[Un leu, un leu... Chapter VIII] Nu Faci Nimic (It Doesn’t Make Any Difference)

robrigo (66)in #nonfiction • 6 years ago (edited)

This is a continuation of the book "Un leu, un leu...", which was written in Romanian by my late godfather and uncle Bill Edwards, and published by Evenimentul, a now defunct Romanian publishing company. The book is being released for the first time in English exclusively online here on Steemit, as a serial. I hope you enjoy his writings as much as I do!
-Rob

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you following along. I'm thankful that I had a godfather with the foresight to write down his fantastic stories, such as the one below.

While stationed as Information Officer with the United States Air Force at Torrejon Air Base, outside of Madrid, Spain in the late 1960’s, I purchased from one of the major galleries in Madrid, a painting of a Spanish Gypsy girl at a roadside water pump filling a large, pale, bluish green water bottle. The painting, by an artist named Del Moral, has traveled with me around the world since I bought it. I took it with me to Bucharest, Romania when I was posted to the American Embassy there as press attache in 1981.

The painting, done in browns and umbers, captures the spirit and soul of both the Gypsy girl and the Castilian landscape in the background. The girl’s face has an arresting quality to it and her stance, frozen forever in oil paint, reminds one of a doe pausing to look at some minor disturbance while drinking at a stream. Visitors to my homes wherever I have hung the painting, invariably comment on it. The painting seemed to especially intrigue Romanians, with their Latin souls.

One of these visitors to my apartment in Bucharest, was Mircea Răceanu, Romanian Foreign Ministry North American Affairs Director. Răceanu visited my apartment, attending official receptions there, many times over the four-year period I was in Romania. At one time or another during those visits, he would position himself in the area where the painting gently dominated the dining table, and casually view it. Romania, like many nations, has laws which protect valuable objects d’art of its national origin, items which these nations claim are part of their patrimony.

At the end of my tour in Romania, when Răceanu knew I was preparing to have my household goods, including the painting of the Gypsy girl, packed up and shipped out, he said to me in an ominous tone during his last visit to my home, “Bill, I am afraid that I will not be able to allow you to take this painting out of Romania with you.” My first reaction was one of alarm, knowing the problems many western diplomats had in obtaining clearance to export some of the items they had acquired in Romania. I then said to Răceanu in Romanian, “But Mircea, this is not a Romanian painting. I bought it almost twenty years ago in Spain and brought it with me to Romania.” Răceanu, deadpan, then replied to me, “Nu face mimic, Im place forte mult (It doesn’t matter, I like it very much).” He then burst into pleasant laughter, giving away the joke he was playing on me. Of course I got out of Romania with that painting and all the rest of my household goods without a hitch.

Mircea Răceanu was later accused of treason by the government of Nicolae Ceaușescu during the last year of his regime. Răceanu was convicted and condemned to death, spending the last year of the Ceaușescu tyranny in prison awaiting execution. He was released only after the fall and execution of Ceaușescu and his wife Elena in December 1989, and arrived in this country, where he had previously served as a Romanian diplomat, earlier this year. Răceanu and his family recently visited my home in Washington, D.C. where a special painting dominates my dining table, and we had a very pleasant meal and evening under the enigmatic gentle gaze of the Gypsy Girl.

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this story, please tell me what you thought of it in the comments below. Also, be sure to read the rest of Bill's works that are being published exclusively here on Steemit: