At the age of 23, Zinaida now can loudly and proudly say that she is a Roma. But it was not the case in her younger days.
While in school, Zinaida often faced bullying and harassment due to the stereotypes around her ethnicity. She encountered constant teasing and humiliation by people just because she belonged to a certain community.
With support from the women’s leadership training organized by Winds of Change, a CARE partner NGO in Odessa, Zinaida has gained confidence and ideas to counter discrimination and stigma against her own Roma community in Ukraine. "Now, I want to teach and motivate other girls to change, and be active so that the world knows who the Roma are, and starts saying only good things about us," says Zinaida.
I am confident that not only the Roma community but also the society's overall attitude towards our community will change,she expressed.
Her problems didn’t go away after leaving school. This time, rooted cultural and social norms within her own community hindered her progress in education. Her father didn't allow her to go to a university because he believed she needed to get prepared to become a good future housewife. It took Zinaida several years to convince her family and get enrolled in Journalism School.
"When I became a teenager, I wanted to fight stigma against my community, defend it, break stereotypes, and tell the world that Roma community is as honest and decent as other communities in the society. But, since I was very young, I could only dream about it, I didn't know how to do it," she says.
Education allowed me to discover and express myself, to know myself and my limits,said Zinaida.
"So, I decided to use a social media platform to reach people. I created a page on TikTok and started telling stories about Roma. In my videos, I tell people how I – being a Roma - live, what we do, and thus want to break out the stereotypes against the community," she added. Currently, Zinaida's channel "VIP Gypsy" has 66,000 followers, and her videos attract over 100,000 views.
"I still receive a lot of hate comments. But these comments help make my videos more popular, and people see and hear how I represent my community in a better light. I am confident that this will change a lot," adds Zinaida.
"My training is coming to an end. With the support of the organizers, our community has got a chance to come forward. It is a great opportunity to present ourselves in society. "