman, who looks as if she hasn’t been sleeping a good night sleep in years, comes before us: "Father, welcome! Do you have diapers for the little ones?..."
The 28 year-old woman’s name is Steluţa Andrei and she has seven children. A boy is in hospital, other three children are still in school. The 6 year-old boy was diagnosed with epilepsy after having undergone a hernia surgery. However, all seven require medical assistance. Father Tudor tells the woman the reason I came there. "Perhaps, if the newspaper writes about you, people may hear our story and help us ..." She is asked what they mostly and vitally need. She stands and looks confused, as if she has no idea where to begin to talk. The children looking at us out of the window are swinging the window bars smilingly. Their mother replies that they need clothes, diapers, food. If they could provide some toys, too... She apologies for not having invited us in the house: "I started to clean up and whitewash, Easter is coming." The priest tells her to come to church and get more whitewash there.
Read in the following editions of the newspaper the story of two savaged siblings who live with their mentally ill mother. Potatoes are their only food.
Earth – that was once one’s family’s food provider – was abandoned due to the lack of money for the farmland works.
Steluţa Andrei and her husband have a hectare of land. Last year they were not able to plow because they didn't have the money for the farm work. Sometimes, her children’s meal consists of cornmeal mixed with sugar water. Father Tudor assures us that the problem of the land left fallow affects several villagers. They plow just to have something to feed the few fowls in the yard. In the village there are about 160 families, half of which consist of a single person, old and forgotten by the rest of the people. In contrast, young families are facing unimaginable hardships for a modern man. If you hear them, you’d say they are from another continent. Neither the day laborers can work because there’s nothing left to make a profit. Some may accept an egg or a piece of bread from the elders that need to get some help around the house. Lacking any possibility of local employment, wallowing in debts and being bound to the land, young parents resemble some feeble grandparents. Their children get to know, from an early age, the misery of the world they are born in, a world in which they will have to get through. The real crisis starts from that moment. But in how many Romanian villages you don’t find people who share the fate of the people in Cârligu Mare?
In a future edition, we will present the case of the girl who is about to celebrate her adulthood bedridden. Doctors had given her no hope of life or 11 years.
"Comfort and gratitude" among rats
Through the Romanian Patriarchy’s program "Comfort and gratitude ", Father Marian Tudor has found out about the problems of several villagers from Cârligu Mare. Every Wednesday, he waits for them at church, listens to their troubles, and every Friday, the priest visits their homes. "Firstly, we posted a humanitarian appeal on an internet forum because I did not know how to help them better. So many cases can be very overwhelming. Sometimes I buy bread for them, as much as I can. We also need to patch the parish house because there are so many rats damaging the place. I don’t complain . The rats have dug the whole village, they are everywhere, and they are more fatty than men", tells Father Tudor.
The priest’s intention is to build a social canteen in the former town hall. Stay tuned for details of the project in which you can also get involved.
"Social network" in Cârligu Mare
"Then, someone from the press in Bucharest created a Facebook page," the priest continues the story of "socialization" of Cârligu Mare. "Step by step, assistance and contribution began to emerge: food, vegetables, fruit, sweets, toys, clothing, from simple people, not from public figures that would only make something just for the sake of being mentioned, but people who drove all the way here, with the trunk of their cars full of packages for the children and villagers. I was amazed by how much was done for them with only an advert. But it’s still not enough. People come, give, leave, and the difficulties and misfortunes remain’’. I asked him if he had disturbed his parishioners by turning their destinies upside down: "Well, at first they said I was taking pictures of them putting them on the Internet to sell their children. But, people talk, and when I ask them why they did it, they reply that they didn't or didn't mean to say that. I get along with them very well. Some people understand and recognize that there is no humiliation in allowing others to help you when there's no other help at hand. "
Watch in future editions on www.observatorulbuzoian.ro other stories about the troubles of Cârligu Mare:
The Buneas deal with a tragedy in their family. Due to an accident, the mother suffers from memory loss. At 27 years old, she lost any hope that she would ever be able to work.
In a hut sprayed with cement, Marian, a boy who doesn't know his birth mother, was found living in cold and hunger until he was taken into foster care.
Help the children there in any possible way you can. Contact priest Marian Tudor by phone 004-0720.281.634 or by e-mail, parohiacarligumare@yahoo.com.
Written by Ciprian Sterian and Sorin Dinco, translated by Andreea Olteanu
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