Neatkarīgās Tukuma Ziņas

Tuesday, March 14^th, 2006

Page 7

In Latvia, to help

On Thursday, March 9^th, our editorial office unexpectedly turned into an arena of international discussions. The heated discussions, which we had only planned to last an hour, didn’t want to come to an end, even after two trains and three buses were “missed”…

The guilty parties for such a stormy change in our office rhythm were five captivating American youths- Kristīne Bērziņa, Betsija Elizabete Lī, Samanta Hendersone, Alise Linna and Roberts Nelb of the elite Yale University, as well as Viljams Sulcs (William Shultz) the director of the volunteer mission “Pakapieni” that has recently moved to Tukums.

- How did you wind up in Latvia?

K. Bērziņa answers (Although she has lived in the US since she was four, she speaks Latvian well, practically without an accent. As she explains, this is because of her family supports for a folkloric and otherwise Latvian lifestyle- ed.)

- We are from a Yale University student club. We wanted to help kids somewhere in the world this spring, and so this project began. I joined the club to help. We decided to come to Latvia because I have family here, grandparents, and I also have the language abilities.

- Are you working with UNICEF?
- Originally that was the idea. We got in touch with the UNICEF Latvia representative Ilze Doskina, but we couldn’t work out the project through them. Similarly, the Mother’s Rapid Response Team did not need our help. We eventually found success with Mission “Pakapieni.”
V. Sulcs:
- We know a lot of families in the area that need help. We decided to offer assistance to Dace’s family in Zemīte. The situation there is rather unusual. The family with many little kids lives in the municipality’s building. They are having a tough time… The roof leaks, the walls have holes in them, snow even gets inside the rooms, and there are no toilet facilities, of course. When we asked the Kandava social service if they could help, we immediately got their “suggestion”- if it really is all that bad, then they can just takes the children away from their mother. And so stopped pursuing the issue with them…
I think these were very extreme conditions for the American youths, and I warned them about it, but they weren’t scared off…

- Who financed this project?
K. Bērziņa:
- We raised the money for the renovation at Yale. We organized a fundraising event with student music group performances and dinner.

- So how many people participated in this “Zemite action”, in which a municipal house was repaired?
- About 150 people came to the event. Thirty local restaurants donated food for the dinner and four singing groups and one dance troupe performed. We raised about $300 dollars. But we had to pay for the trip to Latvia ourselves. Part of the trip was of course paid for by our parents, but Robert and I work so we paid for it by ourselves.

- Where do you work?
Kristīne:
- I translate books into Braille for blind kids.
Roberts:
- I work for the program “America Reads”- I teach people to read. My mom is a reading specialist. (Responding to the journalist’s amazement at such a specific occupation…) Of course, doing such a job requires patience. When working with children one has to have empathy for their environment.

- Then this trip was very expensive for you?
Kristīne:
- Our plane tickets were inexpensive. In December SAS (Scandinavian Airlines) has one day when tickets to Latvia are inexpensive. On that day we called each other at 7:00am and bought tickets. The discount was about $300 dollars- a round trip ticket cost $436 dollars.

- What was first impression of Latvia?
- It is very snowy here, much like Connecticut. Of course, Latvia is very different from the USA, but there are many similarities. People live similarly. Just not the family we helped, although we could probably find a family like that in America too.
Roberts:
- It looks like everything is developing very quickly and economically improving.

- And what is different?
- The culture is different.

- For example?
Everyone:
- The food- that really is different. And also… we were taking a train from Ikšķile to Tukums. In America a train from the 1960s would be considered garbage, but here they look… quaint and interesting. They aren’t so old as to place in a museum, but still… everything is so European. So old.
Alise:
- And the landscapes! You drive and drive and suddenly you see an old hunting castle. I really liked Jaunmoku castle. It is in the middle of nowhere.
We were told to be careful of “latvāņi” (a poisonous plant), but America also has poisonous plants. For example, poison ivy is everywhere.
The lack of diversity is also striking. People were looking at us on the train all of the time. We aren’t used to the attention. We take the multicultural society in the US for granted.
- Other Europeans are happy about the ethnic situation in Latvia- having fewer immigrants than elsewhere. Right now the developed states in Europe are having problems with people, who are looking for better lives and bring along their cultures too.
Samanta:
- Racism isn’t noticeable in America, and if it is, it is condemned by society. One does not have to be afraid to call a black person a Negro as much as one did a few years ago, because they are starting to refer to themselves as such. But in some senses problem persist. It is significant that the Academy Award for Best Picture this year went to the film “Crash,” which specifically addresses these questions. Everyone, is a big or a small way, is capable of discrimination.

