E&E Outstanding Citizen Film Wins American Marketing Association Award
MR. ETHAN HAWKE: The Roma people of Eastern Europe, known more commonly as gypsies here in the U.S., are on the very fringe of society.
Often isolated, rarely educated, it's
almost impossible for them to get jobs, and so there is
despair, hopelessness, alcoholism and
abuse.
My name is Ethan Hawke and this is the
story of one woman who has taken the plight of the Roma
people to heart. Her name is Leslie Hawke, and she is my
mother.
TITLE SLATE - [MUSIC]
My mother joined the Peace Corps in 2000
and wanted to go to Ecuador, but was assigned to Romania,
to the provincial city of Bacau. Bacau and its 250,000 residents
are still emerging from the fall of
communism 15 years ago.
There is a growing middle class and a
healthy local economy. But not for the people of Roma descent. Within the first few days,
she met Alex, an 8-year-old boy who frequently begged during rush hour
at the intersection under her window. It was a scene repeated throughout the
country, Roma kids on the streets, out of school, doomed to a lifetime
of jobless poverty, the cycle guaranteed to repeat. Getting kids like Alex off the street became my mother's mission.
MS. LESLIE HAWKE: So I wound up the next day taking him to the shelter that the organization I work for ran, and he stayed there for 3 days.
He seemed to be thrilled to be there, but on the third day his mother showed up absolutely furious that we had taken the primary breadwinner of the family away, and that was my first introduction to the complexities of child begging in Romania and how most of these kids are actually supporting their families. So you can't just take them to an institution and make things better.
MR. HAWKE: Realizing the solution was in helping the families find an alternative way to survive, my mother thought of the Doe Fund in New
York City which helps homeless men get jobs. Then, thanks to a USAID grant program initiated by Ambassador Rosapepe, she started a work-training program for mothers calling it Ready, Willing and Able, after the Doe Fund program.
MS. ACHIHAI: It's not just a project for a child, for the children. It's for the family together and it has a very interesting means of changing lives for the families and making mothers work for themselves and find other ways of producing incomes for their own families.
MR. HAWKE: In this recent orientation session for a textile training class, you can hear the despair and the hope.
PARTICIPANT 1: [Translation.]
My mother is mentally ill and my father was an alcoholic. I decided to get married to take my own life into my own hands. I was too young. I was 16.
PARTICIPANT 2: [Translation.]
I've never worked anywhere. I've never been hired.
MS. HAWKE: Did you ever try to get a job?
PARTICIPANT 2: [Translation.] I tried, but because of the kids, I couldn't leave them alone. Their father is dead. I had to take care of them.
PARTICIPANT 3: [Translation.] It's just so hard, my little girl, it's hard for me to take care of her. She's got problems. She's had problems since she was born.
PARTICIPANT 4: [Translation.] I want my kids to have a better life than I have if that's possible.
MS. TITARU: [Translation.] We realized that there was a real concrete for need for actual partnerships, tangible partnerships that we're doing something between the NGOs and the local administration and especially the business community here in Bacau.
MR. ATANASIU: It was not too difficult at all to get involved in this because Leslie was very convincing and the message she is sending practically galvanized not only my company and myself, but all the other people. So, yes, we hired in here a few dozen of these women. Many of them are from Roma origin. And not to my surprise, but probably to many other people which were a little bit pessimistic in the beginning, they did a very good job and they got more integrated and did well in our company.
MR. HAWKE: Alongside the Ready, Willing and Able program, my mother started an educational program for the kids to help them get into school, stay in school and excel.
Her team in Bacau literally goes door to door recruiting kids for kindergarten and grade school. They work with local educators so Roma kids can be integrated into the regular classes, and they provide hot lunches and after-school activities. They even give parents incentives for sending their kids to school, things like medicine, fire wood and help in getting ID papers.
MS. NACSU: These children that you see here didn't know what school meant. They used to just stay on the streets. Now the children come here, they learn you can see that they're well dressed. People are taking care of them.
MS. SIBISTANIU: [Translation.] Through this project there have been brought into the mainstream schools around 214 children, and a portion of these children have continued their studies in mainstream schools within our system, and so you can really say that this project achieved its goal of integrating children into the school system here.
MR. HAWKE: Jobs for impoverished families, education for the next generation, these are long-term goals, but visit a Roma home and you see immediate needs. In the tiny settlement of Colonia near Buhusi, the Ready, Willing and Able team gathered volunteers to replace leaky thatched roofs with tin and helped form a neighborhood association.
MR. ZAHARIA: [Translation.] Because your program is named Ready, Willing and Able, and this showed them there with a little bit of help, money or materials, [they] themselves can do something. So for them it's very important because it shows that they can do something. It's showing--it's increasing the self-confidence of the people that they can change some things with their own resources.
MR. HAWKE: But there is much work still to be done. Conditions in this housing complex on the outskirts of Bacau are even worse. Ovidiu Rom, my mother's not-for-profit organization, continues to work with the city's new administration to address the problems.
MR. MARDARE: Without education it's practically impossible to get a fairly good job, so that's why I stress that this program in which Leslie has been so much involved is in full harmony with what the government tries to do.
MR. POPA: [Translation.] She's kind of like a great explorer kind of like Columbus heading off into the great unknown not knowing what land he was going to find, what people he would find, what problems, and not knowing whether he'd be able to accomplish anything. And look here's Leslie and she's done it. She's managed to have a great success.
MR. GARNER: She's got more gumption, more backbone than most of us will ever have. She's got that typical New Yorker toughness that it needs to stand up to government officials when they were not letting her do what she needs to do to help these people.
MS. SOVA: [Translation.] Together with Leslie we've achieved some very good results and I'm very proud of them, and I believe that together with her we're going to achieve very good results in the future
not only here but maybe across the country.
MR. CUCU: [Translation.] I don't really think it matters if somebody is American or English or what nationality they are. What matters is that you're truly human, and I can say that Leslie has really showed what it means to be human and what it means to be a lady.
MR. GIANU: [Translation.] You know, when I think about Leslie Hawke, I think about the American spirit that wants to be with its neighbors around the world both in their times of joy and in their times of trouble.
MS. HAWKE: If Maria and I have made any significant contribution, it is to show on the local level
that when given the opportunity and support, people will work very hard to improve their lives and the futures of their children.
MS. CUMPANA: It never matters if you are a Romanian or a gypsy people or the color of your skin, to be in this world, to be open, to be sincere, to share love, is very important.
[MUSIC]
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