TIME

Two recent events made me think of time and how we handle it. First, my 95 year old grandmother was hospitalized, and still there at this moment. Secondly, a fellow filmmaker whom I met in Chisinau while shooting Mamaliga Blues, died of cancer.

I was able to record many conversations with my grandmother, and made some videos of her cooking old Jewish recipes. People say that photography and video made people immortal. They are there for us - forever. Somewhat. But this event also made me think of the many stories she never told on video, that I always used to hear but can also forget so easily. There is always so little time to devote to it.

I was unaware my friend had cancer and learned of his death on Facebook days ago. Viorel and I hung for a few days in Chisinau, he showed me the city's nightlife, we went to some bars, a rock concert and local restaurants. He introduced me to some of his friends and told me stories of the Soviet era. Kind and always available, I admired Viorel's sense of humor. I remember he said it was hard to film in Moldova's countryside because every little village he stopped the locals would make sure he tried their homemade wine. Inevitably drunk, the crew ended up not making the film. And then he said Moldovans regarded themselves as the Latin people of Eastern Europe. But most of his other stories I already forgot. Viorel was not recorded by me. I have only a picture with him. 

Everybody knows life is short, but the other problem is time. We always wished we had more time. Time can be interrupted all of a sudden. And it can only live through preservation of memory. Memory is endless time.

Viorel and I - our only picture - in Chisinau, 2008

TEXTURES OF CHISINAU

If you look closely, every corner of Chisinau offers a visual experience. My wife Lara is the kind of person who spots the little urban details of a city most people take for granted, or simply neglect it. I took the liberty to post some of her pictures of Chisinau. There are much more, and maybe she'll write more about it later.

CHISINAU-PORTO ALEGRE (and vice-versa)

My grandparents lived in Chisinau, Moldova. I was born and lived in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

I have recently traveled to both cities in 2012 and strangely noticed they share some similarities:

1) Dwindling Jewish community
Brazil never had a big Jewish community, but in Porto Alegre's state, Rio Grande do Sul, it has diminished from 12 to 7 thousand. Nobody is sure of why, but some point out that many young people are leaving. The same goes for Chisinau, that once had a huge, vibrant community, destroyed during the Holocaust and just now trying to get restructured. But it's still small.

2) Struggling economy
Brazil is one of the new leading countries in world economy, part of the "BRIC" (Brazil, Russia, India, China). But it has many political and social problems, and its vast resources are not yet being shared with most of the population. Chisinau is Moldova's capital, the poorest country in Europe. People are overwhelmed and tired by political corruption.

3) Urbanism
Both cities have sidewalks with cobblestones, twisted alleys, local and small grocery stores, old abandoned buildings, and a small (almost) international airport. The geography and architecture is a bit similar.

4) A predominant leftist ideology
Leftist politics have been popular in Porto Alegre for a long time, as well as Chisinau, which has a ruling communist party.

5) Atmosphere
No, not the quality of air. It's rather something you feel and see. People walking in the streets, cars, stores, buildings, humidity, heat, cold. I don't know if I'm dreaming of all these connections, but to me they seem true.

CHISINAU

OUR LAST DAY IN MOLDOVA

April 10th consisted of a morning walk around Chisinau, a few more footage shooting and a meeting with the folks at KSAK, the Art Center. 

street fair in Chisinau

Melina stares at Moldovan dolls

On this day, Natasha could not be with us, so she sent her son Grigory, who did a great job replacing his mom.

In the afternoon we headed to Cricova, one of the amazing underground wineries, where besides having wine tasting, we saw the one of the oldest wine in the world (1902), from Jerusalem. Its actual price is 300 thousand dollars. They said the France prime minister wanted to buy it, but at the end Cricova's winery did not want to sell it. They have an amazing collection of old wines, it's like a museum.

Jewish wine

Our Moldovan tour guide at Cricova sat next to us and asked where I was from. When I said "Brazil", he said he had a friend from Brazil who used to live in the US, he was from Porto Alegre and was an Internacional fan. What are the odds: same hometown, same soccer team fan. Small world.

In the evening we went to the Seder at the Jewish center, and blended a little with the Jewish community. We were happy to see Marina Shraibman once more. The Jewish community struggles for a revival of its once vibrant past, but as some said, it is nowadays less spiritual, more about business - and divided into different interests groups.

Marina (to the left) at the Seder

The short trip ended at the same restaurant where my father, sister and I ate in our last night in 2008. It's a small and simple place, but with great food. I had cheese and honey pancakes, Lara had varenikes, we shared it with Melina.

Our plane was leaving at 6AM the next morning. We came back to the hotel to pack and organize ourselves. That was it. Goal accomplished. Vadul Raskov, Chisinau, interviews, etc. It was fast, difficult, but worthwhile.

