Russia - St. Petersburg&Moscow

The tiles were dirty and cold. The snow carried by the boots of the hurried passengers filthy melted in the diffuse layer on the whole length of the cold corridor. A guy with a floor cleaning machine was struggling without any chance to remove the dirty water from it. I searched some drier spots and seemingly untouched by steps of the travelers that were transiting the room. Under normal conditions, it would not have been a good waiting place. But there were a few degrees better off less than zero and snow did not cease to fall heavy and cold. The strap of the heavy backpack was hanging on my neck, while the small bag that I was carrying on my back caused me a trail of sweat down my spine. On my head, the cap was wet as well and my thick jacket felt suffocating. In these conditions, entering one of the halls seemed the best option. Shortly after we got rid of luggage, I wiped the sweat from my forehead and I grinned worried when I went over behind my wet back. The first impulse was to get rid of the thick clothes that I felt cold on my body. Still, I kept my clothes on, as the cold from outside and the cold stream corridor would make me feel more refreshed than I wanted to be. I arranged the luggage in order, one by one, making sure that the bag left beneath touched as little as possible from the black and filthy snow.

The others were in a similar mood. Smaranda hardly breathed under the thick scarf, with her hat fallen on one side. A few strands of blond hair can hardly been noticed sparkling on the light. She left her luggage in my care and sought to refresh herself while curiously watching the display of souvenir shops. Mark looked at his watch and seemed even more baffled that we had to spend two hours more on that dirty tiles. I said that I was going to check what time and at what line the train was supposed to come. Balu smiled beneath his thick mustache continually typing on his Nook in a rather desperate attempt trying to find a network connection. It was certain that latest information would be useful to us, as the train would have no connection with the outside world. I went out in the cold with wet clothes under the jacket. But I knew that's the only way to prevent a possible cold: to keep myself on the move.

We were in one of the train stations from Moscow prepared to embark in a journey that can be an experience that you live once in a lifetime, a journey of six days by train to Beijing, across Russia to Lake Baikal and then to the far Mongolia eventually getting to China. But until then, we had to endure two hours of waiting in unfriendly conditions.

There was no waiting room in the station or we did not know where to look for one. There were two huge underground holes, two cafes without seats and an open -air pool with desks where they sold tickets directly in the street. No roof, not even a cover to take refuge from rain or snow caught our sight.

We spent four days here, in Moscow, the capital of Russia and we thought that nothing could surprise us anymore. We were fascinated by a lot of contrasts and quirks, but we kept our enthusiasm in such a way as to be able to explore the places and see people and facts with emotion and joy in our soul. And if we add the four days of St. Petersburg, I could certainly say that Russia would remain a memorable experience for each of us.

Let's take them one at a time for me to be able to live them again and recollect from my memories the precious moments that we lived in Russia:

We arrived on October 24, at around ten in the evening in Oslo airport (Gardemoen). It wasn’t the first time when we were supposed to spend the night sleeping in an airport, so I came prepared for it. The emotion of the previous happenings, with the goodbye party and the farewell to our mates was still deeply overwhelming each of us. Even so, at four o'clock in the morning, the boarding time found all of us exhausted and not in the mood for talking. Moreover, the first plane that would take us to Riga was empty and rather strange. With only 12 passengers on board and the flight engine noise amplified ten times, the plane left the impression that it can open up at any moment and crashed to the ground. Luckily, the entire flight lasted less than two hours and the feeling of anxiety disappeared once we got down to earth. We quickly changed the plane to a more crowded, but less noisy one and after two more hours, we arrived in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Besides, we passed customs control unexpectedly quick and we found ourselves out in a center of a city, as if we came out of a station instead of an airport. We had a look on a map and we lost several minutes to realize where to go. As everyone probably knows, Russia uses the Cyrillic alphabet, an alphabet totally different from what we are normally used to see. A bus driver saw us confused and took us under his protection. He understood where we want to go and explained that he could lead us near in his language. Although skeptical at first sight, we still left ourselves in his hand and we took the bus. I withdrew money from an ATM, but just enough to pay our ticket. Because of the extraction fees, the commission was more than the money that I got, but this, I found out later. (Actually, this made us aware that it would be easier to pay by credit card or to use cash, as foreign currencies can be exchanged anywhere in Russia without commission). After we got on our bus, we soon realized that the road would last more than half an hour and we relaxed while admiring St Petersburg’s architectural wonders. And, thanks God; we had what to look at. Wide boulevards, with huge buildings of specific architecture, traditional Russian columns that seemed to touch the sky and churches with their multi colored or golden towers that resembled sweet twisted candies amazed us from the very beginning. Therefore, we left ourselves stolen by the view until the nice driver told us that it was time to go down. Then, more than one hour had passed until we eventually managed to find the booked hostel. No, we were not lost as one may be tempted to assume, but we went slowly suffocated by our luggage and delighted by the many wonders that came on our way.

