In this piece 1 examine the migration of Hungarian Roma to Canada. The major subject ofmy enquiries is the community ofa Vlach Gypsy family, many ofwhose members have be en trying to settle down permanently in Canada since 1997. In the course of my research 1 met several other groups, too, of whom 1 have but scanty information due to the cursory nature of my acquaintance with them. The procedures folIowed while colIecting and analys-ing my data derive from the methodology and the definition of culture applied by cultural anthropology. As weil as conducting interviews, 1 acted as participant observer among the members of the community sp lit, in terms ofresidence, into two groups respectively based in Budapest and Canada. Rather than view it in isolation, I try to interpret migration in the context of other aspects of the community's culture as an equal constituent of acomplex phenomenon taking into consideration the standpoints of the participants in the process, as weil as ali factors dependent on themselves (Niedermüller, 1990: 231; Puskás, 1982:
30-31). My emphasis is clearly not on presenting the entire process within a broad social context or providing a macrotheoretical interpretations in the terms of a demographic, economic and poiiticai approach. Such theories, formed in the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, saw emigration as resulting from one or another major trans-formation of society. One of these was the theory of push and puli as formulated by Ra-venstein, or theories which found the only explanation of the phenomenon in the differ-ences between the rate at which the economies, labour markets and populations of the various regions developed. Mine is a micro-Ievel approach providing a more complex analysis which, focusing on members of a particular community, attempts to interpret the process of migration as shaped by the interaction between extemal forces and the cultural peculiarities of the community itself. Needless to say, while presenting the process ofmigra-tion, 1 also look, highlighting economic conditions but without attempting to give a com-prehensive overview, at the everyday life of the community as it is taking shape in its new environment. As I hope, inquiries of this sort can deepen our understanding of the culture shared by the target community as weil as uncover the process of migration.
Having said that much, it is to be bome in mind that only a few years have passed since the beginning of Roma migration to Canada, which is why one should be carefui with
1 Acknowledgments for their contributions to the funding of my Canadian research go to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Institute of Minority Research - Centre for Migration and Refugee Studies. My special thanks aredue to András Ráfael for the extensive help he gave me with mywork.
drawing any general conclusions. And yet, the great opportunity of current research is that it can be present at the emergence of a new community: the cultural peculiarities of the sening community are still clearly tangible, peculiarities whose adaptation to the new en-vironment has much to offer to the student of Roma culture.
The actual research took three months of the year 2000; in its course I conducted one-on-one and group interviews with members of a Budapest-based Vlach Gypsy family that I had known for years. The material thus accumulated was published in an article (Hajnal, 2000), whose conclusions I have used in the present piece. During my research work certain diffi-culties carne to the surface, diffidiffi-culties that anyone addressing the topic will be faced with. Going on for two or three years now, the process of Hungarian Roma migrating to Canada has been followed by ali parties, whether individuals or institutions, participating, to whatever extent, in the discourse involving the situation of the Roma in Hungary as weil as the participants in the process itself. It is hard to make a statement or offer an explana-tion which, often misinterpreted or wilfully twisted, should not be turned into apolitical weapon. In certain topics one should even be wary of providing even factual descriptions in case they are used for the purposes of various superficial and unscientific interpretations.
The keen public attention and increased sensitivity besetting the topic are mostly percei ved by those directly involved in the issue themselves; these people follow closely the media coverage of the matter while trying to obtain additional information via informal channels.
People thus impacted are families who are currently living in Hungary with relatives already in Canada, and who might themselves be considering taking the same opportunity them-selves. Others involved are those who have spent some time oversees themselves, but have decided, for whatever reason, to return to Hungary. From such individuals, it is very difficult to obtain any detailed or usable information on the circumstances and substantial aspects of their migration. There is great apprehension on their part despite years of mutual ac-quaintance. Some are anxious about the success of their planned-for journey, others worry about their relatives abroad, while the returnees fear legal retribution.
With regard to the above, after the research was begun in Hungary, it became clear that any complex, multi-faceted approach to the issue required that inquiries be made among the members of the community already living in Canada. One of my be st Roma friends, currently staying in Budapest, who exerts quite some influence within the community, gave me recommendations to his relations living in and around Toronto, many of whom 1 had met before (and who, in their tum, were aequainted with my earlier work with the commu-nity). After a few telephone exchanges 1 travelled to Canada, where I sought out a family in the small town of Welland, some 120 kilometres from Toronto. The he ad of the family I had seen on one or two occasions in Budapest, but the others I had not met before.
It was in this environment that I did my tieid work for a month in late 2000. It was, as it goes without saying, the life of this family that I had most insight into. I was involved in their everyday activities, participated in their feasts, and took part in trying to solve the diffí-culties of life as they arose. In the course of this participant observation I met and talked to individuals and families living in and around Toronto. They mostly fitted into my friends' network of family and other connections, and I had met several families like these back in Hungary. During my work I was faced, to an even greater extent, with the difficulties familiar from Hungary. Regardless of any former acquaintance, and especially in the begin-ning, my enquiries were met with distrust and suspicion even more intense than what I had
come up against in Hungary. They feared that the findings of my work might be turned against them by the Canadian immigration bureau if, as they thought could happen, the Hungarian authorities misused the information I was to obtain. That was why I refrained from using a tape recorder or a notebook during the interviews, recording what l had heard and experienced in my field journal at the end of the day instead. What gave me the most difficulty was, understandably, taking photographs.
