29 Aug 1998

Hi,

Time for an update. I have more or less settled into a routine, even if it is one that starts at 7 am and continues unabated till 11 pm, seven days a week. I have lost all track of time since there is no difference between a Wednesday and a Sunday. I wake up at 7 am, make breakfast for the school (of 10 students and 5 teachers), get the students to clean their rooms, have them help me dig a trench or clean a carpet, make lunch with another teacher, back to maintenance work, tea break (which someone else thankfully provides), some sports, dinner, teach computers for a while, clean rooms and finally get the kiddies to bed, which is probably the biggest nightmare! Of course if everything went as smooth as it looks on paper, it would be a different matter. But some kid will get upset, start abusing, break some stuff, pack his bags and threaten to go home. You plead, yell, threaten, plead again, and just about when you are ready to give up, he will pick up his shovel and work arduously for another ten long minutes before the charade begins all over again with some one else.

No complaints at all, I am enjoying every moment of it thoroughly. I would not have it any other way. It is just very amusing when you sit back and think about it. My respect for my parents, particularly my mother, has shot up by a mile. If any of you think being a house wife or taking care of a child on a full-time basis is an easy job, think hard again.

This routine of mine will change soon next week when the academic session begins. There will be lots more classroom activity, which will be nice.

The last couple of days have been very quiet. It has been my first real break since my hectic departure from madison. The headmistress took seven of the “tough” kids to Norway along with another teacher. Since three of the teachers work in shifts, only the headmistress and I are “permanent” at the school. Which means I got to take care of three students all on my own for a week while the rest were away. Of course these are relatively quiet kids but it was quite an experience all the same. Now the kids have gone to their respective “homes” when they will visit their fathers in jail or dela with their alcoholic mothers. I wonder what good it does them besides providing a change of scene, which
I admit is really worthwhile.

One of the students (say his name is Thomas) is a 16-year old with the mind of an infant. A victim of prenatal alcohol and drug abuse. Makes you want to find his mother and sock her in the jaw. Thomas sticks to me all day long and often knocks on my door quite late at night. He needs constant attention – he will grab my arm every once in a while and point at his dirty shoe or show how his nifty Venezuelan knife works. He will deny he is hungry when woken up for breakfast, and ten minutes after we have cleaned up he will come down and ask for food. Everything is a bargain – you give me this, I will do that for you. If I clean now, I will ride the scooter tomorrow. I try not to fall into this trap but sometimes it gets to be so tiring, I just cave in and play the same game. I wonder if I am just reinforcing something I should not be. I don’t know. Perhaps this behaviour is not particular to Thomas but mere childishness. Or in a sense it is perhaps a child’s mimickry of adult behaviour.

One day three of us teachers were struggling to align a fence. We were
at it for about ten minutes when Thomas came up to us with a small
wooden plank and an iron rod. He placed the plank on the ground and used the rod as a lever and voila! the fence was straight as an arrow. Just like that. Another time he fixed a scooter and two broken door latches.

Made me wonder what kind of connections were in place in that brain of his and what were missing. And what can one do about that? Reminded me of the protagonist in Sling Blade.

Anyway, I have been using the last couple of days, when I have been here all on my own, to catch up on sleep, a lot of email and other work related to my program. Today I made a short trip to a nearby town called Tonder. It was a major port in the Middle Ages but it is now known for its lacework. A pretty little town, it still retains the charm of a typical Danish community, with cobble-stoned streets, red brick thatched houses and the occasional one painted in pastel colors. There is a major music festival this weekend and it was nice to just sit around sipping hot choclate and listening to some Peruvian pipes and Irish jigs.

I need to say something about technology in Denmark. It is funny how you go to a new country thinking you have seen the lastest in techno gizmos and you find new small gadgets that make life so convenient. Or just interesting. Like the toilets which are called gylle (pronounced something like gouee) – they all use a simple vacuum and it saves a lot of water. The wind mill at DNS was the largest in the world when it was contructed 20 years ago, and is still one of the largest at least in Denmark. It was an ambitious project and when it was proposed many in Denmark thought it was a ridiculous idea. Today it is a landmark. That seems to be spirit of the work at DNS. Take on immensely difficult projects and see them through. The Tvind schools, which I talked about in my previous letter, have been founded by people from DNS. Many people in Denmark hate these schools, in fact the Government has been trying for some years to declare the entire system illegal. The reasons range from differences in idelogy to suspicions of financial mismanagement. People at DNS are quite proud of their institution, perhaps rightly so, but their occasional sounding of their own trumpets does not sit right with me. In any case, I could not care less about all these silly politics.

Nevertheless it is always interesting to hear what people think of each other and a man who gave me a lift last week left me in no doubt about his hatred for DNS. He was a member of the European Parliament and we had a long drive together so we talked about this, that and the other, to the point where he started discussing his private psychiatry sessions he is having b/c of his impending divorce!

Despite his impression that all DNSers were left-wing commies, he was nice enough to drop me at the gate of DNS instead of making me walk the last couple of kms in pouring rain.

We are now 25 in our team but we are still looking to expand it before we leave for India. So if any of you are interested in joining me on this wild trip, let em know! 🙂 Seriously, if you know of someone who is looking to do something offbeat and might be interested in DNS, please ask them to get in touch with me. So far, the 25 of us represent 15 countries and 4 continents. We still need an aussie. Interesting people. One guy from Cape Town has spent the last six years backpacking in Australia and Europe. He picks a country, finds a job, works and lives there for a few weeks, and then just moves on to a new country. Now he has joined DNS. There is a Japanese, a Korean, 2 from Scotland, a couple from Ireland, a Slovenian, 3 from Portugal, one each from Ghana, Poland and Romania, two from the US, and so on … I am going to teach them Folk Dancing next week so JP’s legacy will spread further …. 🙂

All right. I better wrap this one here. Oh, one last thing. Did I say how much people over here smoke? Everyone at the school, besides me and Max the dog, has a cigarette in one hand and a mobile phone in the other! Every student smokes and so does every teacher. I just cannot understand how one can try to make some one understand the harmful effects of smoking hash when nicotine is consumed in tons! On average, 15 cigarettes are consumed per person each day! I think it is ridiculous. It also means I have to spend as much time as I can outdoors or in my room so I don’t waste my lungs passively. Another incredible thing is that every student has a mobile phone and a television in their rooms. In my first letter, I mentioned how the social security system allows for very little poverty. Now you see how it is wasted – there are several young people who just waste away b/c the state provides for them even if they are unemployed. These people find no reason to work and use their “income” from the state to buy drugs and alcohol.

Anyway, I will end here. I hope all of you are doing well. While I enjoy writing these long updates, it would be nicer to hear what each of you are upto and what is happening at your ends. So do take a few moments to stay in touch….

Farvel,
Arvind