Basketball at Midnight

It’s not cold, at least. Well, not right now, in the middle of the day. It gets cold at night, but I’m surviving well enough.

I’m still here in Leh, the irrigated river valley surrounded by frigid desert, surrounded by snow-capped mountain peaks. It’s pretty enough, especially when taking tea in the mid afternoon on a rooftop restaurant, but we can’t leave. On day two, when I was still in a state of perpetual headache from the acute mountain sickness, it rained all day. That storm, when it reaches the peaks to the south, caused a landslide that closed the pass. For two days, people have been saying it will be open in “2 or 3 days,” which I suppose means that they have no idea. A couple peppy Canadians who already have a deposit on a jeep were told “well, maybe 10 days” on the first day. That may end up being nearly correct.

So we’ll see where I can get to next. I may get to Srinigar after all.

I wrote this on September 9 but apparently mis-saved it. I’ll leave it here for the minute in case it is of any interest to the readers.

I wonder if I can make a statement along the lines of “A state’s biggest issues crowd the streets.” I’m not exactly sure how to phrase it, or even how to explain it, but I’ll give some examples and see if you can figure it out. In the USA, if you haven’t noticed, we are inundated by law firms. Walking down a street, browsing through the phone book, even watching TV, there are constant advertisements and offices for lawyers. I have not seen a similar level anywhere else.

As I mentioned years ago, in Canada, the would-be law firms of hte USA are replaced by small little medical clinics. I know they have a socialized medical system and that most Canadians I’ve spoken with are very happy about it (and most conservative Americans who attack it only have information about the inaccessibility of expensive, high-end procedures that very few people have a need for), but there’s got to be a more efficient system….

In India, on the other hand, the streets are clogged with institutes and colleges advertising every type of degree : B.Education, B.Commerce, B.Engineering, every type of computer-certification (Microsoft, Linux, Sun…), etc etc etc etc. Although it’s nice to know that there are places of higher education, I recently wondered in an email with Deepani whether or not there is any type of accreditation, degree requirements, or checks on an institute to make sure they are providing what can reasonably be called an ‘education.’

On a travelling note, as the title also notes, I have made it to Udaipur, Rajastan, and have found it an okay city. Due to the poor monsoons in the last decade, the massive lake for which it is known is 3/4 dry, and the city island palace sits in a puddle that, on one side, has a crabgrass plain. Despite my cynicism, it’s a reasonable enough place, and once you get past the mobbing tourist scene, people are extraordinarily friendly and smiling, and the city is serene.

I left Puhkar, and it’s daily highs of about 90 degrees, at around noon, two days ago. After a train ride, sleeping for 3 hours in the airport, and a brief plane ride, I arrived in Leh, Kashmir, India yesterday morning. Becky, a friend from Washington University, met me in the airport, and we’ll travel through Northern India together before she heads home in the first week of October.

The altitude of Leh is 3,505 m (11,499 ft), which is higher than any point in the USA East of the Rocky Mountains. Because of that, it is cold. Very cold, especially when the sun’s not shining. And especially since very few places are actually heated. I bought a wool hat yesterday and will probably get a jacket and gloves today.

Otherwise, it is quite beautifully set in a valley surrounded by mountains. I’ve been slowly getting over my past sickness (a bacterial throat infection, as was finally discovered), and now am dealing with acclimitizing to the elevation and accustoming myself to the cold. We’re hoping to take the road to Manali out in a few days, assuming the snows haven’t come yet. The road crosses a pass that is 5,328 m high (17,480 ft), which I believe will be the highest point I have ever ascended to. Most of my Rocky Mountain backpacking trips top out around 12-13,000 feet. It’s also the second highest motorable road in the world. The highest being on the road north from Leh.

The Ladakan people are most closely related to Tibetans, and they are similarly Buddhist and not nearly as aggressive as the Indians I have spent my last two weeks travelling with. China and India actually have a border dispute for the region Northeast of here, and while I don’t really think China should have any more control of Tibetan people than it has, the culture here is quite distinctly not Indian. I would support splitting Kashmir between Pakistan and Tibet if Tibert were ever liberated. Not that I’d have a vote.

Internet, also, is very expensive here, and so I will not be on very often for the next week or so. I hope you all understand. Take care.

