What makes you a Roma?
My soul, my blood, my culture. I´m very proud of my Roma identity. I´m coming from a traditional Roma family. I didn´t go to kindergarten. It was next door, but I was afraid to go there. Later on I wanted to go to school, because at home I started to get bored. My brother was 14 years elder than me. In the beginning it was difficult in school. I was beaten up in first-grade, kids called me with a derogative term “Gipsy”. But this motivated me to study hard in order to perform well at school.

How important was this scholarship for you? Does it open opportunities, which you would not have had otherwise?
Definitely. I went to St. Petersburg for my BA and lived with my aunt while studying. My aunt helped me a lot by paying my food and giving me accommodation, however after one year my parents’ money to subsidize my studying ran out. I heard about the program on a human rights training and applied for a scholarship. It was strange that I had to prove that I am Roma, to do this I had to go to the police for some piece of paper which confirmed that. I had never thought about how to confirm my identity before that moment. I spoke Romani, I lived in a Roma family – nobody had ever asked for more proof. When I received the scholarship I was supported for four years for my BA, which motivated me a lot and gave me a lot of confidence.

Did you have problems like those at school at the university, too?
Some students and professors were full of prejudice towards Roma. When something criminal happens in Russia people always blame it on the Roma. Here comes the issue of unawareness of Roma people of their human rights and the tools which can be used to protect these rights. I think human rights organizations should engage more actively in human rights education, especially of young Roma.

Was there a Holocaust experience in your family?
Yes, my grandmother was a survivor of the Holocaust. My father told me when the Nazis arrived to Alexandrovka, a village near Smolensk, they started killing the Roma and throwing them in a mass grave. When they took my grandmother and her six children, including my father, one of the Nazi soldiers told her to run. I don´t know what happened to the guy, but thanks to him I happened to be in the world.

Is this still a trauma in the family?
Yes, it cannot be easily forgotten. Every year we go to the monument and commemorate the dead in that mass grave.
With these German atrocities in your family’s past it must be strange for you to receive a scholarship from a German foundation that is intended to enable you to have your own career?
I feel good about it. Coming to Germany I have very mixed feelings. I grew up with this family story. My grandmother never got any compensation from Germany. Now I get a German scholarship.

The interview was conducted by Gemma Pörzgen in Berlin, July 2011.

Interview in PDF

Born 1986 in Smolensk (Russia). Tatiana Timchenkova is from a Roma family who speaks Romani at home. She was one of the program’s first scholars from Russia. She finished her masters in International Relations in St. Petersburg and is currently working on her second master in Pisa (Italy), this being in Human Rights and Conflict Management. She speaks six languages: Russian and Romani (mother tongue), English, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Polish.