Romanistan
The authors of Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling present: Romanistan! Do you love rebels? Do you want to live in a place where outcasts shine their brightest? Welcome to Romanistan! We're your friendly neighborhood Gypsies, celebrating Romani identity and outcast culture, and practicing good diplomatic relations with other marginalized communities.
We love the rebels who are living their truth, even if it clashes with tradition. We also love tradition and honoring our roots. This podcast is for everyone who loves and supports Roma & related groups, and anyone who feels like a misfit and wants to uplift others to create a beautiful community.
We feature pioneers in culture, fashion, art, literature, music, activism, cuisine, and everything good. We adore the intersections of gender, sexuality, spirituality, ability, and identity. We cover all topics, from the difficult to the glorious. Let's sit crooked and talk straight.
Hosted by Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele. We reclaim the slur Gypsy, but if you aren’t Romani, we prefer you don't use it. xoxo.
P.S. The Romani people are a diasporic ethnic group originally from northwest India, circa the 10th century. Now, Roma live all over the globe, and due to centuries of oppression, slavery, genocide, and other atrocities, Roma are still fighting for basic human rights. We seek to raise awareness of who Roma are, and highlight Romani resilience, creativity, & culture.
Romanistan
Amaro Voice Crossover with Sejnur Memisi
Sejnur Memisi is a journalist & Roma activist from Germany. He is originally from Kosovo, and escaped 1999 with his family to Germany because of the Kosovo war. He studied Media Management and since April 2020 has produced Podcasts about Sinti & Roma. He began the podcast (Sinti Roma News, formerly RYMEcast) in the German language. 3 of his German speaking Podcast episodes were nominated for media prizes, CIVIS Media Prize & the German Podcast Prize. Since 2023 he is in the Commission Audio for the Civis Media prize, where he can use his vote to nominate other podcasts. In March 2024, he started a new English-language Podcast, “Amaro Voice” about European Roma.
Watch Amaro voice on YouTube, and listen wherever you get podcasts. You can listen to part 1 of this crossover, when Sejnur interviews us, on Amaro Voice. Follow @amaro_voice on Instagram.
The Romani crush this episode is everyone.
Welcome to Romanistan Festival is March 28-30, 2025 in New Orleans!
Thank you for listening to Romanistan podcast.
You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook @romanistanpodcast, and on Twitter @romanistanpod. To support us, Join our Patreon for extra content or donate to Ko-fi.com/romanistan, and please rate, review, and subscribe. It helps us so much.
Follow Jez on Instagram @jezmina.vonthiele & Paulina @romaniholistic.
You can get our book Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling, online or wherever books are sold. Visit romanistanpodcast.com for events, educational resources, merch, and more. Please support our book tour fundraiser if you can.
Email us at romanistanpodcast@gmail.com for inquiries.
Romanistan is hosted by Jezmina Von Thiele and Paulina Stevens
Conceived of by Paulina Stevens
Edited by Viktor Pachas
With Music by Viktor Pachas
And Artwork by Elijah Vardo
Hey, ramana Sound listeners, just popping in to remind you that our first ever Welcome to Ramana Sound Festival is happening March 28th to 30th 2025 in New Orleans, cottage, magic, bimbo Yaga Productions and us and anyone who's been contributing to our book tour fundraiser, which is still ongoing, and you can kick in, get a signed copy of Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling, get a tarot card, get all kinds of things to help. But basically it's happening. Go to romanosanpodcastcom. There are so many really cool, exciting events. I will just give you the quickest of rundowns. We're starting off with a literary panel, then we're doing a live recording of Romanasan Podcasts at Cafe Istanbul. Then we're doing a fortune-telling pop-up, followed by a literary salon with Lilith Dorsey and her ritual blessing, and then our Tarot and Ancestors Communication Workshop, rounding out the evening with BB's Kitchen, a Romani-style feast with tea leaf reading. There's so many cool things happening.
Speaker 1:If you're in New Orleans, please stop by, share with your friends in New Orleans, fly in if you can. We would love to see you. Romanosanpodcastcom you can get all your tickets there and, yeah, we just can't wait. So thanks for being here. Enjoy this wonderful episode we have prepared for you. Our Amaro Voice crossover episode. Yay.
Speaker 3:Welcome to Romanistan.