So, I am sick. Fever with no other major symptoms, which was quite worrying to me. Fever and diarrhea, no problem! Fever by itself, cause for concern.

So, yesterday, I went to the pharmacist to see what he said, and he gave me some paracetamol and sent me on my way. That stuff works well. I’m highly supportive. I’ve heard about it in Malaysia but didn’t actually know what it was. I thought that perhaps it was a new-fangled fever remedy that was more effective than tylenol/acetaminophen and didn’t have the problems of advil/ibuprofen. Actually, it’s just the Eurasian name for acetaminophen, both are named by condensing the full chemical name.

Today I went to the hospital, figuring I should at least get a blood test for malaria. Although Andrea was excited to hear of the chance of hallucinations like those I had under the duress of mono, I didn’t think Malaria would be a great thing to acquire.

At about 10:00am, I walked into the hospital. In the entryway is a man at a desk. He asks me what is wrong, I tell him “fever.” He pauses to see if I say anything else, gives me a slip of paper, tells me to write my name and go into the next room (still not really in the hospital proper) and see the “doctor.”

So I go in. After about 30 seconds for him to finish talking to the previous patient, he calls me. Takes the paper. Asks me what’s wrong. I tell him “fever.” He asks, “anything else?” I respond, “No.”

So he writes down two prescriptions, one for paracetamol (again) and one for a general anti-biotic. Then he writes down a list of tests to be done. He tells me, “Go to the lab, have these tests done, and if there is no other problem, fill these prescriptions.” He then gives me directions to the lab.

I go to the lab, and after a couple minutes, a man draws a vial of blood and gives me a bottle. He tells me to come back at 12:00 with the bottle full of pee. Total time from arriving at the hospital: about 15 minutes.

I go back to my guesthouse, rest for an hour and half, and make my way back, peeing as instructed somewhere in the interim. I arrive, the same man meets me after a minute and asks me if I can wait 10 minutes. He tells me to put the bottle in the corner, goes into the back, and I can hear some machines whirring. Somewhere along the way he takes some samples from the bottle. He comes back out, writes down interesting numbers about my lymphocyte count and hemoglobin and the negativity of my malaria test, and puts the papers into an envelope. He gives me this envelope and goes on to the next person, who walked in a couple minutes earlier.

Confused, I ask him if I should go back to the doctor at the hospital. He says, “If you want, but you’ll have to go in the evening. They’re not taking new patients anymore. You’re tests are normal. You have the prescription if you want to get it filled.”

Total time for all medical involvement : about 40 minutes.

Total cost of the visit, the blood tests, and the medication : about US$10

I reminsce about how often I was not even seen by the doctor after 40 minutes in the waiting room.

Pushkar, Rajastan, India.

This is, perhaps, the last stop I make before Delhi Domestic Airport. I’m about set for a break, and Pushkar is as good as any other. My other option is to go to Jaipur, the capital, which just seems like far too much hastle for me right now. I don’t plan to stay in Delhi at all, and I’m stopping at the station outside of Delhi and going straight to the airport. Becky, from Washington University, will be meeting me there (she arrives at the international wing around 9pm), and then we’ll camp out in the airport in preparation for our 5:00 am flight to Leh. If you’re up on the news and are worried about the bombs in and around Delhi, don’t worry: I will not be entering the city proper, and I am fleeing to peaceful Kashmir almost immediatley. I’ll admit that there’s some irony in saying that.

Back to Pushkar: it’s the end of the Ganesha Chuthuri festival, which I’ve heard translated as “Welcome Ganesh!” and “Ganesha’s Birthday” (the source of the first translation was more credible, but you never know). While I’m typing this, poeple are slowly moving towards the lake with their variously decorated Ganesh figures to dunk or throw them in. In the past, they would make the figures out of clay at the beginning (it’s an 11 day festival), and then gather at night for some dancing or performances or just loud music. Then on the last day, toss them into the lake/river, whatever you have available. With the advent of plastics and chemicals, they seem to be able to make brighter, more detailed Ganeshas, but I hope they’re not left in the lake.