When we finally arrived at the hostel, we were headed towards our booked room. It was a room for ten. We chose the most crowded one not because it was necessarily the cheapest, but based on the assumption that there we could easily get acquainted with more people and we could enrich our knowledge with a variety of new and exciting information.

And this proved to be right. Thus, we met Miles and Sonia, both coming from the U.S. in order to study Russian. From Miles, we learned about local interest for football and the local team Zenit. On one of the days we spent in Petersburg, 60,000 people braved the cold and snow to sustain and track their favorite team in an important match in the Champions League against a strong team from Spain (Atletico Madrid). Miles was there and he helped us understand what devotion meant to him even if it was about a football team. What matters the most would be to have confidence in what you love.

Sonia was working as a volunteer at an orphanage nearby. Unfortunately we could not go there because of rules that were not related to us and to our short time spent in Sankt Petersburg. Nevertheless, we talked for hours about her work with those kids and her enthusiasm and emotion was hard not to be noticed by us. Thus, just thinking that we could have to opportunity to get into this place, made us realize every child was beautiful and deserved all the best. At the children's home in St. Petersburg, volunteers were trying to prove there was no difference between orphans and children who have parents. Or, between children with Russian parents and those that belonged to different ethnic minorities and were not able to speak Russian. We all knew that every child, with or without mom and dad needed and had the right to education. Well, Sonia explained to us that the main task of volunteers and social workers employed by the Russian authorities consisted of providing to children all they could in order to have a happy childhood and hope for a bright future.

Also, in the hostel room we met two students from Russia that gave us a lot of useful information about the education system. I learned from the beginning, as I was advised before departure that discussions and communication with strangers could bring a lot of benefits to us. Thus, our interaction with people of all kinds, locals or tourists, sketched us a rather panoramic view about education and life conditions in Russia.

To get a different approach about our theme, we met with a professor teaching at two of the most important universities from the city in our fourth day spent. We chose to meet her due to her insight related to education and its relation to employability and her cosmopolitan view. Hence, she studied and taught a variety of topics in a university from US and she had a very good knowledge of English language. So, like in the case of Miles and Sonia, we had a common language that facilitated our discussion. Hence, we spent hours in a café near the university to get to know the Russian educational system, or, at least, get a clear view about it. We found out that nowadays the system seemed trapped in a transition period, with pupils disoriented from the discrepancy between what they learn in the schools and what they actually need to adapt to the market demands. According to her, they lack the initiative to attempt to find solutions by themselves and a critical judgment to analyze every situation they encounter. But, with a focus on self-initiative and self-motivation developed and encouraged by career services from universities, they may be guided towards professional development and a career that meets their individual expectances. Unfortunately, a lot of universities do not offer a qualitative career service and universities end up in seeing students as a source of income. It was strange to us to hear from a university teacher that universities were similar to business, but at a closer sight, this approach seemed reasonable and heavily sustained. It is the trap of political changes, a time when reforms make every social sector a room for experiment and stability seems a far-away goal. In this sense, I could connect the fault of universities with the fall of USSR and of the communist regime and the chaos created when people encouraged to take a workplace are suddenly forced to struggle for finding one. Therefore, as Elena Kournichkova explained to us, students would need to be guided and encouraged to develop their skills and initiative by teachers, instead of getting just the advice to accumulate data. Soft skills, such as communication, networking, and ability to learn foreign languages, precision and attention to details should be cultivated together with assimilating hard knowledge. So, it is not enough for a youngster to be professional in his field if he is not able to exceed market demands, which encompass team spirit and self-initiative.

Apart from the issue of employability, Elena gave us pieces of advice about our travel and the benefits of it for our development. Hence, she encouraged us in getting all the benefits that we can from this by getting to know people and finding a way of communicating to each of them, even if we do not speak the language. In this sense, she appreciated that we took the courage to struggle to become better and the will to adapt, as these features show our strength in cooperating with difficulties and getting prepared for integrating as good citizens to our society. As a personal observation, I learned from her insight the advantages that both the Russian and the American system of education offer to youngsters and I understood that getting the courage to act is essential for any improvement.

After four days, we left Sankt Petersburg and eight hours later, we reached Moscow by train. Buying a train ticket to Moscow was not an easy task, as we encountered difficulties related to the language and a long time of waiting because of the process to purchase a ticket. Hence, we found out that in Russia one had to present an identity document for being able to purchase the ticket. Whether you are a child or adult, you must be logged in STARE database trip. For tourists, it seemed almost impossible to buy tickets only from the agency or station ticket office and often the price paid was much higher than the real one. But we got help from Miles and owing to his fluent Russian, we managed to buy tickets cheap as we were locals. While getting on the train, we were surprised that despite the fact that the whole journey lasted eight hours, the train was special, with great coaches, comfortable seating and a large space for legs. I could not remember ever having so much space in any journey.

Then, we stayed relaxed with our legs stretched out and the eyes on the window catching every sight from the beautiful landscape. Winter took mastership over the entire country, while the wind was blowing and the snow seemed to form white waves with multi-colored lights. But in the landscape that was running in front of us, I saw images of the people that we met, places we had seen and museums full of history that we got the opportunity to visit.