Speaker 1:We're your friendly neighborhood gypsies I'm Paulina and I'm Jez. We're here with Senor Nenishi and we are so excited because this is our Amara Voice crossover. You can listen to Amara Voice for part one, where we are interviewed, and now we are going to talk to Seynour ourselves. We're so excited. Thank you for being here.
Speaker 4:Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3:Seynour Memishi is a journalist and Roma activist from Germany. He is originally from Kosovo and escaped in 1999 with his family to Germany because of the Kosovo War. He studied media management and, since April 2020, has produced podcasts about Sinti and Roma. He began the podcast Sinti Roma News, formerly Rhyme podcast, in the German language. Three of his German-speaking podcast episodes were nominated for media prizes Civis Media Prize and the German Podcast Prize. Since 2023, he is the commission audio for the Civis Media Prize, where he can use his vote to nominate other podcasts. In March 2024, to nominate other podcasts In March 2024, he started a new English-language podcast, amaro Voice, about European Roma, so welcome.
Speaker 1:We're so happy to have you. Thank you. We always start off asking about where you and your family are from your vita and where you are now. And you say in your bio your family escaped the your vita and where you are now. And you say in your bio your family escaped the war in Kosovo and you're in Germany and you're doing activist and journalist work that we are very impressed by. Would you like to share a little bit about your experience coming to Germany as a refugee and how that might have shaped your advocacy?
Speaker 4:So first I was born in Pristina it's the capital of Kosovo in 1992. And then we lived in the Roma neighborhood. It was called Muravskas. But on this Roman neighborhood it wasn't just like for Roma people. There was also living like Turkish people and Albanian people, because Kosovo formerly was part of the Ottoman Empire, before it was Yugoslavia. So in that time it was Yugoslavia and in 1999 we had a war and we needed to escape, but we didn't know where we should go.
Speaker 4:So my parents wanted to go to Italy, because a lot of people from our communities live in north of Italy. But my uncles and my aunts, they were living in Germany before, because some of them came as guest workers to work in Germany. But some of them came also because in the Balkans we had two different wars, one in 1992 and one in 1999, and some of our family members came to Germany because of the war from the 92. And so that's why we came up to Germany, because my grandma was with us. So for my dad it was important to just bring his mom to his siblings that they can see her. So actually we wanted to go back to Italy, but then family members told us no, stay here in Germany, germany, and then this is how we ended up to stay in Germany and, yeah, so it was very difficult because we needed to go from country to country, so it took many time and also it wasn't always. I can say the escaping in the beginning wasn't always legal, you know. So well.
Speaker 3:Thank you for sharing that. That's definitely a really interesting story and I love how your parents just listen to your family, like that's what you do you just listen to whatever the family says. So we want to ask you our famous question, do you?
Speaker 4:consider yourself a rebel. I would say yes, but we needed to be a rebel, you know, because in the beginning we escaped the war and in the war we escaped it because people were systematically killing Romani people or you know. So sorry trigger warning I forgot the trigger warning, so the system was like a genocide, but still not recognized as it. And to escape from the war you need to be a rebel, I think. But always when you start an activist, you kind of when you are younger, you have more energy, you kind of more rebel. And I would say now maybe I'm more little bit, not so much rebel when I was starting, I don't know, like eight years ago, so now I'm more wiser, I know when should I be rebel and when I should not be rebel. Because if I feel like in the beginning, when I started, I was some in the wrong time rebel, what maybe was doing for my work more difficult than it should be, uh, for your work.
Speaker 1:Do you mean your work in journalism like?
Speaker 4:you were.
Speaker 1:You're being a rebel there I mean like being as activists, as journalism before in the media, yeah, I mean, it's so important to I think you're absolutely right that genocide in Kosovo is not really talked about enough or recognized as genocide, and there are so many things that are ongoing that we need to make noise about, even though the system doesn't want us to. And yeah, that's what we really appreciate about your work too, and oh, let's see, we would love to know what inspired you to start podcasting and what has the experience been like for
Speaker 4:you so my inspiring was so do different things. I will start shortly, because my dad is also a journalist, so he had his own radio show in Kosovo, in Pristina. We had our own radio show and our own TV show where Roman people in media and also journalists was doing different kind of work. So my dad was in the you know, redaction we say in Germany redaction I don't know how to say for English, for he was choosing the topics, what they should talk about, like for research and for radio. He was moderating his own show. He was talking about romani, people from, from the balkans. He was playing romani music, like balkan roman music. And so I was three or four. Uh, one day he took me to his job, because I remember as a kid I was listening to his radio show and I always ask him can you take me to your job? I want to see how you work. So I think I was four. Then he took me to the studio, to the radio, where he was working. I can remember and since then I was very passionate and in love with this work and I said like, no, I want to be something with media, something like journalists. And then when I was killed I was like playing moderating for my grandma and her friends in the in the roman neighborhood. So I was doing like shows and doing something, acting and like just doing the same like my dad was doing.
