The hunger games.

When we were visiting the States, Catching Fire came out in theaters and Kelly, her sister Kendra and I went to see it. It broke us open. Many of the scenes look like the pictures and videos in the news these days of Syrian opposition and government forces fighting in Aleppo or protesters being beaten back by the police in Egypt. Between that and a reality show where the contestants kill each other for entertainment. The games' tagline is, "May the odds be ever in your favor." You see graffiti protesting, "The odds are never in our favor."

I find it hard to believe that one could watch this movie and come out of the theater feeling good about life (unless you can completely divorce what your eyes see and what your body and mind encounter in the world around you). For one, you just spent 8 dollars on a ticket to keep a multi-billion dollar industry going that uses violence as entertainment. Perhaps you could have bought  a burrito or a sandwich for someone for whom the odds are never in their favor. Kelly says that she can't think of that story as removed from the world that we live in, especially since we live in a post-industrial, post-authoritarian region of the world. Here's one story of why.

We were going into the fancier of the two "supermarkets" in Lupeni one evening a few months ago when we met a girl. There are always little Roma girls asking for 10 bani or milk or bread outside of this supermarket, and we usually oblige them. This girl was different. We'd met her in church last week, and we both recognized each other. She asked for some milk for her baby sister, and we gladly bought her some. I forget if we asked her name or not, but I regret not asking. It feels like we've known each other too long now.

We started seeing her often around the city. Not at church anymore, but outside the meat store, outside the Italian restaurant, with her little brother in our stairwell one night. She has a large family, I think 5 or 6 siblings, and she's the oldest at 11. She's with her little, little sister a lot, holding this little, sleeping bundle of clothes and baby. Her brother is full of energy and really talkative once he gets over being shy. She's confident and strong, the oldest child who acts as a second parent. Their mom is a short woman with crooked teeth and a lined face, though I doubt she's much older than 30. It's just her and the 6 or 7 kids, like many Roma families. you receive more government help if you have kids out of wedlock, and since few Roma men can get jobs anyways, it makes some sort of sense.

The mother seemed harsh and controlling to me at first. She was hard on the kids, and the girl has told us several times that she's not allowed to go home and start her homework without milk. I felt anger at their mother for giving this harsh responsibility, and pity for the children. One of the little girls' feet are twisted, so that one points directly towards the other foot and the other is turned almost all the way backwards. I've seen the mother trying to hurry this little girl up as they walk through the city, and I was afraid she would fall for lack of balance and care. I'll sometimes try to avoid them when the mom's around. We're respectful to each other, but I don't trust her. She seems like she's hiding things. But few people aren't.

Last week, the girl and her brother were by the Italian restaurant where our out-of-town colleagues were having lunch. I stopped to talk to them on the way in. They were running down the ramp outside and trying to jump into the square of red bricks in the sidewalk. It was raining a bit, and slippery, but they didn't care. When they invited me to try, I gingerly ran down the ramp and jumped easily into the square. She asked me how you say "taci" in English--she had learned but forgotten. "It's something like 'shuddup,' right?"

"Yeah, you say it, 'shut up.'"

"Yeah, that's it. Thanks." She said thanks in English. She then asked how to say, "ce faci?"

"How are you?"

"Houraou? Oh man, I can't say that. Say it again?"

"How are you." Too hard. Oh well. She told me they also speak Hungarian, and I congratulated her. Hungarian is a hard language. She said that they got cold easily. It was raining, on the verge of freezing, and they only had a plastic bag as a shield and no gloves. I promised to look for gloves and more bags, and then went inside the restaurant to eat a nice, warm lunch in a nice, warm restaurant with our nice, warm friends. I felt like saying bad words the whole time just to express how sad I felt to leave them out there. They kept making faces at us through the window, and it hurt a little more each time.

When I was leaving, they asked me for 1 leu for milk. I didn't have 1 leu, only bigger bills, but I was going to buy some  black beans that we had specially ordered, so I could bring back 1 measly leu when I returned. Affirmative. Hopeful. Kelly had already told them she'd buy them some bread. I got to the health food store and the beans hadn't come. No big bills broken. I decided to just buy a liter of milk. Easier that way. They were thankful when I gave it to them. Hopefully, that meant that they could go home and do their homework.

Today, as I was walking back to the office from lunch, I saw their mom outside of the meat store. She saw me too, and beckoned me over. I went, though I didn't want to. She pulled two half-sheets of paper from her pocket and told me that one of her kids was sick with this problem, and another was sick with this problem. She tells me that often and asks for money. I feel so uncomfortable giving money to people begging at this point in my life that I almost always just buy her a bread or say, "I'm sorry, but I can't today." But today, she told me it was only 15 lei for the medicine that was prescribed on this paper, and where in the world would she get that money? I told her that I didn't quite understand what she wanted, but I would go to talk with a colleague who would.

I went to the office, talked to my boss/kind of big brother here Ilie about it. He buys medicine for a Roma guy every month, and it's not cheap stuff. We talked a bit, and I told him I wasn't sure how much to trust her. He told me that especially in Romania, nice, trusting people are sadly seen as stupid and exploitable. Yeah. I know. But I've been recently trying to err on the side of love. I called Kelly and asked her if she was ok with me buying some medicine. She said yes.

I went back down to the mother and clarified what the she wanted me to do. She gave me her ID card and said all I had to do was ask for the medicine and her baby would be fine. While she was digging out her ID card, she asked me to hold the baby. She's probably 8 months old, sleeping, so beautiful from what little of her isn't covered by her snowsuit. I walked to the pharmacy, bought the medicine, and came back, quietly triumphant. The mother thanked me "from her soul," as you say here. I asked her baby's name. "Ana."

"She's beautiful."

"Yeah, I hope this medicine helps her."

"Me too. May God help you."

"May God help you. Thank you."

We all do what we can to survive. Some of us have to work harder at it than others, so that means some of us can help out more. She's not just a controlling mother. She wants to increase her family's odds. I'm glad to have done what I could to help today.