"Dukh - Pain": an English - Romani poetry book

Dukh - Pain, a book of poetry by Bosnian writer Hedina Sijercic has been brought to my attention by the book's publisher, Roland Hönsch of Magoria Books.  The poems are in Romani. See a preview here along with the English translation of some of the poems.

Romani, the language of the Roma or Gypsies, belongs in the Indo-European family of languages with many similarities with North Indian dialects. I have no knowledge or familiarity with it but on reading the preview I can understand several words without deciphering the context or the meaning of the poems. Incidentally, Dukh, the word in the title of the book does mean pain or sorrow in most north Indian languages.

Update:  Mr. Hönsch has forwarded me this link to articles by Ronald Lee on a variety of social and cultural issues pertaining to the Roma. Among them is an interesting piece about the Romani custom of worshiping the Black Madonna. I had mentioned this practice in my review of Isabel Fonseca's book Bury Me Standing.  As I had speculated in my review, Lee too traces the origin of the Black Madonna to the Indian goddess Kali.

Until recently it was widely believed that this worship of Kali Sara, the Romani Black Madonna or Goddess was unique to Les Saintes Maries de La Mer. My own recent research among Romani refugees from the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and in countries of the Balkans has uncovered the little-known fact that other Black Virgins are worshipped by Roma in central/eastern Europe and that Roma from these countries perform similar rituals. These rituals include laying flowers at the feet of the statue, adorning the statue with clothing of the sick hoping for cures, placing requests to the statue, and lighting candles to the female divinity. To the Roma, Kali Sara is the Protectress who will cure sickness, bring good luck and fertility and grant success in business ventures.

The Romani ceremony at Les Saintes Maries, as elsewhere, consists of carrying the statue on a platform strewn with flowers into the closest body of water such as a sea, lake, flowing river or even a large pond of clear water. The platform is then lowered to touch the water while the crowd throws flowers into the water. Indian scholars such as Dr. Weer Rishi and others who have witnesses this Romani ceremony as well as Western observers who are familiar with Hindu religious customs have identified this ceremony with the Durga Pooja of India In Romani, Kali Sara means Black Sara and in India, the Goddess Kali is known as Kali/Durga/Sara. Like the Hindus, the Roma practice shaktism, the worship of Goddesses. In other words, the Roma who attend the pilgrimage to Les Saintes Maries in France and in other related ceremonies elsewhere honouring black female divinities, are in fact continuing to worship Kali/Durga/Sara their original Goddess in India.

Comments

[Sujatha]

Do you think any of the Romani words bear similarities to their Bangla equivalents? Many do seem quite familiar. Also, the translated poems are not literal, some words have been substituted by more familiar English phrasings for better reading, I guess.

That was interesting reading about Kali Sara and the links to Hinduism. I wonder how the older generation of Roma feel about the newly uncovered links.

[Ruchira]

Those words you recognized are common to both Hindi and Bengali, the two being similar. The custom of immersing the goddess image into the waters of a river or sea is similar to Bengali Hindu tradition.

Perhaps Mr. Hönsch or someone else familiar with Roma culture can shed more light on how the community feels about the connection to Hindu worship traditions. From Lee's article, it appears that they don't mind. Ever since the linguistic similarities to north Indian dialects were uncovered by philologists, the Roma in Europe have known that their origins lie in the Indian subcontinent. I had read a long time ago in an account by a Bengali travel writer that when he encountered a Roma community somewhere in middle or east Europe, he was greeted by the leader of the group with the following words (I will write it as closely as I remember. After so many years my recall may be faulty ): Tu, Man, Ek Rakt. Translation: "You and I share the same blood."

[Roland Hönsch]

I cannot generalize about the Roma's attitude toward their cultural and linguistic links to their ancient homeland of India. However, Romani authors and academics I am acquainted with, generally view these connections as being a primarily positive one that can illuminate certain aspects of Romani language and culture for the benefit of both the Roma and present-day Indians.

I find Ms. Paul's anecdote about the greeting of the Bengali writer to be entirely plausible. Recognizance of the Indian connection appears in Romani tales and songs, and does so in a positive light. In fact, it was in a Romani song's lyrics that I first encountered references to the Roma's Indian roots (my amateur translation of the first verse from the Hungarian follows):

The Roma have been travelling for a thousand years
Punjab, in India, was their ancestral homeland
A thousand years is a very long time
My beloved's [pregnant] belly is growing
Even we will fit in this great world

Reading the comments about readily apparent linguistic similarities, I have become rather curious. Would a visitor fluent in Hindi care to post a Hindi translation from the English version of one of the poems in the free preview document?