In Moscow, we arrived on time and we took the metro to our accommodation. It was snowing pretty and delicate, and we felt joy and enthusiasm for discovering the second point of our trip. However, an hour later, after wandering the dimly lit streets of a Moscow district, with the same heavy luggage on our backs , our joy seemed to leave place for cold and discouragement. In this circumstance, I called the phone number that we got and a woman came before us. The woman, aged about 50 years, owned an apartment on the fifth floor of a block of flats. Smaranda heard about it in advance and arranged to sleep in her home for a much lower price than we had to pay at the cheapest hostel. The place looked similar to a traditional old house and nothing seemed to resemble to a location for tourists. With the dark from outside the night and our eagerness to experience life in Russia closer to the locals, we accepted the conditions and we found ourselves crammed into a small room. And if that was not enough, we had to share the room with a friend of the host, a Frenchman that was working in Moscow.

The room had two bunk beds resting on one wall and three smaller beds piled each on other sides of the room. A table placed in the middle and a black cabinet diminish the space next door in the room. The room was high -ceilinged with a yellowy light bulb in the middle. The walls were covered with wallpaper that had once dressed colorful and traditional Russian motifs. Unfortunately, in the present it was washed-out and shriveled in places, but with the same color as the ceiling and the frame of the dirty old door or the one of the window. On one wall, we noticed a traditional rug, while on top of the Wardrobe, an old traditional Russian painting tried

to make the room friendlier. The bathroom was down the hall, divided into two rooms, one for the toilet and one for the shower. The misery that came out especially because of the age of the house was easily to be taken into account. The kitchen, as tiny as a shower room with two sinks and taps included a hose, a sink with different old plates dirtied as the time passed by disorderly thrown on every corner and an antique stove probably much older than me that we were wondering how it still worked. Everything was sticky from tiles to tableware from the faucet to the sink window sill not open. What is more, half of the small ladder near the little table from the kitchen, the place where you were supposed to sit while eating, was occupied with old newspapers.

We said that in India we might face even worse conditions and should never weep for what we have. We decided to stay and adapt to it. Surely there are people in this world who live in conditions much heavier than that.

Thus, another four days when Moscow showed us why it deserved to be called impressive followed. Starting with the Kremlin wall on Red Square to orthodox churches with high towers that made you feel trapped in the pages of a storybook and continuing to Boulevard Gum Arabic where we found famous shops that remind us of market and consumerism and ending with the promenade street Arbat, we could say that Moscow offered us surprises on every small step that we took. The cold weather, the beggars in the subway, every shop with food from the streets, stores with shelves full of souvenirs and not the least the famous wooden dolls - matryoshka completed the image that we had about Russia: a rather vague, but at the same time complex one.

We did not care about the weather or I rather say we tried to fight against it. Although it was cold, we spent hours and hours from morning till late afternoon in the streets, eager to find out and know everything about Moscow. But that seemed normal for a city so beautiful and it did not pass long time until we understood that four days would not be enough for getting to know the capital of Russia.

Nevertheless, when I went to the station to embark to the Transsiberian or I may say the Trans-Mongolian, I felt like we managed to accomplish something important, that we can be proud of. . Everyone that we talked, each word that we managed to mutter in this strange language would remain in our mind and we would feel proud of how we managed to make ties to people in an unknown country, with a language and writing hostile to us, but nice and friendly people and landscape. We got a lesson from every place and picture that we took, but, more than everything, people that gave us a hand without any obligation and expecting no benefits taught us that one can smile even when outside is cold, and when the little sun-rays are unable to warm the air.

Yet, leaving Moscow did not mean leaving Russia, as the train would offer us five more long lasting days of Russia, with strangers, boredom and unexpected. After two hours of waiting in the cold, we embarked on a new adventure.

Next – The road through China, the Transsiberian experience

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Beautiful Iran

On the 6^th of December we arrived after a very long train ride from Ankara Turkey to Tabriz Iran. Our host, Asad and his friend BAmeen picked us up at the train station in less than 30 minutes. Soon after we arrived a bunch of their friends arrived at their place and we soon started talking about everything. Iranians are mostly curious about how their country is perceived in other parts of the world. We approached various topics, but the one that stayed with us during the entire travel was the Islamic political regime and its restrictions. There seems to be a huge gap between the younger population and the very intolerant political government. Iran, unlike other countries has a supreme leader who is the religious representative of Islam and who is also the most powerful person in the state. Therefore the President has limited power and the Islamic form of government dominates democracy. 

            We could see among the younger generation a big desire to leave Iran and meet other cultures. Many want to emigrate to Australia, Europe or USA in order to study or work. The problem is that men are unable to get a passport, unless they attend obligatory military service for two years. Women can apply for a passport, but unfortunately Iranians obtain visas in many of the countries with a lot of difficulties, or, in most of the cases, not at all.

