Yearly report 2002
(October 2001 until September 2002)

Jürgen Dahm

October 2002

e-mail: english@j-dahm-stiftung.de

Hello !!!

First of all I have to say

T H A N K  Y O U !!!

for all the help that once again I received from so many people: Sending money, collecting clothes and medicines, helping to bring these things to Nepal or to Indonesia...
Thanks to YOU and so many other people I could further improve my work and help even more children!

Another year has gone by ... - For me it passed so quickly, because I was so busy: About a year ago I was assigned to write the German translation of the new English edition of the APA-guide on Nepal.

3x APA-guidebook: The old german
edition, the new english edition; and
"my book" that is available in book shops
throughout Germany since July 2002.

I never knew how difficult it would be and how much time it would cost, because it was not just a plain translation. I had to check and update everything and reduce the number of characters again and again to make the German text fit into the international layout and between the existing maps and photographs.

The ever growing number of children means that in Nepal every day between 1 and 8 p.m. I have to dedicate my time fully to them and cannot do any other work. Besides this I had to prepare for and lead two tourist groups. Between all this I spent many days (and evenings, and late nights) at the computer writing this book.

Some excerpts from my diary:
- at the computer-office I sent 9 e-mails and received just as many ...
- still I had not read and answered the e-mails that I had received in the morning...
- till late in the evening I was busy; had not even read the hospital reports from the morning...

I should have finished the work on this book (380 pages!) by 25. March - but it was not until the end of June that I sent the last corrections to the publisher.
Between Nepal and Indonesia I spent only six days in Germany. And for the first time I had been in Nepal long enough to see the children pass their exams. This meant that during one week between my trekking group and my flight to Germany I had more than 60 pupils to get ready for the next year, do all the admissions, buy clothes and books, etc.
It was a busy time - and again did not allow me to work on the book.
 

For years I have been writing a detailed diary - for myself as well as for some friends. And this year I would like to share some excerpts from this with you. - Look for these grey boxes throughout the report:
Late in the evening sleeping Raju (13-14 years old !) got up half-awake, looked around and started crying - because Krishna had taken his teddy bear. I gave it back to him and hugging it he went back to sleep.
This is so typical for these children at this age: Because they never had any teddy or any doll or any toys at the "right" age...

Quite a few people who visited me and saw my work with and for the children realised that it is nearly a full time job for a good part of the day. And some of these people were surprised when they heard that I am not paid any wages for this.

Usually I open at 1 p.m. and start with distributing the vouchers
for lunch. This was what it looked like when one day I was late
returning from the hospital and arrived at 1.20 p.m.

Because of these "wrong expectations" I would like to explain: All this still is my "hobby" and I do it during my free time.
Nearly all the donated money goes directly towards the children. Big expenses are for food, schooling and medical problems. Small amounts go towards laundry, hair cutting, cycle repairing, etc.
Administrative expenses are only for photocopies, postage and my taxi rides to schools and hospitals, and a small remuneration to those youths that take care of the children while I am not in the respective country.
My accounting is very detailed; I even write down "0,00" if a child receives a "free" pen that I was given by some tourists. - And after paying dinner for 20 at 70 cent each I write 19 dinners into the account - thus having paid for my own food with my own money.

On the other hand I invest only my time and hardly any money. I live very cheaply (eating the same food most of the time together with the children). So the money I earn from writing books, selling slides for postcards and leading groups ever now and then is enough for me to survive.

back to the top

Nepal, autumn 2001:

Since Nepal Airlines does not fly to Europe any more, flights to Nepal are either difficult or expensive. So I spent one night in a hotel in Kuwait and half a night in transit in Delhi before finally arriving in Kathmandu - without my big bag! For ten days I phoned and visited the airport - until they finally noticed that my luggage was not somewhere else in the world, but in their own store room. (During my stop in Kuwait it was put on a different flight and arrived one day early.)

Ravi came to the computer office looking for me because someone had cut little Krishna's foot. - Unbelievable! He owed money to another boy (12 years old) and when he could not pay, this boy took out a new swiss knife and cut across his forefoot. Arriving at the hotel I saw a lot of blood, dirty legs and a gaping wound about 4 cm long.
I had wanted to work at the computer; and the children started coming in for lunch. But no way: This had to be stitched. So first I put him on the toilet seat and washed his legs around the wound - when some of the other children came back from the soccer field including Raju with a swollen elbow that might be broken and had to be X-rayed.
- That's what you call "rationalisation"! So at least I did not have to go to the hospital twice. (!!!)