We arrived in Los Angeles exhausted. It's time to continue working on the documentary.

CHISINAU - 4 years later

We arrived in Chisinau on April 6th, but were only able to see the city on the 8th, after Vadul Raskov. I felt many things have changed. First, I saw more businesses and even two big shopping centers. For example, next to our hotel in 2008 there was an abandoned house - now there is a travel agency. But as people told me, more businesses does not exactly mean economic progress. Moldova's economic stagnation seems a constant, as the country primary source is agriculture and there is no real industry per se. Political problems also don't contribute much. The country didn't have a president for two years, and now the political direction is towards getting closer to Romania, creating a "Romanification" of Moldova. For some, it isolates the Russian speaking population, especially job-wise. For others, it means a political opening towards democracy, running away from (still) authoritarian Russian influence.

 

As an outsider, it's difficult to have a correct assessment of the situation, but it's clear that Moldovans are still very much divided.

On our second day in Moldova, we drove over Chisinau for some city footage I needed, and had lunch at Marina Shraibman's place. 

 

Marina cooked us delicious mamaliga, fish and salad. Lara especially loved the tea made from a dogwood tree. Melina played the piano and fed the birds outside the kitchen's window. 

We drank homemade wine and celebrated our arrival. Marina talked about Ihil Shraibman and showed us her private library of Yiddish books.

Marina is a very special person, generous and passionate. She belongs to a Jewish community that is also struggling for survival, as we later observed.

GOODBYE CHISINAU

Our flight was very early in the morning, so we needed to be at the airport by 6AM. We asked the hotel receptionist to call us a big cab, since we had a lot of luggage and wanted some comfort. The cab that came was very small, old and falling apart. Only one bag fitted in the trunk, and the others were in our laps. We could notice that the car’s break discs were extremely worn out, as they made this constant noise. The car was also in the gas reserve. We thought we may not make it to the airport. Well, one last adventure.

We finally arrived safe at the airport and for our surprise the place was packed. A LOT of people in the check in line. But there was not a line; it was just a conglomerate of people trying to reach the counter. We couldn’t believe all these people were flying: youngsters, their parents, grandparents, babies, the whole shebang. We then realized most of these people were not boarding, but yet saying goodbye to the ones who were flying. So the person checks in, waves his/her hand to the family, and enters the boarding gate. Didn’t they know after you check in you can hang out at the lobby and still spare some words and hugs? Another cultural difference, or something like that.

It’s funny, once you are in the country, everything is an experience, everything is different, interesting, nice. But when you’re leaving, you just want to get home, and all the country’s hassles come to you at once! So my sister got furious and started to push away the crowd, opening a path, like Moses in the desert, so we could finally check-in. My bag was a little overweight, so I had to transfer some stuff to my carry in luggage.
After that, we exchange our last lei for dollars and went to our gate.

As we were waiting to board, Kerley receives a call from her friend Maria: the receptionist at our hotel had called her (somehow she had her number, but not ours). We had forgotten the hotel keys and she needed it back desperately. The key was actually in my pocket. The receptionist wanted my sister to put the key in a cab and bring it back to the hotel. My sister said we were already in the boarding area, had passed through security and couldn’t leave just now. After a lot of talk (gee, it was just a regular key – but I think the poor girl would have to pay for another one herself), Kerley tried to see if any of the airport shops would agree to hold onto the key until the receptionist gets it. But they all said no. So Kerley went back to security and asked for a policeman to keep the key. Of course they couldn’t communicate very well, but thanks to a woman who was around and spoke English, the policeman agreed to have the key. And he gave Kerley his phone number, in case the hotel people needed to locate him. His name was Ruslan.

OK, the airplane to Frankfurt was there. I’ve never seen this, but we had to board through the back of the plane. It literally looked as if we were entering in the plane’s ass. Other people found it funny too, and were taking pictures. We took one too.

We soon found our seats. Kerley and Mauro were behind me. By my side, in the window, was a young mother and her baby. The Air Moldova plane is very small and simple, and on the other side, across from me, a very tall man was fighting against his seat. His long legs simply couldn’t fit in it! He complained and complained, until finally the flight attendant moved him to a better location, some kind of first class seat.

The flight to Frankfurt was calm. The baby next to me couldn’t stop looking at me. His mother said I looked like his father. I was so tired I quickly fell asleep. Sometimes I would open my eyes, and the baby was there, looking at me and holding my arm. And like this I spent the entire flight, protected by these young Moldovan hands.

When we got to Frankfurt there was no time to say good-bye, we had to part ways and I had to run like hell to try to catch my flight to London. I quickly saw Shlomi waiting for us and ran to the British Airways counter. I was extremely late.
The last image of my dad I remember was him looking for his luggage in the carrousel.

Next: post-trip reflections

View from our hotel window: