We were not allowed to have an abortion. It was not because of the Church, but because Ceausescu needed lots of slaves to sing praise songs on May the 1^st. We had abortions anyway. One every two years. How was one to raise a child in that poverty? Nobody found out about it, Securitate or not. (A. G. I., 39)

Women came up with all sorts of methods to get rid of the baby. Many times they put their lives in danger. My friend caused herself a kind of inner explosion with help of matches. (A.-I. B., 101)

I had regular medical check-ups at work. I asked for a doctor because I had the flu, but they didn?t bring one until I had a gynecological exam. One my colleagues had just had a miscarriage and they accused her of having an abortion. That is why they made us have a gynecological exam, to prevent us from having an abortion in case we were pregnant. (G. S., 118)

An employee in charge of organizing party and trade union activities. A cultural activist was in charge of cultural events: contests, festivals, etc. In the 50?s and the 60?s, the activists had only completed the primary and secondary school; they had all completed evening schools and free attendance schools in the 80?s, while some of them had even attended the ?Stefan Gheorghiu? Faculty.

I remember one memorable sentence a trade union activist once uttered. His name was Marghidan, and, after suggesting a series of idiotic activities, he added: ?comrades, this isn?t pleasant, but it is mobilizing.? (111)

Once in a while, I had to attend those party meetings, everything was done at the ?Comrade?s? indication, nobody would assume any responsibility: ?the Comrade said; the Comrade did?. Every one of the Comrade?s orders was exaggerated by his ?hound dogs?, who only wanted to assert themselves. Therefore, it was those ?hound dogs? - the transmission belt between us, the common people, and the party?s Central Committee - that amplified things. Maybe they were given a task, but by the time it reached us, they would pump it up, let alone that the same thing happened with the messages sent from the bottom. If somebody said: listen, I?m going to exceed the quota by 5% to 10%, what reached the top was 15% to 20%. It was all because of those political gofers, who pumped it all up, over and over again, but nobody would take any responsibility: the Comrade said so, and that would have to do. If the Comrade said we should do this, nobody argued, as they were all afraid of him. (22).

We were in charge of writing, of drawing, but as with any factory at that time, propaganda was always on the agenda; from time to time, the party secretary, a foreman, used to drop by, sometimes we would meet at various sports events, and he would ask me whether I wanted to join the party. I always gave him a straight answer, but probably he never told anybody. I used to tell him: ?the moment this party is outlawed, I will be the first to join it?. I wonder why he kept nagging me, trying to persuade me to join the party, when everybody else had stopped doing that? My position wasn?t even important enough, he wouldn?t need me anyway, so I was a guy who could have very well sent the party to hell. I wasn?t even a member of the trade union, I was against all that, but only because I was a rebellious spirit, and not because I was part of some sort of political-subversive organization. Why would that guy want to make me join the party? He probably had his orders from the party, to make me do God knows what, or to carry some stupid things at the party?s march.

As for my boss, do you know what happened? He was given an order: take your boys and do this or that. But my boss could not appoint me to that particular thing as part of my job tasks, as the law didn?t allow it. He couldn?t pay me. He was supposed to make me do that thing, and if I refused, he would be the one who was kicked in the ass by the party, and by his superiors. This is one thing that many regret. In fact, it is not for the past times that they feel regret. It is true that, say, before Easter, we would buy anything we could find, with whatever money we had, whereas today one cannot afford to buy even though shops are full. So, that was not it. What was important back then, and I miss it today, was that if you had a problem, you could beat a party secretary with a first secretary, because you knew that if you told his superior, he would be finished. So, if he screwed up, he had to deal with it, and then make up for it, too.