#izabesworld

[izabesworld]

This image of an 1800’s “vardo” has been circulating on Facebook….

Now this is the real image:

We DO NOT need to photoshop traditional vardos to make them more appeasing, both are gorgeous, historical, and hold so many memories and weight.

Let’s stop trying to make Romani culture into an ancient aesthetic and accept it for what it is 👏 !

[zablife]

🧐🤔🤯(All the other spellings I find of it do spell it Tachipen, now I am more intrigued than I already was knowing the meaning of the word! (This was the only source I found that showed the translation so directly to include.))

(not really an ask, just dropping by to say hi! 👋🏻)

Hi Ava!! I found both spellings as well, but more often the spelling "tachipen" which is also the way it's spelled in the captions. (Not that that's the most reliable source.) @izabesworld do you happen to know which is correct?

[the-fangirl-diaries]

Please! If you haven't already, go and listen to this music. It's cured me of my writer's block, it's beautiful, and it's like stepping through a time machine!!

Tagging a few of my mutuals and friends here! @zablife @izabesworld @cillmequick @look-at-the-soul @runnning-outof-time

[zablife]

15 Questions for 15 Friends

Tagged by @peakyswritings, @jomarch-wannabe, @leenieweenie12, @runnning-outof-time, @potter-solomons

Are you named after anyone? My father named me, but fuck knows why he chose it??

When was the last time you cried? Today (I cry all the time, I'm a Pisces 😂)

Do you have kids? Yes, Sonny, the furry ginger menace, is my biological son as far as I'm concerned 😜

What sports do you play /have you played? Nothing competitive but I used to surf and I had a ballet phase

Do you use sarcasm? Constantly

What's the first thing you notice about people? mouth/teeth

What's your eye color? Blue

Scary movies or happy endings? Scary movies 😱

Any talents? Pickpocketing (It’s a party trick! I always return whatever I've nicked 🤭), learning song lyrics

Where were you born? Australia

What are your hobbies? Writing, painting, swimming

Do you have any pets? 🐱 A revolving cast of fosters

How tall are you? 163 cm or 5’ 4”

Favorite subject in school? English lit

Dream job? Fashion photography, but my day to day is quite rewarding

No pressure tags: @izabesworld, @brummiereader, @pacifymebby, @little-diable, @thomashelbyswife

15 Questions for 15 Friends

Tagged by @jomarch-wannabe , thank you so much for the tag, darling🤍

Are you named after anyone?

Nope, luckily

When was the last time you cried?

Two/three days ago?? I honestly don’t remember

Do you have kids?

Does my dog count?

What sports do you play /have you played?

Dance, more precisely ballet and contemporary, and a bit of modern. But I’ve also tried other styles over the years

Do you use sarcasm?

Not really, I prefer irony

What's the first thing you notice about people?

Their “vibes”

What's your eye color?

Brown

Scary movies or happy endings?

I like both, but it depends on my mood

Any talents?

Nope I have to work hard

Where were you born?

Italy

What are your hobbies?

Dancing, cooking, writing and reading

Do you have any pets?

Yes, a dog - a little shit that I love with all my heart

How tall are you?

1.70m, I’d REALLY like to be shorter tho

Favorite subject in school?

English

Dream job?

If money didn’t matter, a writer or a translator

No pressure tags: @call-sign-shark @zablife @runnning-outof-time @emotionalcadaver @evita-shelby @justrainandcoffee @cillmequick @lunarubra @rysko and whoever wants to do this

[izabesworld]

Peaky Blinders Fan-Fiction Help!

As someone part of the Roma community, I’m trying my hardest to spread awareness of the struggles the Roma community face, and how to help people make respectful choices when writing pieces about us.

I want to try my best to give you accurate names, to tell you what we did in the time period and how we did it. I’m focusing primarily on Peaky Blinders as I know that is what brought Roma so much attention, and it would be so easy to misinterpret us.

I’m going to split it into topics that you can find, with links for east access. I’ll give you popular jobs, popular names (which are often more “normal” than you’d think) and how we lived our lives.