During my first day more than 30 children came. On the fourth day I checked my files: I had met 72 children and youths already. And if I include those whose mothers or siblings I met, there were 105 children about whom I already had first hand information.
On the third day I paid dinner for 32; the fourth day saw more than 50 lunches; and some days we finished up to 1½ pieces of soap on a single day!

Promising to share two oranges between them I made 4 children clean the room, bathroom and the box full of pens and games.

Mukesh had brought me one floppy disk with his accountings of the last 5½ months and a file full of bills and receipts. It took many days to go through all this, check it, ask back to Mukesh and to the children if something was not so clear.

In spring the number of children who "permanently" stayed with me at the hotel had grown so much that those that can stay with their family but like to spend a night at the hotel ever now and then, didn't get a chance any more. So I sent Mahesh to buy two pieces of carpet and two blankets for 3+3 children to sleep on the floor. Now we can sleep up to 10 children (and most nights we were "fully booked").

A few more notes about my activities - not directly regarding the children:

I had brought the wheel chair of my late father. Before giving it to the dispensary (who already had a poor man waiting who needed it) I allowed the children to use it and taught them how to handle it, how to manage steps and stairs ...

Binod (14) after the fight two days ago had been waylaying Kedar after breakfast and attacked him with a knife. Luckily none of them were injured; some people separated them and held on to Binod until police arrived. Now he is in the police station - and because he had some hashish in his pockets he might well end up in jail. - And then one youth came and told me that police at some other place arrested Ravi for no reason; if he is not back by late afternoon, once again I will have to go to the police station to free him.
I wrote a lot ... ... the afternoon had passed by and I had to go to the police to get Ravi.
They had him and the others let go just a few minutes ago and I met them at the edge of the mainroad:
... Ravi and all the others - some of whom come every afternoon, some of whom I don't even know or have seen only once. (But all of them know me; and each of them lifted his hands high for a polite "Namaste, Jürgen".)

For the first time I carried traveller's cheques in Euro - and was happy to find out that they were accepted without any problems.

I had a wardrobe built (which in Nepal is not more expensive than a ready made one) to my specifications: With a high partition for X-rays, a lower one for A4-size files, and small ones for computer- and camera-equipment and medicines. - With the ever growing number of children I am very happy that now I can lock these kind of things away.

One morning I could not get up any more; an intervertebral disc had slipped. How painful that was!!! - For two weeks I walked very slowly using a stick for support.

One day I returned to the hotel at lunch-time - and the water met me on the stairs: In the morning we didn't have water; one of the children must have opened one of the pipes. And when the water came, it came faster than the outlet could take it. The whole room was full of water about 3 cm high before it seeped over the step towards the stairs. (Thankfully nothing important or expensive was damaged.)

The sister of Mahesh and Mukesh married and for a few days I was invited to all the parties and ceremonies.

Mukesh with his savings and a loan opened a cyber-café; a public Internet-office. He started with five computers. And in a nicely decorated room and with a good pricing policy it is running very well and he has already bought another computer.

In December my flight back home was cancelled; because of the difficult connections this flight was not daily and I returned to Germany with a delay of five days.

back to the top

Schooling in Nepal:

I was quite happy that only two of the more than 60 children and youth whose schooling we pay, did not pass their exams. All the others did quite well. Some brought very good results and we further increased the number of pupils.
Muna in 1999 had failed the school leaving examination and was so ashamed that she did not want to repeat it at the same school. But none of the other schools accepted her and so she quit school and started training as a health worker. This she finished with good results. - Now she came and totally surprised me: Besides working in a dispensary she had studied at home, had taken the tests at a different school without ever attending classes - and had passed the SLC (School Leaving Certificate). Now she was still working and studying at "Campus" (a kind of senior highschool; grade 11-13). I was so happy!!!
Mandil finished grade 10 (SLC) with the best results. So Mukesh (after asking my permission via e-mail to Indonesia) enrolled him in a very good private Campus.