Also, I should note that Ms. Sijercic's book contains all poems in both English and Romani. And the English versions are, as noted by Sujatha, not mere translations--the English poems have been written by Ms. Sijercic to match the spirit and essence of the Romani poems, and were subsequently lectored by Mr. Ronald Lee into their final form.

[Desiphral]

Hi, I am a Rom from Southeastern Europe, the area where live most of the Romani people (about two thirds of the entire population). I'd like to say that here we really grow up exposed to the culture from the Indian subcontinent. We are up-to-date with the last Bollywood movies and music, we read Indian writings and on long term we desire to become reunited with the rest of the Indian culture. The fact is that there remains a big cultural difference between us and the local non-Roma. The Romani elite either becomes too much assimilated (and consequently uninteresting and unpopular among the usual Roma) if they are cultivated in local non-Romani ways or they lack strength if they want to keep the Romani culture and to be intellectuals in the same time. Thus, it is normal to seek outlets of self-expression adequate to our world view, a broad space where we could promote our culture beyond the current Gypsy caricature of the Western society.

All the Romani schools I am aware of in this area have Desi names. For example, the Gandhi highschool form Pecs (Hungary), Gandhi school in Zvolen (Slovakia) or Jai Bhim school in Alsoszentmarton (again Hungary). Many Romani singers have songs in Hindi in their repertoire, some also mainstream Desi names (like Rukmini, in Romania).

In this sense, I find illustrating this video promoting the main Romani party in Bulgaria, Evroroma, with Tsvetelin Kanchev (the president) and Sofi Marinova (one of the best contemporary Romani voices). It has a Bollywood atmosphere, alluding to films we all saw, because this is popular among us:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUzeYFKm3MU

Usually most of the public information about us are interpretations through non-Romani eyes that do not know or do not want to acknowledge the main pillars of the Romani culture. In this sense, these articles may shed some light on the reality of the Romani culture:

http://desicritics.org/2007/12/13/120931.php

http://www.web4desi.com/Articles/34-ArticlesByAlinDosoftei/45-romani-society

[Ruchira]

Thank you Roland and Deisphral for your informative comments and links. I had heard that Bollywood is very popular among the Roma of Europe. Until a few years ago, Hindi films and songs were widely enjoyed in Soviet Russia and eastern Europe even among the non-Roma - especially Raj Kapoor movies.

Roland suggested that somebody attempt to translate one of Hedina Sijercic's poems into Hindi. I myself am unable to rise to that daunting challenge although my Hindi is near perfect. But I did go over the poems and picked up familiar words from one of them. I of course used the English translation to guide me. Without a sense and a context, I would probably not have been able to recognize isolated words.

Here is what I came up with: The first word is Romani, the second Hindi and the last one is the English meaning.

Ando Suno (ando = andar = inside, Suno = suno / sapna? = hear/ dream)

Cherav radio emisija pe Romani chib.

Ashunav pesko krlo: (Ashunav = Anubhav? = feel)

“Lacho djive, Romalen thaj chavalen! (chavalen = chhaila / chhawal [slang] = boys / children)

Aven saste thaj bahtale!” (saste = svasth = health)

Studio, mikrofono, bashalipe.

E gadze chelen amenca.

E gadze hasaven amenca. (hasaven = hanse/ hansaye = laugh / to make one laugh)

Bahtali sem. (Bahtali = behtar = good)

Ando suno

Cherav radio emisija pe Romani chib.

Ashunav pesko krlo:

“Nashen dural Romalen thaj chavalen! (dural = door = far)

Nashen dur dural!” (dur = door = far)

Granaturja, jagala, churika. (churika = chhuri = knife)

E gadze maren amen. (maren = maarey = to beat)

E gadze mudaren amen. (mudar = murda / mrityu = dead /death)

Bibaxtali sem.

I am intrigued by the first line. Ando Suno has been translated as "In a dream" in English. I made a linguistic leap to read it as follows:

(ando = andar = inside, Suno = suno = hear)

Since we know that the translation is more in spirit than literal, could the line actually mean, I hear inside me?
I would love to know from someone who understands the language.

