flevente@yahoo.co.uk

September-October 2001:   five students at Tvind’s KwaZulu Natal Experimental College in Durban, South Africa, complained to the police about their treatment at the college and their inability to get money back.        South African police arrested and questioned the Dutch school principal and considered fraud charges.

The case was  dropped after three weeks, for ‘lack of evidence’.

Here is Lazlo’s story to Tvind Alert:

We have asked the investigators (Captain Chatty and Inspector Govender) at Pinetown`s Police Station,
Commercial Fraud Unit if we can tell you our experiences and everything we know about the case.
They agreed on it. It also means that they must know much more about the things that were going on or are
going on at Kwa-Zulu Natal Experimental College.

The following story is a draft of what happened, we have tried to summarize the things.

Currently there are five state witnesses Robert Westendorp (Holland), Elza Pavsic (Slovenia), Wan-Li
Jia “Nicky” (China), Laszlo Fazekas (Hungary), Adrienne Fulep Fazekasne (Hungary). There were two
more people with us but they made an agreement with Humana so that they drop the charges. Actually this
does not mean anything in this criminal case, even if they made an agreement it can only mean that they have
no further towards the school whatever the court decision may be.

The director is Ester Boere (Holland), and the school`s address is 5/11 Richmond Rd. Pinetown-Durban.

Our group started the programme on the 6th August, originally we were 16, then two more people came. It
did not take long for us to realize that there wasn`t a constructive organisation at KNEC.

We had to attend long and meaningless meetings about  unrelevant topics and we experienced a great lack of organisation.

We did have a few lectures in the beginning during which occasions we were introduced to the school`s
budget. The largest amount of it was the rental costs of the school: They pay R 20,000 a month.  We found it quite strange to pay such a huge amount of money given the fact that usual rental costs in S.A. are much lower and that it seemed unreasonable to rent such a huge complex of buildings for some forty people.  We asked several times who the owner of the building  was and we were answered that it was a private company.

Later one of our teachers – accidentally in a heated conversation – let us know that the owner of that
company was a group called “The Teachers` Group”.The remaining lectures were not worth of mentioning.
Many people were quite surprised when they had to learn that KNEC was never a College, it is registered
as a private Company, it is more like a driving school making it actually illegal for them to ask S.A.
Embassies to give study permits for its students, which they by the way did.

The building complex of the school stands of 12 bigger buildings and several other buildings as well, like
offices, huge garages, kitchens etc. altogether about 20-22 buildings. The teachers and the Director live in a separate building up on a hill where they have their private kitchen and showers. In one of the buildings you can even find a perfect but deserted auditorium, we never used it. There is a common male and a common female shower for the students. The room that we used for classroom was above the laundry on the first floor, it was quite strange to see that at the end of the stairs there was no railing making it very dangerous.

When we asked for the internet to the surprise of most of us we found that all the students can use only one
computer between 9.30-11.30 p.m.  It was very strange, since in their brochure there was a photo of a computer room with lots of computers.    In August the school`s phone bill came out to be (according to the Dirctor) R 16.000 (US$ 2000), which they didn’t pay, so the telephone company switched off the line from 3Sept. From then even our limited internet was gone and we couldn’t keep in touch with the outside.
The director on a group meeting suggested that the bill was so much because of the students, however none
of us had any access to the school’s phone.

Our team was the 3rd team at the school, it was called the August Team.  Since the previous Team, the April Team leaves in the second half of October, we had plenty of opportunities to talk with them. They told us that when they arrived in April they all had to live in the same room for six weeks and the only activity they were doing was painting the building, which we found very unusual, since at the time we already knew that the school
didn’t own the buildings but rent them from a private company. After they finished with the painting and repairing work they started fundraising for the school, however they were never informed what the money they collected was spent on.

Just to remind you some of these people had to pay US$ 2500 to participate in this programme.

So what is fundraising in S.A. if you study at KNEC?  First you yourself have to apply for a fundraising
permit, which is essential if you want to perfom street collection. If you have it, you`ll have to arrange transport to the place where you have the permission to, transport, possibly for free.   Once you are there you must stay there and fundraise  for the whole week, sometimes for two weeks in a row.  What else do you need ?
You don’t need to worry about food, because you get  R15 (US$ 1.70) for a day from the school provided you
keep the receipts. And if you need to eat too much,  you can still go to shops and “clunse” or in another
word beg for it.

You also need accommodation for you and your group.  For free of course and for a week. If you do not have
one, you will have to sleep in the streets or in a park, in South Africa, where crime rates are one of
the highests in the world.  Members of the April team were so desperate that they even tried to ask permissions from the Pietermaritzburg municipial prison to stay in a cell for a few nights. They were refused and never slept there. They also tried and asked churchers but they already had inmates, some local homeless people. Most often they stayed at summer cottages of friends, all in one room, once they were sleeping in an office (8 people) for a week, without having a shower.

So for us it seemed and this team justified that once you are here the only educational programme for you is
to beg for money, food and accommodation. On 21 August our team (18 people) was stuffed into two vans and was sent to Pietermaritzburg for fundraising.   We were given a T-shirt saying: “Kwa Zulu Natal Experimental College trains 100 volunteers to fight AIDS”. Before we left we had a short lecture about how to fundraise well. We were informed that we had to each collect R2000 a month for six months in a row, totalling R12,000, otherwise you can’t graduate from the college and you can’t go to the college. We were also told that we should’nt talk with people who apparently do not have money. LAter we found this very unusal, since we all donned a T-shirt saying that we were fighting against AIDS and because of this many apparently poor people came to us to ask questions about the disease. (1/3 of the people in Kwa Zulu Natal have HIV, most of them don’t have access to proper info about HIV/Aids). According to what we were told at the school, we shouldn’t have talked to these people.

When we arrived in Pietermaritzburg, we had to firs tlook for accommodation, quickly for free, for 18 people. Fortunatelly one of our team mates had a cousin working for the Pietermaritzburg City Council , who told us that we could stay at a scout camp.    Another SA student had friends at a catering restaurant seeing that we were there for a noble reason offered us proper breakfast and dinner for ten Rand a day each. So we had 5 Rand for lunch (US$ 0.60). After we arranged these in the morning we went to the streets of Pietermaritzburg. We approached the passer-bys and asked for donations. We had no material to sell, all we had was our stories and a newsletter from the school to show. Most of the people were very kind and generous and since they beleived that we were collecting money for AIDS awereness programmes they gave us various amounts of donations.

The people here are not very rich, the average amount that you can get form the majority of the people is
between 50c-2R.If you are doing it all day, you can raise about 100R a day.( You have to make R2000 in a
month for six months to qualify as adevelopment instructor.)

After a few days most people in the area will know you, so they are not likely to give any more. This is
the time when you have to start the whole thing agan, asking for permissions, etc.

On the second day in Pietermaritzburg we realised that our fundraising permit never existed. The reason for
it was that our team was reluctant to ask for permissions and we told the school’s director that if they want us to go fundraising then they should arrange the permit for us at least for the first time.  They applied for it and they got an application form and a cover letter from Pietermaritzburg City Council. They gave us a copy of the cover letter and persuaded us that it was the real PERMISSION.  They also gave us a fundraising number which either might have never existed or was an old one.  Fundraising in S.A. without a permit is an offence
against the law. Since the City Council provided us with accomodation they learnt very soon that we never
had a permission so they informed us that we should leave their Scout Camp immediately.

It was on a Friday morning, we removed our luggages to the catering restaurant and went back to fundraise
again. We arrived back to the school by midnight the same day, had to give the money we collected to a
teacher, the same we had to do every evening. The director used to phone every evening asked how
much we made and nothing else.

When we arrived back at school there was no water for the whole weekend, we couldn`t even have a shower. Our group was very furious and we wanted to have a meeting with the director which she refused saying that she was busy with more important issues.

At the school we had two teachers, two young men,one from Angola and another from Zimbabwe. They are very nice people but they themeselves acknowledged that they didn`t have the necessary education to teach
people. They also told us that they didn’t have another choice but to work for Humana and do whatever
they are told. They also had to fundraise. They received no salary, only accommodation, food and S.A. visas.

The Zim. teacher (who was working on constructions before in Zimbabwe) had to teach us about HIV/Aids, he
could but rely on a thin TCE booklet, produced by Humana, a booklet which consists only of common
knowledge. He started to read the booklet and since he had not much experience in education whatsoever, he
wanted us to write down all of it, word by word.  The Angolan teacher, who was working with tree plantations before had to teach us Portugues without a coursebook or dictionaries. SA students from our group were requested to teach Zulu, without coursebooks, because it is better to fundraise if you have a basic
knowledge of that language.

This form of education was quite unusal but compared to the previous group’s programmes it was still more
effective. That group is going to Mozambique in two weeks’ time and they didn’t even have one Portugues
lesson or any lessons whatever. Still you can’t say that we were satasfied with those few lectures. Anyway
most of the time we were cooking, dishwashing, cleaning and shopping food or participating in
so-called Common Actions, e.g. preparing chairs, unpacking or moving furniture.

Before we joined the school we were informed that our school fees included full medical insurence and
hospitalisation. At the school we realised that we would never have medical insurance, the school nevere
contacted any insurance company. Even if you wanted to buy simple and cheap medicines,you had to either
beg for the money or you had to go and buy it yourself. Finally your pain is your problem.  It happened that people got sick and nobody cared or looked after them for days. It is very starnge to understand that unless you sort it out for yourself, you will have to go to countries like Angola or Mozambique without any insurance.

The school has a separate building for library. To our surprise the majority of the books are old pulp
fictions and worthless romantic novels. The schools policy was that no money should be spent on books.
They asked second-hand shops to donate to the school the books that they couldn’t sell to anyone.

KNEC is a boarding school. It means that you only need pocket money for stamps, toothpaste etc. because you get full board at the school. Every student receives R15 a day for food, they add all the money, do the
shopping and do the cookin for themselves. Obviously R15 for a person a day is not enough for a nutritious
diet. The students who do the shopping have to beg for the food money, it is never given automatically, on
time. Even when it is given, it is not the full amount, so you don’t even get that ridiculous 15Rand a day. It happened many times that the whole school had to go on without any food for days. At the end of the
week due to the delays it turns out that your food money a day was about R10. The only constant and basic
feeling that you have there is hunger.

After a few weeks of this kind of starvation your brains can’t make or reluctant to make the right deceisions. You don’t feel like doing anything, going anywhere, reading anything, you just let things happen, give up
thinkiing about the future, and start living day by day. After a while you think it is normal to live like this, begging for money on the streets or working for nothing.  If you should realise that you want to change something, the best you can do is to go to a shop, buy food and eat. If you do this after a while you will fee like waking up from a bad dream.

Some people started thinking in our group. First a few people left, they tried to ask back their money, in vain.
Humana’s number one policy is: We never pay. These people were from S.A. they didn’t pay so much, so after shrugging their shoulders they left.   The problems came when the other people started saying they want to quit the programme and to get back their money. The director understood, however not completely that there were serious troubles going on. She made up a story that the minister of Education is to come so everybody should be working together for the occasion by participating in a grand Commmon Cleaning Action which would last for two days.

Some students went on a strike afterwards and decided to go to the beach instead, where they saw that the director , the school leading staff after announcing their commands simply went to the beach to have fun.  Anyway the preparationfor the Minister was going on, if you decided not to participate in it, according to the school policy it meant you were not participating in the school programme and thus must leave the school immediately. (without of course your money).

Later we learnt that the coming of the Minister was a Humana trick, which is applied for collapsing teams.
After all these most of the people decided to leave.   First was Henry from Cameroon, he was followed by
Lilian from S.A. Then Fany left ( swiss) and asked for her money several times, very vigorously. So she was
presented a cheque. Later in the bank she realised that her cheque was bounched. Soon Xolani (S.A) left
with Erica (Australia) and Kriya (USA). After them Tico left, when she asked for her money she was
ignored. She came back with her father and they were given a cheque as well. It was of the same kind of a
cheque of course.

A few days later Robert, Elza and Nicky decided to leave and they tried to ask back their money. The director was too busy to talk with Robert, but they offered R200 to Elza. She paid R12,000 four weeks before. When Nicky was summoned at 11 P.M. they decided to be tougher.He was told that he had two ways: he leaves the school tomorrow by seven, and he may get his money some day or ” we’ll make you leave tomorrow”. He spent the whole night worrying and waiting for the security guards to come and throw him out.

The next morning one of the teachers told the remaining people that ” some people decided to quit their programmes, the school policy is such that if you make this decision you must leave immediately, or
if you don’t want to we must call the security guards and throw you out”.   Then we were asked if anyone of us still wanted to quit the programme. The answer was negative.   Fortunatelly they could never have Nicky and the others thrown out of the school, because the next afternoon the director was arrested and taken to the
local prison.

