I was born in the neighbourhood of the blind. Yes, now the blind have their own neighbourhood, so do the deaf and mute, the crippled and all deformed beings, the freaks, as we are called. We almost form a country of outcasts, except we don't. We have chosen the sea instead of walls, and sand instead of roads, words instead of gossiping screens, and lively smiles instead of false grimaces. The moon bathes us at night and the birds sing to us by day. We light the sun each morning with a prayer and it catches us alive. I was born blind, but I see the light.
(Translated by Lenuța Bejenaru / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by prof. dr. Nadina Vișan / Edited by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)Real Fiction is a collective project started in 2013 by Florin Piersic Jr. The concept of Real Fiction continued to exist as a Facebook group, after a volume of stories was published at Humanitas Publishing House. (In January 2023, the group has 10,220 members.) The authors write ultra-short stories, with the texts limited to 500 characters (in Romanian, so the length of the English translation might be a little different) - a flash-fiction exercise on a topic that changes every few days. The group's coordinators are Florin Piersic Jr., Gabriel Molnar, Răzvan Penescu, and Luchian Abel. (Drawing by Adrian T. Roman)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale. 