Before my return to Hungary my hosts and I agreed that I would continue my work in the near future. This became feasible in the spring of 200 1, when I managed to spend another two months in Canada. Selecting the place to stay at was a forgone conclusion.
My former hosts would have been offended if 1 had decided to stay anywhere else, although the family had moved into a smaller flat in Welland. 1 found it far easier to do my work now than I had done the first time, as many were familiar with the piece l had written up on the basis of my first stay the re.
It is important to emphasise that the combined duration of three months that I spent in Canada altogether was insufficient to conduct research into every aspect of the commu-nity's life there. What is thus highlighted in this article are thus the daily economic issues of making a living as weil as insight into the functioning of the community's network of connections, based as it is on the family and the relations, because that is what determines the practice of migration. Areas that has thus been left undiscovered (and supplementing of incomplete information) require further research; part of that l try to determine within this article. In the course of my work I also prepared a photographic essay of the life lived bythe emigrant families.
OFFICIAL PROCEDURES UPON ARRIV AL, SOURCES OF HELP WITH PRELIMINARY INTEGRATION
Immigrants from Europe to Canada have be en arriving in ever smaller numbers in re-cent decades with their proportions also falling off (Harney, 1998: 21). Since 1975, immi-grants from the Third World have become predominant (Neuwirth, 1999: 51). This tendency has been somewhat modified in recent years by a larger number of immigrants from Central Europe clairning themselves to be of Roma nationality. The sending countries include the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and the successor republics of the former Yugoslavia.
Families claiming themselves to be of Roma origin are admitted as refugees under the 1951 Geneva Convention and the 1967 Protocol (Tóth, 1994: 17-18).
A prirnary destination of families arriving from Central Europe, and Hungary within that, is mostly the Eastern seaboard and, main ly, Toronto.? That is where direct flights can be
2In Hungary I tal ked to a Romungro family whose relations were settled on the west coast of Canada.
Ialso talked to ayoung man of the same Romungro background who had spent months with his brother in Vancouver. These interviews, together wi th information obtained in Canada, suggest that Roma migration to Canada isnot limited tothe Eastern regions of the country. However, thefamilies I have studied arenot aware ofemigrants living outside Toronto or at least the province of Ontario. There are references nevertheless to the existcnce of Roma communities based in Western Canada. One article gives a more or less detailed description ofhow the Western Canadian Roma Association works. The primary objective ofthe association is to organise and assisi Roma families in the Vancouver area (Lovell, 2000: 10).
booked to, which may be more expensive, but eliminates difficulties related to transfer-situations arising mostly from the lack of language skills and relevant experience. The authorities of trans it countries might also retum Roma travellers on account of insufficient funds. Another attraction of Toronto is that it is here and around the city that the largest groups of recent Roma immigrants (having arrived within the last three or four years) can be found.
The first people the refugee claimants meet in Can ada are officials of the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB). Official procedures tend to take a routine course, but clairnants are often kept waiting for hours. That occurs after an ll-to-13-hour flight, which can be a taxing experience for the jet-Iagged arrivals the majority of whom are first-time travellers over such a distance and whose families often include infants. Interpreters speaking Hun-garian are provided by the govemment, although in the night such help is mostly available via telephone only. Refugee claimants have to give a brief rationale for their decision.
Their state ment is recorded in writing, after which their particulars, finger prints and photo-graphs are taken. Passports, driving licences and other identification are taken from the claimants, who are then each issued with a replacement photo ID instead. If there are no friends or relatives waiting at the airport volunteer to look after the new arrivals in the first period, then they are driven by taxi downtown, where they have to spend the first night or two in a motel or hotel. They are then provided with the addresses of refugee shelters where there are vacancies available; when there is more than one address on offer, the clairnants are free to make their own choice. Within the first few hours of arrival, assistance is provided by IRB officials who escort the families and cover any necessary expenses they may incur.
Refugee shelters tend to be situated on the outskirts of larger cities, sometimes along motorways, away from any residential areas. There are purpose-built facilities, but unused motels (usually in a po or state of repair) have also been appropriated by the board. Families are accommodated together, while individuals are put up separately. Well-heated rooms with cooking facilities are provided, but the buildings have communal kitchens, too. Shared bath-rooms, toilets and laundry rooms are located at end of a hallway.
Claimants are usually obliged to spend three to six weeks at a shelter, the exact period depending on the rate at which their cases are being processed. In the meantime, school-aged children are bussed to schoollocally so that as little study time is lost as possible. Adults are issued with pocket-money and allowed to go downtown from where they have to retum for the night, which they have to spend at the shelter. They are subjected to mandatory medical tests and required to fill in a long form called PIF (Personal ldentification Form).