Another question. Do all the different Roma communities in Europe speak the same Romani tongue? For example can a Roma in Romania communicate with another say from Hungary or Bosnia, using a common language/dialect? Or does Romani vary from region to region?

[Desiphral]

Interesting parallels...

In Romani suno comes from the same root as sapna in Hindi. "Hear" in Romani is "shun", you'll see it further below in the poem as "ashunav", in the Gurbeti dialect used in this book. The rest of the parallels are correct.

I'd like to point also other Indo-Aryan words.
"Cherav", as the dialectal form of "kerav", is the same as "karna" (to do).
Lachho लाछो is the same as achchha (good).
"Djive" as the dialectal form of "dives", is the same as "divas" (day).
"Chelen", again a dialectal form of "khelen", the same as "khelna" (to play).
"Sem" ( I am) has the same root as "hoon". In Romani it remained the Sanskrit "s" that in other Indo-Aryan languages changed to "h", under Persian influence. For example, "Vov si" - "Vo hai" (he is).

Reggarding the question of the Romani dialects, there are, as you can see, some dialects that changed some initial sounds, also there are

[Desiphral]

Sorry, I clicked by mistake the Post button :)

So, there appear some sound changes, but they tend to be regular and if one knows the correspondence it may be known the corresponding sound. Also, obviously, there are differences of vocabulary, regarding the words borrowed from the local non-Romani languages. So, when, more Roma with different dialects, we talk together we tend to use the Indo-Aryan core, which as you can see is prevalent, also words from better known languages, like English, Spanish.

In some countries, the local Romani groups lost the use of Romani, eventually they preserved only some vocabulary used on the structure of the local language. Sometimes, these creolizations are named also Romani, but they should not be confused with the real Romani language.

[Ruchira]

Ah, Chelen = Khelna! Why didn't I see that?

Desiphral, a few questions:

Your name (pseudonym), does it have anything to do with "desi" as South Asians understand it?

Is the word Gypsy offensive to the Roma or merely misleading? Say, like "American Indian," which is historically incorrect but not a pejorative. The Native Americans did not come from India and the Roma didn't come from Egypt.

Have you read Isabel Fonseca's book Bury Me Standing to which I have linked within the above post? If so, what did you think of it? If not, please see my review.

Update: Okay, Desiphral, after reading the linked article in Desicritic more carefully, I get the meaning of your name. Very nice! In Hindi that would be Desi Bhai = Desi Brother.

[Ronald Lee]

I am happy to see Hedina's book is arousing so much interest. It deserves to be widely read. For those who are interested in Romani dialects, Hedina is currently preparing a dictionary of her Gurbeti Romani dialect. There is also my Learn Romani course book published by University of Hertfprdshire Press and a forthcoming Romani-English dictionary.
Ronald Lee

[narayan]

Romani
I have always looked for connections between languages and am delighted to see this particular bilingual book. The handful of poems and their translations that I scanned makes me wonder if this is a language of Indian origins that has escaped the influence of the Indo-European languages of the Muslim world. I see that Desiphral has already alluded to this subject. Since reading Anthony Burgess' essay "Language As A Family Affair", I find it easier to make the connections Desiphral makes. of consonantal shift patterns from one language to another.
"Good Afternoon, Roma" -- I am wowed more by Ronald Lee's translation than by the original. Whether by accident or intent, the translation has the shape of the prow of a ship, which doesn't show distinctly in the original. I have seen two songs with such deliberate shapes, one Brazilian, the other famous in Carnatic music.
Wikipedia has a lot of good information about the Roma. There is also the site
http://www.romani.org/
which has more insight into Indian connections.