Speaker 4:And then when I came to Germany, I wanted to do something with media. That's why I was in media arts, in media management school, so I learned everything how to edit video, audio, to do website graphics, everything that you know about media. I learned everything in school and also started after that. I wasn't sure if I should do on microphone or in front of camera, so I wasn't ready for that. And then I decided to be behind the scenes and I was doing for German TV companies.
Speaker 4:And then, during my activism with Tanny Pehr and Dickie Labista, I was more empowered and said, okay, that's a good option to combine journalism, media with Roma. And I started first with Instagram. So my Instagram page was called Before Roma Youth Media. So I was doing stories. I wanted just to change the narrative about our people and to show that we are very diverse. And also the beginning my idea was like how I can change the narrative.
Speaker 4:I was just doing instagram stories about famous romani people from the world and then I listened podcasts like for a long time since 2014-15, I listened true crime podcasts, but also like podcasts about pro wrestling. So this is how I came up to podcast then, because I realized this is kind of modern version of radio, because before I wanted to work for radio but in Germany I got never the opportunity. And then I was doing research on Spotify, just wrote Sinti and Roma or just Roma, and to see what is on Spotify about Roma and I realized there was just few interviews from German media with Romani, rose or other people from the city, roma activism and NGO work and I realized there's nothing. And then I said, ok, then COVID Corona pandemic started and then it was the best opportunity because I had time, I was at home and then in April 2020, I just started and the beginning wasn't so perfect because of the audio quality.
Speaker 1:But I just started.
Speaker 3:That's wasn't so perfect because of the audio quality, but I just started. That's amazing, what a story. I just I love that your dad inspired you. Yeah, he was a OG podcaster back in the day. I think it's amazing all the work that you've done and I definitely want to say thank you Literally thank you so much for all that you've done and your family. Really interesting story. What is your current vision for your podcast, amado Voice?
Speaker 4:So it's important for me because also started activism with telepanic Navista before that before because I started to be activists very late in 2017. Before that I wasn't so active so I never knew. I knew that we have many different Romani people also Sinti, manoush and other groups who are similar like Roma in Europe but also across the world that we are so diverse. I kind of knew a little bit of some things, but when I started with my international activism I realized how diverse really we are. And then I was doing research on my own. So this is important for me with this podcast to show that we are. And then I was doing research on my own.
Speaker 4:So this is a part for me with this podcast to show that we are many different Romani Sinti, traveler, vanuish and other groups from Europe and the whole world. So in the beginning was focused Europe, but then we realized no, we need to do more. We are more diverse than Europe. So there are many that we have Roma in Brazil, we are in South America, we have Roma in other continents, in Morocco, etc. So we want to show different voices from different groups and communities from Europe and also in media. It's sadly that our people don't have so much representation and voices, so we want to try that's why I'm with our voices to show different people and to give them a voice.
Speaker 1:That's beautiful. Yeah, you're right. There are so many different types of Roma all over the world, and we've been wanting to interview people from South America and other places that we haven't got to yet. It's just, there's an endless amount of content. We just keep doing interesting things and finding interesting people. Our listeners have probably heard of the organization Dike Na Bister, which translates to Look and Don't Forget. We love their work with Roma, genocide Remembrance Initiatives and education for young people. It's so important to get the young people involved, and you've been a volunteer with them since 2017. We would love to know more about your work with them, but also how others can get involved and support it.
Speaker 4:So I basically started 2017 as a participant for the German group. So one of from the organizers from Germany, who was part of the people who created Technipair and Technipair organized Diki Nyavista. So he always asked me do you want to participate for Diki Nyavista? But in 2015 and 16, I was working for German media company and we always, because of the live shows, I couldn't have the time in summer to go to Dicke Neubister. Then my contract was finished in 2017 in summer and then he asked me do you want to come to Dicke Neubister said yeah, okay, why not? So I was, in 2017, participant for the German group because in Dicke Neubister as a specialist, we have different participants from different countries. So every country is one or two ngos who bring their participants from their country, so almost like 20 to 22 countries who brings their participants. And then in 2018, I was facilitator.
