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FREEDOM LIGHT If I were to
write about my past or even my roots, my parents, families and friends, war and
peace or tyranny and liberty, or love and hate (my God the list is long!). Shall
I start with my birth? I have seen the
light here in Greece, in May, in spring 1939; I will call it Freedom Light. I
remember many artists, Chagall, Picasso, Brancusi, Modigliani, come to mind,
saying that Paris was their freedom light, an eye opener for their minds, their
creativity, their finger tips, their colours and shapes, intertwined together in
the same and divine Yin Yen of the east. I remember their long lives and
tormented stories, far from being mine! I was in Athens building my own life.
They were in Paris destined to become great masters of the arts. I was newly
born, few years before the war, loved by my parents. With the
passing of time, I was to learn from them, their habits and their manners and
the value of life. Soon, I was to realize that they were to become, more and
more, synonymous to country–lost, a strange feeling of sadness and fear, but
also of hope because we were free in Greece among friends. We felt protected,
not in danger, and together with my brother, we were four to confront the
future. Our dear Romania, my Dacia Felix, got trapped behind the Iron Curtain,
inhumanely and unjustly. We lost her for four and a half decades, for ever it
seemed, as you loose someone dear. Tyrannies
never seem to end. What was left of her was the large embassy’s tricolour my
father brought home one day, as his career came abruptly to an end. And life passed
by, some people called it exile; we
never did because there was hope and love among us. Refugees from the cruel
regime, mostly Greeks, often came to our house seeking help and guidance from my
parents; food was distributed and shelter was provided by various organizations my father represented benevolently; by helping ourselves we’ve learnt to help
others. The rest of our family got divided, scattered around the world, some
still in Romania, having news from them became increasingly difficult, if not
impossible, calling them or sending a reliable friend to meet them, was utterly
unthinkable. We managed however to helped them as much as we could, once a month
was the norm, by sending them food and periodicals; a ritual I still remember
to–day. I was maturing... When I was
young, I believed that tragedies like war and famine were natural ingredients of
men’s existence; Woodstock’s generation was not yet born... Little did I
know then that it only takes a few madmen, one or two being quite enough, like
Hitler and Stalin pulling stubbornly in two opposite directions the fate and
peace of countries and continents. Poor nations, why do you need to suffer so
much in History’s name! Why is she so much easier to write with blood? Have we
not all heard, sometimes during our lives, that happy nations have,
unfortunately, no history of worth? If only these madmen had not forgotten the
words of Lao Tse: «If you want to lead
your people, follow them». Is the sage too far back in history or is his
China too far away for us to care, or is it just because philosophy seems to be
terra incognita to so many of our leaders? As time past
by, I lost my parents, but Dacia Felix remained, she is my personal territory no
one can ever touch. We grew up together. Marc Chagall from Paris used to say of
Russia: «Mine alone is the country of my
soul». Is he not the persecuted master of dreams, where his people float,
love and hope? The Unbearable Lightness of
Being on canvas. So, I was
adopted by the country I was born, we call her Hellas. I saw her struggle
for her own freedom, helped by the British and the Americans, as she was luckily
thrown, at Yalta, on the right side of the Iron Curtain. I’ve learnt the names
of her seas, her islands and her mountains and the wisdom of Socrates, Plato,
and Plutarch, to cite a few. Her first Cycladic sculptures,
so minimal, so modern, so silent and mysterious, is Greece’s first lesson to
us all. She was destined to shed her light upon us. Where there is light, there
is shade. When asked what life is, Plutarch answered: «Life is the shade of a dream». The penumbra of thought. And then the
miracle becomes reality! The Berlin wall crumbles. Countries and nations, one
after the other, rediscover the true meaning of their lives. Freedom is back
again. It is then that I decide to go back with my childhood memories to see
what has changed. I
walk in a dark, cold, Bucharest, her people praying with no words, in their
churches, in their homes and their streets. Mine alone is
the country of my soul. Scarlat
R. Arion Athens, February 9, 2005 |
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