It was a very unexpected and unpleasant accident for Humana. The next day the so-called Global Building
Weekend had to begin and they invited 50 volunteers from Jo’burg to participate in a huge construction
project on the school buildings. All the fifty volunteers arrived the next day so that they could help the development of the school of such an aimable charity organisation. The mystirios Teacher’s Group
decided what works should be accomplished during the weekend. Some of these plans lacked common sense but neither the volunteers nor the students had a say about it. They were only employees.

The work tasks were given in an imperative manner, the people who had just come from Denmark and the teachers were sitting at a table (apart from the director, who was still behind bars) monitoring the process of the work. At the end of the days each constructing groups had to give an account of their work. We were also told that if anyone from the group leaves for more that five minutes somebody from the group must go and find them and bring them back to work. The works done were tough, phisical ones. One group had to remove a huge wall, others had to move furniture all day, etc.

We all had a feeling that thse works were not performed for the student’s interests. Of course it was very unpleasant for them that the director was in jail, but they comforted the volunteers and the students that it was only an accident, the police was overacting because of a minor misunderstanding and basically the whole thing was a civil case. (Ester was arrested for common law fraud, which is a criminal offence).

The following day they presented the director ( she was out on bail) saying it was all over, everything is
resolved, things are back in normal. Of course the two of us knew that they were lying, because after Ester
was arrested we went to the police station, asking what was going on. They told us that she was arrested
for commiting common law fraud. They also informed us that the whole department was investigating in Esters
and the school`s case and they told us that things were serious. At this moment we also decided to make
our statements and cancel our programmes.

By the news many impotant Humana people were sent so as to repair the damages. They offered us to go to another DRH school which we of course refused. We told them we didn`t want to be associated with such a company and we asked them to pay our damages and let us go.  Seven of us had a meeting with their attorney. They tried their best to set the whole case to a civil case, which of course would have been the end of the story for us. Then they were trying to make individual agreements so as to break up our group. In two cases they succeded but two other people Elza and Nicky, who were offered a bigger amount, refused accwepting it saying they either compensated all of us, or there was no agreement.

A few days after the meeting each of us received two letters, at dinner time, in front of the dining hall, so that all the other students could see and be intimidated not to make their statements.

One letter said:

” Dear Sir,
State v. Ester Karen Boere 19 sept 2001
We act for Ester K. Boere.
The charges that you have laid with the police have no
foundations and are ill- conceived. Please be advised
that our client is considering institutuing an action
against you for malicious prosecution.
Yours faithfully;
Tamlyn Reid
Garlicke and Bousfield INC”

The other letter from the same company informed us that we had to move to another building on the school`s premises. We were no longer allowed to dine or enter the dining hall. From the meeeting with their attorney it was obvious for us that their attorney did not know Humana or its associated companies. They are also trying to emphasise that Ester wasn’t the director of the school, they are saying she was only an employee. This is quite strange, given the fact, that until her arrest she had signed all the documents as the director of the school.

Currently we are staying in a seperate building, isolated from the rest of the students. As food allowances we are given R15 a day. (The bail condition says that they must provide us food and accommodation until the court decision).  However we have nice lodgings, we wre refused when we asked for a fridge , pans, stove or cooking facilities. We have to use open fire (barbecue) in the garden if we want to prepare hot food for ourselves.

This is the current sitution, we are waiting for the court decision and we hope for less rain.

Things are looking up, since we werw informed that the director’s visa expires on the 4 October, which means
that after that date, unless they make an agreemant with us she will have to return to prison.   Our two teachers were degarded to students again. The students and the people from Denmark work from dawn to dusk to make the place look more like a school and less like a factory.  They have bought new computers, Portuguese coursebooks  and installed a lot of furniture.

After the police dropped charges, Laszlo and the students wrote again:

The news is quite shocking. By the way I got to know the name of the local TG company, its name is “Argyl’s
Property”. But the building is still owned by the government, so they just have it from the government.
This is why it is not surprising that the whole thing have been turned down; Ester’s visa expired on the 4
Oct, so they had a show-trial on the 3 October where the prosecutor suddenly realised that there is no
evidence for any criminal activity and the charges are provisionally withdrawn.

Ester went to Zim the next morning. It is very interesting to know that you can’t just go to Zim, you need at least a few days to organise the tickets, etc. Let alone two days before the session they gave us food allowance for two days only, saying they would not need to provide us anything after the session anyway. I mean they had
known it before that the judge will drop the case, without listening to the witnesses or looking at the evidences. When you wrote about the ANC connection I did’nt believe, now I know it for sure. Even our consul, who is a well-known lawyer in SA said that it must take at least three months. He was wrong.

We (my wife and me) left the building and trying to look for another possibility because we want to do
something anyway.

They have also started operating in Nigeria, the system is the following: 1. get into the government 2.
do what you want.

I still can’t believe that the prosecutor dared to say that it is absolutally legal to rent a building from a
private company, advertise it as a whatever college or university, drag people from all over the world, ask
for (false) study permits from embassies, take their money, make them work like slaves and then throw them
to the streets.

We are a bit sad.

Bye. Anyway we have started to write a book about our experiences. We have enough, believe me.

Laszlo Adrienne

5 1/2 months at IICD, then a year of confusion and disarray in India

by Ellen, Canada   ellenshifrin@yahoo.ca

INTRODUCTION

Today is July 13, 2001.  Just under one year after I heard about IICD, and I rue the day I ever heard about them.

Mid-July, 2000: I start a search to volunteer in India.  I have given myself one year to learn how to give 300 percent, to work with people who are less fortunate than myself and the majority of the people I know.

With some nervousness, I followed the web search that led to the organization that would provide the longest period of time in India.  And wow, they even had a program before going that would train me to be a “development instructor”, a euphemism for volunteer.  On July 24^th, 2000 I sat in a small room with Line, a young Danish woman, the director of IICD-Michigan.

As she enthusiastically outlined the program for me I learned that IICD was one of several organizations that feed volunteers to the various projects run by Humana People to People (HPP).  Line did not tell me that all the “feeding” organizations are part and parcel of HPP.  She talked about how 25 percent of the education is spent on individual learning projects, which can be done alone, or in a group, 25 percent on “activities and courses carried out as a group. Some are preplanned, some the team chooses,” 25 percent of the work is about reflecting on our experiences and what we have learned, and last but not least 25 percent of the education is about language learning.  She did not tell me that education itself is only about 5 percent of the program.  She did not tell me that 95 percent of my time would be spent taking care of the building, fundraising, cooking, cleaning, organizing for special events like Family Weekend, a trip to Denmark to see the “real reason we were here”, and an Open House for the neighboring community.

There were many other things she did not tell me at that first visit.  Ignorance, in this case, led straight to 5 ½ months of hell.

THE BEGINNING

During the first month, a blissfully warm, cornfields-as-high-as-an-elephant’s-eye August, I learned about the Teachers’ Group (TG).  At the time I believed it wasn’t a problem.  Now, I see it’s a big problem, because at the projects only TG people can be project leaders, a restriction that prevents the right person being hired for the job.  It puts inexperienced people in charge, and creates a big mess when problems come up they are completely unequipped to handle.

During the first month I also learned that “education” meant – do-what-you-want-to-do-when-you-want-to-do-it.  And if you didn’t want to do it, well, that was fine too.  As an “older” person (I’m 54), I wanted to.  So I read by myself in my room.  I attended the sporadic Hindi classes because, having been to India before, I knew it was important.  When everyone else went to Denmark to see the famous Tvind windmill and attend a conference I was pretty sure was going to be ridiculous, I went to Toronto to study Hindi.

As the oldest by far of the students (there was one other woman my age who was going to Zambia), I was pretty isolated.  This was a silently but mutually agreed upon situation, as I found it difficult to hang out with the young people and talk about the “hot” young men, and I was amazed to see their lack of curiosity about the country we were going to volunteer in.  On their part, they found me controlling, overbearing, and ‘too good’ (read: I don’t drink, smoke anything, or express a sexual interest in the opposite sex).  Fair enough.  I had relationships with individuals rather than with the group.

ODDITIES

One of the reasons we were at IICD for 5 ½ months, Line told us, was to build a solid team.  So it was pretty odd that we did not do one single team-building activity.  Oh yes, from time to time we had “building weekends” and “school Fridays”.  TGs believe that this is enough to build a team.  The current team (July 2001) about to leave for India is 4 people divided into 2 and 2.  The 2 groups don’t even talk to each other!  So much for team building.

Line didn’t tell me that our teachers would be two young men who had 6 months each of field experience, none of which was in India.  She didn’t tell me that teachers don’t actually teach.  She didn’t tell me that although drinking and smoking was forbidden, there would be nothing to fill the time with.  So young people with a college mentality of ‘when there’s nothing to do, drink’ would do just that.  You put 14 young people in a dormitory in the middle of cornfields, don’t give them anything to do, and voilà – they drink, smoke, and watch movies.  All on the sly of course, so that when Line finally found out, just before we were going out on what was supposed to be our final fundraising trip, she freaked, yelled at everyone, threatened and then demanded people to ‘fess up.  It’s hard to imagine what she expected, given the situation.

Line didn’t tell me that in spite of the theoretical open policy, when it came time for her to be open, this was a different story.  She always listened to my suggestions on how to further the cause of education, but at the end she finally said that she doesn’t believe in education.  That the philosophy of IICD is, in fact, non-education.  As a long-time teacher, I found this offensive.  She had strung me along until just before we were about to go to India.

MY RESPONSIBILITY

Why did I stay?  Well, that’s a long story.  I wanted to go with a group.  I didn’t feel confident enough to go on my own.  I kept hoping things would change, that at least I would have time to really learn Hindi.  I did have the time and space to prepare myself.  I read books about development work, about other people’s experiences in the field.  I tried to give everyone good food to eat (my responsibility area was food).  I became involved with a few people and felt loyal to them.  I wanted to see what would happen to some of the young people during their time in India, if they would grow and mature a little.  Given what I know now, I’m really, really sorry I didn’t leave after the first month.

MISCONCEPTIONS

Line thought that India is just like Africa.  She had never been to India.  In fact, no one on the staff had ever been to India.  They had all been to either Africa or Central America.  They thought that all third world, developing countries are the same.  There are so many people from India living in the U.S., you’d think they could bring in some really interesting people to give seminars, workshops, and language instruction.  No, they don’t believe in doing anything for the students.  If we had wanted that, we should have found out where this was available and then, with no money, tried to become involved with the local Indian community.

Line thought that in India you could ask someone from a local village to translate for us, for free.  Now, this is apparently possible in Africa (I say apparently because I’ve never been there so don’t know first hand).  In India, young people in the rural villages do not speak English.  And they don’t work for free.  “Are you SURE?” Line asked me at the end of my stay in India when she came for a 5-day fact-finding mission.  By this time I was so fed up all I wanted to say was, “Oh no, I’m not sure.  Gee, maybe I missed an amazing opportunity, darn, I should have asked a local boy to translate for me.”  Instead I simply said, “Yes, I’m sure.”  But I could tell she didn’t really believe me.

That’s because she KNOWS.  All the Humana People to People TGs KNOW.  They KNOW that what they’re doing is the RIGHT thing.  They KNOW that they don’t need to look beyond their woefully inadequate training to the world outside of Humana People to People.  They KNOW they don’t need to fill out paperwork.  They KNOW they don’t need to be accountable to their funding organizations, the people they are there to serve, or the staff who isn’t white.  (Oops! Did I say, “isn’t white”?  Why yes, racism.  More on that next.)  They also KNOW that people learn by osmosis, they don’t need any structured classes.  They KNOW staff members will naturally learn how to lead projects and be models for the villages they reside in.  They KNOW team building happens as a result of spending a few weekends working on projects side-by-side.  They KNOW that drinking is the root of all evil.  They KNOW that young people without any experience are more qualified to lead a project than older, more experienced people who don’t happen to be TG.  The list goes on . . .

RACISM

Humana People to People (HPP), the “Federation”, has their headquarters in Zimbabwe.  Why?  Well, it must have something to do with the fact that it’s cheap, that the government welcomes them, and that they can come in there and do whatever they want.  They have this huge building that clashes so dramatically with the landscape and the local architecture it’s hard to imagine unless you’ve seen it or the pictures of it. Why?  Why Zimbabwe?  Why the ostentatious building?  Ah, Power!  All these white Scandinavians running around lording it over the Africans.  They are the ones with power.  They are the ones with money.  They are the ones with education.  They are the ones with know-how.  They are there to bring the RIGHT WHITE way of living to the poor ignorant Africans.

It doesn’t work quite so well in India, where the staff is all well-educated young Indians.  Even there, however, there is a dramatic difference in the status of white TGs and Indian TGs.  Here’s an example:

R, the young Indian man I worked with in Jaipur, is TG.  We had applied for and received accreditation from the UN to attend the UN’s General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV/AIDS in June in New York.  We had applied specifically as HPPI – Humana People to People INDIA, because that experience is what we could contribute to the discussion on the Declaration of Commitment and the conference.

As soon as we learned about the accreditation there was a sudden flurry of interest from the Federation and from the country director, H.  They were trying to figure out if they could send other people.  They even thought about not having me go, but since I had done the work on it, they couldn’t really say no.  Finally the day came when money was being handed out for the trip.  R received his money, and I received my stipend for the month of July, even though I wasn’t going to be in India, but it was going to cover whatever it could in New York.

I asked if they had made a decision about sending anyone else from the Federation.  K, the state coordinator, said, “No, they thought about it, but because funds are low, decided against it.” She told me she had suggested to R that he fundraise the money to go, and she wasn’t sure where this money would come from, perhaps her own pocket.  She said all this with a straight face.  I actually believed her.

So, R and I get to New York; dip in the Atlantic Ocean, and go to register for UNGASS.  The first part goes well – we get our badges with our picture. Then we go to the next counter that will give us the badges we need in order to get into the hall where all the action is – the room where the NGO briefings take place, the gallery of the room where all the official delegations sit and where all the leaders give their speeches.

“Those badges were picked up by two other people from your organization,” we are told.  We didn’t get it.  It took quite a bit of explanation to sort it all out, but it turns out K had faxed information that allowed two people from Planet Aid or HPP in Zimbabwe to get these passes.  Needless to say, R and I were not happy.

That night we met one of the young Scandinavian women who had one of our passes.  She was agreeable enough, and offered to meet us in the morning so that we could share the passes among us.  In the end the whole special pass event was a non-issue.  On the other hand, I realized that this woman had just arrived from Zimbabwe, for goodness sake.  How on earth did she get there if there was no money and K had to pay for R out of her own pocket?  Not only that, there were two of them there from Zimbabwe.  It dawned on me that these women are white Scandinavians – the elite, the ones with connections to Amdi Petersen. R is not.  Yet they are all TG.  It seems some TG are more important, oops, I mean equal, oops, I mean, well . . .

TRUE STORIES (in no particular order)

Story:  H, HPP’s country director for India, never welcomed any of us – 9 volunteers – to India.  She neither came to see us nor emailed us.  I met her by accident the weekend before I was to leave.  By that time her fake charm felt like pure Evil – like the Al Pacino character in the film, The Devil’s Advocate.  She is a manic personality who goes around starting things and then dropping them.  Development work, anyone?

Story: When the 5 of us who were working in Kutina, the small village that was the headquarters for the Alwar Village Development Project, arrived, no one bothered to welcome us.  I later learned that the Project Leader, A, had spoken badly about us, saying outright that we were neither needed nor wanted, and the rest of the staff followed his lead.  A few weeks later, when a few of us were going off by bus to the nearest town to check our email, A said, “And I hope you never come back.” The reason we know he said this is because one of the young women in our group was there, and told us how when he said it, the others around (all Indian) fell quiet and lowered their eyes.

Story: M, the young man I worked with in Kutina who was the program officer for HOPE (HIV/AIDS education program), was very agreeable for the first three weeks.  He tried to find ways to include me and to find things that I could do without Hindi.  We decided I should help him reorganize certain aspects of the program, and teach at the English Medium Schools in Alwar City, the capital of the district.  On the surface he seemed interested, and yet he never translated for me.  He never tried to include me in the local events.  He is the one who, upon hearing that most people who have AIDS actually die from TB, said, “Oh, that’s in Africa.  TB isn’t a problem in India.”  (Nothing could be further from the truth.)

How the Teachers Group used offshore accounts, front companies, false invoices and fake letterheads to cream off the profits from Humana charities, 1990-2000

by ‘Whistleblower’

Links have been restored

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As told to Tvind Alert

‘Whistleblower’ is a Dutch former Tvind employee who worked for ten years in the Teachers Group’s used-clothes business in Amsterdam. He has come forward with information about the methods the TG used to evade tax and cream off profits from Humana and UFF used clothes boxes throughout Europe. This is his story.




I didn’t go to a Tvind college. I was recruited to work direct for Tvind in Holland in the used-clothing business in around 1990, after replying to a job advert.

And I never joined the Teachers Group, but I knew all the Tvind people in the Netherlands, and a lot from elsewhere too. I dealt with a lot of paperwork, sales and invoices. My job was to work out the logistics and movement of clothes between various suppliers and customers all over Europe and the USA.

I ended up staying for ten years and a day.

My employer was an Amsterdam-registered company Textile Transformation EC Trading BV – a Tvind company, of course. I worked direct for a man named Flemming Gustafsson, a Teachers Group member. (He is now elsewhere but still working for the TG, probably in Africa – and is wanted by the Russian FSB for a recent timber scam.)

EC Trading (for short) was the equivalent of the current TG clothes broker Garson & Shaw, a middleman company that never handled any clothes - there was no warehouse and the company did not make any collections.

Essentially the purpose of EC Trading was to buy clothes from UFF (Scandinavia) and Humana (rest of Europe) charities and drop-in box schemes. EC trading bought all the good quality ‘surplus’ clothes that had been donated to UFF/Humana but were not suitable for Africa – that is coats, woollens, and so on. They would then sell them on to East Europe and other places. But we never actually saw the garments at all.

In the beginning it seemed like just another job, but gradually, as the boss was often out on trips, I took on more responsibilities. I noticed some odd things. I began to see more and more strange mail coming in, that it was sometimes my job to open and deal with.

There were two key paperwork scams we used that made sure that as much money as possible went to Tvind, and not to either of the charities.

Here’s how it worked:

EC Trading dealt exclusively (more or less) with three ‘sales offices’. They were companies called Holland House, Agence Notre Dame and Transco Shipping. They were all, of course, Teachers Group-owned operations.

Holland House [registered in Jersey] had offices in Poland and was run by a Teachers Group member named Allan Foighel, and handled clothes sales all over Eastern Europe – Romania, Russia, Hungary etc. (Allan Foighel today runs Garson and Shaw in the USA).

Agence Notre Dame [registered in the UK] was also a ‘sales office’ exporting clothes to East Europe.

Transco Shipping [registered in Guernsey] handled exports to west Africa – Togo, Benin and Ghana (for some reason – quite why these kind of ‘surplus’ clothes still went to Africa is a mystery).

Each sales office had their own customers in various parts of the world. In some cases (such as in west Africa and central Asia) these were also Teachers Group-operated companies – mostly known as ‘Trade Link’. Others were genuine independent retailers.

Now here is the key thing.   All three of these ‘sales offices’ used fake or misleading letterheads.    None of the companies were actually registered in Holland, but they all had letterheads printed with an Amsterdam telephone number, an Amsterdam mailbox address (not a real office, just a mailbox), and an overseas bank account – Holland House’s was in Jersey.

So when they raised an invoice, the money would be paid into the overseas bank account, not to charity. In fact, none of the three sales offices raised their own invoices or paperwork for the sales they made to customers at all. I did it for them using the fake letterheads.