Ravi Maharjan is dead.
I learned it by e-mail in Indonesia (from Mukesh) that he died at the end of july in a cycle-riksha accident.

He was nearly 15 years old.
I liked him very much and we were pretty close. - As his parents were divorced, his mother working, he stayed with me most of the time whenever I was in Kathmandu. He was one of the most sincere and reliable kids I'd ever known, and only this spring the countinous persuasion by myself and his mother convinced him to finally go to school again. - I was so happy ...

But sometimes we have disappointments and problems as well:

Kedar had quit school and started to work because his mother could not earn enough money alone to feed herself and her two children. Because he is intelligent and hard-working (for many years he was amongst the best of our pupils) I started paying a weekly food-subsidy to this family and he went back to school.

Nima continued to make us worry, did not go to school very regularly - and disappeared this summer and did not come to meet Mukesh any more. We think that he must have gone back to his village and hope that the years we paid his schooling (up to grade 8) helped him enough to make a living. (He comes from a village near the Everest trekking route and speaks English quite well; so he will probably work in tourism.)

Niroj quit school and has to work because his father "drinks" all the money that the mother earns. But because he had become pretty lazy the last 2 years or so, I did not intervene and just continue to pay the school for his sister.
Manita for the second time could not pass grade 8 and quit school. Her brothers continue to go to school.
Kancha quit school and works now. He was in grade 5 and already 16 years old and his father wanted him to work. I tried to convince them that at least he should take the centralised exam of grade 5 that would give him a small certificate - but in vain. (That is a problem for many of our children. They started schooling to late, or they stopped again for a few years. Then they are too old for the class that they reached.)
Amit quit as well. He was in grade 9 at the age of 16 and he really should have stayed another 1½ years up to SLC. But he just disappeared. When he came back after 2-3 months he had been with his grandmother in their village, but could not be convinced to go back to school. He works in a bag-factory with his father, but we already see the profit of the education as he works as a controller while his father is an ordinary tailor.

(As usual most of my reports are about boys, though about one third of our pupils are girls, but they make less problems and headaches than the boys.)

back to the top

Medical issues in Nepal:

In autumn I could finalise the tetanus immunisation for another 36 children, and I was happy and proud (just a bit) that I could round up all of the children that had had their first and second shot between October 2000 and March 2001 for this third injection.

We have a second girl with rickets and bent legs. That means many months of calcium medicine and braces to slowly straighten her legs.

I had planned two big surgeries for October 2001, but these children went to their home villages during the festival season and returned too late. So I had both done in spring 2002:

Kumar had the contractions of his burned left hand taken off, had skin transplanted once again so the fingers could be straightened. (Right after the surgery he had to be fed, because he can not use the right hand with no fingers at all. So I "invented" a holster of velcro and leather, sawn by Amrit's father, that enabled him to hold a spoon.)
Saugat's burn contractions between his legs were taken off, so he can now spread his legs and finally sit normally like other people. He still needs physiotherapy and massage and might need yet one more surgery.

In spring a girl was introduced to me that suffers from cerebral palsy. I don't know much about this medical problem; something at birth or in early childhood damages the co-ordination between brain and muscles - while the brain as such is fine and might even be very intelligent.

Ram Krishna, the former leader of the poor people's dispensary made me very happy with one of the nicest compliments when he told a reporter from one of the newspapers about me "actually he is Nepali; he was just by mistake born in Germany. - all his thinking, his emotions and his feelings are truly Nepali".

I had known her father for many years; but he never told me about his daughter. Now they had found possibilities for further treatment, but could not pay it. So finally he asked me to help. Besides a special training she needs braces for nearly all of her body, needs a wheel chair and should go to a boarding school and stay at it's hostel. So since May 2002 we have paid the monthly fees for school and accommodation (and the family pays all the other expenses such as uniform, books, stationary, etc.). We bought the wheel chair and had the braces made and will take care of any other necessary medical expenses.
Luckily some tourist from Germany who knows the father as well has promised to take over the responsibility of all this!

Kumar lived with the street children. Playing on one of the pedestrian bridges he slipped and fell - 2 stories onto a fence with points designed like leaves that should prevent people from climbing it. He was caught with his calf - "luckily", because it might even have killed him. It was the deepest gaping wound that I had ever seen!
Luckily (again!) neither tendons nor bones were injured. The wound was cleaned and stitched and healed pretty well.

