Romea.cz's Sarah breaks down prejudices on TikTok, educating, entertaining, and restoring Romani self-confidence

For instance, Sarah has noticed that many children on Czech-language TikTok don’t know the difference between the terms “Gypsy” and Roma. “I always give viewers something to respond to in the videos. It’s often something that appeals to them or makes them think,” she said.

In an interview for news server Romano fórum, Sarah explains why she chose the job of a TikToker, how she copes with online hate, and what she loves the most about Romani culture.

Q: Where were you born and where do you live now?

A: I was born in Jablonec nad Nisou, but I’ve lived in Prague since I was six. I like the big city and I can’t imagine ever going back to a small town.

Q: What was it like to live in your home town?

A: It was quite challenging for me in kindergarten. I was the only one with darker skin, so the children often pointed at me and called me “chocolate girl”, for instance. They often laughed at me. I had a friend in class who had an Afro hairstyle, and the other children laughed at her because of her hair. We weren’t expelled from the group, but we always had to endure their hints and remarks.

Q: Did you confide in anybody at home about those experiences?

A: Certainly, yes. We were always dealing with such situations in our home, we never just let them be. It gradually started improving, though. When I was older it didn’t happen so frequently. Over time, some of that stuff calmed down.

Q: What was the difference between life in a small town and moving to Prague?

A: In a big city like Prague it’s certainly better. In a small town, everything is more visible. If there are more Romani people living in a small town, non-Romani people have a tendency to tar them all with the same brush. For instance, there are streets there where only Romani people live, and if somebody says they live on that street, too, they are immediately categorized as Roma by the non-Roma. Prague is big, it offers more opportunities, there’s greater anonymity here, and the people are also more diverse.

Q: How was it in school?

A: At school people made hints about my background – for example, they asked me if we collect scrap metal. If we Roma wore brand-name clothing, my non-Romani classmates immediately said it was “fake” or that we’d stolen it. Things improved in about the eighth or ninth grade, though.

Q: How did it happen that the hints of that kind improved over time?

A: I believe you come to terms with this over time and stop taking it so hard. You acquire self-confidence and don’t put up with it anymore. You just have to get through it somehow. If you’re a bit different, whether you’re female or male, darker-skinned, or different in any other way, you will encounter such situations. Even today, when I’m working as a hairdresser, it happens from time to time that a customer comes in, sees me, and leaves. He doesn’t want me to cut his hair.

I don’t care anymore, though. I ignore it, I have it under control. People who are always concerned about skin color or appearance are completely out of touch with reality and there’s no point in dealing with them. The problem’s not mine, it’s theirs.

Q: In addition to working as a hairdresser you also work for the Romea.cz news portal. How did you get that job?

A: It began when Romea.cz wanted to produce videos on TikTok, and they were looking for somebody young so they could mainly reach the younger generation. I told them I could try it and see what it would look like and what the response would be. I ultimately stayed with it. Many people, though, especially from the older generation, do not realize that the TikTok videos are actually aimed at teaching young people something, and they criticize my style. For instance, in the comments, criticism frequently comes from older people saying I’m just “some hairstylist” and not a reporter, but the whole point is that the content should be delivered in exactly that style, to appeal to young people. The concept as a whole was designed to appeal directly to the younger generation in their own language. Before I came along, more than one person had tried to do this, but the content wasn’t correctly targeted and didn’t appeal to young people as it was meant to do. They did it like news reports on television, it was too formal.

Q: How did you set up the concept so you could do it differently and also stick with it?

A: I did my best to do it naturally. At Romea.cz they aided me with advice about how I should express myself and what I should say. Today I take the critical comments I mentioned with detachment. I do this the way I do it, and it will either appeal to people or not. The main thing is that it works.

Q: Do you come up with the subjects yourself, or do you collaborate with the editors?

A: We create it together, most of the time we work on current events. If something’s happening that’s important or interesting right now, we film a video about it. We do our best to refute various stereotypes. It has to be something that appeals to young people while being meaningful and having some kind of scope to it.

Q: Do you have the feeling that thanks to you, young people have understood something new to them, or that it expands their horizons?

A: Certainly, I’ve seen that in the comments. I noticed that young people, Romani children especially, frequently don’t know things that are absolutely basic. For instance, I made a video about the difference between the terms “gypsy” and “Rom” – many people didn’t know what the difference is between them at all. That surprised me. However, I believe young people learn many new things through videos which they would otherwise not know. Frequently they write me messages, too, sometimes they want my aid with a problem of some sort. It’s nice to see that it has that kind of impact.

Q: What specifically do they ask you for when they write to you?

A: Most of the time they send me their stories and want me to publicize them. For instance, they ask me to share their stories – they probably believe it will resolve something or draw attention to it if I were to do that. I have a hard time understanding their intentions sometimes. To be sincere, I don’t share such stories very often because the purpose of my videos is different than that.

Q: What do you think the power of your video format is?

A: I always offer young people something in the videos to which they can respond. Frequently it’s something that appeals to them or forces them to think. However, it seems to me that sometimes viewership is also caused by people who want to “dig” at me. Whether it has to do with the way I’m speaking, or the subject matter itself, they have an opportunity to express themselves, to show up online. Whether the motivation is positive or negative, my video catches their attention and gets them involved. “Haters” basically aid us by increasing our viewership. Each comment increases the impact of the videos, more people see them. Ultimately, therefore, that’s not just assistance to me, but to all the young Roma and non-Roma who access our content thanks to that and are able to learn something.

