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About 50 Sinti and Roma from France have been traveling for several weeks already thru that particular region of the
former East Germany. They say that they are visiting the graves of their relatives from the time of the Second World War.
The Group comes from France and the men earn their living with the sharpening of knives, axes, saw blades and ploughs
and while some people may have been friendly towards them others were and are rather ill disposed towards them.
Only a stone
throw away from the wood where neo-Nazis are regularly holding their "maneuvers" on the night to Wednesday, 08.20.03, unknown
perpetrators set fire the car of a young Roma-woman.
Originally
they had intended to move from Lohmen, where they had been encamped the week before, to Duerrroehrsdorf-Ditterbach but the
stopping place there was being used by showmen. So instead they came to Gersdorf. "Here the neighbors called us names from
within the safety of their gardens and they threatened that they would destroy our caravans if we would not leave immediately",
said the men. They sure did not feel welcome even though the mayoress Brigitte Kolba did help them to find a stopping place,
as well as arranged for electricity and water and for a refuse skip to be provided. "Obviously not without charge", said the
Mayoress. "But", she continued, "They are after all our guests". The Mayoress also mentioned that children from the Kindergarten
had been visiting and playing with the small children of the Romani families and commented that Sinti and Roma on the camp
were "nice people".
That not
everyone saw it the same way as did the leader of the community became obvious when on the night to Wednesday that Mercedes
was torched.
The police
estimate the loss of the vehicle to be 4000 Euro but the money is not that important to the single mother whose vehicle
it was. She and her child are being looked after and cared for by others in the clan. The other members of the clan put together
their saving in order to buy the Romni another car.
Because
they want to leave as quickly as possible. And who can blame them for that? The majority of the caravans left already on Wednesday
evening. "We haven't done anything to anyone. We are behaving ourselves respectable and decent. Why then did someone do this
to us?" is the question the members of this group of Sinti and Roma from France direct towards police and the German public
in general. Something like that has never ever happened to them before.
Maybe I
should add that this is nothing new, I am afraid, in Germany as can be seen from the other incident in Bavaria, which is also reported here. It would also appear as if it is getting worse.
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