Longing for a free world (part 1)

It was 1989, early in the year. Romania. At the time I was employed by the Brasov Philharmonic, playing about 46 weeks a year, generally two concerts each week on Mondays, 10 AM and 6 PM. I enjoyed the city of Brasov, nestled at the ankles of the Carpathian Mountains with Mount Timpa overlooking the old medieval city, with 500 year old houses and churches, and surrounded by the old walls and fortresses. The city had changed its name many times in the past few hundred years, between German, Hungarian and Romanian names, depending which country rules its inhabitants. Right after World War II, the city was renamed Stalin, and Mount Timpa had all trees cut and replanted with new ones that from the distance spelled "STALIN." Even in the late 80's you could still see it. My life was enjoyable, but occasionally it felt stale and uninspiring. I wanted to see the world, meet people, visit historical places, and make music with other artists. The political repression was crushing (I had just seen a women practically kidnapped by the secret police in broad day light in Palace Square in Bucharest, just about 20 feet in front of me, with dozens of people watching; everybody looked the other way, and walked with the head down - any questions would have been met with a similar fate). Normal citizens could not travel abroad, and very few artists and athletes were allowed this luxury, and that only after being verified for their trustworthiness and servitude to the communist government. Always their families were the left behind as a guarantee of their return, and mishaps leading to severe persecution of the closed ones. When my neighbor, Ion Corneanu, violinist with the Bucharest Philharmonic defected, his wife lost her job as a teacher, and the harassment was unbearable for her and their two kids, who were close to my age.

After a few year of being stuck with no possibility of traveling abroad, I asked my friend Hans Allwang, who lived near Nuremberg, Germany, to write a letter of invitation to visit him for a week or so. At the same time I applied for permission to travel abroad from the Romanian authorities. It was a long process. We could not hold a passport - it was always kept at the Ministry of Interior Affairs. First step was to ask permission from my employer. After their report to the secret police, the request went to the Ministry. At every step I had to justify the request to travel abroad, and to make a commitment that I will not defect, betray or berate Romania.

Eventually, I was called to the Passport office on Iorga Street, in downtown Bucharest. There, I was given my passport with an exit visa that said I was allowed to travel to West Germany, East Germany and West Berlin. With the passport I went to the West German Embassy, where I had an official invitation from my friend and benefactor Hans Allwang, a pharmacist in Rothenbach, a small town near Nuremberg. Strangely, I was denied an entrance visa to West Germany, with no explanation, even though I had visited the country twice before. I found out later that my friend had been asked at the local police station, where he had to fill out the invitation papers, if he can guarantee that I would not defect, and while he did not believe that I would do that (I had turned him down four years before), he could not in good conscience offer such guarantee. (to be continued)