Letter from Central Europe

An appointment was made on Monday, May 12, at a camper van parking area in a small, remote Austrian village not far from the Czech border and 130 kilometers from Vienna. "It's one of the few places in Austria where you can park for several days for free, and electricity isn't very expensive," joked Elena Stancu and Cosmin Bumbuț, who have parked their white converted truck under the shade of large trees, which has served as their home and workspace for six years.

Since 2019, this Romanian couple – she, a 42-year-old reporter with long wavy brown hair, and he, a 56-year-old bespectacled photographer – have been crossing Europe to document the lives of their compatriots who have massively left the country ever since its accession to the European Union (EU) in 2007. "Romania is the EU country with the most citizens living abroad," Stancu said, referring to the estimated two to five million Romanians who have emigrated to western Europe.

For this former deputy editor-in-chief of the Romanian edition of Marie-Claire and this former fashion photographer who, in 2013, left their "glittery" lives to embark on itinerant reporting, the topic of the Romanian diaspora naturally imposed itself. "This exodus of the Romanian population has generated numerous problems," the journalist said, citing the case of Roma families exploited by farmers in Germany or young Romanians forced to grow up in their homeland far from their parents.

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