vikiradTG2007
Forum Addict
On Monday, the world will celebrate 20 years since the symbolic moment that heralded the end of Communism in Eastern Europe, the fall of the Berlin Wall. It's been 2 decades in which this whole area has been fighting hard to heal itself from the wounds inflicted by a dark half of a century, by a massive social experiment which failed spectacularly. And, in several parts of this former bloc, the wounds of those 45 years underneath the Iron Curtain's grip are still painfully obvious and no more healed than they were at the time when the regimes were overthrown.
Corruption still rages; bribery is the order of the day. "Freedom" of press just means that all the politicians are arguing and fighting on live TV for all the world to see. Politicians govern countries at their own whim, they don't care about political platforms, they just want to fill their own pockets and the ones of several businessmen allied to them. Public auctions are fixed, even though it is always denied. Deadlines are never obeyed. It's all a huge mess. And over here, this is especially painful since the Romanian people overthrew the Communist rule at the highest cost of any nation in the Eastern Bloc. People gave their lives for freedom... but their sacrifice seems to have been in vain so far.
How do others who live in the former Eastern Bloc feel about the significance of what happened in the autumn and winter of '89? How do people who viewed the events from the outside see all of this? I want to hear your opinions.
Corruption still rages; bribery is the order of the day. "Freedom" of press just means that all the politicians are arguing and fighting on live TV for all the world to see. Politicians govern countries at their own whim, they don't care about political platforms, they just want to fill their own pockets and the ones of several businessmen allied to them. Public auctions are fixed, even though it is always denied. Deadlines are never obeyed. It's all a huge mess. And over here, this is especially painful since the Romanian people overthrew the Communist rule at the highest cost of any nation in the Eastern Bloc. People gave their lives for freedom... but their sacrifice seems to have been in vain so far.
How do others who live in the former Eastern Bloc feel about the significance of what happened in the autumn and winter of '89? How do people who viewed the events from the outside see all of this? I want to hear your opinions.