            There already were some attempts to fight against the regime. For example in 2009 there was the so called Green Revolution. Many people went out in the streets to protest against the oppressive and restrictive regime and more particularly, at that time, against the stolen votes during the presidential elections.. The government however sent military troops to fight back and suppress violently the movement. Many people were killed, imprisoned or disappeared without a trace. Such was the case of our host’s girlfriend. She was killed while getting out of school without any reason by the Lebanon Army employed by the Iranian government. She was sixteen and got brutally murdered in front of her friends and her boyfriend (our host). Nobody could do anything to save her. In that moment Asad(at the time only 17) decided to join the revolution and was arrested as a result of his actions. He was then sent to a survival military training course for nine months – mountain, desert and jungle survival. The course transformed from a training one into real missions at the most dangerous borders.His position was the one of a sniper and although very good at it, he hated the missions. He still blames himself today for the ugly things he was involved in.  Due to a serious accident during one of these missions, he managed to be sent home and hospitalized after a series of pressures and bribes from his family. Some of his colleagues are still missed by their families and nobody knows where they are!

            Our host made it possible as well to visit the shop of a local shoemaker (which was one of our points on our wish list) and we were able to make an interview with him. Although he had already been working for twelve hours he answered all our questions patiently. The most important fact we found out, was that his business was not threatened by the invasion of the cheap products, because he has his own clients that understand the difference in quality. Similarly, the knife makers from Zanjan (area famous for this craft) were also able to sustain their business for the same reasons. Andras purchased a knife, helping thus the local craftsmen.

Another part of our plan was to spend a day with a honey maker and understand his way of living. With the help of our hosts (who drove us everywhere, even if we were seven in a small car) we managed to visit Kashan, an old cave-village in the mountains, where we met a local family that was sustaining itself from honey making. This simple family was getting by with one tone of honey per year. Although their lives implied a lot of work, they said they would never leave their home (which was three thousand years old) in order to move to the city. We had tea in their one room humble home (which was 3000 years old) and discussed about the struggles of their life and the habits of the people living there (we managed discreetly to make a short video as well, as they were not too much into photos and videos).

            The Southern part of Iran was a strategic point for us, as it represented the place where the Nomadic Tribes were spending their winter. We were lucky, as our host in Shiraz was a Nomad himself, currently living in the city. He made it possible for us to visit his family in the mountains and to spend two days with them. The life as a Nomad is very harsh because there is a constant work with the sheep and goat herds. Water is scarce and the weather conditions are sometimes difficult, especially in the nights, when it is freezing cold. We experienced this on our own skin, by sleeping in one of their tents and waking up frozen in the morning.

The next morning we visited the Nomad school, which was in very poor conditions. Only seven students were studying there. We were told that only a few years before there were between 40 to 50 students, but recently the number of Nomads is rapidly decreasing. The Nomadic life is extremely limited in certain respects; therefore young people decide to move to the cities for better life conditions and the chance to continue education. The children impressed us with their simplicity and humbleness. We decided to donate money for a computer, as they were having computer classes in their curriculum but no computer to work with. The teacher was a nomad himself and has been teaching all his life in that school. The school and the teacher were in theory supported by the government as it was recognized as a public school, but, unfortunately, the government couldn’t care less about 7 scattered kids – fact which led to having a school in terrible conditions.

     

       Isfahan was the next stop, one of the most beautiful cities of Iran, where again we got more lucky than we thought we could. We had as host Adel, a student graduating tourism. However, because he was busy with his final paper, we ended up spending most of our time with his flat mates. Jonathan and Afshin were also working on their thesis, one specializing in ecotourism and the other one in intangible cultural heritages. It was the first time we discovered that Unesco has under its patrimony these type of heritages, such as experiences, traditions and customs. For his thesis he chose four of the most important and ancient intangible heritages and he made it possible for us to experience three out of four. ...

1.      First one, called In Persian tradition, Tazieh drama, inspired by historical and religious events, symbolizes epic spirit and resistance. The common theme is the heroic tales of love and sacrifice, and of resistance against the evil. While in the west the two major genres of dramas have been comedy and tragedy, in Persia (Iran), Tazieh seems to be the dominant genre. Considered as Persian opera, Tazieh resembles the European opera in many respects.

The Tazieh that we attended was about the murdering of the third Imam, Imam HusaynIbnAly – the third Shia Imam who, together with his family has been brutally and unjustly murdered in a battle against the governor at the time. The annual memoriam for him and his family is called Ashura and people are every time extremely touched and depressed when they are faced again with the story. For us it was strange to see people’s reactions as this is an event that happened 1400 years ago but one of the directors of the play explained to us that Iranian people believe that truth is immortal and that every time they are part of the Tazieh, they are faced again with the truth and their dramatic reactions come naturally.

