Photo Story Documentaries

Beneath The Streets of Romania's Capital, A Living Hell

I stumbled across this article while searching the web for a photo story of the Romanian people. I decided to first watch the video of this to see and hear what it was about before actually reading it. I will warn you that it is kind of graphic, so beware.
I chose this because I wanted to see what else I can learn about Romania. Being born in the US and never having any Romanian history taught to me, this is how I learn about my family's country.
Having gone to Bucharest way too many times for me to even count, I never knew about these tunnels. I have never even thought about real people living in tunnels.
Personally, I think that this was a great topic for a documentary. It teaches people about what goes on under their city. Not many people think about what could possibly go on at night in the streets or below the surface.
These people were in orphanages when Ceausescu, once Romania's communist president, was in power. I think that to them, that was a much better life because they were in the care of the "state". Once communism fell apart in Romania, everything went downhill for them. Some were in concentration camps and some went to prison. The ones who got out came to the tunnels. The original intent for the tunnels was for it to be a heating system for Bucharest.

These people are sort of a family. They look out for each other, but also do drugs together. The main guy that they followed is the drug dealer who goes by the name of Bruce Lee. He explains that the "little" kid they met outside is practically his son. He looks out for him and doesn't let him do any drugs that involve needles. The kid, Nicu, who is actually 17 years old, is only allowed to do a metallic paint called Aurolac.
The text goes with the stories after they are pictured, sort of like what I just did.
It's amazing they got Bruce Lee to trust them enough to bring them into his "home". I wish there were more photos though and that they spent more time with these underground people.
They did however go back to these people 4 weeks later when one of the underground people, Catalina, died from her weakened immune system from AIDs and drugs. (Link here.)

Gypsy Life

For my second documentary, I came across a photo story of gypsies in Romania. (Link here.)

I thought this was fitting, because it kind of goes along with the documentary above. Most of the people in that documentary were also gypsies.

I've seen this type of community before many times. On your way to the country side, or going to the mountains, or the beach you will encounter this type of view pretty often. I think that in a way it has it's own beauty to it.
In this photo story it's not really about a certain family, but about the gypsies in general. Each photo has a caption of a few words and there isn't really an order to it. If you were to rearrange each photo it wouldn't change the story.
As I was looking through the photos I've noticed that it's not too much different than the regular poor white people in Romania. They wear about the same sort of outfits and look way more aged than someone living in the upper class.

 In the image above it basically shows what the living conditions are for some white folks I know in Romania. Always strange colored walls, with at least 1 rug hanging on the wall.

One thing to take note of in the image above is the fact that they have a horse (here it'd be ridiculously expensive to own) and a buggy, or cart (or whatever you call them here). I personally know many people in the countryside that own horses and buggies that aren't rich at all. It's one form of transportation.

I think this photo story was well done, however I wish it was more story like and more personal. It seems kind of impersonal to me right now. I also wish there was more captioning or an article or something to go along with the images. The images do go well alone though.