I want to do anything I can to make sure our culture is represented, and make sure it is represented well! <3

A post that may interest you: Peaky Blinders and the Roma community.

GENERAL RROMA CONTENT

ROMA NAMES (FIRST, LAST AND MIDDLE)

ROMANI NAMES PT2

SPIRITUAL BELIEFS

COMMON ROMA JOBS

ROMA ATTITUDES (HOW TO PRESENT US IN YOUR WRITING)

ENGLISH ROMANI LANGUAGE

HOW TO REFER TO ROMA

CURTESY WARNINGS

ROMA AND CABBAGE

WORLD WAR ONE - ROMA JOBS

THE ROMA FLAG

MY TAKE ON THE WORD GYPSY

APPLEBY HORSE FAIR

APPLEBY HORSE FAIR (2)

ROMANI FOODS

PALMISTRY AND TEA

CONCERNS PEOPLE HAD WITH MY POSTS

Misrepresentation.

Dismissal of the bad.

țigan/cigan

ROMA NEWS

16 year old Romany boy shot by Greek police.

Rroma Heritage Month (June 2023)

PEAKY BLINDERS ROM

What dialect would the peaky blinders speak?

Shelbys and religion.

Peaky Blinder S6 culture

[izabesworld]

Appleby Horse Fair!

To this who have followed my blog for a while, it has been a while! So hello, and thank you for sticking around 😃.

For those who are new, my name is Izzy and I’m a Rroma woman wanted to educate people on all things Rroma. I focus mainly on educating those on Peaky Blinders misconceptions and fanfic writing tips, but also share things about my culture, about Rromani culture and share traditions.

This time of year is a big part of the year for many Rroma men and women in England as it’s officially the time of the Appleby Horse Fair!

The Appleby Horse Fair, also known as Appleby New Fair, is an annual gathering of Gypsies and Travellers in the town of Appleby-in-Westmorland in Cumbria, England.

The horse fair is held each year in early June, attracting roughly 10,000 Gypsies and Travellers, about 1,000 caravans, several hundred horse-drawn vehicles, and about 30,000 visitors. The Gypsy and Traveller attendees include British Romanichal, Irish Travellers, Scottish Gypsy and Traveller groups, Kale (Welsh Romanies) and more!

My family is under the Romanichal section of this list, or if you’re English you’d know us better as Romany due to where we come from.

Appleby was given to us by King James (the second) of England in 1685 - supposedly - and by the 1900’s became a huge thing for English Travellers are it’s a time of year for us to come together, share our culture and even trade with a spit to the hand.

The Appleby Horse Fair, despite being a huge thing in Romani culture, isn’t shown in Peaky Blinders, and would be an amazing thing to show in fan fiction.

At Appleby, we have markets and history, where we see each other vardo’s and horses, tell people family stories and even make family tree connections! We like to call it a big family get together.

There are so many things I could delve into when it regard the Applyby Horse Fair, so let me know if you’re interested in knowing more about it ! 💗 (Even as an anonymous ask).

Much love to you all 👋

[izabesworld]

Hi! So I'm but sure if you've answered this before, I've just found your blog but find it interesting, especially since I'm trying to write stuff for Peaky blinders. I was wondering if you could tell me your take on the use of the word "gypsy" when writing. Because I know it is very controversial and a lot of people say not to use it because it's offensive. And I was just wondering if you could explain why, because I grew up in the US and am not really familiar with the culture and it wasn't really anything I grew up hearing about. So I was just wondering if your could maybe explain why people consider it a slur because I'm really am not sure. I don't want to me rude or anything it's just something I'm genuinely curious about. Because I've seen some people say they think it's offensive and some props say they think it's rude. I was also wondering your take on possibly using it in a Peaky blinders fic, because I think in the shot the Shelby's have use it a few times to describe themselves or when just they're being referenced or because I've heard it was used more in that time. And yeah. I know that was kinda ramblly and I'm not sure if it makes sense but I was just curious on your take about it. You totally don't have to answer though!!! Thanks for reading this!