The father of three of our pupils suffered from kidney failure. The mother paid the first dialysis herself - but then their money was all spent. The doctors told them that sometimes after 2-3 treatments the kidneys might resume their work. So I paid for the second one. (Though your money should be used for children only, I thought it would be OK to try to save these children their father.)

After each dialysis he was well for a while and could go home. But when the "success" of the second treatment again lasted only for a few days, the mother, without consulting me or the doctors any more, took him to their home village - knowing that he would die.
(I can tell you some good news as well about the same family: In spring 2002 the mother managed to rent a small shop next to the room where they live. Now the fruit that she sells does not have to be carried all the way to the bus station, where she was selling by the road side. And she is always near their quarters and can control and take care of her three boys and one little girl.)

"Trifles":
In the case of two children I had to have a boil cut out of their legs, and after the surgery they stayed with me and I changed tampon and bandage daily.
Sujana (8) had multiple fractures of her upper and lower arm. She had playfully hung onto the back of a cycle riksha; her dress caught in the chain and her arm was twisted around the axle.
Some Krishna, who still was quite new at our's, I had the ear operated that had produced puss for many years.

Hire fell from second floor and had a multiple jaw fracture. For weeks he could only "eat" fluids.

Another "case" once again I cite from my diary: (He is 14 years old and up to then I knew him only from his sporadic visits when he needed something for his schooling.)

Dhurba is so ashamed of his condition that
I made him un-recognisable on this photo.

Dhurba came, who is one of the newer pupils. He had announced that he would want to stay "for 1-3 days" during the short holidays after the small examination. - Very soon I found out, why he wanted to stay: He asked me, what we would usually pay apart from schooling and cleaning wounds; he had heard that we even paid expensive surgeries for some children... - He sounded like a reporter ...
But when I asked him, who he was talking about (and I thought it was some child in his neighbourhood), he showed me his arm: totally crooked. It was broken when he was two years old and had been treated "locally" in the village. - And he is so ashamed of this condition and hides it so well that after so many months neither Mukesh nor myself had noticed that he is handicapped! (When he bends the arm, it is nearly normal; but when he stretches it, the ellbow is in a very awkward position and feels very strange; as if the tendon were on the other side ...)
In spring 2002 we wanted to have him operated. But he first wanted to attend the examinations, and after that we did not get a date for the surgery for a long time. Meanwhile Mukesh wrote to me that it has been done - but I haven't seen the result yet.

back to the top

(After Kumar's accident at the Emergency of the central Government Hospital:)
One of the doctors recently (when he saw me for the first time) was so unfriendly - I even told him instead asking me he should rather ask the children, why they come to me with their injuries instead of directly going to the hospital themselves. He was more friendly when I met him for the second time. But today he really showed interest when he saw me distributing vouchers for their lunch to the children: What is this? And what I do? And later he asked whether those children in front of the hospital sleeping by the road side also were "mine". I explained that some of them used to come, but now they are all addicted to this glue and I saw them only when I came to the hospital. - Work in the Emergency stopped. Most of the doctors came and wanted to know more. - And they did know nothing about this problem. Yes - they had been wondering why some children always hold a plastic bag in front of their face...
Lucky coincidence that at this time two of these children entered the emergency because they had heard of Kumar's accident. And I told one of them to breath right into the face of this doctor... (They stink glue up to a distance of some 2 meters; their lungs are full of this smell even hours after they took it; and if 2-3 of them come to visit me in my room I have to be careful not to get dizzy from the stink that comes out of their throats.)

A big problem:

Glue-sniffing  has finally come to in Nepal. - You don't know what this means?
Sure you have seen in some TV-report about street children in South America or South Africa that they use the smell of glue or some solvent as a drug. It makes you happy, makes you forget the hunger (and anything else)...
For years I had been happy (and surprised!) that in Nepal nobody seemed to know about this cheap drug that is so readily available everywhere. They have cheap liquor, they have hashish, marihuana, heroin and many other drugs. But nobody seemed to know about this glue.
Since early summer of 2001 they have known it......