My job was to write the invoices on their behalf in Amsterdam, using the letterheads I was given. I would send the original to the customer, as if it had come from the sales office, with a copy to UFF or Humana.

Then I would arrange transport for the clothes direct from, say, UFF in Sweden to a company in Warsaw, or from Humana to, I suppose, somewhere like Latvia.

The customers got the clothes, and the price they paid was quite normal. But everything was structured so that neither UFF / Humana nor EC trading made much profit on these deals – the big profits were taken by the three sales offices and sent to their Jersey bank accounts.

The banks and account numbers were changed regularly – which I suppose all fits in.

Out of curiosity, I once visited all three addresses of the “Amsterdam based” sales offices on the letterheads. All three turned out to be nothing more than independent secretarial service offices, that received mail and some telephone calls and forwarded everything on to my office.

Most of the fixed phone lines we used came in through a re-route, though I don’t know from where.

However you looked at it, the profits went back to Tvind in Denmark, but the biggest profits were made with companies registered in the places where the least possible tax was paid, for example in Poland, and that is what went to the foreign bank accounts – not to Humana or UFF.

There was a second scam involving split invoices used by EC Trading.  This involved writing two invoices for each consignment, splitting the bill into 50-50, or 40-60. Then only one part of the bill would be sent with the goods. When EC Trading exported to Hungary, for example, customs would only be presented with one of the two documents, so only a proportion of the duty was paid.

This went on in various countries for about 5 years.

Eventually customs and tax authorities in several countries (Holland, Belgium and Hungary) grew suspicious and the network had to be folded up.

Gustafsson fled to Nairobi, Kenya, with his crony Birgit Dinesen. There they started yet another sales office called Holland Trading (this company also worked in Budapest) to capture the market for clothes in Kenya and Tanzania. But this never worked well, and they eventually returned to Holland.

I left the company in 2000, and a few months later, EC Trading folded – went bankrupt.  This was clearly anticipated, as for some time the company’s business had gradually been taken over by another enterpise  -  and that enterprise was   -  Garson & Shaw.

Garson and Shaw was a new company that took over the clothing business, first in London at a mailbox address, then in Gibraltar and the United States.  All the business was moved over in around 2000.

EC Trading left large debts, but as most of these were to its Teachers Group trading partners, of course this just meant more money falling into Danish Tvind coffers.

In Gibraltar, Garson and Shaw shared a building with three other Tvind companies in the same block, each registered on a different street around the block and so each with a different postal address. I imagine the set up in Gibraltar was the same as everywhere else – secretarial services and accountants forwarding mail and phone calls.

In the end Gustafsson returned to Holland to found yet another Teachers Group used clothing enterprise called Conmore (what’s in a name!), and he also became the European representative of Garson and Shaw.

Strangely enough, the Dutch authorities never apprehended him.

None of these network of companies now exist – they have all stopped trading (although some of the Trade Link companies in for example Almaty and Kiev might still exist). But Garson and Shaw is still in business in the USA.

What were these people like? Well, there were some odd things about the people running the show, as well as the business. Everywhere I looked, I noticed there always seemed to be a Dane in charge, always with his own private phone and fax (this was in the pre-mobile phone era – remember that?)

There was something not very businesslike about them, strange as that may seem. They were all very intelligent people but a bit absent minded, “not quite of this world”. They were all single, not in any relationship – they all appeared completely “neutered”. And they all had a glassy, brainwashed look in their eyes, and did nothing but work, work, work.

Looking back, I suspect they were from the lower ranks of Tvind recruits. They reminded me of the kind of unattractive, needy children who have been bullied at school, and desperately want to belong to something, anything. Perhaps that’s why they were selected.

That’s my story.

‘Whistleblower’




See also:

Hot Money: The clothes laundry in Gibraltar

Berlingske Tidende, ‘The Used Clothing Trophy’, 2002




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Do you have a story? Tell us.

Posted: 10th November 2009, revised 1st March 2010

I volunteered to join the ‘development instructor programme’ in 2000.  I viewed it as a great opportunity to put ‘something back’ and gain invaluable life experience prior to embarking on a degree.   I attended a meeting, which are ran regularly throughout the UK and paid the 2,000 (£).  However when I arrived in Denmark at the school I found that this amount was just half of the school fees needed and that the rest had to be fundraised in the streets of Denmark.  I found this daunting as all volunteers had to ask for strangers to support, what was worse, on reflection was that half of all the time spent in Denmark at the so called education stage was spent trying to reach the target of 2K.  Logically this leads me to conclude the training could be completed in 3 months rather than six if the fundraising element was eradicated.

After much deliberation the I along with other volunteers hit the streets of Denmark, during this time while collecting some Danish would ask are you part of Tvind – I had no idea what this meant or what the were referring to.  However it would soon become clear.  Volunteers were taken to ‘events’ held by the travelling folk high schools in order to meet others, on of which was held at Tvind.

I decided not to collect on the streets and following rather long discussions about the motivations of the organisations I began to question the whole set up.  The so-called training programme I had enrolled for was not educational in the slightest.  In the morning the head teacher who is a member of the Teachers organisation would pay her guitar and the education was done via online training courses, which are utterly useless, everything was badly organised and morale was very low.  Looking back on reflection their selection process for the programme is extremely poor.  As one would logically expect to place people in remote regions should not be taken lightly and some of the volunteers had pasts that lead me to believe they simply had nothing else to do, one individual on the course had mental illness and had to be sent home, another was deemed unfit as he too, had some kind of mental illness.  Furthermore for others the stresses of fundraising were undertaken on a group basis, this lead to a lot of peer pressure, if the targets were low the so called teachers had no support and instead cleverly I guess left the group pressure dynamics to set in and as a result others left.  This was a horrible experience to put people through as they had signed up to do something productive, put their lives on hold and left their countries behind.  Logically volunteers wanted to see the process through – To go home and explain what an absolute joke the whole process was hard when some had committed to the programme.  The treatment of volunteers in the deliberated schools in Denmark is something I still find hard to explain.

The set up is easily undermined, and given the organisation’s set up, I should never have had faith with the organisation to got to Africa.  I worked in Africa and found that the projects I worked on, employees were volunteers in Africa on the HIV and Aids campaigns; they work on a daily basis in the hope of employment.  Those that do get employment, do so on the basis they join the teachers group which involves salaries being put into a ‘TG’ common fund rather like Marxist policies they sacrificed their personal lives, money etc to be involved in an organisation they have no control over.  As a result you recognise the managers of these projects are a clog in the wheel of some larger organisation that they have no control over.  Similarly once engulfed, how can they leave?  Many have little or no qualifications in whatever country they are from originally and how do they explain they have been involved in an organisation which operates the way the TG do???