Hey! I have answered this before, but I'm more than happy to answer it again so thank you so much for this question.

History lesson first:

The word "gypsy" has a few origins in relation to Rroma, so I'll go through the ones I know and work through them.

The first one I'm aware of is the idea Rroma individuals come from Egypt. Many were unsure of our origin but knew we had "strong" features and darker skin. These traits are due to us originating in South India. So the first meaning of the word I know us gypsies from Egypt, which is factually incorrect.

Another reason I'm aware of is the breakdown of the words - to gyp means to steal (or in some definitions to gamble). Throughout history, Rroma as a group were deprived of recourses. Many of us were involved in slavery in Eastern Europe for 400 years, and others were sold in the Atlantic Slave Trade to the Americas (leading to the group Afro-Romani).

If you deprive a group of people of the basic necessities to live, they're going to bargain to get them, maybe even steal. During these times in history, we were known for stealing food and fabrics from richer members of society. Therefore, gaining us the name "gypsies"

It's also important to factor in other ethnic groups that also use the name "gypsy" when in referral to themselves:

1-We have Irish Travellers, to start, who are not Rroma. Irish Travellers are from Ireland and are a whole other ethnic minority. People often confuse Irish Travellers with Rroma due to their similar nomadic lifestyle. Irish Travellers allow themselves to be called gypsies as it was a self-given title centuries ago, inspired by the Rroma definition of gypsy.

2-We also have English Travellers, who are often confused with Romanichal. In England, people are often confused with the difference between English Travellers and Romanichal - and so was I (in full admittance) when I began educating myself on the different types of travellers.

While there are marriages and cultural similarities between English Travellers and Romanichal, they're not at all genetically or historically linked. English Travellers come from Cromwellian times. The English Travellers also have their own views on the word gypsy, and doesn't have any historical nor offensive connections to them.

3-British Romany "Gypsies". British Romany Travellers are a very specific type of Rroma. British Romany Travellers have been in England since 1515 when Rroma began migrating to Europe after their migration from India. They're the descendants of Romany migrants who emigrated from India - therefore, the meaning of the word gypsy to them is in relation to the British's (is that a word?) idea of them coming from Egypt.

4-The Romanichal (Romanichal Travellers) are a Romani subgroup in England and other English-speaking countries. These are not English Travellers as they are descendants of the Rroma who once lived in India. Most Romanichal speak Angloromani - which is a mixed language that blends together both Romani vocabulary and English syntax.

There are around 400,000 Romanichal worldwide, 200,000 living in the United Kingdom, 164,000 living in the United States and the rest living in South Africa, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

5-Kale (Welsh Roma). The Kale are a group of Romani people in Wales and are often descendants of Abram Wood who was the first Rom to live in Wales in the 18th century. There are around 700-1,000 Kale members of society and speak their own version of Welsh Romani.

6-Romani (also spelt Romany or Rromani depending on where you come from). Romai people live in predominantly Europe and there are around 2-12million worldwide (shocking 10million confusion I know). The language you speak as a Romani person depends on where you live, where your ancestors lived etc as there are hundreds of Romani dialects.

NOW TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION!

The short answer to your question, which I probably should've put at the start and not the end, is please do not use the word gypsy when relating to travellers as for all "gypsy" groups there is a more specific name used in regard to them.

The word gypsy (also seen as gipsy) is rather ambiguous in dialect use as it doesn't specifically shown who you are in referral to. While some communities such as Irish and English travellers deem the word okay to use, the vast majority of the Rroma community do not.

The word gypsy in reference to the Romani community has connotations of illegality and is known as a racial slur. In 1971, the world Romani Congress unanimously voted to reject the use of the word gypsy due to the stereotypes associated.

The word gypsy was used against the Romani community during significant human parts of history - the Holocaust, the Romani slave trade and the Atlantic slave trade.

HOWEVER

It's also important to keep in regard the use of the word, are you using it to write an 1800s piece? Is your story or piece of text historically accurate, and to use the phrase "Romani People" would be historically inaccurate as that isn't what we were called then.