Speaker 4:So I was doing a workshop for the first time and I mean, of course, I learned english in school, but my english wasn't so good. Maybe I'm speaking now. It was very bad. But because of dick in abyssal, because I was every year there and I had a lot of friends, I met friends and people. Then, of course, of this you have, you have more practice, because if you just learn in school, if you don't have to practice, you will not learn it. And then in 2018, like I said, I was facilitator doing a workshop and then since 2019, I was part of the media team.
Speaker 4:So in dikina vista we have our own media team. One guy, delphi lakatos we will have also an interview with him. He was doing like short movies. He's a filmmaker from poland, so he was doing movies. Then we have other movie maker from slovakia who is roma, who was doing something. Then we had people who was doing photos, or people who was writing description and posting for website or who was creating the description for instagram and facebook. So we was working together. I was mostly doing like instagram stories and doing interviews for my podcast.
Speaker 4:So since 2019, I was part of this media team and then also just in 2023, I was the German group leader. So we have also group leaders who brings their participants. So Dikinabisa is basically you have the organizing team who invites many NGOs from Europe. They give you like we have one hostel where everybody sleeps, so every NGO brings their people from five to nine participants from one country. So this example one NGO from Germany, then other from Spain, italy, different countries, and every NGO has one group leader and the group leader has the job to care about his participants or her participants.
Speaker 4:You know, going to Auschwitz is always emotionally, so you need to care for people. But also we have in the university in Krakow Krakow we are we have in the university workshops. So as group leader you need to take care that your participants go to the workshops, something like this. And then we have the facilitator. We have 20 facilitator, so every workshop group has two or three facilitator, so you have like 10 workshop groups. Every workshop group do the same. We have a calendar, like in school, but I will do the same.
Speaker 4:But we mix them. You know, like in one workshop group you have two, three participants from germany, two, three participants from spain, from italy. We mix them that people can get to know each other and can connect internationally. And in the last few years we had also few one, two, three participants from the usa. Last year we had participants from brazil and other from canada. We had also sometimes just one or two persons who came, came very far away and immediately doing videos and stories and pictures for posting, because we post on Instagram, on Facebook and on the website secondaugusteu more about Antikinamista.
Speaker 1:It's such an important program. We're just so grateful that it exists. We really do need so much more education around Roma and Sinti and the Holocaust, and it's a great program. I know someone, naomi Nikronov Dikla Collective, who did it a few years back and she only just had the most wonderful things to say about it.
Speaker 3:As we're talking about Romani representation in media and literature, we heard that you have been researching Romani heroes and characters in DC and Marvel. We've talked with Robin Bader a few times on the podcast about Romani comic book heroes and would love to know what you've been researching about Roma in comics and anime.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so I had two years ago a project with the EVZ Foundation. So EVZ Foundation supports Jewish and Romani projects. It can be related to the Holocaust but also other topics like empowerment. So I had a project where I was doing about heroes a podcast series about fictional heroes but also real life heroes like Holocaust survivors. So on the fictional heroes, I was doing research about DC, marvel and also anime Are you into DC, Marvel and anime, so do you know a little bit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I wouldn't call myself well versed in comics, but I think they're really cool and fun and I'll see the movies and I'll like flip through comics in the store and things like that. Paulina, you grew up reading comics though.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I do like a lot of comics and I have been I. What's really weird is, as we have been talking in our previous episodes with Robin, like comics that I actually really love Doom and things like that. It's rare that I read the origin stories or sometimes I have, but a lot of the times I just kind of remember the gist of the characters and a lot of characters are actually roma. So I was like shocked to hear that some of my favorite characters had some like romani history or even interactions you know what I mean, like magneto and stuff like that.
Speaker 3:But I'm a fan. I like some anime, but not too familiar with it. I know I I watch some now, but probably newer vampire stuff on netflix, stuff like that yeah.
