Nobody probably could avoid participating in such an ?activity?. The last one was the meeting on the 21st December in the Palace Square when finally, whether decided beforehand or not, instead of insincere ovations, booing was heard. We finally witnessed the performance of the contested power. Up to that moment these were supposed to be performances of the worshipped power. Amid theatre settings that were getting increasingly wilted (flags, slogans, placards, paintings, dedicated all to Ceausescu, collages with reports and achievements of his politics), the population had to resign to a position of enthusiastic obediance towards a sole leader. Somewhere in the distance, surrounded by his retinue, he looked, elevated on a rostrum, down to the mass of people flowing by. Even more disgusting was the necessity to deal with party-liners, the repressive forces, the militia men standing by the road, who considered everybody just a mass to be manoevred:?Faster, faster! Keep rank!? they used to order. (87)

The fundamental demonstration was a torture for the young people and the employees. The preparations and the rehearsals in view of the final demonstration would start two months before the day of the parade.? The productive youth? had to learn the marching steps because one had to march in rank and files, far better than the army. Everybody had to participate, artistic teams were built up in all the factories, they were sent to the villages to the performances taking place there as well, or to the parks in Bucharest- all that besides what took place on the stadium ?23rd August?. For instance, I, a member of the dance team of The Trade Union Cultural Association, together with all the entire team (choir, pop and folk music singers, dancers, who were all on the party lists) usually went to the parks of Bucharest. Those who did not want to participate in the parades were threatened with the prison. That?s why wanting or not wanting to participate was beside the point. You were forced to! In every factory, those who took part in the parade were appointed beforehand: the party men, ?politruc? (as we used to call them) came and informed the manager of the institution about the number of the people he had to contribute with on behalf of the factory. Among the participants, there weren?t only those from the artistic teams, but also those who had to stay in public and to shout slogans. For sportsmen, 23rd August was a real ordeal: they had to stand for at least 8 hours under the sun, to endure blisters and stuff like that. This used to happen every summer- the worst was 23rd of August- because otherwise, on the 1st of May and 30th of December, everything was usually organized by the trade union clubs. (O. S., 41)

Unlike the winter demonstrations, who were carried out by the inhabitants of Bucharest, the ones taking place on the stadium, on the 23rd of August, were carried out by children and teachers from all over the country. Thus, each county had to send its representatives, the children, to camps set up for one month. The children had a rehearsal program right there on the stadium ?23rd August?, in the morning and in the afternoon.