Pushkar itself, aside from the parades of Ganeshas, is a tranquil little town in a valley surrounded by hill and ridges. There are no autorickshaws, and thus no autorickshaw salesmen, which also greatly cuts down on the number of people trying to sell me marijuana. It is also, possibly, the city most holy to Brahma, popularly termed ‘the creator’ in English. His wife/consort is Saraswati (Goddess of the Arts and Intelligence, I believe). There’s only a few temples in the world dedicated to Brahma, and Raga told me a while ago that this is the only one in India. Apparently he came down to bathe in the Ghats, which are similar to the beaches in Lake Mohawk: a small access goes down to the water’s edge so people can swim (wash). But, there’s no sand. Anyway, he came down to bathe and also to perform some ceremony. Saraswati had better things to do, and Brahma, dope that he is, immediately married someone for the sake of the ceremony. There’s commitment for you. Anyway, Saraswati was mad and proclaimed that no one will worship Brahma outside of Pushkar. It’s possible that everyone, upon hearing the news, decided to dismantle their temples to Brahma as not to anger Saraswati (really, do you want the Goddess of Intelligence to forsake you?). Then again, maybe no one really worshipped Brahma to begin with and it was a convenient justification so his admirers didn’t feel bad.

That brings me to the Christian conspiracy regarding Hinduism, which I’m convinced was invented to facilitate converts and to convince those already converted that Hinduism is just wayward Christianity. In the west, they seem to propose Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva as a Hindu “trinity” of Creator-Preserver-Destroyer and, of course, say that Brahma is the paramount god. Just as Hannukah is not actually a very important Jewish celebration (it is no Chrismas-equivalent, as some like to think), Brahma is not actually a very important god, as far as I’ve found and read. He may have created the fabric of the world at some time (though, both Vishnu and Shiva have stories in which they, actually, did this), but it seems in everyday life he’s fairly withdrawn and unconcerned with reality. Most of the stories I’ve read that include him talk about demons doing favors for him and tricking him into granting them superpowers, which Vishnu, Shiva, and Paravati (Shiva’s wife) have to then track down and eliminate. Just like in the Pushkar story, he’s rather a dope. Furthermore, with the reincarnation aspect of Hinduism, Shiva as destroyer ends up being responsible for re-creation as well, because destruction leads to immediate and manifest recreation; there is no Brahma-intervention to do it. So really, at least in my opinion and understanding, Brahma doesn’t deserve many temples.

Now, for you Hinduism buffs who are just thirsting for more, you shouldn’t get Brahma the dopey-god-character confused with Brahman, which is more of an “Ultimate Reality.” Christian theorists might better latch onto this to provide a good tie in to Hinduism. Brahman is the real 42. The real essence of life, the universe, and everything (these are not “separate” in Hinduism). The separate gods (Vishnu, Shiva, etc) have been named and given personalities because the average Rishi-human can’t really conceive and understand of the truth of Brahman (Brahman works in mysterious ways) and needs the personalities to get an idea of a being greater than humans. Part of attaining enlightenment is to realize that there is no “separation,” whether between Vishnu and Shiva, or the self and the universe: simply to understand Brahman and that one is part of Brahman.

Gender

I’m not sure how much I complained about gender roles and separation in Malaysia, but I had a lot to say, regardless of whether it was said. Well, even if it wasn’t written or you forget, summon up your various preconceptions towards Muslims when it comes to gender roles, even if they’re overblown. Now let’s talk about the Hindus up here in Rajastan.

Saying that there is a severe gender separation doesn’t quite cover it anymore. The women’s areas of the castles were basically latticed so that they could watch what was happening in the nearby courtyards, but that no one could see them. That’s inventive, I admit, and interesting to see the craftsmanship since the lattices were more or less carved out of stone. One of the “events,” however, that it was noted that they might watch was the coronation of the Maharaja. But what that means is that the wife could not even be present for the coronation! Pure silliness.

At one time, the Maharaja and wife (I never got a Hindi name for the wife. They translated it to “queen,” I think) went to London, and in keeping with tradition, her normal travelling veiled accouterments were taken with her so that no one in England could see her either. This created quite a stir with the paparazzi, as you might expect, and they followed them around the entire time. In the museum they had a picture of a veiled/latticed carrying thing that was carried by 6 men, and I’m still curious if that is what they brought for her. If it was, it would probably be hilarious to watch six guys carrying a enclosed buggy down the streets of London. Anyway, so one photographer got a picture of her ankle. It being the only picture of her that any of them got, they were going to publish it in the papers near the article.

