Wednesday 24 August 2011

Misto Avilyan - You are Welcome - Mai Croeso i chi


'Misto avilyan - You are Welcome - Mai Croeso i chi'

A two day celebration of Romani and Traveller people and their culture is taking place in west Wales on September 30th and October 1st 2011.
Day 1 will include presentations and discussions with members of the local communities, artists, academics and politicians culminating in a
Q & A session with an impressive panel of guest speakers including
Prof. Ian Hancock from the University of Texas, Austin, a Romani scholar, linguist and political advocate.
Day 2 sees the opening of a new photographic exhibition by Romani photographer Andrea Annamária Duka and the UK launch of the Roma Media Archive www.romamediaarchive.net inaugurated at the Roma Pavillion www.callthewitness.org of the 54th Venice Biennale 2011 by photographers Tina Carr & Annemarie Schöne.
At 6.00pm traditional Romani food, cooked by ‘Hungry Dragon’ over a stick fire will be enjoyed followed by a wildly energetic Hungarian Ceilidh with the Jani Lang Band.

Kethanes džastar Let’s get together □ Gadewch i ni ddod at ei gilydd



Monday 2 May 2011

Dale Farm Latest

If the Dale Farm eviction goes ahead these children will be made homeless, a violation of their human rights.













Monday 11 April 2011

Dale Farm: Zero Eviction Day 9.4.2011

Saturday was a great day with the largest turnout so far of Dale Farm supporters joined by representatives of Roma groups from all over the world, here to show solidarity with the 86 families who have been living with the threat of eviction for the last 10 years.


!NO PASARAN!


Ariel view of the Dale Farm site when the Travellers bought it showing that it was not 'green belt' but a massive scrapyard - far right of the picture - that the Travellers themselves cleared and renovated, at their own expense, before they could live on it in the first place.



Joseph Jones (left) Gypsy Council and Yves Cabannes chair of the UN Advisory Group on Forced Evictions


Solidarity from Representatives of the International Alliance of Inhabitants here to celebrate the anniversary of the First Gypsy Congress in 1971


Grattan Puxon (far left) Secretary of the Dale Farm Housing Association, with the new banner.

Sunday 3 April 2011

Monitoring Human Rights Violations

Essex Human Rights Clinic: Skills workshop on Legal Observing/Monitoring of Human Rights Violations

We, along with members of the Gypsy and Traveller community and their support groups attended this informative day of training, places on which could have been filled three times over.
We all hope it will not come to this but we must be prepared, in the event of the Dale Farm evictions taking place, to defend our human rights by all peaceful means possible.
There will be further training days in the run up to direct action. We hope that the Bailiffs, Constant and Co. will be undertaking similar training and will employ more women in their ranks to ensure fair treatment of the evictees. (Have you ever seen a female bailiff?)
Friday 8th April is International Roma Day. April 9th is Zero Eviction Day which will be marked at Dale Farm with a celebration that includes representatives from the international Roma communities showing solidarity with Dale Farm. All are welcome.


Grattan Puxon, Secretary of Dale Farm Housing Association explains the background
to the eviction



Professor Todd Landman Professor of Government and Director, Institute of Democracy
and Conflict Resolution
, University of Essex.



Malavika Vartak, Amnesty International

Dale Farm Travellers eviction: the battle of Basildon | Society | The Guardian

Dale Farm Travellers eviction: the battle of Basildon | Society | The Guardian

Wednesday 23 February 2011

Letter from Terezia

'Here is Terezia's letter - I've tried to translate it very exactly although is wasn't easy.' Judit



Dear Tina and Amari,

I'm writing this letter on the 19th January 2011 with love and with all the warmth of my heart. It's been a long time since we met that first time (September 2008) and your friendship touched me deeply. This friendship is a great happiness for me - I give thanks to God for this long-term and eternal friendship. Thank you for everything.
You know, in Hungary I havn't got any real friends (maybe only one) your kindness and respect makes me learn English: in the half-term exams I get good marks in English both written and oral.
Thank you for the photos - they prove our real friendship. I hope your honorific friendship will remain for a long time.
Greetings and kisses. I miss you and feel sorry that we can't communicate to each other because I can't speak English.

Bye, your friend
Terezia


Terezia, Sajokaza July 2009

Terezia is the first Roma woman we met on our research trip to Hungary in September 2009. We could communicate only through gestures, the ceremony of coffee making and home-made cake, and the warmth and desire to be friends. She made us welcome and introduced us to her family in their impoverished home in the Solyom Settlemt in Sajokaza.
Terezia is one of the few adults in Sajokaza to have embraced the concept of education and learning as a tool for a better life. Supported by the Jai Bhim School she has won accolades for her achievements in reaching high school levels of attainment. She has also brought up four sons and a daughter single-handed since the premature death of her husband and is a member of the Sajokza Women's Commitee.


Terezia, Sajokaza September 2010

Tuesday 15 February 2011

The 'Gentrification' of Budapest's VIII District

Like many ordinary, residential but also poorer areas of major cities, eg Berlin, Budapest is undergoing a major transformation driven by economic pressure. The VIII District was traditionally settled by crafts people, (market) traders, artisans and Romani people many of them musicians. Due to its central location it represents attractive and valuable ground for city development and foreign investment under the guise of 'gentrification.'
Many local people, the majority of them Romani or older Hungarians are forced out of their houses some of which are developed others demolished.
Even the Roma Parlament at Tavaszmezo lost its vital advocacy centre in a beautiful listed building well frequented by local Roma. Now they are forced to travel for legal advice on the pressing issues of housing and employment to the new offices on the outskirts of the city.
Such development gradually forces out the original inhabitants, draws in more affluent elements of society and changes the whole character of the district forever.


The VIII District of Budapest is to the right of the Duna (Danube)
the pink bit on the right between the first and third bridge


Prater utca


Baross utca


Girls in 'the Hood'


Kisfaludy u


Tenements


Tavaszmezo ut


Angels of the VIII District


Futo u. An old style courtyard being encroached on by new development.