Speaker 4:So I like also the marvel movies, but for only the marvel movies. But I would say myself more as a c fan. So I like to the whole batman dark universe and that it's more realistic and not like superpowers so you need to train and to gain everything. So I like this kind of the story and I'm more into anime and manga. So first, when we talk about marvel, you maybe heard about stan lee, who created Marvel and a lot of characters for Marvel. So Stan Lee, his family, is originally from Romania, so his family came as immigrants to the USA from Romania. But Stan Lee was born in USA. So it's interesting because Marvel has a lot of romantic characters, even more than DC. Dc has maybe just one or two, just one character, but marvel has a lot. So it's interesting. But also, the marvel characters never got titled with racial slur, always romani or different. Of course the superpowers or other stuff can be talked about if it's stereotypics. But he knew about roma. So my theory. So the question is like wow, he knew a lot about roma in that time. So my theory maybe his family grew up with roma in romania or his family was roma from romania who immigrated to usa. So that's just my theory, it's not proof, but it's proof that his parents came from romania as immigrants USA.
Speaker 4:So a lot of characters. So in Marvel you maybe heard about Nightcrawler. He's not Roma but he got adopted by a Roma family. So his mom is called Margalie, so she has like witchcraft superpowers and she adopted Nightcrawler when he was like a baby, and then Doctor Doom. She adopted Nightcrawler when he was like a baby and then Dr Doom. So in the next Marvel cinematic universe he will be played by Robert Downey Jr, so Dr Doom is also a Roma character.
Speaker 4:Then you have Scarlet Witch and her twin Quicksilver. So for these two there's like two stories, two different background stories. So one of them's where they are half jewish and half romanian as children from magneto like magneto is jewish but created a spy identity as a roman to fight against nazis and his wife was roman. And the other story about scarlet witch and quicksilver is that they are both full roma from sovakiya, like sokovia, and Sokovia is like a fictional country which should be like between Serbia and Bulgaria in the Balkans, and they got raised by their aunt and uncle who are Roma.
Speaker 4:Then in DC you have Nightwing. Nightwing was the first Robin for Batman. So you have one comic book. It was called Gffing knights, volume 20, something like this. It was released in 2001. So if you just google robin romani on google and go to pictures, then you will see some screenshots from this comic where they use romani language in the comic when he was talking to his grandpa or to other people. And there's also another comic book it's called Nightwing, annual, volume 1 in 1997. So on this you can find that they use Romani language when he was talking to his parents or to his dad. Like Nightwing, his dad is Romani and his mom is like American and also the fans. You know, in this fictional era you have, like this, canon and non-canon about stories. So in 2015 fans asked dc on twitter if his romani identity is canon. Dc approved before on tweet and then in anime, maybe you heard about Sailor Moon and on Sailor Moon one character is called Sailor Pluto and it's not 100% sure, but people discuss about this and say that she's Roma.
Speaker 4:And then there is an anime. It's called Fullmetal Alchemist and Fullmetal Alchemist had a movie. It's called conqueror of shambhala. The main character of full metal alchemist meets a woman who is called noah. So it's in the time after the first world war, where they chose roma and sinti people who was faced discrimination from the naz, from the Germans. So it's about this time. So the movie is called Conqueror of Shambhala. And then there is also one anime from the 90s, cowboy Bebop. There is one character called Fire Valentine, but for her they said she had amnesia, so she was thinking that she was Roma. But it's not 100%, but they were talking about Roma, and there's also many other alimes who are maybe not that much famous. In the 70s there were also a few alimes about Roma from Japan.
Speaker 3:Wow, that's so interesting. Yeah, wow, that is so cool, so interesting yeah.
Speaker 1:Wow, that is so cool. Yeah, there's so many opportunities to get more Romani content out there with Romani actors and writers is where my brain immediately goes. But I also didn't know that there was Romani representation in Full Metal Alchemist. I had a student years back when I was teaching shout out to Fatima who kept telling me to watch it. She said it was so good, so now I'm definitely going to.
Speaker 1:That's so cool thank you so much for doing that research too, because I think that people get so excited when they hear of romani representation in things and it gives them an opportunity to see themselves in literature and it's an they might do something with that. They might work on the next project, so that's. That's really cool. What are some of your favorite roma made representations of roma in the media or in literature?
Speaker 1:from from roma yeah, yeah, and you know there's. There's definitely more and more out there and um, I'm more aware of things that are happening in english literature, like there, um are books coming out like salvage, or um lynn hutchinson leaves new book. But I don't know too much about european literature or media representation of roma, except for things that go big like infamy or something. But specifically just want to know if you have any roma authors, creators that you would recommend for their portrayal of roma yeah, so I know, like example, for media in sweden they have like their own radio show about roma in romani language.
