One childhood accident, a little socialist bureaucracy, and an unexpected reunion many years later.
By Ovi Catanescu, with memories contributed by my brother Adi
There are childhood memories that stay with you forever. Some because they were wonderful, others because they were painful. And a few because, many years later, life finds a most unexpected way of bringing you face to face with the people involved.
This is one of those stories.
It begins with a bicycle in Brăila, continues with two suitcases full of punched cards, and involves a woman whose nickname was far more memorable than her actual name.
The Accident
I was a little boy growing up in Brăila, Romania, when I had an unfortunate encounter with a bicycle ridden by a boy named Colonati.
He was about four to six years older than my brother Adi and me, which meant he was already riding a full-sized adult bicycle.
The encounter did not end well.
I suffered a serious cut on my face, between my nose and upper lip.
There was quite a bit of blood, and according to Adi, who remembers some details better than I do, the injury was a frightening sight.
Our mother rushed me to the polyclinic.
Adi remembers the doctor preparing to stitch up the wound. I remember something entirely different.
The operating-room lamp.
I had never seen anything like it before. The bright light and the warmth coming from above my face were completely new sensations to me.
Funny how a child's memory works. Some of the most dramatic details fade away, while something as ordinary as a medical lamp remains perfectly clear more than sixty years later.
But the most important part of this incident wasn't the injury.
It was an accident.
My mother, our family, and the Colonati family all understood that. Nobody had intended for anyone to get hurt.
There was no reason to turn an unfortunate accident into a dispute between families.
Eventually, the wound healed, the years passed, and we went our separate ways.
Or so I thought.
An Accountant Among Computers
In 1981, after graduating from the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest with a degree in Accounting and Finance, I was assigned a job at a computer data center in Slobozia.
In socialist Romania, the government found you a job after graduation.
Whether you were actually qualified for that particular job was sometimes a minor administrative detail.
I had studied accounting and finance.
So naturally, they sent me to work with computers.
Of course!
To be fair, I had taken computer classes at university, including programming languages such as FORTRAN and COBOL.
But computers in those days were nothing like the machines we use today.
They were enormous mainframes housed in specially designed rooms with raised floors and controlled temperatures. Programs and data were punched onto cards, fed into card readers, and processed by machines that produced mountains of printed paper.
When I arrived at the Slobozia center, nobody was assigned to train me.
Nobody seemed particularly interested in explaining what I was supposed to do.
And, as I gradually discovered, there wasn't even an accounting department where I could put my education to use.
In practical terms, I had very little to do.
I suspect the management knew perfectly well that sooner or later I would find another job through a transfer.
But I was curious.
Instead of sitting around doing nothing, I started asking questions, observing the operations, and gradually figuring out how the center worked.
It processed information for various companies. Employees punched thousands upon thousands of cards, which were then sent to a larger computer center in Brăila.
Every Thursday, someone had to transport the cards to Brăila.
By Saturday, the processing was completed, and the printed reports and other documents were ready to be brought back to Slobozia for final processing.
That's when I had an idea.
Meet Mrs. Chicken Poop
My grandparents and other relatives were living in Brăila, my beloved hometown.
I missed the city, my family, and my friends.
Why not volunteer for one of those weekly trips?
I mentioned the idea to my colleagues.
They laughed.
Then they explained that permission had to come from our director, a woman named Mrs. Coteț.
Her unofficial nickname was Mrs. Găinaț, which roughly translates into English as Mrs. Chicken Poop.
Now, the nickname was funny enough.
But the advice my colleagues gave me was even better.
They explained that if I went to Mrs. Coteț and asked to be sent to Brăila, she would certainly say no.
However, if I told her that my supervisor wanted me to go but that I personally did not want to make the trip, she would almost certainly insist that I go.
In other words, the secret was to ask for the opposite of what I wanted.
So I went to see Mrs. Coteț.
I explained that my supervisor wanted to send me to Brăila, but that I really didn't want to go.
And just as my colleagues had predicted, she decided that I had to go.
Problem solved!
In socialist Romania, sometimes the best way to get what you wanted was to convince the person in charge that you wanted exactly the opposite.
Two Suitcases Full of Trouble
The following Thursday, I left for Brăila.
There was just one small problem.
I had to transport two enormous suitcases filled with punched cards.
And those things were HEAVY!
First, I needed a taxi.
Then a bus to Brăila.
Then another taxi to the computer center.
By the time I arrived, I had discovered that transporting thousands of punched cards was considerably less romantic than visiting my grandparents.
But I was back in Brăila!
And there was something else that made this particular trip interesting.
Before leaving Slobozia, I had learned from my colleagues that the director of the Brăila computer center was a man named Colonati.
Colonati?
That name sounded very familiar.
I was almost certain he was the same boy whose bicycle had collided with me so many years earlier.
The Boy With the Bicycle Had Become the Director
I arrived at the Brăila computer center on Thursday afternoon and took care of the business that had brought me there.
Then I told the staff that I needed to discuss some special matters concerning the Slobozia operation with their director.
I was granted a meeting.
When I walked into his office and introduced myself, he recognized me immediately.
It was him!
The boy from my childhood.
The one with the bicycle.
Only now he wasn't a boy anymore.
He was the director of a major computer center.
Considering that Colonati was four to six years older than I was, this wasn't entirely surprising. He had graduated from university earlier and had already had time to meet the professional requirements and work his way into a management position.
Meanwhile, I was a freshly graduated accountant working at a computer center where I was still trying to figure out what my job was supposed to be.
Life has a wonderful sense of humor.
We spent a long time talking.
We remembered the accident, caught up on our families, discussed my work in Slobozia, and talked about many other things.
It was a wonderful reunion.
Before we parted, Colonati told me that if I ever needed help with anything, I should come to him.
And I knew he meant it.
What I Remember Most
That trip gave me the opportunity to visit my grandparents, relatives, and friends and to spend some precious time in Brăila, a city that has always occupied a special place in my heart.
On Saturday, I returned to Slobozia with the processed results and printed documents, just as the schedule required.
But when I look back on that journey today, the punched cards aren't what I remember most.
I remember my mother and how she took care of me after the accident.
I remember that both families understood what had happened and treated it for what it was: an accident.
And I remember sitting in Colonati's office years later, talking like old friends.
There had been no blame, no bitterness, and no resentment to overcome.
Just two people whose lives had crossed in childhood and, through a remarkable coincidence, crossed again many years later.
And come to think of it, none of this might have happened without Mrs. Coteț.
Because if she hadn't insisted on sending me on a trip I had pretended not to want, perhaps I would never have had that reunion.
So, wherever you are, Mrs. Chicken Poop, thank you!
You probably never knew what a favor you did me.
The Owl Doesn't Forget. 🦉