Inhaling this smell damages not only the lungs, but the liver as well and especially the brain. On the Internet pages of Casa Allianza, an NGO that is active with street children in Central America, you can read that it is nearly impossible to rehabilitate a child that is addicted to this drug.
I was told in which school it had started; but I don't know whether a child discovered it by chance... If I ever found out about a person who taught this to Nepal's children, I would ... (I don't know ...)

Street children in front of the central hospital.

Many of "our" children have used this drug. I hunted the Internet for information and materials. I explained. I threatened. I tried to make them afraid. I even punished (those that wanted to quit but used it again). Never ending discussions. I allowed those kids who wanted to quit to stay with me all day (though usually the time after breakfast is "my" time and the children are allowed to come only after 1 p.m.). I fought. I did not allow the most endangered children to go away in the evening or to sleep outside.

One day two boys of 12 and 14 who were trying to quit came to dinner "full" of this glue. They were totally different people; they messed up the place, spoiled the food, disturbed the other children so much that I myself eat only after 9 p.m. Some of the youths were guarding them and then I asked three of the more reliable older ones to spend the night with us in my room to help me to guard these "stoned" children. The four of us were busy enough to bring these two to my room, carrying them part of the way. And then these youths had to take turns guarding our door until midnight and prevent these children from running away, while I was trying to calm them until they finally fell asleep.

(I had filmed some of this and when I showed them the video the next day they did not remember anything!)

If a child managed not to sniff for ten days, we were happy and proud. But none of them managed to really quit.
One group of street children managed to become clean. They had agreed amongst themselves that whoever relapsed would be beaten by all the others. They explained to me that they agreed to this because after having sniffed the glue you cannot remember anything you did.
By spring 2002 the police had understood the problem and told the shops not to sell glue to children. Now it is more difficult, maybe more expensive; and they have to walk farther to find a shop that still gives it to them.
A final solution is not in sight.

back to the top

After reporting in the "latest news" about my departure from Lombok, many people wrote and asked "I always thought you feel much closer to the children in Nepal than to those in Indonesia?"
Also I had realised that in these yearly reports I usually write much more about Nepal than about Indonesia. And I would like to explain:

A) I myself am not so sure and wonder very often whether I think more about the Nepali children while I am in Indonesia - or about Indonesian children while I am in Nepal.

B) When I write these reports I am usually in the middle of my preparations to go back to Nepal. So Nepal is much more present in all my thoughts than Indonesia (which I left only a few weeks ago).

C) Indonesia is much easier! The country is easier to travel, is more quiet, greener and cleaner than the big city of Kathmandu - likewise the situation with the children is easier and more comfortable: No street children, no orphans, no pickpockets and no gangs. No glue sniffing and no drugs. So for me Nepal is "work", Indonesia is "holiday"...

D) In Nepal I look after more than three times as many children, compared to Indonesia. For this reason alone it should be understandable that I (have to) talk and think much more about Nepal.

Indonesia:

I had been in Germany just for six days, then one week on Bali before my friends arrived and we spent three weeks travelling - still writing every evening on the guidebook. Towards the end of this tour I finally came to Lombok and met many of our children - some even coming by public bus from their village to our hotel to meet me.

After my friends left, I first stayed on Bali and took care of Kadek: He was fine and I was happy to see that he had used his artificial foot and leg so much, so they were totally worn and could hardly be used any more.

That was good news! - I had been so sceptical and had thought that he might not be able to walk on these. But actually he wears them all day and is very happy to have them. We had them repaired and adjusted to his increasing size.
But after just a few weeks they were so worn that I could easily guess that they would not last a further 9 months (until I will return next year). So I suggested (and it took some time to convince the orthopedician of this "crazy idea") to make the false feet smaller so they would fit into ordinary shoes. The "special equipment" (that could only be repaired in Denpasar and the father could not afford) would be protected; and the ordinary shoes, if worn, could be replaced by Kadek's father in any shop nearby. (Besides this, the ordinary shoes look much better and more "normal" than those that the orthopedician had made. - Kadek was very happy.)

The orthopedic surgeon gave us a date in the middle of July. For the weeks of waiting for this date I brought Kadek back to his village (and school) and went to Lombok myself.
Then surgery on his left hand was done. This hand has only three fingers; the two fingers are joined by skin, and the "index finger" and thumb have only one common root bone. Thus the whole hand was stiff.

