"Magistrala Albastra"

Dan Spataru & Mirabela Dauer: "Magistrala Albastra" (engl.: The Blue Thoroughfare) - a fancy propaganda song dedicated to the
construction of the Danube Channel.

Communism in Romania, even more under Dej than Ceausescu, was vicious and repressive. Prisoners were used for forced labor on the Danube-Black Sea Canal; several thousand people died during its construction. The prisoners were battered, persecuted and starved out. The dead bodies might be buried in the concrete of the channel or in the black sea. In some cases for the living family members a letter was sent to inform them about the fact of the decease.

A sinister joke goes like that:

Two people working on the Danube Channel (La Canal).
-How long are you in for?
-Fifteen years.
-What did you do?
-Me? Nothing.
-Eh, you are kidding, everybody knows that for nothing one gets only ten years.

Dan Spataru is from Medgidia, a city located in the Jud. Constanta, about 40 kms from the Black Sea Coast, through which the channel goes.

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