Vlach or Roma? Daj Nostri?
I have a question about my background because even my family is not really sure.
My mom is from eastern Serbia on the border to Romania. We speak Vlachski, its kinda like an old romanian dialect. My family also looks more like roma people, they have dark hair, eyes and their skin is also darker. We have similar traditions to roma people especially when it comes to funerals (mourning is a very big deal). My great grand parents also used to travel in order to sell their work , they created bowls and stuff like that out of wood if i'm correct.
so culturally and look wise we are very similar to roma people but we do not speak the roma language, like at all. When I ask elder family members about our identity they just say we a "cigan" so gypsis. we kinda created a term for our self because we really are not sure how to identify ourselves and its "daj nostri", which just means "one of ours".
So if anyone is also from eastern Serbia and has a similar family history or culture, maybe you have more insight
xx