X-ray before the surgery.

The idea was to remove that one finger that was unmoveably connected to the thumb, so he could move the thumb and remaining finger to grasp any items.

Surgery was done without any problems; after 2 days he left the hospital. I brought him to his relatives in town (who took him to the doctor every week) and went to Lombok myself. I phoned them every other week and they told me "he's doing fine" and finally "we brought him back to his village".

So I stayed on Lombok until shortly before my return flight to Germany and visited Kadek and his family only in September. I was quite shocked and disappointed when I saw the result of the surgery: It had healed well and the hand was "fine", but the surgery did not bring the improvement we had hoped for. The hand is nearly as useless as before; he can bend the remaining two fingers a bit, but they don't touch each other, he cannot "close" them or grasp anything.

For a change not from my diary, but from the German "Latest news" on the Internet pages. Because nothing special had happened I just described a typical day of my life on Lombok / Indonesia:
Usually one to three children spend the night in my room, because the mother works, or because they live too far away and can only get our dinner if they don't have to go home, or just because they want to use our toys and games till evening instead of spending their time at home or in front of the neighbour's TV. So every morning at 6.20 the alarm clock rings, so these children go back home and from there, to school.
I go right back to sleep and usually after 7.30 get woken up by the next group of children. The school neither has enough rooms nor enough teachers, so grades 3 and 4 get their lessons in the afternoon. Those kids should actually wake me up at 8 o'clock, but usually from 7.30 sit in front of my room (not so quietly) waiting for their breakfast. As soon as I wake up we use playing cards as a lottery to determine 2 children who have to go and buy breakfast for all of us: Sticky rice and vegetables packed in banana leaves which we eat on the small veranda in front of my room or sitting in the garden.
Most days the children go to the beach after breakfast. And when they have returned, showered - and rid the room of all that sand that stuck to their feet, they take out all the games and toys - cards, dices, Memory and Malefitz, "4 wins" and chess and jigsaw puzzles of all sizes as well as colour pencils and that paper that I beg for in the photocopy shops: One side used and spoiled and the back good enough for colourful drawings.
Around 11 o'clock they usually go home; soon they have to pray and go to school after that. If I have to go to town with some of them, I may send the others away much earlier. If not, now is my time to be alone, to go to town, to do my shopping, to visit some friends, but I do not like to stay long, because after 1 o'clock the "morning kids" (including ALL the kids from secondary school) come back from school and want their lunch. And they are huuuungry!!! Because most of them have to go to school so early that I cannot give them breakfast. For good reason I never give them money - and at home they hardly ever get any food in the early morning. As soon as they arrive (or I come back while they are waiting already) we again draw cards to determine who has to go and buy lunch: Ordinary boiled rice with vegetables and a bit of meat or fish, once again packed in banana leaves, so we can eat it at the hotel.
These children - mostly a bit older - afterwards usually go on their own: to see friends, play soccer or to fly their kites.
At 5 p.m. the afternoon-pupils come back from school and want their late lunch (because their parents didn't give them any money to buy anything at school).
Just after 6 p.m. I tell all the children to go back home for their evening prayers and Koran-lessons.
It will be nearly 8 o'clock before the last children have come back and we can go for dinner. This is the richest and most expensive meal of the day and we take it in a small restaurant 200 meters down the road. Most of the children are not even filled with just one plate and I allow them to take another half plate of the same food - the typical Indonesian "mixed rice", i. e. boiled rice with small portions of all imaginable kinds of other food, such as two different vegetables, a little bit of minced meat, a small peace of chicken, some fish, some peanuts, half a boiled egg and so on.
After dinner I pay out any money that they need to pay at school the next day or buy anything, and write down their "orders" for what I have to buy in town and at the wholesale the next day.
Those days pass by so quickly - and are a lot of fun !!!

When I came to Denpasar (with a Video of the hand to show him) the doctor had gone to Jakarta and was due to come back one month later. So it will not be until 2003 that I can ask him and find out why it did not work out as expected and whether any more improvement is possible and wether we will have to do yet another operation.

News from Lombok during this summer is much better and I was really happy and satisfied. All the kids passed their exams, some had excellent marks and some were first or second in their class. Emis who had run away last year to work, was accepted at the same school again (though she lost one year by her "excursion"). Alimudin, who for years could not be controlled and had quit school twice already, started again after I stipulated that a good part of the starting expenses would have to be borne by himself and his family. Now he is eager, avoids any fight and quarrel and even the teachers are happy with his behaviour.