Are you writing a piece that highlights the issues behind the word, where you aren't calling Romani people it, but instead highlighting the wrong in it.

Are you taking from a place in the early 1900s where Romani people called themselves Romani gypsies because that was the official documentation name given to us.

In summary:

Please don't go about calling Romani people gypsies unless in a historically accurate context.

I spent 20 minutes typing on this post, so thank you so much! I may have to open a window and I'm sweating like a dog in heat and need a break. You definitely gave me a lot of talking points (lol oops), but thank you for that also. All in all, I hope your answer is somewhere in this mess. 💗 May you have a blessed day!

Izzy 💓

[the-fangirl-diaries]

Thank you for tagging me @runnning-outof-time

sage green or baby blue | moon or stars | paperback or hardback | piercings or tattoos | drawing or writing | saturn or jupiter | line without a hook or mr.loverman | ancient greece or ancient egypt | prague or amsterdam | dark academia or light academia | indie aesthetic or cottagecore | stargazing or late night drives | strawberries or watermelons | rings or necklaces | extrovert or introvert | dragons or griffins | ocean or mountain | silver or gold | dawn or dusk | creative or free spirit | early bird or night owl | cook or bake | dagger or sword

Tagging some of my friends in case they want to join :) 

@izabesworld @zablife @forgottenpeakywriter @look-at-the-soul @cillmequick​

This or That!

Thanks for the tag Mia @teenwolf-theoriginals ! 🥰

sage green or baby blue | moon or stars | paperback or hardback | piercings or tattoos | drawing or writing | saturn or jupiter | line without a hook or mr.loverman | ancient greece or ancient egypt | prague or amsterdam | dark academia or light academia | indie aesthetic or cottagecore | stargazing or late night drives | strawberries or watermelons | rings or necklaces | extrovert or introvert | dragons or griffins | ocean or mountain | silver or gold | dawn or dusk | creative or free spirit | early bird or night owl | cook or bake | dagger or sword

Tagging: @writers-hes @zablife @shelbydelrey @cillmequick @youtifulsunshinelixfics @look-at-the-soul @there-goes-thefighter @the-fangirl-diaries @raincoffeeandfandoms @emotionalcadaver

[izabesworld]

Something in the Peaky Blinders community that has caught mine and a few others’ eyes, in the frequent and so relaxed use of the word “Gypsy” when not in book context.

As someone part of the Rroma community, having once lived in Romania, moving from country to country until we settled in England in 2008, I think it’s important to make it known to people who may not be aware before it becomes a widespread issue.

The word Gypsy has been used since the beginning of our communities in the North of India, where majority of us originated. The word has been used to enslave the Rroma community until the late 1800’s, it was used during the Holocaust to justify the slaughter and eradication the Rroma community endured and wipe out our community.

Between 200,000-500,000 (the records unknown due to the disregard of Rroma life) Roma and Sinti people were murdered by Nazi’s in the 2nd World War. Roma and Sinti people were sent to ghettos, Auchwitz, Dachau and Brikenau, which has a specific “Gypsy Camp”, made specifically for the Roma and Sinti communities.

Romani is not Romany, Romany is not Sinti. Rroma is an Indo-Aryan ethnic group that has a closed language. We wish that for the purpose of fanfiction, you do not attempt to learn that language as it is closed. The language has saved the lives of millions of Rroma through the years - being a symbol of our strength and integrity. If something were to happen to our community again, we would rely on our language to keep us safe once again.

Having Romani, Romany, Sinti or any other Rroma connection does NOT make you ethnically Rroma. Having Great-great grandparent connections to Rroma does not make you Rroma, for you will not be persecuted for living in a Vardo, nor will you be persecuted for the label on your birth certificate.

We want you to celebrate our culture, when you are invited. We want you to celebrate our dished and clothing, when you are invited. If you have a Rroma friend, you will more than likely understand a few basic words of our language.

