The Ending of Regimes

I finally dared asking the question about the ending of regimes. When did it first occur to you that communism might not be forever? To me, it is a hard question. It was answered to me in the following way by someone I appreciate a lot:
‘Summer of 1989. My father was saying that Ceausescu’s regime was not going to last past the year. I didn’t know. I realised that things were happening in Berlin. Then we had a meeting of the UTC (Union of Young Communists) at work. It was a regular thing, an ideology meeting, a kind of advanced course. One guy was speaking and I was sleeping with my eyes open. I must have been one of the older people there, I was around thirty. Something he said woke me up, and I reacted to it. He said that only with Communism, History had come, before Communism there had been no History. I said f*%& that, what on earth do you mean? I was astonished that no one else reacted, but they were either not listening, like me, or they were a lot younger. What happened then was even stranger. He made his excuses and left in the middle of the course. I was expecting to get into trouble by the security, but I did not. I started to believe my father was right.’
1989 was a long time ago. I was nine years old. I remember the Berlin pictures on TV, the classrooms I was in that year, and I remember my communion. It was so stressful the day ended with a headache (possibly brought on by the impossibly tight weave the hairdresser had created on the top of my head), the ice-cream lamb was crying, and it was cold and beautifully bright outside. Last weekend someone (male, around 35, married, one child, wealthy) was visiting who wore a communist emblem T-Shirt under his white jumper. You know the kind, red background, white hammer and sickle. Strange choice despite the period that has passed…