Q: Does it hurt your feelings?

A: I’m not bothered if hate targets me personally. However, it’s disgusting when attacks target innocent people from our community, especially children. For instance, that happened in the case of Natálka Kudriková, who suffered serious burn injuries in a Molotov cocktail attack on her parents’ home in Vítkov. People wrote in the comments that she deserved it and should have died. That crosses the line and makes me sick, mainly because of what it could do to the victim.

Q: What about positive reactions? Does any story stick in your mind of somebody writing to say your videos changed something in their lives?

A: Yes, certainly. For instance, people write to say they learned something new from my videos. That always pleases me. Sometimes people come up to me in person to say they know me, they follow me, they want to take a picture with me. That’s nice, I enjoy that.

Q: Are you managing to be both a hairdresser and active on social media?

A: Naturally, the activities on TikTok are more my hobby, something that amuses me, but I’m not doing it full-time for now. I’ve been filming videos for Romea.cz for roughly two years.

Q: You’ve all launched another project in the meantime as well. What’s that about?

A: We’ve begun to do podcasts. We invite Romani guests, for instance, singers, actors, or other people with interesting stories. For the time being Denis Holý and I have recorded four episodes and we’re curious to see where that will go. Many of the podcasts produced today are based on bizarre content, which bothers me, so we wanted to create something different. For that reason, we decided to focus on Romani figures who could be inspiring to others.

Q: Is the podcast in Czech or in Romani?

A: We communicate in Czech, but there are different challenges which are part of the content. For instance, we ask the guests if they speak Romani and we test them. We discovered that very few Romani youngsters speak Romani. That’s one of the things to which we want to draw attention.

Q: Do you speak Romani?

A: Not very well, but I comprehend it and can make myself understood. What’s interesting is that I know many people from the Romani community who don’t speak a single word of Romani. They don’t even know our Romani anthem. I believe this is being lost a bit among young people today.

Q: Do you believe Romani youth are trying to fit in with the majority society more today?

A: I don’t know if that’s it. I believe parents today are not speaking Romani with their children. Previously, it was common to speak Romani at home. I regret that the Romani language is disappearing here. We have many beautiful elements in Romani culture – music, language, traditions – and it’s sad that part of that is disappearing.

Q: What do you love most about Romani culture?

A: The music and its energy. Romani people know how to take pleasure just from everyday life, from life itself, and I think that’s beautiful.

Q: Have other media outlets made you offers, too?

A: I have, but I want to stay with Romea.cz. This is personal to me, I wouldn’t do this just anywhere.

Q: Apart from the podcast, do you have any other plans for your work?

A: This is enough to do for the time being – I’m working as a hairdresser, I’m producing a podcast, and I’m making videos for TikTok. We also considered my going with Štefan Balog and the students who get scholarships from the ROMEA organization to the talks they hold with Romani children in the schools. I could be an example for young people, to show them that they can become part of society through the media, culture, or anything else.

Q: Do you have the feeling that the approach of the majority society toward Romani people is improving over time?

A: I think it’s improved quite a lot, but it’s similar to Slovakia, people will always find something or somebody to use as the target of their hate. In the Czech Republic right now a big part of that hatred refocused onto the Ukrainians, so Romani people are a bit “in the background” in that sense. Apart from that, it’s more visible on social networks than it is in real life.

Q: How do you respond when you encounter such people in person?

A: If it’s somebody whom I don’t know, I do my best to discuss it with them. For instance, I was cutting one gentleman’s hair and we were talking about the situation on the Mojžíř housing estate in Ústí nad Labem. He mentioned the case of somebody refusing to deliver local Roma the pizza they ordered. He said it was necessary to understand the driver delivering the pizza and his fear that something might happen to him in that neighborhood. I told him that while I get that perspective, I still believe there are also respectable people living there who do not deserve that stigma. It’s quite a complex issue overall, because there will always exist two sides. One side has justified concerns, but the other side also needs respect. I comprehend both sides, which is a demanding exercise.

Q: What experience do you have with other stigmatized places, such as the Chanov housing estate, for instance, which has long been labeled the most infamous Romani ghetto in the Czech Republic?

A: If one says “Chanov”, many people imagine something terrible. I used to perceive it that way myself. However, when I was there recently, I was surprised, it’s nowhere near as terrible as I’d believed. It was always said that the situation there is catastrophic, but it has changed in the interim. I found normal homes there, no horrors. The problem is that some prejudices persist even if the reality has been transformed. If a person has never visited such places and only knows of them from stories, transforming his or her view will be a complex endeavor. Personal experience does a lot.

Q: What bothers you the most about all of this?

A: The most unpleasant thing is when people judge you a priori. For instance, if we Roma are looking for housing, it often happens that the landlord immediately asks us if we’re Romani. A Romani person who is looking at an apartment will bring somebody with them who doesn’t seem Romani for that reason. That’s what we do when we actually want the apartment, but fear they will reject us just because of who we are. Most of the time I invite a girlfriend or somebody close to me who doesn’t have Romani features to go there with me if I’m looking at a place. Non-Romani people are afraid we Roma will be loud, or make a mess – those are their prejudices. In our building there are three Romani families. We’re fine, one of the other Romani families is too, and then there’s one Romani family who are louder – but that doesn’t mean all Roma are loud. We’re different from them, they’re different from us. People simply vary, irrespective of their skin color, nationality, religion, or sexual orientation. We can’t tar them all with the same brush.