2.      Pahlevani and zoorkhanei rituals - a traditional Iranian system of athletics originally used to train warriors. It combines martial arts, callisthenics, strength training and music. Recognized by UNESCO as among the world's longest-running forms of such training, it fuses elements of pre-Islamic Persian culture (particularly Mithraism and Gnosticism) with the spirituality of Sufism. Practiced in a domed structure called the zurkhaneh, training sessions consist mainly of ritual gymnastic movements and climax with the core of combat practice, a form of submission-grappling called koshtipahlavani.

This form of training was practiced hiddenly in times of war and even the places where they are held look like some hidden cellars with small doors. Only the local people interested in these heritages know where to find these rituals. For us, the men practicing it were exceptional: very proud but humble, very strong but caring. They were so happy that we were part of their training and we enjoyed it so much. The drummer that sets the tone to all their movements and rhythms is very talented and plays a key role in it. Every time they make a move, the sportsmen ask permission from their drummer and the audience. It is fascinating to watch and we are very blessed to have experienced it.

3.      Radif is a collection of many old melodic figures preserved through many generations by oral tradition. It organizes the melodies in a number of different tonal spaces called Dastgah. The traditional music of Iran is based on the radif, which is a collection of old melodies that have been handed down by the masters to the students through the generations. Over time, each master's own interpretation has shaped and added new melodies to this collection, which may bear the master's name.

The preservation of these melodies greatly depended on each successive generation's memory and mastery, since the interpretive origin of this music was expressed only through the oral tradition.

To truly learn and absorb the essence of the radif, many years of repetition and practice are required. A master of the Radif must internalize the Radif so completely to be able to perform any part of it at any given time.

On Christmas Eve, our hosts invited two of their friends, professional players of Santur (a very complex stringed instrument played with two delicate wooden mallets– an instrument which is said to have been the basis of the piano) and Tonbak (the national drum). For almost two hours we were taken away in the dream like world of Persian music – it was absolutely amazing to listen to and it left us all speechless.

4.      The 4^th and last of these intangible cultural heritages is an ancient form of oral story telling (using some paintings or drawings) which we did not manage to see and also would have been difficult to understand as it is in Farsi but it is still very much alive today.

There is no better way to learn about a country’s identity than by experiencing its culture and by spending time with its people. Jonathan and Afshin were simply beautiful people who spent their entire free time with us in order to give us a good feeling of Iran, its welcoming people and its ancient culture. We will forever be grateful to them.

            Another very powerful experience was meeting Asa, a young Afghan living in Iran. He was the one who took us to the ancient village in the dessert, called Fahraj (in Yazd province). He was supposed to be our host, but because of his problems with the police he took us to a special hostel where he spent the night with us. We first did not understand why we couldn’t spend the night at his place and also why he seemed to be hiding all the time when he was with us. Soon we found out about his story. Two years ago he was working in Orient Hotel (in Yazd), where he met a Chinese tourist. She seemed to have had a bad experience in Teheran with some Iranian people and when finding out he was not Iranian she gladly accepted his offer of being hosted at his place. The next day the police knocked at his door and started questioning him about his guest and his decision to host her. Later on they ended up at the police station where they have been questioned for hours. Things dramatically changed when one of the officers found out that he was Afghan. They called the chief of police to see what there was to be done about him. He was told that hosting tourists is illegal in this country as it is threatening the hotel industry (and we thought it might reveal too much information about Iran to people from outside as it happened in our case). He got as a punishment 50 whips and 2 weeks in prison. He was later transferred for a few days in an Afghan refugee camp where life apparently was worse than he could imagine. The refugees had only 2 meals per day, breakfast which consisted out of a piece of bread and dinner which, as he put it, was worse than dog food. The water was also not drinkable and people were getting sick because of it. The funny part was that the leaders of the camp opened up a small supermarket at the entrance to the camp, so refugees were spending whatever money they had on buying overpriced food in order to survive….business was running great as the reports to the United Nations were reading that all the refugees are getting good food and the money received is being spent properly.

Asa managed to get out after numerous interventions and bribes from his father. Every attempt to get him out ended up with a refusal and a ridiculous explanation, either that the servers are not working and he cannot “check out”, either that the right officer is not there, and so on. Finally, his family succeeded in paying enough and putting enough pressure to take him out.

Before this incident he had had several years of experience in the hotel industry, but it was all washed away. None of the hotels were able to hire him as they would have been closed down if anybody founded out that there is an Afghan in the staff. He was later even banned to come and visit his ex-work colleagues. Currently, he is working in a sesame factory (which we visited) where he is highly appreciated by his boss (who knows he is Afghan) but not so highly paid. Afghan people are extremely discriminated in Iran. I tried to found out why and we asked some of our Iranian friends who told us that the reason is that Afghan people made a lot of mess in Iran; there have been many rape cases or robberies committed by Afghan so nowadays they are very much hated. Unfortunately, this extended to honest, peaceful people like Asa who was trying everything in his power to leave Iran.

