him to a reading syllabus beginning with the easy bits of The Communist Manifesto. By age eleven, he was reading the revolutionary writings of Che Guevara, Walter Rodney, Ho Chi Minh and Amilcar Cabral. He took his father’s assignments seriously and followed world events as closely as possible.
In September 1969, when Ho Chi Minh died, the state newspaper, Scînteia , ran a photo of him on the front page. Using a thin blue marker, Nicolae created a pointillist impression of Ho’s delicate bearded face, wisps of thin hair on his chin, which he mounted on cardboard and hung on his bedroom wall.
He dearly wanted to please his father, and in return be treated as a thinking young adult. But the more he read, and the more he compared what he read to the hardship and corruption he witnessed around him, the greater was his suspicion that something was not right. Of all the revolutions that had occurred in the Socialist World, Romania’s, he concluded, was a travesty. The missives that Marx, Lenin and Trotsky had posted many years before had clearly been lost in transit.
Nicolae maintained his faith for as long as he could. But his repeated visits to the Securitate became layers of depression, harder and harder to shake off. One night, unable to sleep, he hit rock bottom. He felt an emotion more harrowing than any he had ever experienced, a feeling that was intensified by the voice of a state radio announcer discussing the dictator’s visit to Buckingham Palace. The radio was in his father’s study. At half-past twelve, Nicolae contemplated killing himself.
It was at that point that Nicolae realized he had nothing left to lose. A clarity came to his thoughts. A door opened. The idea of escape.
Andrei dismissed Nicolae the first time he approached him with his plans. But not long after, the circumstances of his own life changed considerably. The Securitate began visiting Andrei’s house and his mother’s dressmaking co-operative, questioning her while he was away at school. His mother tried to calm him. It’s just harassment, she insisted. But clearly she was upset, more so than Andrei had ever seen her. She paced the kitchen restlessly at night. Andrei noticed her body startle when the wind rattled the shutters or a visitor knocked on the door. He too alternated between panic and resolve, and he vowed to himself that he would protect her—even if it meant leaving Romania.
In the plastic bag that Andrei packed in haste while his mother was sleeping, there were two changes of underwear, an extra shirt, marine goggles that would replace his eyeglasses, some matches, food and water for two, and a slender waterproof packet containing a few photos and personal effects. He wore a bathing suit under his clothes. In contrast, Nicolae carried virtually nothing—a snorkelling mask and, pinned to his bathing suit, a tiny enamel portrait of Che Guevara given to him by his father.
Nicolae had spent weeks secretly dispensing his belongings. He did this partly out of concern for his family, for he truly believed it would be easier on everyone if there was nothing left to tidy up, but also because it provided him with an almost therapeutic sense of ceremony. To begin another life, Nicolae believed, the past life had to be given away.
On board the Zenica , however, Nicolae’s confidence quickly dissolved. The faint smell of laundry soap on his shirt filled him with longing. He was rid of possessions but not emotions: the unsaid goodbyes weighed heavily. He reached for Andrei, who moved closer and rested Nicolae’s head against his shoulder, softly counting down from one hundred as the Turkish freighter lifted anchor. When he reached fifty-seven, they heard the nasal sound of a ship’s horn.
The wooden crate in which they hid was hardly large enough for them both. After an hour, their flashlight began to flicker and fade. Andrei turned it off and immediately a damp blackness closed in. He shook the flashlight and turned it back on.
In September 1969, when Ho Chi Minh died, the state newspaper, Scînteia , ran a photo of him on the front page. Using a thin blue marker, Nicolae created a pointillist impression of Ho’s delicate bearded face, wisps of thin hair on his chin, which he mounted on cardboard and hung on his bedroom wall.
He dearly wanted to please his father, and in return be treated as a thinking young adult. But the more he read, and the more he compared what he read to the hardship and corruption he witnessed around him, the greater was his suspicion that something was not right. Of all the revolutions that had occurred in the Socialist World, Romania’s, he concluded, was a travesty. The missives that Marx, Lenin and Trotsky had posted many years before had clearly been lost in transit.
Nicolae maintained his faith for as long as he could. But his repeated visits to the Securitate became layers of depression, harder and harder to shake off. One night, unable to sleep, he hit rock bottom. He felt an emotion more harrowing than any he had ever experienced, a feeling that was intensified by the voice of a state radio announcer discussing the dictator’s visit to Buckingham Palace. The radio was in his father’s study. At half-past twelve, Nicolae contemplated killing himself.
It was at that point that Nicolae realized he had nothing left to lose. A clarity came to his thoughts. A door opened. The idea of escape.
Andrei dismissed Nicolae the first time he approached him with his plans. But not long after, the circumstances of his own life changed considerably. The Securitate began visiting Andrei’s house and his mother’s dressmaking co-operative, questioning her while he was away at school. His mother tried to calm him. It’s just harassment, she insisted. But clearly she was upset, more so than Andrei had ever seen her. She paced the kitchen restlessly at night. Andrei noticed her body startle when the wind rattled the shutters or a visitor knocked on the door. He too alternated between panic and resolve, and he vowed to himself that he would protect her—even if it meant leaving Romania.
In the plastic bag that Andrei packed in haste while his mother was sleeping, there were two changes of underwear, an extra shirt, marine goggles that would replace his eyeglasses, some matches, food and water for two, and a slender waterproof packet containing a few photos and personal effects. He wore a bathing suit under his clothes. In contrast, Nicolae carried virtually nothing—a snorkelling mask and, pinned to his bathing suit, a tiny enamel portrait of Che Guevara given to him by his father.
Nicolae had spent weeks secretly dispensing his belongings. He did this partly out of concern for his family, for he truly believed it would be easier on everyone if there was nothing left to tidy up, but also because it provided him with an almost therapeutic sense of ceremony. To begin another life, Nicolae believed, the past life had to be given away.
On board the Zenica , however, Nicolae’s confidence quickly dissolved. The faint smell of laundry soap on his shirt filled him with longing. He was rid of possessions but not emotions: the unsaid goodbyes weighed heavily. He reached for Andrei, who moved closer and rested Nicolae’s head against his shoulder, softly counting down from one hundred as the Turkish freighter lifted anchor. When he reached fifty-seven, they heard the nasal sound of a ship’s horn.
The wooden crate in which they hid was hardly large enough for them both. After an hour, their flashlight began to flicker and fade. Andrei turned it off and immediately a damp blackness closed in. He shook the flashlight and turned it back on.
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