IT'S A SMALL TINY LITTLE WORLD INDEED

The random happy events in our lives are one of the things that makes us thrill with excitement and vibrate. These events are rare, and we often feel they're arbitrary, unless there's really a mightier power above us. Who knows?

In any case, I consider random personal connections part of these events that make our lives more special and divert from daily mundane things. I met my wife on a bus by accident, and couldn't even think one day I would date her, and moreover, get married. I ended up studying at the San Francisco Art Institute also by this kind of fate's "invisible" hand. It was basically one phone call that convinced me applying there. And I never spoke to that person again.

What I'm trying to get at is that the world is incredibly small and we, humans, can, at any given moment, establish a random personal connection. This connection could or not change our lives, but the impressive thing is that it really happenned.

As I posted before, I've been meeting many people with the same ancestry as mine during the several screenings of Mamaliga Blues. These screenings have proven to be a melting pot of Bessarabers: a Moldovan girl who had a Tolpolar neighbor, an Ukranian gentleman who saw his father in one of the many old photographs shown in the film, and, more recently, a lady from Edinitz who used to live in front of my great-uncle's house in Moldova.

Surely the internet and new technologies help to make the world smaller, but it's always been this way. A small world makes us feel more human - and gives us comfort.

WE ARE NOT ALONE (YET)

Mamaliga Blues toured around a few cities in the US and the screenings were so inspiring that I decided to dedicate a post about them. It was not only because we shared an exhibition date with Nancy Spielberg (yes, HIS sister) or that I was interviewed on Miami local TV that made it all  so unique and special. It was the people in the audience I met between December and January that made the 9 years of producing the documentary worthwhile. The crowd was diverse: students, genealogists, Moldovans, Brazilians, Americans, Colombians, Canadians, Equatorians, film lovers, artists, Jewish and non-Jewish. 

Here are some interesting things learned during the screenings:

- first of all, an unknown fact to me: one of the audience members told me there is a town called Mamaliga in Ukraine, bordering Moldova. What are the odds...?

- I met a Colombian lady with ancestry in Moldova as well. After watching the film, she told me she was the first cousin of one of the people we interviewed and, moreover, said that her grandmother was the first girlfriend of Sioma Tolpolar, my cousin. 

- There was also a Peruvian gentleman who said, after chatting for a while, "you know, I think you are in my genealogical tree"

- In New York, after the film played, one Moldovan lady said her neighbors were Tolpolars and is supposed to get me their contact information

- In the same screening, another Moldovan made an assumption on the reason why my great-grandparents were not buried in their hometown or closer to it. She said that in the 30's, the situation for the Jews was especially difficult and it could be possible that the sinagogues were being disconnected, as well as the Rabbis moving to other more Jewish populated cities. So the burial services were being largely suspended.

- yes, some did cry, but I was surprised with the fact that a non Jewish lady came to me apologizing for what her Moldovan fellows had done to the Jews during World War II.

- And lastly, one man revealed that a boy shown in one of the many archival photos, was actually his father.

So we, Bessarabers, may be a few, but we are very much connected. And the screening room can be a communal space where people share stories and try to find closure. The sense of being around people like you, with the same roots or interests, made me feel a bit hopeful about the future. Knowing about your history and keeping memory alive gives you perspective but also bears responsibility of relaying it to the young/next generation. As long as there are people who understand this, we are not alone - at least for now.

A DOCUMENTARY SHOT IN MOLDOVA

When my father, my sister and I went to Moldova 2 years ago, I already had the intention of documenting the trip and turning it into a film (given my filmmaking background). I didn’t have any idea of what the outcome would be, but even though I took a camera, a bunch of tapes, 2 microphones and a few other paraphernalia.

I came back from Moldova with about 20 hours of footage and still no idea of what kind of footage I had and what I would be able to turn this into. This is because although I contemplated the idea, I did not hire any cameramen or anybody to help me. So I spent the whole trip with the camera in my hands, and experiencing it through its lenses. The camera was basically my eye. A very difficult task, to pay attention to your surroundings, to the framing and audio quality and at the same time understand what’s happening and be able to interact with it. And 5 languages were in place: Portuguese, English, Romanian, Russian and Yiddish.
Although I loved the trip, it was a lot of hard work. I must acknowledge my sister helped me with the second microphone, getting images’ authorizations/release and so forth. But in any case, I didn’t have any idea of the material I had. In my mind, I thought I was going to be able to edit a 5 or 10 minute promo to try to get some funding and go back with a proper crew and shoot a “real” documentary.

Two years later, two years of editing, I have to admit I have much more than a promo. I’m still putting pieces together, combining this puzzle into a film that can entertain people other than my own family, but much more confident that I have an almost completed documentary here.

There is still a lot of work to do: finishing the editing, composing the music, creating all the subtitles for the multiple languages, tightening the narrative/structure, etc. But after having directed a few shorts, this could finally be my first feature-length film. And I’m very excited for all that it represents, for everything I care, rediscovering the past, investigating your identity, feelings and perceptions of memory, possibilities for the future, understanding history and its consequences.

When the documentary is more put together, I should post some clips here. Stay tuned!

Next: Grave restoration in Moldova.

WHY MOLDOVA?

My grandparents were born in Moldova and moved to Brazil in 1931. I never met them, never knew much information about them, and so was always involved in this mystique, in this historical puzzle. Every time my dad and I would go to a different country, and that happened several times in the 90’s, we would check the phone book for a person with the “Tolpolar” family name. Oslo, Munich, Vienna, Budapest, Prag, Asuncion, Sao Paulo, etc. In New York we once found somebody named “Tolpo”. Could it be a relative? Unfortunately we never called.

My dad doesn’t know a lot about their history, so my infinite questions were never fully satisfied. How was life in Oliscani and Orhei? Why did they move to the South of Brazil? Did they have an accent? How were their voices like? How did they move? Were they nice? Intelligent? Are there any Tolpolars in other countries? What happened with the Tolpolars before living in Moldova? How my life would be affected had I met them?
I can only relate to them through pictures, stories and imagination. It was almost unbelievable and so exciting to think that a Brazilian like me actually belonged to a very recent history of such a distant region of the world. Different culture, language, mind frame. So remote from the Brazilian reality. My reality.

You could compare my grandfathers’ pictures with mines and certify that we came from different planets. They spoke Russian, Romanian and Yiddish. I speak Portuguese and English. They lived in a difficult age of pogroms, persecution, war, no TV. I cannot live without air conditioning.

Going to Moldova to visit their birthplaces was a way to try to connect to them, understand my past and maybe settle my curiosity, anxiety and uneasiness. But this was a distant dream that could only be accomplished after I moved to the USA and after Moldova became an independent democracy.

In 2006 I started to research about a possible trip and getting information about all the operational stuff: visa, plane tickets, country information, accommodations, etc. Because there’s not a lot of information, and mainly firsthand information about Moldova, it took me 2 years to finally get everything together. On May 14th 2008, my father, sister and I were boarding on a plane to Bessarabia, the old land of our ancestors.

I had read a lot about Moldova, and heard many conflicting information about this country in construction, that not many people know about. Myths, stereotypes, urban stories, jokes, everything made me realize I was going in to a place far from my reality and comprehension.

Next week: the trip, the excitement and anxiety, arriving in Frankfurt and boarding Air Moldova.