The TimesA turning point in the campaign to close Romania’s dungeon-like orphanages and cruel homes for the disabled came with the shutting of Camin Spital a grim block near the Ukrainian border with bars on the windows to stop people from jumping to their deaths “It was like Dante’s vision of hell — the sign on the door said it was a ‘Centre for Irrecuperables’ and it was a prison for children diagnosed with mental disabilities who would never leave,” Stefan Darabus the national director of the charity Hope and Homes for Children (HHfC) “We were warned not to go to the third floor or we would be attacked by the older children,” Darabus said of his first visit in 2002 “Shutting it down was a major stress test for us.” “We were warned not to go to the third floor or we would be attacked by the children,” Stefan Darabus the national director in Romania of Hope and Homes for Children saidTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILLWhat Darabus and colleagues found on the third floor were youths who had been so starved of contact with the outside world they ate the shaving foam they were given because it smelled so exotic “When we got them outside it was the first time they’d walked on grass and they picked up leaves and held them with joy — it still makes my hair stand on end,” Darabus said Closing down Camin Spital was an early success for HHfC which was launched in Bosnia in 1994 by Colonel Mark Cook of the British Army the charity has gone on to help close hundreds of similar sites in Romania slashing the country’s tally of children housed in orphanages and homes for the disabled from 100,000 to fewer than 1,000 Bars on the windows at Camin Spital orphanage stopped children from jumping to their deathsTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILLTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILLFor the children emerging from closed institutions HHfC reunites them with their families and provides foster care “Reintegrating children with their families after they leave orphanages or care is priority — after we check on the risk of abuse,” Darabus said mainly for older kids and those with challenging behaviour or special needs.” Two weeks ago in the Romanian capital of Bucharest the charity opened the latest of its family houses that will host 11 special needs children aged 6-15 who come from a larger state institution that the charity helped shut down the children wrote their names on the bricks on the building “It’s always a moving moment,” Darabus said “The closure of an orphanage is just a first step which is their way of attracting attention “Girls deprived of affection all their lives can misinterpret the attentions of a pimp as love and fall into prostitution Boys can join gangs which offer a sense of belonging,” he added the charity has also set up one of its two transit centres hosting people who may be living in society for the first time but still need a helping hand with finding jobs and getting a driving licence “They lack life skills and can have a low tolerance for frustration so we can mediate with employers,” an official at the centre said As HHfC focuses on closing the remaining orphanages the shock of stumbling into Camin Spital still motivates the team to prevent youths such as 18-year-old Bogdan Bodor from being sent into care in the first place He was born with the rare genetic condition phenylketonuria (PKU) that turned his hair white at five months old and later left him with epilepsy and a mental age of three Now Bodor lives in a cramped flat in Baia Mare in northern Romania with Magdalena Bodor who must feed him a strict low-protein diet with expensive supplements to stop his condition worsening “I gave up my dreams for Bogdan and that means I could never think about giving him up who is divorced and struggling to keep working as a cleaner after a minor heart attack this year To help her keep her son and to stop him ending up in a state institution HHfC stepped in to help Magdalena pay for Bogdan’s supplements He was born with a rare genetic disability that left him with a mental age of three Hope and Homes for Children provides them with financial and educational helpTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILL“We also bought a laptop and tutoring for Magdalena’s older son who had lost a year of school looking after Bogdan and we helped Magdalena train as a tattoo artist,” Carmen Magyari Darabus said the charity first took the decision to work with the local authority in 1997 “There were four adults looking after 87 babies up to three years old who were in cots “We saw babies left with a bottle as they lay with their head sideways on the pillow As deaf mutes they would then be sent to Camin Spital.” Then HHfC set up Romania’s first four family homes “Back then what we were doing was unheard of — people were laughing at us,” Darabus said When Otto Sestak first visited Camin Spital as an adult the sight of the metal gates caused a terrifying flashback to his childhoodTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILLCamin Spital one of Romania’s most brutal state institutions for children is an abandoned shell of a building today with leaking ceilings ripped out wiring and one rusting wheelchair parked by the main door (Tom Kington Otto Sestak shows the glass fronted rooms where 254 children — mostly diagnosed with dementia and dressed in rags — were fed mush and wiled away their days in the stench of urine and sweat As a young recruit with the charity Hope and Homes for Children Sestak arrived at the home in Sighetu Marmatiei in northern Romania in 2002 tasked with shutting the place and finding homes for the residents heard the crows cawing in the nearby dank fir trees