In fan-fiction, it is expected to see the word Gypsy be used sparsely, giving context to the time period and the lack of regard for our community, despite the hardships. However, we ask you do not use it in reference to us or our people, fiction or not. We ask that when you talk about the Shelby’s as people, you refer to them as Romani, not as Gypsy.

We ask that you do not call yourself Gypsy in your usernames, for that is disregard to our culture and our people. We ask that you do not refer to yourself as a Gypsy in context of you like a person of Rroma descent.

We ask so little, but these changes can change the future of so many Rroma people. It can change the future of my grand-children’s lives, my children’s lives. If we understand now why Rroma are important, why we aren’t thieves, job stealers and lazy, we’ll make a change to the future and what may happen next.

Rroma has had so little rest, and we are still in a constant battle with the engrained systems that disallow us to do certain activities and events due to our heritage.

As authors on this app, we ask YOU to be the first to make that change.

Of course, any reblogs etc are appreciated, or if you choose to illiterate this piece into something else to spread to your friends on this app, we will also be entirely grateful. If the message is spread, maybe the next generation of will not have to be told the message at all.

All my blessings to anyone who has read this. Nais nais tuke <3

[izabesworld]

Roma attitudes and how to present us in your writing.

The top of this piece primarily discusses negative stereotypes in writings, so you can understand why these aren’t really true, and the bottom has a header which you can read to see how to present us as we are.

FOR MORE READ THIS.

Do I think this piece will be groundbreaking? Absolutely not. Do I hope this piece will prevent AT LEAST one writer from making a common mistake in their writing? Absolutely.

I want to start of with Roma Family Loyalty. This is something people are eager to show in their writing, presenting family units as something that is powerful and strong, which is great. However, like all families, we have limits.

A popular mistake in Peaky Blinder fanfiction is the misuse of this loyalty. It’s not shown in celebration, we don’t see Roma characters celebrating character achievements to the small things like better results in school and moving up in a business.

However, what we do see is family loyalty in a way that portrays us as violent. We read about a family member killing a character, and don’t see the backlash the character should receive. We don’t see the distrust you now feel for that person, we don’t see the problems that now arise. Violence committed by Roma is such a common topic in fan-fiction, when in fact, it is very rare.

Of course, the Peaky Blinders series is filled with blood, guns and knives but it’s also filled with Aunt Pol’s love of God, it’s filled with Arthur’s character change, it has Ada’s moving on from old family ways for a better life for herself and her children. All things that would’ve been celebrated.

A Roma family would’ve been ecstatic to see the change in Arthur. It would’ve been celebrated and praised, not pushed off and ignored. It’s not something that happened over night, it required dedication and support from those closest.

You often see scenes in “Shelby Sister” series where the Shelby Sister in question is afraid of Aunt Pol and Tommy because she gets beat. When this too, isn’t a reality.

Of course, it does still happen, and I don’t want to dismiss ANYONE who is a victim of this time of punishment, however, in Roma it’s extremely uncommon. (We are more creative).

When in the series has Aunt Pol been portrayed as someone who beats Finn as punishment? When Finn smoked that cigarette, he received a tap to the head and a word later. He was not beaten, so why is it done in fiction?

Roma families protect their family, they do not beat them. (Still not trying to dismiss anyone who was a child beat by their Roma family, this is just an in general <3). DESPITE the times they lived in where this was considered normal.

We are not genetically violent. We do not grow and and think “guns are okay”. In our world, they are not. At the time, everybody owned a gun, however, we knew the consequences of using one. It wasn’t a first option, nor was it really an option at all.

Selling Family Members?

We do not sell family members. This one is a BIG one for me.

We do not get in debt with another Roma family and offer daughters to solve that debt. We speak to them… Like everyone else? I’m not sure where selling Roma children has come from.

We do not offer out children to random Roma families. We do not meet a wealthy Roma man and think, “yes, I will sell my daughter to him”.

Yes, we do have a history of arranged marriages, and they do still happen today, within reason. We do not marry happy people with happy relationships. We do not marry people who do not want a partner. We do not marry people because they’re “too crazy”.