Similarly the project co-ordinator was from the USA and had previously failed to get a degree in medicine, she joined as a volunteer and eventually joined the teachers group.  Once again her organisational abilities left a lot to be desired and it was obvious outside the organisation her abilities in a conventional role would be limited, furthermore a van was given as a gift to the project to do outreach in rural areas which was in fact used for her personal use. The whole project was run badly, a so-called charity ran by so-called project managers with little or NO qualifications at all.  I doubted this is what I signed up to see on a gap year, I wanted to see development work, instead corruption, deceit and bad management was observed.  If you are considering this programme go to VSO!!!  I left Africa early, disgusted with the organisation.

Name witheld

UK

Bob Nelson, 23, a former pig farmer from Huntly,  near Aberdeen, enrolled with Tvind after spotting a newspaper advertisement headed ‘Africa Needs You’.  He spent nine months in Scandinavia and five months in Mozambique, but arrived back in Scotland last month convinced he had done nothing to help poor Africans, but instead helped fill Tvind’s coffers.

He is angry and disillusioned.  “What makes me most angry is the feeling I was deliberately sucked in for their own purpose.   These people don’t really care for anyone but themselves.  I met lots of genuine and lovely people who were just being used and abused in the same way,” he said.

After ringing the telephone number in the advert, Mr Nelson was invited to Denmark for an ‘information weekend’ which he described as very exciting.   He was promised training followed by experience of an aid project in Africa.   Because he could not afford the £2,000 advance fee, he agreed to work as a volunteer for three months at a UFF clothes sorting centre in Norway in order to defray the costs.

Once there he found he was expected to work up to 16 hours a day, sometimes starting at 7.30am and continuing until 10 or 11 at night, in return for living expenses of £30 a week.  When he demurred his boss, Jesper Petersson, shouted and stormed at him.   ‘He was a workaholic and wouldn’t accept any criticism.  The place was in chaos and we were always given more work than we could cope with, but there was no reasoning with him.”

In February last year he went to the Travelling Folk High School in Denmark, where he expected to learn practical skills.   But the course was chaotic and students were often left to their own devices.  “There was a strange attitude.  There was no proper training.  The teachers had absolutely no respect for the students and the students held the staff in contempt.   I expected something professional, but it was quite the opposite.”

After eight weeks he was sent out to raise money on the streets of Copenhagen, selling college newspapers to passers by.  Students were given a target of £100 a day and told that if they failed to achieve it, they would not be allowed to go to Africa.    But Mr Nelson became suspicious when people on the street became angry and told him he was raising money on false pretences.

“Everybody in Denmark knows about this organisation and most people really despise it.  They would take me aside and tell me to go back and ask the teachers about Mogens Amdi Petersen, about Faelleseje and about where the money was going.   But when I did, the teachers got defensive, hostile and aggressive and wouldn’t talk about it.”

Mr Nelson hoped his experience in Mozambique would prove better.  But when he arrived in Maputo with one other solidarity worker, there was no-one to meet him at the bus stop and he had to find his own way to the ADPP compound.    His passport was taken away and he was forced to travel without proper documents for the next five months.

At Tvind’s teacher training college in Nacala, where he was supposed to help train young Africans, he found the administration chaotic.  Danish project leaders were absent for much of the time. “There was no leadership and we felt a bit lost.    It was six or seven weeks before there was a proper meeting and we were told what to do.

“The school was very tense.  The Danish project leaders were very closed-minded and had a kind of tunnel vision.   Anna, one of them, was extremely disrespectful towards the Africans, bad-tempered, wouldn’t listen and would not take no for an answer.   The Africans absolutely hated the Danes   -   they used to describe them as neo-colonialists.”

Eventually, with his girl friend, Mr Nelson left the project a month early, retrieved his passport and made his way home through Zimbabwe and South Africa.    “We were just totally disillusioned because there didn’t seem to be any reason for us being there, although we worked extremely hard we struggled to achieve anything.   It could have been so much better organised.  We had worked long and hard to get to Africa and it all seemed completely pointless.”

Now back in Scotland and unemployed, Mr Nelson continues to feel depressed and frustrated by his experience.  He believes the real aim of the programme was to raise money for Tvind and recruit vulnerable young people into the Teachers Group.   “I feel used.   I believe these people use the prospect of going to Africa as a bait, and when you are hooked they get what they want from you,” he said.

“It’s all about money and getting people to join.    They make you work extremely hard and undermine your independence.  They get you to do things over and over again without questioning anything.  There was definitely a cult-like feeling.   I am sure there is a hard core element of the Teachers group, mostly Scandinavians, that are definitely a weird cult.   After a while you stop thinking for yourself   -  and if you are weak, you end up becoming one of them.  These people should be stopped.”

Some might say that asking questions is wrong, but not in this case, I was determined to find out who I would be working for, I wanted to know who the Managers or the top guys of Humana were and I wanted to know whether they knew who I was or was I just another statistic – a solidarity worker from New Zealand.

I started out asking several students from one of the Danish schools about the organisation “Humana” and discovered they all had a robotic answer and that was – “we don’t really know Humana, as long as we are going to be doing good work in Africa we don’t see the need to find out who they are”… I noticed this was the usual answer given by several students and was a bit confused as to why nobody questioned anything about this mystery company that is supposed to send us to africa to do volunteer work.

The school produced a monthly budget report and we found that the fundraising money that we raised selling newspapers was not accounted for, I then asked where is was, to my surprise they said “oh we shall put it in next time”, the next time came and then the staff told us that the money does not go for the projects in Africa but for the running of the school. Some of the students became suspicious and thought okay so where is the fundraising money against the budget – same reply “oh we have not put it in”…

Information in general about their teaching methods went through my mind constantly, the fact that we had absolutely no time for anything was a lot of pressure at the beginning, when we asked for help it was suggested that another student could help instead.

Then information about the headquarters in Zimbabwe made us think twice – there are supposedly only 18 staff, and they are housed in a huge building all decked out with laptops and cellphones. Then after meeting some of the members staff in Denmark or from those who visited the school, we realised they all had cellphones and mercedes to drive around in, if they were a company who had no money to even run a school then where did this money come from?.

A fellow student then found some information about Humana/Tvind and it was not favourable, governments had banned the organisation from the company, journals and newspapers had written several different articles mentioning money misused, this not being what we could have ever imagined.