The Maharaja estate bought every single copy of the pictures because of the chance that the picture would get back to India.

Ridiculous.

Jodhpur

I stalled out in Jodhpur for three days, and am now in Jaisalmer. Jodhpur was not exactly packed with things to keep me busy, but it had a magnificent fort/palace/castle on a rocky outcropping in the middle of the old city, and that gave a fantastic panorama to just absorb. Jaisalmer, also, has a similar set up, but it feels significantly hotter here. In Jodhpur, I also finished up Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky, which was a bit tedious at the end with the trial, but I was motivated to get through it. When Jodhpur began to shut down at about 9pm, I spent the last two evenings talking with a recently wed Swedish couple that were fantastic. The wife (whose name I forget, but sounded somewhat like Kinkya) was a singer, originally from Hungary, who had emigrated to Sweden early in life. The husband (Gustoff), while running a furniture making shop, I believe, planned to be a writer, which drew a lot of our conversations to literature and culture and philosophy. The wife actually had consumed some disagreeable bacteria somewhere and had some problems on their second day, and I tried to help out with some naturalish medication I had found in Malaysia.

Gustoff had not read Dostoyevsky, but when I mentioned Notes from Underground and it’s involvement with the “hyperconscious,” which is, in my opinion, a better work if you want to start reading Dostoyevsky, he became very excited. The notion of ‘hyperconsciousness’ was exactly the focus of his own writing, and he was elated to have an actual “word” for it now. I wish I could take credit for the word, but it wasn’t mine.

There were points of personal irony, as well, in some of our conversations. I noted that he thought about things in a certain way that was reminiscent of how I often think (thought) about things, and in watching the train of thought I realized how possibly out of context my own comments often are. One of our conversations roughly follows below.

Me: “I wonder whether or not obesity is more of a factor of having your own transportation. So much of the food here is fried or drenched in oil, and I think if more people had cars or motorbikes and didn’t have to go 5 km to the market to get their rice, they’d be fat in much more similar rates to the west. I noticed that in Malaysia, where personal transportation ownership is just now becoming common, the majority of people are becoming so.”

Gustoff: “You know, I was reading that it’s not the fried foods or the butter that makes people fat. It’s the sugars.”

Me: “Sugars?”

Gustoff: “Yes. All the processed sugars in the foods. That’s what makes people fat.”

Me: “I’m not sure if it has the same impact in Ind…..”

Gustoff: “Some of the India are already becoming fat. You can see it, especially when the women wear saris, but it’s the sugars. Something about them. There’s a new diet in Sweden, and I’m going to try it when I go back. It’s called the Stone Age Diet. It’s low…. low… What are the types of food? There’s proteins, and what.”

Me:“Carbohydrates. Low Carb. A low carb diet- We have that to, but we call it the Atkins Diet. Atkins, I believe, died of a heart attack.”

Although much of India is similar to my 2004 journey (although that journey was to other parts of the country), I have found a couple very notable things that are quite different:

Cell Phones

Cell phones are now ubiquitous, and everyone except for myself seems to have at least one, and often two. Why they need two is beyond me. Originally, only television struck me as being oddly ubiquitous (long time readers may remember my observation that in one of the poorest areas in Laos which quite possibly had only one outlet in the town, powering a fluorescent street lamp. The townspeople had also plugged a television into the same outlet and the city would turn out at night to watch the community TV.

Cameras

Cameras and photos are, as of yet, not quite universal in India. In Malaysia, everyone’s cell phone had a camera, but here it’s still only a reasonably small segment of the population that appears to carry around digital cameras or cameras in their phone. What has changed, however, is the attitude people have towards cameras. I had read in my first journey that some people felt that taking a photo would capture their soul and that one should absolutely ask before taking any photo. Many people turned me down, at the time, and most others would inquire if there was some way to get a copy before I left. As I was still using a film camera at the time, that was usually not possible.