- Weren’t you afraid to come to such a far and unknown country?
- (Complete surprise and confusion.)
Scared? Of what? Why? There was nothing to be afraid of. We were only afraid on our flight here when our plane encountered a storm. The plan was tossing in all directions and we could hear the wind howl. And they when we found out that we were over Greenland…

- But terrorism threats? How did your parents react to your decision to come?
- No, that kind of fear only paralyzes people. We didn’t think about it. Our parents supported us. They said that we were finally doing something useful. They want us to stop living in a bubble and experience the real world! Here at least we could really help.
Kristīne:
- Right now it is Spring Break and students traditionally spend their breaks drinking in the Bahamas or Mexico. But we aren’t unique in wanting to do service during break. Right now there are about five groups from Yale that are doing service, helping others, during the break. There are groups that are in Louisiana and Florida repairing damage from the fall storms. There are 5000 people at Yale and most had to do community service in order to be admitted. Currently about 75% of the student body is involved in some service organization.
Samanta:
- These days one needs to complete a certain number of hours of community service in order to finish high school. Volunteerism is also a component of many academic and elite organizations. It is a part of the American culture and it is important to teach it to children. Even in elementary schools children participate in book drives to give books to poor families. It is considered proper to help others if you have the means.
Alise:
- You were saying that the government supports many cultural activities, for example, dancing and singing groups, but it is strange that the government does not support essential things. For example, the family that we helped does not have a toilet! This family has asked for help from the authorities, but they have not been helped because of lack of funding.

- What did you did in their apartment?
- We were in Zemite for three days. The apartment is on the second floor of an old building. It has three rooms and a small kitchen. When we arrived, the home was really in a catastrophic state. All of the walls were black, the paint was peeling, and there were holes in the walls in places so that we could see the wooden lattice on the outside. The family was saying that they even had had snow in the room. At first we didn’t know what to start with, should we deal with the floor, or the window that was about to fall out. There were drafts everywhere and it was cold. Our budget also couldn’t cover everything.

- Usually these families don’t complain about their conditions because their children could be taken way!
Roberts:
- Well that is the dilemma. We visited the Irlava orphanage. Everything was so wonderfully nice and homey, but children need families. Families should be helped to take care of themselves, especially if the people want to help themselves. Dace was very thankful for our help, because no one had given her assistance before.
Even if the parents aren’t too active in fixing up their situations, the kids can be more ambition. Santa (9) and Gints (8), who were home to protect themselves from the flu epidemic, helped us all of the time. They helped us take off the old paint, spackle the walls and paint them too. They wanted to be involved in the whole process.

- How did you learn to renovate a room? Did you have experience?
- We had a professional help us, a father of a different large family, and we are so thankful for his help. All of us have some experience in repair work, but none of us could image how horrible the apartment was. Samantha and Robert have worked in an organization founded by US President J. Carter that build homes for the poor. This program also sends homes to Poland and Germany. However, none of us have worked in a home this old, so without our advisor we would not have known what to do.

- You make it seem that the world really could be a better place! My impression of America has been poor because of the Iraq war, but you have changed it.
Samanta:
- Many people oppose the war in the states and we are against it too. But we are also against the attitude America had during World War Two, when it did not participate in international relations- when it was isolationist. The situation is unfavorable, but in the beginning America believed that we were helping the people. We are a rich and influential country, so we shouldn’t ignore the suffering of others in the world.

- But do you agree that the war is a profitable business?
- I agree that this situation is corrupt. For example, Bush has a lot of friends in the oil business. Cheney owns a military production complex.

- What have you gained from this trip?
Kristīne, Samanta:
- It is hard to say what we have gained, because we still are caught up in the moment and we haven’t had time to reflect.
Roberts:
- We are happy that we have given the family something tangible- a nice, sunny room. We have gained a new experience and seen a different culture. But the most important thing, of course, is the realization that we can go to the other side of the world and change something for the better. Of course we could not have done this without the help of others, though. Mission “Pakapieni” helped us so much.
And also, we now have this feeling, that if we want to, we can achieve anything!