While you can meet Finnish Roma women in traditional dress, it is slowly changing. Their arms and legs remain covered, hair is long etc but the clothes styles are trad. Finnish. The men are fond of brown suede jackets, dark blue trousers and black shoes. Wealth, in the form of gold jewellery, is still displayed.
Below the belt jokes and swearing are taboo, and this was interesting because it made our series suitable for the whole (Finnish) family. And several of the sketches I wrote were censored by the Roma in the team and had to be rewritten. In one, I wanted to do a very surreal Romadance sketch with (CGI) many Roma women dancing in a line in the style of the Irish Riverdance. The joke being of course that all the action is in the legs, which were invisible under the large voluminous skirts. That part was OK, but there were objections to our male star doing a bare torso solo. You can't be me, I'm taken
That part was OK, but there were objections to our male star doing a bare torso solo.
Having looked through the footage, I found the French Gitans, in look and behaviour, to be far less traditional than the Finnish Roma. For them the bared chest seemed more de rigeur ;-). The woman also had bare arms. They also displayed far more 'passion' than the average Finnish Roma.
I've discussed this with my Roma friend and he admits that Roma in different cultures DO adapt their own culture to make a better fit with the culture they are living in. Historically, perhaps half of the male contestants in our annual Seinajoki Tango Festival contest (just held again last weekend) are Roma. Finnish Tango is a rather melancholic Finnish country music that bears little relation to any tango played elsewhere - especially by Roma.
Django Reinhardt was a Belgian Sinto gypsy who adopted hot jazz with some success ;-) You can't be me, I'm taken
Must be the warmer weather. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
