Growing up in post-revolution Romania was not easy. The time span between 1990 and nowadays (!) is defined as a period of "transition" between the communist regime and democracy (or what we believe democracy is ).
Most of our parents grew up in the 70-80's under the communist regime with 2 hours of TV per day, staying in line for the daily bread ratio, and "exotic" fruits like oranges only on Christmas days. They grew up in a society where very few people had a choice. Most of my generation's parents got a job right after finishing high school, and of course, the lucky ones who got into college, having a higher paying job assured for them. ("The system" was taking care of everything - You couldn't quite choose your job, but thanks to corruption, nobody complained). Other than that, everybody was wearing the same clothes, eating the same food and drinking the same wine. And I think most of them were happy that way.
The falling of the regime left the country broken, and the industry dismantled and sold, so many people lost their jobs. Some got rich swift, taking advantage of the poor-written laws, others were dead broke, living from one paycheck to another, with 2 or 3 kids to raise.
Top that with the invasion of western culture, and you get a very colorful landscape where values have a vast spectrum of meanings and interpretation and contrast arises everywhere. 25 years later, in some matters it's still the same gal, wearing a different dress, but more of that in a future post.
If you're still reading, you're probably wondering why the long intro.
Truth is, I honestly don't know at this point. I'm just sitting at my laptop with my headphones (listening to The Kings Of Frog Island- Welcome To The Void) on and writing. Steemit is my first attempt at blogging and I relate to a lot of what this guy is saying . In a way I feel like I'm bare naked, exposed to the world, and just picking stuff to show. I feel that context plays a big part in what people perceive, and there's actually a language barrier between what we see, how we interpret what we see, and our ability to share emotion through language. In a way it's much like CSS coding, we strive to make sure it renders correctly on other devices.
So, back to our story. I grew up in a neighborhood that looked just like other neighborhoods around. It was built in '86. Everybody lived in flats.
There was a guy who had a lot of sheep and sold their cheese. He lived in our block of flats, and his kid was the first to have the cool legos that were advertised on Cartoon Network on TV and a BMX bike. I had cheap, larger lego blocks and and old Pegas bike. It's like in that Dexter's Lab episode with Paper Major Glory. There was this other guy who owned a store, and his kid and the sheep guy's kid were the first to have roller blades, while the poor kids had 70's disco style roller blades. That's the kind of environment most of my generation grew up with.
We weren't quite poor, but we were not in the middle class either. I watched my parents put a lot of hard work so they can buy us the bare minimum, so we fit in with the other kids. In Romania I've observed a common thing back then regarding older people: It was important what everybody else thought about you. So, even if it wasn't always on time, and it wasn't always THAT cool, but somehow we got by.
I think that, compared to the western world, back then most of Romanians perceived everyday-items things as a luxury-good. For example, my parents made a loan from the bank in '97, so they could buy a CD and Cassette player (at least they got a good brand - but in the end, it's a damn cd player!) They paid the loan back in one year's time. One of my first memories I have from this world is my parents arguing over a training costume my father bought for me. It was too expensive. I think I was 3 or something.
So my parents struggled with money sometimes. I think I was 8 or 9 and my mom only had money for only one ice cream.
And, of course, there were 4 of us: mom, dad, me and my sister. A lesson for equality . I remember feeling a bit frustrated as I went to the store because that kind of ice cream we had money for was not that big. So I returned, we sat in the living room on the couch and armchairs and ate the 1/4th of an ice cream watching the romanian version of "Want to be a milionaire?" on TV.
After a few minutes I went outside to play. It was around 8 p.m in August (most of us stayed outside until 10 p.m). In our block lived another family I haven't told you about. They fit into that category I mentioned earlier, six members, one salary, and were loud and angry all the time, fighting each-other over booze or money. 2 of them were around my age. So I go outside, and all the kids are gathered around those 2, brother and sister. They were fighting over an ice cream wrap because they both wanted to lick it. The boy won it, picked the wrapper up from the ground and started to lick it. Of course, they were both crying and most of the kids around the block who were there laughed at them.
I think it is then when I first realized that my family was actually doing ok - by observing how much worse and painful it can be or become.
I've recently had a change of perspective about life and existence in general. I understand that what we observe ourselves to be, is not necessarily who we are, what I'm trying to understand-or rather observe - is the logic behind it - and how that aspect influences our personality and our perspective. How and when did that happen? I am who I am because of that? Or that happened because of who I am? So rather instinctively I began retracing the emotional source of who I am today through what has happened and changed my view on a certain matter.
If you're just being polite and think I can improve, you can follow me 
(BONUS image: All Santas looked like ninjas when I was a kid)