Roma / Gypsy / Tzigane / Cigano
"Bury Me Standing" has made an impression on American consciousness of gypsies to the exclusion of other material that has been accessible in the US.
My earliest memory of gypsies (50s) is of my father speaking of the Lambanis in the villages of his childhood. He was apparently mistaken in associating those people with the Roma. That said, Banjaras and Lambanis/Lambadis originated in Punjab/Rajasthan, as did the Roma. I used to see (60s) extended family groups of fair skinned people making their home in utter squalor for weeks on end in the train stations of the northern suburbs of Bombay. It was rumored that the women turned tricks and that the men were thieves. In India, as in Europe, gypsies have long been suspect and reviled. Alistair Maclean's "Caravan to Vaccares" did not help dispel the stereotypes.
Later (70-80s), in the US, I started seeing and reading material about gypsies that were more sympathetic. I remember seeing a pilot for a TV series about a Boston lawyer who was a gypsy and an amateur sleuth -- the first indication to me that gypsy colonies existed in the US; A book by a Gujerati doctor about his fascination with the Roma and his attempts to reach out to their community, from which I remember the greeting 'hum tum ek rakt'; A sighting at a rest stop on the NJ Turnpike of a gypsy family; An early morning sighting at a local 7-11 of gypsy roofers in a pick-up truck; The entertaining film 'King of the Gypsies'; The much better film about NY gypsies, 'Angelo My Love', directed by Robert Duvall -- a must see.
More recently (90s) I have seen a few feature films about East European gypsies, and some documentary material about the plight of Europe's gypsies since the breakup of the Communist bloc. Seeing the film 'Traveller' gave me the mistaken impression that the Traveller communities were part of the gypsy diaspora. Ditto, the Brad Pitt character in 'Snatch'. A few months ago I witnessed a nasty incident with a group of agressive young Travellers at a local restaurant. It is easy to see how the term gypsy freely attaches to nomadic tribal people who are forced to live by their wits.
And where would jazz guitar playing be without the pioneering influence of Django Reinhardt, a French Gypsy. For a taste of Django see ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEzsPGHsi90
The scores of versions of his beautiful ballad 'Nuages' on YouTube attest to its status as a Standard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtvuFlT3gWw

[Ramayana]

Narayan wrote: "Good Afternoon, Roma" -- I am wowed more by Ronald Lee's translation than by the original. Whether by accident or intent, the translation has the shape of the prow of a ship, which doesn't show distinctly in the original. "
I just like to say this is not Ronald Lee's translation of the poems, this is Hedina Sijercic's translation. Mr.Ronald Lee lectored the poems and didn't make changes of Hedina's translation.
Ramayana

[Roland Hönsch]

In answer to Ms. Paul's inquiry about the word "Gypsy":

As you pointed out, the term is indeed inaccurate. But more than that, the word is associated primarily with the negative and mythical conceptions Europeans historically had about the Roma. It is therefore a word that denied and continues to deny the Roma control over their own identity.

In fact, it used to be "scientific" consensus among certain scholars--some of whom are still alive today and continue to firmly hold this incomprehensibly patriarchal and racist view--that gypsies (not Gypsies) were less an ethnic group and more a special interest group (I paraphrase, of course) united not by ethnocultural links, language, or a common ancestry but merely by the irrepressible urge to "live wildly" outside of civilized society. And indeed, even today, the word conjures up just such images in the average European's and North American's mind.

Such crude and denigrating characterizations are, of course, a far cry from the reality of the Roma as a people who survived tremendous persecution, slavery, and even genocide primarily because of the strength of their communities and the strength of their commitment to their way of life.

Therefore though there are individuals and groups who tolerate this exonym, or one of its variants in other languages; many Roma do indeed consider the word "Gypsy" and its variants to be pejorative, not meaningfully different from the N-word used to denigrate people of African ancestry.

[Sukrita]

This is most fascinating...the language/culture interface in Romani is bound to reflect many cultures through, I'm sure, not just the origins of the Roma but also, by virtue of the fact that this is a community that moved from place to place; the lexican of Romani then must be a carrier of a variety of cultures and languages. In itself that makes material for further study. Such languages, rich in a certain kind of cultural plurality, must be conserved. The threat of homogenization is so strong from the forces of material Globalization...It is so refreshing to get to know about the Roma and their language. The contents' page of Dukh/Pain, has titles such as Life, Sorrow, Wind, Mother Dream etc...There you are, you have in this culture, I believe, a good mix of the elemental with the specific cultural practices such as the worship of the Black Madonna!

[Florina]

Dear all,

Reading Hedina,I felt how her poems describe the aspirations and hope of millions of Romani people in the world. Hedina make a clear distinction between aspirations of Roma and the brutal realities of today where Roma are treated as sub-humans.
The emotional pain of her poems become the voice of silented Roma bitterness all over the world - whose rights to happiness, spirations and armonisation within the invironment are denied trough a conspiracy of silence.
I highly appreciate Hedina's poems, seing those poems as a cry of milllions of Roma kids claiming their rights to be treated as proper human beings.