Who are the Roma?

Romani travellers, otherwise known as gypsies.

They tried to scam me a lot back when I lived in Jersey. My car is dented and there’s this scam where they drive up and say they just got off a mechanic job for X Company and have their tools in their car and will fix the dent for $200 or so. Then the scam is they put a bunch of Bondo on the dent and cover it with white tape and tell you not to remove it for a week. They often get rude and threatening when I refuse and tell them I am reporting them to the police.

How do I know they were Roma, you ask? A good friend in the area hustles pool and plays with them a lot. One day I mentioned all the scammers in the A&P parking lot and he laughed, told me who they were, and had me use his name in the future to get them to leave me alone. He even taught me this phrase in another language to use, but I can’t remember it now.

My friend also told me that most Roma are very religious, and you can be sure they are telling the truth if you ask them to swear to God.

Edit: whoops, forgot to answer the question. My views on the Roma that I have knowingly interacted with are not positive. I don’t like that they are probably successfully scamming old folks, in particular. But I would not expand my judgment about those individuals to cover an entire group of people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romani_people

Gypsies. Like a lot of people who are a long way from home, in an unfamiliar land and culture, some have become very resourceful.

What does it mean they are “ethnic” Europeans. Does this imply they are not fair skinned? Serious question, I’ve never known what “ethnic” means, I’ve been told I have an “ethnic” look.

The Roma are a people most likely originally from northern India. Historically, they have been travelers throughout Europe and are located in many different places. They have a reputation of being lower-class, swindlers, and overall troublemakers, similar to the way Hispanics are sometimes viewed in the United States. The Roma are of darker skin tone typically and they have historically been persecuted and oppressed and used as scapegoats for different European countries’ problems.

Whoa! @DominicX I catch your drift but let’s not be foolish here.

“similar to the way Hispanics are sometimes viewed in the United States”

Mexicans are some of the hardest working people I’ve ever met. I’d say 80% that I know hold down two jobs at a time. I have zero prejudice against Mexicans earning a living. Fact, when my restaraunt first opened there was a mix of Mexican and Whites in the kitchen. The harder workers were the Mexicans, eventually they got more hours because they kept up with the demand. Later on we got a new GM who thought it would be nice if we could have more English speaking people in the kitchen, again the kitchen was half white half Mexican. Same results, the Mexicans outworked the whites, which age ranged from 21 up to a 40 year old. Not trying to imply Mexicans are the better workers, but from what I’ve read, Romas don’t like to work, and Mexicans on the other hand want to work! It’s funny because Mississippi tried to adopt the same facists laws of SB1070 from Arizona and then they had a huge shortage in farmer employees because no “American” Citizen wanted to work as a farmer in the first place! I tell ya, my fellow Americans crack me up with their silly views that , “If it aint white it aint right.”

but from what I’ve read, Romas don’t like to work

Well, I can’t confirm or disprove that statement. I’m not saying the Roma don’t earn some of their negative reputation. I don’t really know enough about it, however.

I would recommend this book: Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and their Journey by Isabel Fonseca, who spent four years among the Roma, learning about their history and culture.

My grandmother would always remind me that the Roma were among the first targets of Hitler. We don’t hear much about the gypsy holocaust because there weren’t enough survivors to tell the stories.

I recommend a movie from 1993. Latcho Drom. Shows the history of the Roma migration from India through music. One of my favorite movies.

What @DominicX said. Some people theorize that they originate from Egypt.
One of the big problems they have had, and no doubt still have, is the problem with achieving citizenship in a lot of places. This makes it hard for them to even get any kind of identity, let alone a job. Many in North America do just fine. But in other places, they get treated like crap. Saw a documentary on Youtube where a bunch of Romani families were given land by some abandoned nuclear power plant and they had to stay there. Everyone was getting sick and everything, no food was given to them or anything.

@keobooks When Hitler got Jews killed, records of every Jew was kept. Like their name, date of birth, job, whatever. The Romani were considered even below Jew status, and records weren’t even kept.

Another interesting movie is Into the West, about some Irish travellers and two little boys who find a special wonderful horse. Romantic. And a thing no one has exactly mentioned is how hermetic these communities are. These are people who have traditionally been hounded and have kept moving. Painted horse-drawn wagons, very beautiful, are traditional. Because of their separateness from gadjo (non-Roma) society, they’ve become expert at skimming the fat off of people whose lives are easier and more settled.
Look into the “gypsy pilgrimage” to Les Saintes Maries de la Mer in southern France. We went one summer. It was stunning. Lots of flamenco…. lots of human beings.

nice casual racism you have going on here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Romani_people

Some cool people on this list. Robert Plant, for instance is of Romani origin.

@ragingloli: say more.