In my present experience, however, not only do people allow you to take their picture, but they oftentimes demand it, as if there is some value to the camera trapping your soul. Maybe it will keep it safe from harm or anything that one does while the soul is thus captured would not be taken into account at the next round of karma-judgment. I just returned from visiting the fort in Jodhpur, where, often taking landscapes and cityscapes, a group of people would come up to me and say, “One snap of us!” When these things first happened, I was wary, thinking it was a trick to ask me for money (which also happens, especially in temples and by full-time leaches), but no. I took the snap, they all said “Thank you” and shook my hand, and went merrily on their way. There is no interest in how the photo came out, or in getting a copy, or in anything else you might expect. And this scenario happened not once or twice, but has been fairly continuous throughout my journey.

In converse, everyone that has a photo-taking device wants to have a picture with me, which is also a bit tedious. I made the mistake of sitting down on a bench in the previously menioned fort, after which storms of Indian visitors came up to me, and without even asking, sat down next to me while their friend or family member took a picture of us together. Then, they exchanged places; then they had their sister sit down next to me; then her child; then their mother; then their 3rd cousin twice removed….. etc etc etc. It did not seem to matter to them that they didn’t even know my name. Again, they said ‘Thank you,’ shook my hand, and moved on.

I left Kalleda on the 3rd of September, and although I began to write a post shortly afterwards, inconsistent internet and lack of time has prevented me with giving you a final update of my status. Let’s review:

I first went to Hyderabad for a few hours, where I was treated to several exit-type interviews with some of the ‘grandparents’ of the foundation. Since I linked you to IRDF’s website last time, I’ll link you to the somewhat nicer website run by the locals, RDF, which is here, although it may not work right with Internet Explorer. I explained my observation and thoughts to them, and need to follow up with a written document. My work is never done.

Then I went to Pune (pronounced, and at one time spelled, Poona), my home and native land. Back when I was a member of Atma, the Hindu Student Association of Washington University, the other members decide it just would not do that i was both white and not-a-Hindu, and so they invented a history for me somewhat different than the one I had known up to that point. You see, I was acutally born in Pune, Maharastra, India; my parents were working for the university there. When I was about 18 months old, they decided they wanted to raise me in the USA and so returned with me at that time. Thus, I only remember a couple basic words (of which my friends reminded me). It went over quite well in general, although Elyce took it by surprise. When she asked why I was a member of Atma, and I responded as instructed, she was shocked, “How do I not know this about you?” Elyce, sadly, had known me before the existence of Atma, and thus before I was told my true and balanced background. Thus, the moment of confusion.

So, I finally completed my pilgrimage back to Pune. On the whole, it was a reasonable enough city. The districts on the south side of the river were nice to walk through and take some coffee. There is also a rather liberal Ashrama several kilometers outside the city, which I gather promotes meditation and enlightenment through sex and zennis (zen tennis. yes. Zen Tennis). Not being a big fan of Karma Cola (the term is shamelessly stolen from a book I read in ‘04)– i.e., the packaging of “Indian Mysticism” for western tourist dollars– making a further pilgrimage to the ashrama was not on the list of activities. I’m much more interested in making a pilgramage to the wellspring of the river Ganga (Shiva’s river) later in the trip, which is a legitimate pilgramage point.

After my day in Pune, I took an early morning bus to Aurangabad, which was an extremely nice city. Set in the eastern part of Maharastra, it is lush and green and seemed somewhat well off. Although the affluent areas of Pune were lovely, the rest of the city was rather congested and hectic. Aurangabad, on the other hand, was just a generally nice place. I did manage to find a couple slums, but they were no worse the average of most other cities. It sits relatively high on the Deccan and so the temperature was quite reasonable, as well. There are green ridges around the city that provide a beautiful backdrop. I say ridges because they run along for quite a distance and look trapezoidal, not hillish.

The original point of coming to Aurangabad, beside it being a good 1/2 day journey from Pune, was to visit Ellora caves, a set of about 30 ‘cave temples’ dug into a mountain. There is a mix of Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain caves, all from different eras 1000-2000 years ago. As far as ancient rock-cut caves with intricate scultures go, it was splendid (pictures pending). Aurangabad also contains the ‘Mini Taj Mahal’ which was built several decades after its big brother, to hold the wife of a different king.

