His cause is a common one among street children and one also shared by Ramona. Her alcoholic father regularly abused her and her brother while her mother stood silently by. It was 1985, Ramona was just 5 years old when her older brother, age seven, took her by the hand and together they fled.
I turned back towards Ramona who all the while had been in the background quietly observing. I asked her what she was thinking?
�I feel pity for them,� she said. �I remember that I was like that - and I see myself in them.�
I began to introduce her. �Do you know Ramona? � I asked the group but was quickly silence by Ramona�s frantic cry - �no don�t tell them.�
�How come?�
�I�ll tell you later.�
Winter had recently passed and the thoughts of snow covered Bucharest streets was still fresh in my mind when I asked how they managed the cold evenings. Claudiu suggest I see for myself.
Bogdan and Cristi led us back towards the road to an uncovered sewer vent partially hidden inside the tall grass and weeds. Ramona chose to wait up top while the rest of us climbed down inside the darkness.
She told me that she never slept in the sewers. She preferred to sleep inside apartment buildings. She would gather all the doormats to cover herself with. Other nights she would hop an evening train and ride it till its morning destination. She refused to sleep in the sewers because she didn�t like them and once I got inside I understood why
I must admit that going in I had imagined a romanticized version of the Bucharest sewer system like that depicted in a Hitchcock thriller; an endless network of tunnels, the echoing trickle of water and flickering shadows. But it was nothing of the kind. The Bucharest sewers that have since become home to hundreds of street child in an ugly concrete bunker with two massive water pipes running through it. The hot water pipe heated the room like the heating rod through an oven. We literally started to roast. All the jackets came off.
Mounds of plastic soda bottles, cardboard and candy wrappers littered the floor. This was the urban hay stack which they would sleep over. Aided by a flickering candle or match they would crawl over one another in search of a free spot in the pile And for a few hours at least they could lay their dirty heads down on something or someone, close their eyes and dream.
�Last month we found a two months old baby there with cockroaches as big as mice crawling over her,� Claudiu said pointing to the bed.
�I have a cat that runs from the bugs because they are so big,� Cristi chimed in.
I asked about the infamous Bucharest sewer rats which I had seen before in garbage bins and running from the dogs. �Many, many,� Bogdan howled, �and bigger than the cats. You feel them run over you when you sleep.�
I asked Ramona to take the lead and show us some of her old stomping grounds. I told her to speak freely...
She led us through the crowds pointing out obscure sights like the two trees where she used to like to sit - now the claim of a sleeping vagabond and a couple street dogs.
I asked her about the street dogs. I had sensed a bond between both these two Romanian phenomenon. During many walks through the city I would pass lonely street children cuddling a young stray like it was his only friend. After all, they have both been abandoned by society - left to fend for themselves, and now, even the older street children, like the dogs, were beginning to give birth on the street starting up yet a whole new generation.
�There weren�t so many street dogs back then,� Ramona replied. �We had street dog friends but we didn�t like them following us around all the time.�.. After a moment of reflection she added, �I am sorry that they left them to be so many and now are killing them. Just like street children there are more and more every year and it�s because the problem wasn�t taken care of at the very beginning.� With a dimpled smile she added, �I just hope they don�t start doing to the children what they do to the dogs.