 We actually witnessed this hush discrimination when we entered a shop and the shop to buy some food for dinner. Asa asked the shop keeper why he keeps the plastic bags behind the counter when is so much easier for people to serve themselves. The explanation was that he did not want Afghan people touching his products as they are dirty and he wants nothing to do with them (without knowing that Asa was Afghan). Our friend got out of the shop extremely shaken up and almost with teary eyes and he told us that almost on a daily basis he has to experience that and he cannot wait to find a way out of this country. He even wanted to return to Afghanistan, despite the fragile situation, but refugees from Afghanistan are not allowed to go back to their country as there are no jobs and no conditions for a normal life. 

It is very difficult to present in few pages our one month experience in this unique country. We have never felt more welcomed and safe as we did in Iran. If the people of Iran had freedom, this would be a great country to live in. We can honestly say that we made lifelong friends who will stay in our hearts forever and who, we hope, one day, to meet again. We felt Europeans have a lot to learn from these people regarding selfishness or better said lack of it, giving up egos and genuinely caring about the person next to you. Regardless of their lack of freedom, of which they are highly aware, they keep faith untouched, they enjoy life and they appreciate and respect human values. It was a humbling experience to be in their presence, in their homes and now, in their lives and hearts.

If, at the beginning of the travel, we had a rather confusing idea of how an investigation should look like, now it is perfectly clear that by giving away any prejudice, expectations and images we might have created beforehand and by getting close to the people, living as they do, listening actively to what they have to say, everything comes to you naturally.

We are very much looking forward to present to you a complete version of our experience in Iran and to show you the videos we have made and to introduce you properly to our new friends. With this occasion, we would like to thank the school and the program for making this possible for us. It will be definitely a life changing experience for some of us and we should not forget how lucky we all are to be part of something so beautiful and liberating.

                                                                                          Team: Alina, Iosif, Vali, Andras, Alin

           

LAOS - First banana plantation

Gitte (project leader for HPP Laos) introduced us to Svend Pedersen (Agricultural Specialist in Lao Banana Company). The day started at the HPP office where we found out when the banana farm was founded, wages for the employees, Lao government regarding the foreign investors, difficulties with local people, etc.

 It was interesting to realize that we take over some words that we hear without thinking if they are correct or not, for instance, I was all the time saying banana tree but actually banana is not a tree, even sometimes can reach 8 m height, it’s just a plant. Svend explained us that it’s like the grass, that’s why is taking less than 1 year to grow and produce fruits.

Lao Banana Company was founded in 2008, is not connected with Humana People to People projects, it is some of Teacher’s Group business. In Laos, the company rented or bought 200 ha but only a part of them are cultivated. The company is an association between Dole (the largest exporter of bananas in the world) and some of the TGs. In the first years Lao Banana Company was selling banana to Dole for export but because of the weather conditions in the cold season and the high standards set by Dole the contract have been discontinued for 6 months.

Now, Lao Banana Company sells bananas only on local market with 0,25 USD/kg. Because there is not the high harvesting season, the plantation can produce and sell around 15 t/week but in the high season around 40 t/week.

In a banana hectare are 2000 plants and 1 hectare can give 60.000 kg of banana/year.

Svend explained us about the main banana leaf diseases – sigatoka- how to identify it and how to prevent it and the insects that might damage the banana fruits. If for the leaf diseases there is a cure: pesticide, for the insects there is no cure, just the hope that they will be fed up and that they will leave the plantation.

In the dry season there is no food for local people’s animals and that’s why the banana plantation was invaded by the village buffalos. Svend told us, with a smile in the corner of his lips, that he tried everything possible to explain to local people that the plantation is private and that the animals that are going to eat the banana leaves are destroying the crop. He spoke to the owners of the buffalos, to the village chief, even he retained for few days the buffalos but with no any positive result.  Even though the plantation covers many km they had to build a fence to protect it by the invaders.

We spoke with the local people that are working on the plantation and we asked them if there is a hard work. Most of them smiling replied that is not, only sometimes when they had to load the bananas in the trucks. They are very used being in the sun and this is no any inconvenience for them. At 12 o’clock they have the lunch break for one hour, and because the company hired someone to cook for the employees they have one meal at the plantation.

The employees start to work at 7 o’clock in the morning till 5 pm. We asked Svend if he has problems with the employees to come in time at work, there is not such a problem- usually the employees are coming even earlier at the work, around 6.30 pm. As we spoke with Svend, Ole and Gitte we understood that at the beginning they had problems with the locals regarding the schedule – the locals couldn’t understand what means working hours, the schedule that they have to respect, the fact that they can take breaks only in the time allowed for this, that they can’t leave the work when they want, etc. 

The employees are working 45 hours/week, usually Sundays are days off. The wages are paid weakly, varies between 42 USD/ week and 62 USD/ week, depending on the experience and when they started to work for the company.  Svend is very proud and happy that he has a reliable man on the plantation- a man that lived in America and came back in Laos many years ago. He is the one that usually translate to locals what they have to do and what is the work plan.

Svend can speak a bit of Lao but, as he told us, to learn to speak Lao is not an easy work, especially because there are many sounds pronounced different and if you mistake a sound that word has totally new meaning.

