Coada

Description

Before the 1989 Romanian Revolution, a child (Ionut, a pupil at that time) is sent by his parents to buy chicken scraps. In order to do this, he must wait in a fabulous, huge queue that surrounds many times the small town where he lives. To achieve his goal he waits in the queue for twelve months, in shifts with his father and meets the ones who will be his neighbours, friends, mentors, life models even. He witnesses the debates of the adults surrounding him learning about life and happiness, about how you get light when there is a power cut and how you chase the mosquitoes out of the house, and many other different things that a twelve-year old filters in his mind and consequently tells a fantastic story. In parallel with the queue’s life, the child’s voice describes life in those communist times seen through his eyes. He tells us about the cold in our houses, about the lack of electrical power-when children studied by candle light, about life in school, agricultural work in the fields which involved pupils, pioneers’ songs and lyrics, Ceausescu work visits, aerated water bottles, Police, Pepsi, 23rd August marching, abortion, the honour bench in the classroom etc.Finally, he succeeds in buying that chicken stuff.At the end of the book the storyteller confesses that he became a policeman, the fulfilment of one of his childhood’s dreams when he had realised that policemen had people’s respect and they never queued. It is a very sad story in a book full of humour.