We marry people with what’s best for them. We ask people what is that family like? Where do they travel? Is there any significant history in that family I should be aware of? Families spend MONTHS even YEARS getting to know the other family beforehand, asking around and getting to know them.

Esme and John was a one off thing, and was a marriage I don’t believe was presented right. The Shelby’s and Lee’s were already familiar with each other, having spent years of connections. Esme needed a husband, and John needed a wife. Esme was not quickly given away at convenience, do you truly think families would allow that??

Our whole lives do not revolve around spirituality and thinking we are being followed by ghosts. We do not live in a constant state of paranoia — it’s unrealistic.

Of course, we dabble into it once in a while, we explore what we can’t see and test the waters, but we are not running around believing there is a bad omen behind us.

Reading People.

Honestly, I do believe this is also something exaggerated in people when writing. We don’t sit and analyse you when we first meet you, but we do try to find out about you before we begin sharing details of ourselves.

We don’t go, “oh, she scratched her nose, she’s a pathological liar”, but we do go, “he’s quite fidgety, perhaps he’s uncomfortable”.

Yet we do still make mistakes, we are not upper beings who know all and do all. We do still make bad friends, and become close with people we do not truly know, despite the fact we thought we knew them.

We do still get in arguments and upsetting conversations, we are not immune to emotions.

Enough of the negative.

I’ll be blunt and honest, we do still make mistakes. We will still get in silly fights, we do still push people a little bit too far, which is normal, we are all human, no?

Roma feel emotions, we get sad when our day isn’t going right, and feel happy when our dinner came out perfectly cooked. We feel love for those closest to us, and feel an intense amount of care for them.

We have friends, lots of friends. Sometimes they’re only Roma friends, other times we meet them in primary school.

We have family celebrations, where we thank musicians by licking money (notes 💴) and sticking them to their foreheads.

We have horses, often not many but us usually a family will have one.

We are not natural riders. Of course we do pick it up quite quickly, having seen those around us do it so often, however we do make mistakes. We do fall off our horses, and we get upset when we do, because it hurts and we’re human. We do have good days with our horses, where we are content and happy.

We make AMAZING meals with cabbage, this could be a whole post in itself. However, we aren’t too good with cooking bread, (for some odd reason?).

We sit with our families and talk about our days. Yes there is secrets, but we do still discuss “why on earth have they changed that shop?”

Just remember when writing us, we are regular human beings, and I think you’ll do okay! <3

[izabesworld]

Being Rom, my for you page on TikTok is filled with Romani content. I have MANY mutuals who spread awareness on the lack of education about Roma have a few who talk about the hate they receive on a daily basis due to their appearance and ethnicity.

I don’t do that, because I know the second I open myself up to the world, things become tough. So I stay on Tumblr having a happy little day.

However, with my for you page being Roma content, I often see things like these:

Imagine using racial stereotypes about ANY ethnic minority in 2023. Imagine still, in 2023, thinking it’s justifiable to hate any ethnic group just because… You don’t like them?

Weird to me.

[izabesworld]

I was wondering if Season 6 of Peaky Blinders made any sense to you and your cultural background. Do the words mentioned that Ruby speaks accurate? The meaning behind the black madonna, and for it to be a symbol of protection from bad spirits? I would love to hear your point of view about that specific season.

To be blank and honest, I really liked Season 6 for the entertainment factor, but didn't think it was all too accurate and played closely on stereotypes of our culture, rather than our culture in itself.

What Ruby says "tickna mora o'beng" has absolutely no significance to me whatsoever. I'm not even sure if it's Angloromani as none of those words is words I've heard or used, and I assume it's them thinking Romanian is Angloromani again.

The translation of the words, from what I know was something about the devil, but even that has little significance to us as the majority of us are either Orthodox, Church of England or in modern times, Pentecostal. The devil can't come to us due to our strong ties to religion.

However, the Black Madonna was bang on the money. I, myself, have a Black Madonna rosary and a Black Madonna statue in my bedroom. Though we don't call her the Black Madonna, we called her Sara-la-kali.

