I stumbled across an ancient Romanian artifact which gave me some misplaced nostalgia for a time I never knew.

An obscure device leftover from some decades ago which most Romanians would be loathe to admit owning in these modern times where the meaningless smiles of beautiful people in advertisements tell us we should trample one another for the much-hyped HDTVs designed to prevent us from watching the television and movies one might want.

Mind you, I’m not awash in some faux longing for a time when a dictator would restrict my choices for entertainment, as happened in Romania for two or three generations. Afterall, we have enough people in 2007 who want to limit freedom globally.

Drawing me near like a beacon from the past, I saw it half-schlopped across a card-table precariously seeming to be made of toothpicks and a matchbox in the slightly musty back corner of a dingy one-bedroom apartment.

Just marvel in its rudimentary glory. I felt immediately emblazened by some wanton spirit out of a Chinese ghost story. A burning passion to know more.

A desperate need to ask a steady stream of questions about the device, much to the concern of everyone around who exchanged knowing glances as if I didn’t know they thought I had crossed the border of sanity.

With my stereotypically little concern for how others might interpret me, I pressed the point to the brink of obtuseness. Dar, a scoate lapte din piatra. I’ve no idea who precisely manufactured this ITC 500T nor what year it was crafted.

It is fully functional, working even today to reel in various broadcasts wisping about the air between us. The owner proclaimed between bellylaughs that the black and white television is Romania’s original TV (by which I took him to mean the first “common” idiot box issued to comrades after establishing a communist paradise).

Just above its marvelously “1950s ham radio” style speaker was the push-button tuner, no doubt a bleeding-edge feature of Communist ingenuity when Americans were still in the dark ages of rotating knobs for channel dialing. You can actually fine-tune the reception by pulling out the button tray and modifying the physical component connections to improve your viewing experience.

It wasn’t the first time I was smitten with something my Romanian friends find to be unadulterated crud best swept under the carpet. For years, I’ve longed to own a Trabant. Last year, I was thrilled to find myself the proud owner of a Soviet-era Лomo Cmena 8M.

I immediately started bargaining with the owner. While, in my mind, I first thought it might be worth as much as 450 RON, I did have to calm myself down and understand that a) to most, this was an old piece of junk and b) we’re talking about the famous rock-bottom Romanian prices here. Perhaps 10 RON might convince him to off-load this trash onto me instead of taking it out to the community bins with the week’s garbage.

Unfortunately, luck was not in my favor. He explained that while he might normally be predisposed to just let me have it for free, since I’d made everyone laugh so much, the plain fact was he’d only recently figured out the television actually was able to be plugged into his truck during little vacations at his mountain cabin.

His only use was as a makeshift portable television enabling him to catch the latest boobtube drivel when anyone in their right mind would take the opportunity to unleash themselves from the hideous brainnoise and allow themselves to actually think for once.

Nuts!

Bah. So, we came to a tentative understanding that if I were willing to buy him one of those handheld portable TVs, then he’d be all too happy to let this old dog go. His only interest was being able to watch shows in the middle of a forest.

I figure I could probably pick one of those up for around 150 RON or close. But it’s dawned on me that I may be able to find another working instance of this relic somewhere else from some other owner who would be all too shocked to discover I was willing to pay anything for it, let alone actually want the thing.

So, it’s true I still do not own a television because life is far better without tv.

But I almost had one!

Photo by wiseacre.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 7th, 2007 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.