Well, we were curious why TG’s chose to found the banana plantation in Laos and Svind explain us that Lao government was the most welcoming one, the laws are not so taught for foreign investors and that the land is very cheap. Before coming to start the plantation there were almost two years of research, investigations in which part of the country is better and less dangerous. Why dangerous? Because of the bombs dropped by Americans in Secret War and that most of them are buried in the grown, being all the time a risk to explode. In Lao territory there are more than two millions tones of mines that are not exploded. Every year are dying between 100-120 Lao people when they are going to work their land and the bombs are detonating incidentally. 

The Lao government has some programs to clear the bombs but it’s a very expensive action and they can’t afford to invest more. There is some international intervention as well but still not enough land is cleared by bombs - UXO (unexploded ordnance).

Svend and Gitte told us that the plantation is considerate by the government as industry- is not production only for subsistence, the company is exporting as well-  that’s why the annual taxes are higher.

Lao Banana Company will extend with growing goats. For the moment at the plantation are raised around 40 pigs, in this way the waste bananas are used as Svend told us. The pigs are bought when they are very small, raised and then sold.

We are looking forward to see the second banana plantation and be part of the production activities. Anyway, Svend was one of the most funny persons that we met in Lao and all the day we spent it laughing and hearing stories about his travels through the world. Thank you, Svend for the tips for India!

                                                            Workers preparing for the lunch

 One of the main dish in Lao- sticky rice with vegetables (mostly boiled, Lao people don’t like too much the fried food)

 In one of the locals home (Lao people don’t sleep in bed, they sleep on the floor and even if sometimes they have big houses they don’t have furniture or beds)

The kitchen in the village (locals’ house)

 Svend making the fire to prepare a Lao coffee

Svend explaining us about sigatoka – banana leaves disease 

Kenya - Mathare slums

Mathare is one of the biggest slums in East Africa and the oldest in Kenya, counting officially around 70.000 inhabitants and still expanding, but in the community the rumors are that the population is around 500.000 living in around 25.000 households. Situated only 5 km from the center of Nairobi, a part of the world that nobody remembers, Mathare is bursting with dirt, poverty, overcrowd, misery, nevertheless life. As all over the internet the awareness is raised concerning visiting the place as considered dangerous and inaccessible, we try to get in contact with some organizations that can get us inside. We find MEO Kenya and send an email about our interest in visiting and working inside the slum. Bernard Nyachieo replies the very next day and we meet him and establish a one week plan of involving in his work. 

In the first day we stepped the path that leads to the slum, we were astonished. There are fields of corn around and we have to pass a small dirty river where clothes are washed and hanged or left in the bushes to dry. Garbage all over, a smell of lost hope and misery follows us all the way…As we go more and more inside, we hear children voices asking us at unison ”how are you?!”, a melody that will greet us every morning in the next 5 days and people saying ”muzungu”(white person) and “welcome”. It is 7 o’clock in the morning and people doing their daily chores are greeting us from everywhere. The landscape is overwhelming and not in a positive way…we feel totally helpless.

We find out that life is a burden inside the slum, valued at less than a dollar per day. Even the poorest people have to pay for everything, from using the toilet to having buckets of water at 2 shillings per 20 liters. The women are going to the place where there is the tap water and fill their buckets and carry them through the field to their homes.

All the huts are 10 feet per 10 feet covered with metal sheets and most of them lack electricity. There are also some flats, but very few of them can afford to live in them, even if the conditions are as low as in a hut, those who live there are considered already rich comparing to the other slum habitants. The police and the elder’s council are the rulers and more than everything the owners of the land make the law. Renting the hut from the owners doesn’t make the slum people being part of any aid coming from outside. Bringing aid is usually made in two ways either through the church either through the owners…and the owners are taking everything. When Red Cross came to bring supplies, as food and washing soap, bed sheets and blankets, because none of the people living inside could show a legal document the owners took over. It is almost

impossible to find somebody that owns the small land where his family is living, as the owners are living somewhere in the city taking advantage of their poverty. Owning a piece of land costs 1500 euros, sum that nobody living inside can afford, and the rent goes from 1000 Kenyan shillings to 3000 per month. Most of the people are working as vendors in the streets or trying to do small chores in the rich people’s houses like washing clothes, house holding, or the lucky ones have small businesses around the slum where they sell different kind of things that they find or can procure easily. As we find out the story of a woman who is everyday going to a restaurant in the city and collecting the left-overs of bread and sells them inside the slum or around at small affordable prices. The slum is surrounded by a field of corn, where some of those who were lucky are working and take the corn, transform it in flour for ugali and sell it to the others. Some of them trying to make some money build corn mils inside the house and put the flour outside the door and sell it.

We find inside the slum a small restaurant, and by small we mean really small, full of flies and with two benches and a long table where people are eating. Across, there is another small shop where somebody is selling bananas at a price of nothing.