Now, I am in Indore, a night’s busride from Aurangabad. I expect that tomorrow I will be in Udaipur, Rajastan, a night’s bus ride from Indore. From Udaipur, I will see the Land of the Kings (a rough translation of Rajastan). Rajastan-Delhi-Agra is the normal tourist route for most European tourists to India. It’s supposed to be fabulously beautiful, and possibly because of the tourist attention, extremely hawkish. In Indore, I am already beginning to see the increased aggression by auto drivers. Becky, a friend from university, will be arriving in about 10 days, and then we’ll head to Kashmir, and down through Uttaranchal (wellspring of the Ganga!) and Uttar Pradesh. Don’t worry mom, we’re going to the safe part of Kahmir nearer the Chinese boarder. Not the part you hear about on the news.

Indore is a complete contrast to Aurangabad. It’s ugly and dirty. Trash is all over the streets, and the pigs and cows are frequently eating from the piles. I don’t see many buildings more than 2 stories high, and there aren’t many actual restaurants. I’m curious if that has a reflection on the wealth – that most people don’t make enough to go out to eat, even though restaurants are inexpensive. Aurangabad, on the other hand, felt ‘affluent’ even though it wasn’t noted to be so. It *was* noted, however, to house the 5 major breweries of Maharastra. Maybe that has something to do with it. The more drinking an Indian city does, the more clean and relaxed it becomes.

Anyway. cheers! Until next time.

So, coming back from a successful Teachers’ Class in which I had them act out different scenarios to reinforce their ability to ask and answer questions that didn’t deal with family members’ names, I found a couple primary school girls around the corner from my room, fighting. Well, really, I thought they were dancing, and as I rounded the corner and saw one doing a fake flying kick, I did the same move in dance improvisation.

They laughed at me for a few minutes and said some things in Telegu. I asked, “Dancing?” And they said, “No, sir! Fighting!” They had a brief pause to see my bewilderment, and did a set of flying fake kicks to show me. Then they paused again, looked at me, and said, “Sir? Dancing?” And started dancing, which I tried to mimic. In the laughing and cheering, the rest of their horde poked their heads out from the courtyard doorway and came running. There was much dancing and laughing as they tried to teach me their dance moves. Then, something happened that I didn’t quite follow. One of them said “Sir! Fighting!” and they all started doing flying kicks, then they all yeled me their names and their mothers’ names and their brothers’ names, competing to be the loudest. They took me by the hands and brought me into the courtyard whence they had spawned. There, a teacher was instructing a group of boys, very seriously, on some type of choreographed dance. The girls, much their juniors, jumped over the little wall and lined up behind the boys, alternating between random dancing and a very satirical parody of the instruction. I found it vastly amusing.

What is Education?

That was the question of the day yesterday. My students were in mid-term exams, which, thank Shiva, consume only 1.5 or 2 days a term (I know nothing about frequency), and so on the first day, I visited a couple other RDF funded schools. RDF, the Rural Development Foundation, in India, and with sister organization IRDF (India Rural Development Fund, a non-profit organization) in the USA, runs the schools and were my contact to the school. You can find their website by clicking here.

Anyway, so I visited two other primary schools in the area, both about 10 km away from Kalleda Rural School (KRS), where I have been teaching. I also visited the Junior College, which is next door to KRS and continues to be under construction. Presently, they have two classes each for two years. When visiting, the assistant principal asked me, since I had no school yesterday, if I would teach a couple classes. A “couple” became four, and amounted to 75% of the school. Because the 9th grade as KRS was also finishing it’s exams in the morning, I had to return to KRS in the later afternoon to teach the two sections there and teach the teachers class. More efficient use of my time (and here I thought I would have a break!).

Anyway, so for a single class in a vacuum, I was in a quandary about what lesson to teach. No chance for carryover or follow up. Only one class. “Junior College” students, which were actually 11th and 12th grade, and equivalent in age to our 10th and 11th graders. So I did what I usually do, I brought two lessons. The first was my lesson using Chapter 1 of The Little Prince, modified for a simple-English reading audience. I love this lesson because Chapter 1 is relatively self-contained, and it has a lot to say for folks who are looking to read into it.

Unfortunately, it has too much to say, and the students were having too hard of a time just grasping the entire situation to do any good analysis into the story. So I abandoned it for my easier lesson, which was quite a bit less “subtle,” shall we say.