and saw the faces of the children poking through barred windows Sestak’s sister lived at the institution before her deathTIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JACK HILL“I realised I had been there before and the terror came flooding back,” he said was rocketed back to his childhood when an older girl would appear at his family home at weekends and play with him “On Sunday when she had to leave there would be lots of shouting And sometimes my mother would take me to visit a frightening place with a big gate where the same girl would run to greet us I woke up to hear my parents crying and my mother ringing my school to say my sister had died I had not even registered she was my sister • Meet the charities supported by the Times and Sunday Times Christmas appeal 2024 “My father left and returned with a coffin on the roof of the car After the funeral there was no discussion and it faded away,” he said When fate took him back to the home in 2002 the memories flooded back but Sestak gathered his strength and walked in “All the kids inside looked like my sister — their heads shaved dressed in rags and making a wailing noise — and it was the same stench I remembered but from the top floor rooms you see children playing in nearby gardens “Later my mother said she had been persuaded by doctors to send my sister there but I never found the files explaining how she died The doctors didn’t use the children’s real names but nicknames which were sometimes based on the noises they made when they tried to speak.” teaching other countries how to close their orphanages and homes for disabled children and place children back into communities “After seeing Camin Spital I knew I did not want to see another child live in a place like that Every pound donated to Hope and Homes for Children by readers will be doubled up to £500,000 by an anonymous donor Find out more about the Christmas appeal and donate by calling 0151 286 1594 or by clicking the button below 19 (UPI) -- A Romanian motorist shared video of a car in neutral appearing to roll uphill due to an unusual optical illusion known as a "gravity hill." located between the towns of Budesti and Cavnic is known as a "gravity hill" due to the optical illusion caused by the surrounding landscape Experts said gravity hills trick the eye into seeing a steep upward slope where there is actually a slight downward slope The greenest cities in Europe are attracting tourists from all over the world and the Romanians might look at the opportunity to visit the beautiful treasures that our great continent has to offer More than a third (37 percent) of Romanians say they would go to a city break in 2019 It is not surprising that most of them prefer to be able to relax in a peaceful and friendly environment Whether they want to spend an afternoon in the park or embark in a bicycle tour of the city, Romanian tourists search “green” opportunities they may lack at home, according to momondo.ro. which impresses with its holistic approach The average price of a round-trip ticket at economy class for an adult: EUR 191 was chosen to highlight the strategy for improving the quality of life of citizens and tourists Developing public electric transport (tramways, electric cars, electric bikes), performance in reducing water loss in the public system and re-using it for irrigation or street cleaning, and focusing on integrating citizens into the mission of making Lisbon a sustainable city, have brought the European Green Capital title of 2020. The average price of a round-trip ticket at economy class for an adult: EUR 226 Lahti (Finland) was announced as the next city appreciated for its efforts to contribute to the health of its inhabitants the city has begun to work on improving air quality accustoming local companies to monitor and contribute to its growth a svery high proportion – 99 percent – of its citizens live at maximum 300 m from an urban green space fishing or even harvesting forest fruits or mushrooms at leisure Policies for recycling or inclusion of citizens in the sustainable development of the city also contributed to the title of green city Average price of a round-trip ticket for an adult: EUR 245 (Helsinki) 9 cities have been awarded for their sustainability efforts and among them the most visited by Romanian tourists are Stockholm (2010) the “The European Green Leaf Award” was launched and among the award-winning ones are Limerick (Ireland) and Mechelen (Belgium) – 2020; Cornellà de Llobregat (Spain) and Horst aan de Maas (Netherlands) – 2019; Torres Vedras (Portugal) – 2015 There are no cities in Romania with coherent strategies for sustainable development but those which have the largest green areas per inhabitant are Cavnic (674.1 m2) and Baia Mare (119.2 m2) according to the National Institute of Statistics when most tourists come here to enjoy the snow and related sports both are preferred by Romanians who want to explore mountain routes in the northern part of the country monasteries or other tourist attractions in (Do not miss the Merry Cemetery in Săpânţa or the Memorial of the Victims of Communism and Resistance in Sighetu Marmaţiei) Alba Iulia enjoys a very good performance (99 percent) mainly due to the hydropower plants that feed the city (according to a study by the Carbon Disclosure Project) Tourists usually spend most of their time visiting the Alba Carolina Fortress or use the location as a base for visiting nearby places (Deva or Transalpina Fortress) The average price of a round-trip ticket at the economy class for an adult in the greenest cities in Europe: We use cookies for keeping our website reliable and secure providing social media features and to analyse how our website is used.