       

Most of the inhabitants are

women who were left by their husbands with a lot of children , most of them are under 30 years old. As we hear Bernard saying, behind everywoman that lives in this slum, behind every woman’s tears there is a man who deceived her. Usually the women are going to work in the mornings and live the kids in the slum. There are few schools where the kids can

go, but they are also requesting money, and from the small income they cannot afford to let their kids have some education. Most of the families are mono-parental, single mothers, the husband left or died and they live with the kids. The most terrifying stories we heard about mothers dieing and kids left behind have no other choice but wandering on the streets of Nairobi, begging for food or money, stealing, etc. because the owners of the slum huts will never let the kids living in the houses if nobody can pay rent for them.

People’s stories

We hear about Linda, a single mother with three kids who is working for a family in Nairobi. She is washing their clothes for 1 dollar per day. She is complaining that she is forced to use chloride for washing and her hands are damaged, but she has no other option. Her husband left her few years ago, run away to another city and she had to take care of the kids. Few weeks ago her husband came back and took two of the kids to live with him and his new wife. The mother cannot afford to do anything, but Bernard is trying to put her in contact with a school nearby her home village and some children care organization that can help her bring back her kids.

Lidia

She is a woman who was living all her life in the slum. But she was fortunate; her family could afford to keep her in school until second grade. Now she is volunteering at MEO Kenya, Bernard’s organization and she is trying to teach the children everything she knows. Even if she has the status of a volunteer teacher, she receives 3000 shillings per

month, money that can help her live with her husband in a small hut in the slum. She is
open and joyful and talks about God who is working through everything. She cannot imagine how life can be like outside the slum, but she would like someday to come and visit us.

 

It is astonishing how people can still keep their good mood and faith in a deity when living at the edge.

MEO Kenya, a hope inside the slum

“I need volunteers to help these people develop through education, I would even like to receive volunteers from Humana” (Bernard O. Nyachieo )

http://mabawaorg.weebly.com/index.html

When we met Bernard he was really happy that we wanted to involve in the slum and in his organization because he needs people that can volunteer to teach. He was born in a village near Kisi(village that we discovered at the end of the week) and he was very poor, but when he discovered the slum, he realized that there are people out there living even in much more poverty than him. He finished his second grade and he started to work, he was dreaming that one day he will start an organization for the people that need more help than him. He met Esther, a Dutch nurse who was in holiday in Nairobi and he shared his dream with her and she gave him 280 euros with which he started Mabawa School in the slum. He rented a hut for 85 euro per month and started to bring children in for the first 5 grades. Because he believes in development from inside he is trying to use funds

from inside the slum. Now half of the funds are coming from Esther and half from the fees-the families who can pay are requested to pay 900 shillings per year per child. The MEO Organization has now two parts, one part school and the other part baby care. Till August, Bernard is planning to extend the organization to helping women develop and acquire skills. Therefore he made a huge detailed plan for Laura Institute which will have two parts- Dana salon, where women will be trained for hair cutting and facial beauty, manicure and pedicure and Esther Tailors, where women will receive skills in sewing, so they can open some private small businesses inside their own homes. It was amazing how Bernard was telling us that he has plans for the organization for the next 21 years and he is waking up everyday at 4 am and starts to work on them. He came to us one day and started to speak about the new institute and the next day he had already everything written down. We helped creating some logos for the new institute and gave him some advice. As he was telling us he really needs volunteers that can involve in helping with the children education and with the next projects and he is trying to persuade us to send our team mates to his place or he is even willing to start cooperation with Humana.

Volunteering in Mabawa School

We spent 4 days in the slum. Our day started at 7am and finish at 5pm when we go to spend the evenings with Bernard and his family. We took the matatu and drove 15 minutes till the slum. The cold mornings woke us up and gave us energy and a huge influenza at the end of the week. When we reach the school the children are already there as they start their lessons at 8 or 8.30. We had English classes, Math, Science and Drawing with 2nd, 3^rd and 5^th grade. The children were very communicative and involved. Most of them don’t know how to count or to spell, but almost everybody knows to speak in English.

Everyday after the first morning class they have one hour of sport and we join them on the field situated across the school between a church and some police abandoned buildings.

 

The joy fills the air and the laughter and energy makes us join them. We teach them new games and they teach us their games and we play until they are overtired. The feeling is overwhelming and shocking, as even though they already know us from the classes they surround us all the time staring laughing fighting between each other to touch us.

Usually at midday they have lunch, some of them are eating in the school, the never-ending rice with beans. Before eating, together with Bernard we are trying to teach them to clean their hands with water and antibacterial gel.

The kids are coming in the row as they already know the rule and we are helping them.

The classes end at 5 pm, but some of the children join the dancing or science clubs and every afternoon they brought us some of their dancing parts trying to show us their beautiful culture and their knowledge.

As a response to their evening art programs we are holding an evening presentation about Europe and together we try to compare traditions and culture and we listen to their amazing questions about muzungus and we try to make the picture of the world we are living in as clear as possible for them.

At the end of the week when we have to leave the slum behind, we feel the sorrow filling our hearts and we are not even strong enough to say goodbye.