The Black Madonna is more fiction than reality, as we don't pray to her or anything like that. It's like an old family tale and we keep imagery of her just in case the tales are true. She's the Goddess of fertility, protection and good fortune so is better to keep her there just for the odds.

The burning of the vardo in S6 was very important to me and was probably the closest cultural connection I had seen. When many of us die, we choose to die with our vardo's. We do this for spiritual reasons, we believe if our items aren't rid of, we can't pass them over to the afterlife.

Burning the vardo sets our spirit free, free of torment. It also allows us to take our worldly possessions to wherever is next.

I do have so much to say about this, but I apparently take forever to type as this has taken me 15 minutes and I need to get my Saturday clean on. So, thank you so much for your question, I may make another post about it later, however, for now, this is my overall view. May you have a blessed day! <3

[izabesworld]

Been 3 months… A whole year older and a brand new baby! 🙈

[izabesworld]

Hello!

I know you've written extensive reference resources for people looking to respectfully write Peaky Blinders content, but I was wondering if I might could request some insight on how best to write a backstory& some headcanons for Disney's Clopin from HoND?

I know the big 2 of no g slur and no crime family, but what might be some other narrative trope pitfalls or historical time period important cultural things to watch for when writing about him and his family?

Thank you, and also your blog is really cool!

I’m gonna actually cry - I wrote an amazingly articulated response to this and bam, I clicked the wrong thing and now it is gone. My life is over 🤣…

However, at this time it was illegal to be Roma. Majority of us were slaves in the Romania region and it stayed that way until the mid 1800’s.

HoND is banned in my house, no one in my house has been allowed to watch it and none of us will ever read it purely because of the offensive stereotypes it holds.

At this point of time for our community, if you weren’t a slave for an owner, you were a slave in the way that’s you were less than homeless, less than a peasant and less than stray cats and dogs that roamed the streets.

There was no respect for us, and our bodies weren’t ours. We’d often be taken advantage of by “country people”, no matter the race of them.

Imagine if there was a hierarchy of races at the time - people saw white people as superior and each and every race as less. Roma were at the pit bottom. We were used by each and every race.

Men, would kidnap Roma women to sell them for s3x work, Roma men were basically in hiding. We didn’t have birth certificates and we weren’t allowed to be buried in churches. There’s absolutely zero documentation of the majority of us for that time period - my family included.

AND HONESTLY - if I’m being 100% real, this is the era of King Louis and majority of us in France were probably criminals. It was illegal to be Roma - we couldn’t have jobs, we couldn’t buy food and we weren’t allowed to own properties. We probably were involved in some crime (stealing etc) in order to survive - I can’t see it another way.

Sensitive but important things I’d add is that the majority of women in his family were probably involuntarily prostitutes - owned by French men.

They probably were involved in crime and had to steal in order to get food and items the family needed.

The men probably didn’t have “real” jobs and lived completely and utterly nomadically.

It was a rough time to be Roma to say the least.

NEVERTHELESS- Thank you for this ask because I myself had to ask some questions before answering. All my love!

[izabesworld]

What are some Traveler or Romani foods? I’m wanting to write something where Tommy’s wife uses an old cookbook she found (either belonging to Polly or Tommy’s mum) and tries to make some of the dishes and maybe Tommy is grateful for his wife doing so because makes him reminiscence about his mum, how love is so much more than just what is visible and stuff like that?

I’ve just written a whole response to this and then my phone crashed - I’m gonna cry!

However, our food is most comparable to African American Soul Food.

When we use the animal, we use all of it. We heavily season our foods to keep them fresh and often accompany our dishes with veg and stuffed peppers.

We have culture staples - like Sodmay which is basically stuffed cabbage with incredibly seasoned meat and rice pushed inside. This is also poupar in West Asia and the Balkans.

We use lots of soups - Lamb soup with typically garlic, paprika, bell peppers etc etc…

I had so much more than this when I was originally writing but I’ve literally got to go to work lol so might add more later!!!

Thank you so much for this ask, may you have a blessed day 💗

[izabesworld]

It’s my birthday!!!! 😋😋😋