The document contains rubrics for particulars as weil as blanks to be filled in with the detailed CV of the claimant up to the moment of arrival, including reasons for their decision to claim refugee status. The documents have to be returned to the immigration office.
A follow-up interview with an IRB-official is tantamount to acknowledgement of the claim, on which the applicant assumes the official status of Convention Refugee Claimant. The claimant is then issued with a social insurance card a temporary ID card, together with a larger sum meant to facilitate new beginnings (those entitled to it call the sum 'starting-line money' or 'furniture money'.
It is from that time on that the sheIter can be left for independently rented lodgings.
Landlords in the area of the shelter seize the opportunity and approach with their offers
the management of the shelters who then give the addresses to the residents. Exploiting the difficult situation and inadequate language skills of the refugees, landlords often ask for higher rents than customary prices. Families tend to settle down, at least in the first few months, in the neighbourhood of the shelters, where their children go to school, and where flats are easier to find due to the refugees' familiarity with the area gained in the meantime. The 'starting-line money' enables them to fumish their flats and acquire basic household utensils. Having moved in, they are issued with monthly welfare benefits and they are provided with legal assistance in the person of a Hungarian-speaking advisor, who helps them attend to their official business and prepare for their forthcoming court appearance.
The sum of government and local assistance in the form of family and refugee welfare ranges from CAD 1,100 to 2,000. Welfare is payable on condition that children aged 6-16 are sent to school, and at least one of the parents regularly attends a language course.
Single individuals arriving without family find themselves in a more difficult position as they have to make both meet on a monthly allowance ofCAD 500.
The period between moving out of the shelter and the first court hearings (meant to establish the legal status of the family) tends to be 11to 12months. Refugee claimants arrive from ali over the world, escaping from the local 'rnafia' or from being persecuted for their race, faith or sexual orientation. Process ing the arrivals puts no little strain on Canadian authorities, who have to decide on a case-by-case basis whether they are dealing with genuine asylum-seekers, economic migrants or migrants motivated by other consid-erations (e.g. to evade criminal investigation). The authorities do ali they can to determine the record of each c1aimant, while the latter, continuously seeking advice from the legal counsel paid by the Canadian authorities, try to build a 'story' meeting every legai speci-fication, which they will have to present in court. What the story is meant to prove is that the c1aimant and his or her family were indeed persecuted in the country of origin, whose authorities fai led to provide sufficient protection, which is why the claimant was obliged to leave his native land.
EVERYDA Y LIFE AND ECONOMIC STRATEGIES IN THE NEW ENVIRONMENT
What makes Canada a particularly attractive proposition to Roma families leaving Hungary is- besides the openness of its multi-cultural society and the fact that its a visa-free zone- - its pote nt economy and comprehensive welfare system. Naturally, there are highly exaggerated ideas about Canada's advantages, especially among those staying at home, but it is a fact that Canada is, particularly from the perspective of certain regions of Central Europe, an exceedingly rich country, which has boundless opportunities to offer to those wishing to settle down there.
There is widespread agreement in anthropological studies devoted to the peculiarities of Roma culture that one major cultural characteristic of these communities is the promptness
3Obligatory visa system was introduced on 5 December 2001. (Edi/or 's note')
and dynamism with which they adapt to the changes in their environment; they are remarka-bly flexible in adjusting their economic strategies and activities to changing circumstances (Formoso, 2000: 58-59; Liegeois, 1998: 57). They employ very efficient methods of con-forming to the transformations occurring in the economy, and they do the same when the Gypsy community itself changes the framework of its life when moving to aplace among new circumstances (Stewart, 1994: Chapter Vii; Piasere, 1997: 122). Although they cannot ignore the economy surrounding them (Piasere, 1997: 32-33), they do everything possible under the given circumstances to engage in economic activities independent of the given environment (Okely, 1983: 53-56). The importance of this paradox (i.e. the contradiction between the Roma's dependency on the world of the non-Roma and their sirnultaneous efforts to preserve the integrity and self-sufficiency of the community) is emphasised in most modem studies of Roma culture. It is in this connection that the issue of Roma groups' attitude to wage-eaming labour is raised. Wage-eaming labour belongs to the non-Roma, non-gypsy world, and efforts at repudiating it are seen by many as an integral part of the Roma identity (Formoso, 2000: 58; Stewart, 1994: 23; Williams, 2000a: 341).
The attitude of the community lexamined to work and eaming money was characterised by largely the same peculiarities in Hungary, too. They were engaged in economic activities, with varying degrees of success, that had little effect on the community's integrity and the independence of the families in that community from their environment. The activities characteristic of the community included hawking ali sorts ofwares. They traded in precious stones and metals, watches, works of art, antiques, cars, scrap non-ferrous metal, consumer
The attitude of the community lexamined to work and eaming money was characterised by largely the same peculiarities in Hungary, too. They were engaged in economic activities, with varying degrees of success, that had little effect on the community's integrity and the independence of the families in that community from their environment. The activities characteristic of the community included hawking ali sorts ofwares. They traded in precious stones and metals, watches, works of art, antiques, cars, scrap non-ferrous metal, consumer