Speaker 4:It's like the radio show is part of the main radio public media company so it's called radio romano maybe you heard about it. So they make like moderation on roman language. So my uncle is moderating there this world. Yeah, and I saw also. Sometimes I cannot understand because I think it's czech or slovakian, but I know romea. They're doing like media work, videos, different stuff like tv in c, czech Republic and Slovakia. I mean, I cannot understand the language, but I see they're doing good professional work.
Speaker 4:I know in Germany a few years ago one Sinti woman, tayu Abuzuzunutur. She created a book with children for children. It's called Chokiziklub, I think it's mixed in german and romani language. So she just released the second volume, I think last year in 2024, and to be honest, I didn't saw so much. I saw that you was publishing a book and also like tayo was the only to um the like book for children. I think we need more in this direction. But also I saw that we have many podcasts. So I'm very happy that in the last four years, because when I started like in podcast I felt like alone. So it's good that we have different podcasts who represent different communities from us, maybe different languages. I know that we have now two different romani podcasts in romani language, like one from kosovo, one from north makedonia, I think, one is from romalitico and one from radio romano avaso something like this and and also in other, like in hungarian language.
Speaker 4:I saw one podcast and yours many years ago. I found out and was listening. It's very cool that we created like our own rubric category, roma content, and it's also good for the algorithm, you know. So I don't like it's good to have different stuff. So not to be to have this kind of mindset, to think you need to have a competition and just you. So because I think if somebody is watching my episode or your episode in course of the algorithm, if they see this consumer is interesting for romani content, they, after my or your episode, they will get approved. How to say they will get to another episode from other people. So like I don't know how to say this in english. In english, the word no, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's.
Speaker 4:The dream is that they'll see that there's demand and they'll start producing like example, if I uh, I'm interested in anime and I watched one amina episode, I watched rank boy and then, after I finished rank boy, they will show me another anime from different people, so I will learn more about it. So this is, I think, good also for the algorithm to have more different content, more different podcasts, different stuff, also maybe stuff we didn't have. So I would like to see more books, but also more creative and artistic content for different people, also not so many for children.
Speaker 4:I saw on tiktok also. I forgot their name. I need to look. So I saw on tiktok because I know because of my nieces, they watch a lot of music for children about the letters from a to z or different stuff. So I saw like one tiktok channel who was or two different tikt channels who was doing like for Roma children, singing in Romani language about the letters, about different stuff. One guy he take like children's songs and create it in Roma Balkan version for children, you know. So I think this is like a target group, but not so many people did, and when I see something new, I like this.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that's wonderful at wapa.
Speaker 3:That's so nice who are your romani crushes, and you know just all you admire anybody I think, we don't have to get personal I think maybe this should be my secret.
Speaker 1:No, I'm joking please do share all your secrets.
Speaker 4:We would love that no, no, I think this should be better, uh, as a secret, um, no, but I think I respect everybody um who go in public and do ngo work or media work or other works, because it's very critical and difficult if you're part of the Romani communities or Sinti Traveler Manus.
Speaker 4:However, if you go in public and you say that you're part of these communities, you always get hate comments or it can be dangerous. You know, from people who are maybe right-wing and also some people I know lose their jobs because they say in public that they're Roma. You know, um, from people who are maybe right wing and also some people I know lose their jobs because the same public that they're roma. You know, and I respect everybody who can go in public and say we are having this ngo and we are doing work for our people, we want to help our people and it's it's not easy. If you're roman, going, man going, you know, say like this but about the crush, maybe it's better than a secret. So I don't know, but I respect everybody who is doing this, try this and do this.
Speaker 1:Love that Very diplomatic answer. That's great. I mean we share that too. I mean we don't have to agree with everyone to appreciate that they're other doing good work. What do you have coming up on the horizon that you would like to share with listeners?
Speaker 4:yes, so I'm just doing right now the amara voice podcast because of this new project also with that foundation. But I would. I want to write a book. I have like two ideas. One is want to write a book. I have like two ideas.
Speaker 4:One is more to write a book, like fictional, and one is more serious, not fictional. And for the serious one, I want first to write a book, but I don't know if I would publish this as a book. I would just to write it and to make the research and then to create like a podcast series about it and maybe, if I have enough writings, then also publish as a book. But I also want to write a book like fictional, always about Roma. I want to do something like take something real, what is happening, or some inspiration, but create a fictional version of it, to combine reality with fiction. And but I always say I want to write. So I start four years ago to write something about my experience with the war in kosovo, but I took also the same some of the reality and created fictional, so not about me, so more fictional.
