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Show Bountiful couple learned to cope Getting 2 Romania girls out : caused weeks of frustration r Romanian authorities would only discuss the matter with a legislator, it seemed. Finally, Garth was cleared to leave the country once and for all. However, a terrible snow storm struck, and Garth and the little girls were delayed another two days. The Romanians have no snow removal equipment, he said. Despite all- of the red tape, the Nelsons said that having two new daughters and a new awareness of the sweet freedom of America surpasses sur-passes any of the troubles and stress, they had during their stay in Romania. (Editor's oote: A Bountiful couple traveled travel-ed to Romania and adopted two little girls after trekking through miles of red tape that included permission from the natural parents who couldn't afford to keep the children. In the second of a three-part series, they describe the austere lifestyle of a communist country so poor it sells its, children to outsiders.) r - By KRIS JOHNSON , Staff Writer j BOUNTIFUL Getting their j newly adopted girls out of communist commu-nist Romania involved weeks (of frustration for a Bountiful couple, who learned to cope with a culture so deprived that light bulbs and laughter are luxuries. j Garth Nelson spent 37 days in the rigid communist country before he could bring ' his new daughters, Alina, 9, and Irina, 5, back to the United States. His wife, Carylyn, endured three weeks in the austere country and in despair, flew home early. "When I got off the plane in Bucharest, I felt like I was in a tijne machine that had gone back 40 years," Garth said. "The military is everywhere with machine guns, the buildings are all decayed, and they have no economy to repair them. ! "The land and the people have been robbed of their natural resources, and little has been done to modernize the country." j Before communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu took overj in 1965, Romania was a number one vacation land, said Garth. Now (the air is dirty, the roads are in disrepair and no one has individual ownership owner-ship of property. i Shortly after Carylyn left, Romania's government-controlled electric power was turned off, leaving leav-ing citizens shivering in dark, unheated apartments. It was 26 degrees below zero outside and 30 degrees in the apartment where Garth Gar-th stayed. There was nothing to cook with or heat with, and they jiad no running water for ten days. "When it gets that cold, you put four or five layers of clothes on and wrap yourself up, and live indoors, wearing things you would normally wear outdoors. Everyone wears their coats and hats all day long," said Garth. j The Nelsons had to stay! iri Romania for so long because of all of the red tape they went through to get the girls out of the communist country. They ended up spending a large portion of their savings. . "As much as I was prepared, there is no way I could have been totally prepared for how difficult it was going to be while we were, there. I learned that if anything tan gd wrong, it will," said Carylyn. Not only was the adoption procedure pro-cedure .lengthy, it was emotionally trying on the Bountiful couple. On (the average, it takes a month-long stay in Romania before anyone can adopt or bring a child out of the country. "First you have' to be able to get into an orphanage and that took us a week," said Carylyn. "Then you have io locate the real parents and get police "documentation. "documenta-tion. After .all of 'that, you have to set a court date so that fhe parents can come in and release the 'children. All of the paper work has to be translated into Romanian, and then you have to get Bucharest authorities au-thorities to finalize the doctfmqnts. Getting the documents finalized can take up to a week." At one point, just as Garth finally thought he had clearance to bring the girls home to America, his expectations ex-pectations were shattered ; when . Romanian authorities found a jone word discrepancy in. the adoption documentation. When filling out the papers, the Nelsons said they wanted to bring a child homej instead in-stead of children. As a result, G arth was delayed another week in subzero temperatures with no heat, and two little girls who were sick from the cold weather. Carylyn, who had flown back to Bountiful, got on the telephone with Utah Rep. Jim Hansen, and he helped help-ed to clear up the discrepancy.' The - - them. They hunger for it. ' ' The Romanians have so little. -Their stores are nearly empty, they have long bread lines and a limited food selection. The only time they can get fruits and vegetables is in the summer, said Carylyn. "I couldn't wait to get home and have a salad. We wanted some u potatoes, and it took us a week to find them." Because Romanians live in a communist society, everyone makes $15 a month. "Whether you're a -, doctor, teacher, or sales clerk, , everyone makes the same," said Garth. Moreover, the Romanian culture is so oppressed, its citizens rarely buy clothes. Much of the clothing they do have is 40 years old. Most Romanians don't have " phones, said Garth. Whenever he had to make a call, Garth went to an unheated building where he had to ask an operator for assistance. "I sat in a room for 12 hours while I waited with 60 other people for my phone call to go through," Garth said. "The room temperature was 1 8 below zero. If you get upset or irate, the operator won't service you. If you push them, they tell you that it is procedure, and no one questions procedure. ' ' Garth said that one of the most frustrating things to him was that the Romanians have electricity, yet a severe shortage of light bulbs. "There are no lights and the elevators are black. You have to feel the walls for the buttons and when it stops, you hope you're on ' the right floor. You then grab onto the wall and hope you can find where you're staying." "One of the ; saddest things about the Romanian people is that they don't know how to laugh or smile," added Carylyn. "They all forgot what the meaning . of happiness is because they've lived liv-ed in an oppressed society for so r long. Their hopes for the future are bleak and dim." Carylyn said she . had dinner with a 40-year-old Romanian woman, and the food was so terrible that she begun to laugh out of frustration. She didn't . want to insult her hostess, so she made the best of it. The hostess began laughing when she saw Carylyn laugh, and the two woman laughed together. Then the hostess began to cry and she told Carylyn she was crying because that was the first time she had ever laughed in her entire life. "The Romanians live their lives in fear," Carylyn said. "The people don't talk in their homes because they're bugged. They don't socialize with their neighbors, because one in four neighbors are government spies. They don't ever express how 'they really feel about communism because they are afraid they'll get caught for saying the wrong thing. They are so fearful, that they're afraid to even think the wrong way because they might get caught. "The Romanians would tell us not to speak English and to lock ourselves in our apartments and not make our presence known. They were afraid for us," Carylyn said. The Nelsons said that many of the Romanian people told them that the little girls were fortunate to ' trade the communist way of life for a new democratic lifesty le. When Garth was finalizing the adoption at an orphanage in suburban subur-ban Suceava, the judge, who was a woman of about 60, looked at him and said, "I want you to promise me that you will send a photograph and a short letter every year to my home about these little girls. It is the only happiness that I have left in my life-to know that I have done ; some good for these children." The judge jokingly asked Garth if he would adopt her and take her to America too. (In Tuesday's edition, the Nelsons and their three sons are adjusting to the addition of two bright little Romanian girls who are fast becoming part of the family.) -L M i "If anything comes out of this situation, it is how blessed we are,"-Carylyn are,"-Carylyn 'said. "I am grateful for our freedom. I am grateful to be an American. It seems like we take so much for granted. Our challenge as Americans is to be thankful for what we have." .. Carylyn added that she gave some Romanians a few paper clips, and they were absolutely thrilled. "They don't have paper clips in Romania," she said. "These people have nothing." "I learned to appreciate America for what it stands for," said Garth. "Despite America's frailties and turmoil, it's a far superior society to live in. "I've learned a great appreciation apprecia-tion for the human life, wherever you are. Whatever culture you're in, the bottom line is that people are people and they need to be loved, and they need to be neededand they respond well when it's given to |