Besides two different uniforms and the sport dress now the children on Lombok have to buy yet another set of clothes: The islamic dress that they wear every other friday.

Many new children, a few new students, but we have increased our numbers significantly because many of our kids this year were promoted from elementary to junior highschool. So far the parents had paid the school themselves and the children came only for food, medicines and to play and paint. But the new school is much more expensive and I took responsibility for their payments. - And on Lombok alone we already have 5 Students (including one girl) in senior highschool (grades 10 to 12) which is even more expensive.
- So very slowly it is beginning to be "work" in Indonesia as well - at least during the weeks after the exams when all the children have to be admitted or re-admitted, - and I even have to help them filling forms and writing applications because most of the parents cannot help them with this.
One day we hired a minibus to go to town with 14 children and youths in one go to buy for all of them dresses, bags, shoes - and have 9 of them their hair cut. (The two youths who started in the electro wing of the technical senior highschool had been given in writing that on their first day they must come "in clean dress and with hair not longer than 1 centimetre" - !)

14 of them and 2 of us hired a car to go shopping in town.

Once I bought more then 350 exercise books all at once - but that wasn't enough; the remainder I bought later in smaller quantities.

The only disappointment was Mardin: He had sent me an e-mail in December telling me that he had finished his education, and it was not until August that I found out that he had not even handed in the last part of his exam papers. After a lot of discussions I once again gave him some money so he would not have to work and would have the time to finally write his paper, pay the rent for type writer and computer so hopefully he will get his certificate very soon.

Four pupils in new dresses:
3x primary an 1x higher secondary school.

And one girl of 12 years quit school because she was only in the 4th grade, quite tall, and was always teased by all the other much smaller children. With tears in her eyes she promised that she would continue to learn at home; but could by no means be convinced to go back to school.

I was very happy to notice that the people of this conservative Islamic village come to trust me more and more. When I started here, there were at best "mixed feelings": What does this foreigner want? Would he give food to our children that is not fit for Muslims? Would he even try to convert them to his religion or would he allow them to play at times when they should go home for prayer?
But now the parents come to my room to ask for help or even advice, to discuss the school problems of their children with me. The football club included me in the list of possible sponsors when they collected money to buy a first aid kit; and once, even the mayor of the village came to visit me.

Another piece of good news (that I realised only while closing my accounts before returning to Germany): Never before had so few children been sick; never before had I gone to the hospital or a doctor as seldom as this year.
I had the splint remove from Amir's leg that he had broken years ago in a car accident. And a small boy whose circumcision had been spoiled in the village I had properly circumcised at the hospital. Apart from this, my medical file this year shows only cough drops, eye drops, head lice and similar trifles.
 

From 15^th September I spent 4 weeks in Germany. Once again time was just running out and many things were unfinished when I left for Nepal.
What has happened since, you can read on the "latest news".

back to the top

The end...

Towards the end of this report I want to thank all those once again who helped me to continue my work.

Many of the readers of the English version of this report are active themselves helping children, working in hospitals, collecting and distributing medicines in Nepal or Indonesia or any other country.
For those who are not - and might want to support my work, I would like to include the necessary information:

Bank account:

Jürgen Dahm
account number 34095671
Sparkasse Rhein Neckar Nord (the name of the bank)
BLZ 670 505 05 (the German sort code that identifies every bank and the respective branch office)

If you send money from abroad please understand that even if you advise the amount in the European currency "Euro", my bank will still deduct 15,- Euro for any amount received from abroad. So if you have any friends with a bank account in Germany you might want to ask them to help transferring this money. And you will easily understand that it is more sensible to send a bigger amount once a year instead of small payments every other month.

Thank you !!!

And once again I would like to stress that I am happy for any letter or e-mail received; not just for money. If you have any questions, comments, recommendations for improvement, please feel free to contact me any time. I do answer every letter or e-mail (though sometimes you may have to wait a bit).
 

So for today I say Tschüß! to all of you and thank you once again - if it might only be for your patience to read all this.

 
Jürgen Dahm

back to the top