Speaker 4:And I just like wrote one chapter and I want to see if I should continue this, but also this I saw it like a learning to learn first because I do it for the first time, so I never published something in the book, so this is a new area for me. So I just wrote as also like for podcasting and for other stuff many texts but not like for books. So I want to try and I try to take some time. So, as I said to myself, so now in the beginning of year, so I want to try and and I try to take some time. So, as I said to myself, so now in the beginning of year, I want to do a lot of interviews, but I can publish in the next five months, just upload them and then I have some time to try to write something and I will see.
Speaker 1:So please do keep writing. I think that if it's so hard to write a novel I've been trying to write a novel for years and I went to school to write and I am still finding it very hard but you just do have to keep going. Someone just sent me a book as a gift on screenwriting which she was using for her novel. It doesn't really matter, it's more about plot. It's called Save the Cat, and so since I just got that in the mail yesterday as a gift, I thought I'd mention maybe check out Save the Cat if you need to rethink your plot or something. I'm sorry about the dog barking, but keep writing. We need your voice.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I am so interested in that and I feel like Jezna actually had this conversation where you know we want to write, but I think making it like fiction allows us to be a little bit more I don't know like creative, I guess, even with our own story. So I feel like I love how you are tying that in with such a sensitive subject and it's also like I don't know why I'm like this. I feel like roma just have so much trauma, like all we could do is laugh about it sometimes, like all we could do is just kind of, you know, like what are we even doing here? And I think, make it entertaining to a degree. But I feel like, yeah, sharing, sharing, that is extremely important and I love your twist on it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, thank you, you just mentioned it like when I started to write one chapter about the Kosovo War. So for me it's a trauma If I would just write a biographic so I would not be able to do it, because it's very traumatical, this kind of story, to have it as a children, as a kid, and then I I chose for myself to say, okay, I take something reality and try to combine it.
Speaker 1:So I think this is the best and also creative way for myself to combine it and to do it yeah yeah, I think that's the cool thing about actually it's so interesting the person who sent me the book about plot we were actually having, excuse me, we're having a discussion about how, when you're writing about traumatic material even if you're writing fiction that might be connected to your life there's something very soothing about being able to put it into a structure where you are now organizing the chaos of trauma. Or, you know, when we look at the big things that are just so difficult to express or pin down, and in this world you're creating, you are creating the story and there's something empowering about that and having a structure to do it really lets you do it, because it's easy also to just get lost in the, in the trauma of writing or writing about trauma, depending on how you feel about it. So, yeah, keep keep going with that.
Speaker 4:That's amazing and it's also fun, uh, interesting, because I started to do something and then you start to have like characters. Then you think about, okay, which age could have this character, which hair color is her or his or their background, and then you start to write, first on characters to think to. Then it feels like you create really a character you know and then you can start to write a story yeah, well, I love that we're so excited.
Speaker 1:please keep us, I'm sorry, oh no, just keep us updated on your writing, for sure.
Speaker 3:And thank you so much for coming on the show and talking about everything in your activism work and we really appreciate you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we really appreciate your work and your time and this has been a pleasure, and so, listeners, please go check out Amaro voice for part one of this episode and also just everything else that Amado Voice has done.
Speaker 2:And, yeah, thank you so much for your time. Bye, bye.
Speaker 3:Thank you for listening to Romanistan Podcast.
Speaker 1:You can find us on Instagram, tiktok and Facebook at Romanistan Podcast and on Twitter at RomanistanPod, to support us, join our patreon for extra content or just donate to our coffee fundraiser, ko-ficom backslash romanisan, and please rate, review and subscribe. It helps people find our show.
Speaker 3:it helps us so much you can follow jez on instagram at jasminavantila and paulina at romaniholistic. You can get our book Secrets of Romani Fortune-Telling online or wherever books are sold. Visit romanistanpodcastcom for events, educational resources and more.
Speaker 1:Email us at romanistanpodcast at gmailcom for inquiries Romanistan is hosted by Jasmina Vontila and Paulina Stevens, conceived of by Paulina Stevens, edited by Victor Pachas, with music by Victor Pachas and artwork by Elijah Vardo.