It opens with the question, “WHAT IS EDUCATION?”, which I write on the black board, and spend a while having the students give possible answers. The trick, of course, is to keep on pressing the students until they run out of “learning! studying! doing when in school!” and have to jump to other areas and levels of life. “Discipline” was common; some students said, “developing myself,” “living a good life,” “learning anything,” “going from uncivilized to civilized,” and “going from illiterate to literate.” It was fun in the first class, I began to ask the difference between the last two, but before I could get the question out, one of the students said, “But illiterate people can be civilized!”

Then, I handed out the article I wrote, partially inspired by a short quote from, who else, Harry Chapin. They read it, and after some comprehension questions, we moved to the “analysis questions” which examined the article in the context of school and education, asked why we don’t teach “these questions” in schools. We then go back to the What is a good education? question and look at possibly conflicting answers on the board. I try to finish by raising the questions “Who defines ‘education’”, “what is a good education”, and “how do we make sure that people are learning this good education”?

Of course, these are questions I can’t very well answer, and I had it pretty well timed that I could leave most of the classes very appropriately with one of those questions hanging at the end. Devious, I know. A couple times, to my amusement, a student would ask me, “Ok, can you give us the answer now?” Although I would usually immediately reply (for the sake of irony), “Why would I ask you a question if I knew the answer?”, I would lead to the more appropriate question, “If we knew the answer to this question, why wouldn’t we have done it by now?” When I could, I would point to a student’s answer of What is education? that involved discovering new things, but not all classes had that. I also was amused by a young woman that said, in regard to the reading, “You don’t talk about poor people in USA schools because there are none!” and a dispassionate young scientist who, holding science above consideration for starving people, said, “If we want to know what the people ate, we can send the students to watch them and write it down, since they’re not going to class.”

Then, in one of the classes, we were completing the circle and had finished our questions on what a good education is. We were now talking about Who defines education? and How do we make sure our children are learning a good education? One wonderful young woman called me over and said, “Can I say education is Facing problems and trying to solve them?” She actually didn’t quite say it like that an strugged with some of the words. But, Eureka! I wrote it on the board to show the class like this “Facing problems and Trying to solve them.” I said I don’t know that I can say that this is a final answer, but I really like this answer, because (1) it involves actually facing the problems- not ignoring that they are there, not writing them out of the textbook, but facing them. And (2) Trying to solve them. It doesn’t say you succeed in solving them, because there are lots of problems that have not been solved in the history of civilization, whatever that is. But it is facing them, and trying to find answers, that is, possibly, a good definition of education.

And for your reading enjoyment, I give you the article itself:

Different Types of Education

The education you get from school is extremely valuable. It will help you to become a doctor or a teacher or an engineer. There are, however, some important things that school does not teach, and there is no way to know if children are learning these things.

Let us think about the US holiday of Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a very important holiday for people in the USA. It happens at the end of November, and people will travel long distances to come together for dinner. For many families, it is the biggest and most important dinner of the year.

For people who live in the Northern USA, Thanksgiving has even more importance. The last harvest begins in October, and the weather becomes cold in November. Often, the first snow storm will happen before Thanksgiving. For many, Thanksgiving is the last day that they can play sports outside, and the dinner has foods from the growing season that just ended. After Thanksgiving, people will need to either buy food that is sent by truck from the South or eat food they have stored from the warmer months.

Because it is now too cold to grow food, Thanksgiving is often the time when schools will have a food drive. Students will go from house to house and ask their neighbors for food to help give a Happy Thanksgiving to the poor and hungry in the community. This has become a tradition in the USA, and many schools collect hundreds or thousands of kilograms of food to give to poor and hungry people.

Please imagine the Monday after Thanksgiving. The students have finished their vacation and are coming back to school. They remember the big dinner for Thanksgiving, visiting their aunts and uncles, and playing the last sports games outside. They also remember the food drive that happened on the last day of school. Now, imagine the morning assembly, and think about what would happen if the headmaster gave this speech:

“Attention everyone! Teachers and students! Our food drive last week was the biggest food drive in the history of the school! We collected enough food to feed 193 families for the entire week of Thanksgiving! Now, we just have one question to think about, and we are going to try to solve it now. We are going to cancel all of our classes for the entire week, and we are just going to see if we can find a good answer to this question. The food drive brought in enough food to feed 193 families for the entire week of Thanksgiving.” The headmaster pauses, and then continues, “Now, what are those 193 families going to eat next week?”

This is an important type of education that is not taught in schools.