By now our dreams were falling apart at the seams, we should just continue and find out other information as soon as possible. Christmas reared another students concerns and we found several other bits of information, including the Tvind Alert website.

For me personally I found the mystery company Argylle Smith and Co letter addressed to the college, then when found out that the company had a connection to Tvind all sorts of things ran through our minds, we discussed several possibilities and then finally decided to confront the members of staff at CICD and then found that they did not tell us the truth, it was very practised and fake.

Gita, New Zealand

WITNESS

CICD college, UK, 2000

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by Annelie Karlqvist

One day in the middle of June I found an advert in the newspapers. “Volunteer in Africa”, with a six months preparation course before, it said. I read it and thought it sounded very interesting, but since I already had got a job and other plans for next year I just wrote it down for “future adventures”. I couldn’t leave it just like that though, and I went in to the web page, which was written in the advert and the more I read the more interested I got.

After some thought back and forward and discussions with my family and closest friends I was “lost”. This was what I really wanted to do now, no matter what plans I had before. The thought of helping by acting in a country like Africa was just a dream come true.

I filled in an application form I found on the web site, and I got in contact with a woman working for HUMANA People to People in Denmark.

I was surprised, or more overwhelmed, of how fast everything was happening. One and at half Week after I fund the advert, I went to Copenhagen to meet this woman for an information meeting, and enrolled myself for a course starting the first of November at CICD in England.

Great! I thought, now I can practise my English as well.

I was told that there were schools in Denmark and Norway as well, but I was hoping for the one in England.

My money situation was very bad for the moment and many times I doubted that I would make it for the course fee, which was very high by the way. But I counted and counted and if I saved all my salaries and worked until November, I could do it. So I saved and saved and didn’t do much else during this time.

The date was approaching, I spoke twice to one of the two “teachers” over at the college, and I got more and more excited. I had never heard anything about HUMANA People to People before and I didn’t really look for “bad parts” within this organisation either. When I think about it I didn’t know much at all. Everything happened so fast and with all the practical things around me I didn’t know what I was going to meet when I came to England. Even more exciting I thought! And it was a big thing for me

Before going I had a lot of difficulties with flight tickets and money. But I solved it and the first of November I went to the airport with the only expectation that it was going to be hard work (that was what I was told anyway) and a lot of new experiences.

It was my first time in England and London was a big place (well, I just saw the airport and the way out to the coach station), but with 32 kg of luggage it was a heavy adventure…

When I arrived in Hull I was picked up by the headmaster and some other students, and we went by car out to the school, which was located way outside of Hull!

I was a bit disappointed when I came, because I was told to come as soon as possible around the first, and I got the feeling that I was going to be late when I couldn’t arrive before the evening that date. When I came there though I was the second out of twelve from my team to be there and the others would arrive during the whole November.

Why tell me one thing so I almost felt bad about it, and then another thing to the others?

That was the first, but not the only time I had that feeling…

Since we were so few people at the college (seven students when I got there) we became very close, and even though we came from six different countries we could talk to each other and feel with each other. We were all in the same situation.

In the beginning everything was new and a lot just because of that, I thought…

Breakfast at 7.30 and then followed the daily schedule. There were a lot of practical things we had to do; cleaning, responsibility areas (everything from to take care of the sewage to the food budget, or computers), sports and the meals. We had a rota for breakfast, lunch and dinner and if you were on one of them you had to count with at least one extra hour before and after the meals, to take care of the dishes as well.

Apart from this we had study time and courses, and each Week we had to reach a target of study points which was very high and difficult to reach considering all the other things we had to do. So after these full days, did we have the evenings free? No….

Every evening we had some kind of evening program; culture evening, group meeting, song evening etc. We had a good time, but after ten or eleven p.m. one was very tired and if you wanted to write a personal letter or just have some time for yourself, it was after that time you could really “relax”.

We had also activities during the weekends (except for 1 w-e / month), so no sleep in there either.

Myself and three other guys wanted to do some more physical training, but since there were no time during the days we started to get up at 6.15 a.m. (before breakfast) four times/ Week, to do both running and cycling twice a Week. We made it a task and could get points for doing it. I remember once when we were about to start to run one morning, and I said to the others “This is crazy!”, “Yes, but we’ll get points for it!”…

After a while we were thinking “points, points, points” all the time. It became a “point-hunting” everything we did, and you didn’t do the tasks you were most interested in, you did the tasks from which you could get the most and easiest points.

We were always jumping from one thing to another with no time to sit down and relax.

We had a lot of discussions about these points, where we tried to explain the pressure we felt all the time, and where we came up with a lot of suggestions and conclusions of how to make it easier to go on and deal with it. Without success though.

We were told that it’s always hard in the beginning, and that the time is enough. It’s just up to us how we plan our time and organise everything. This is a good way of preparation before going to Africa and if we weren’t able to handle a situation like this (whit a lot of pressure etc.), how would we be able to go to Africa then?! That we felt this pressure was “normal” in the beginning (although we had been there for over a month!), and we would get use to it. There were no other ways of doing this (concerning the points), this system was a very modern and good system, and it was the right and only way to do it.

” You can never say that something’s impossible to do if you don’t give it a try first”. That we had been trying and always did our best were nothing they would talk about. If we wanted to give up we were free to go…

…so we continued with Africa in our minds and after a while I got use to be tired all the time. I looked forward to Christmas when I was going home, and when I could relax and breath.

We had also a lot of other discussions, especially about the money (course fee) and the Fund Raising. The target my team had to reach every time we were out fundraising was very high, and if you were realistic, impossible to reach. But once again “you can’t say that something’s impossible before you’ve given it a try!”. They didn’t want to see the problems and when we tried to be realistic it was up to us to do something about it instead of complaining.

The questions were many and the answers were few, and sometimes I asked myself if all this was worth it. Why were they so stubborn about the points and so unwilling to change (not completely!) the system when they saw how hard it was? How could it be that we had to fundraise so much and still always was under budget? Could everything really be so expensive? I mean, the course fee wasn’t cheap! How come that a discussion (argumentation) always finished with them “talking around” the question so the problem no longer existed when they were done?

I remember one argumentation when I tried to “interrupt” to be able to say and give my point of view (I knew it would be too late otherwise) and I was “shut down” three times – No Annelie, not now! / No Annelie, I’m talking now! / – Shut up Annelie and let me finish. That doesn’t make you fell very well…

Other questions came up as well, like does the money that comes from Europe and all over the world really stay within the projects in Africa? I had heard from a safe resource that so wasn’t the case…and I wasn’t the only one to be suspicious.

But since there were their words against my “suspicious” and I didn’t have any straight answers, no black and white proof, I continued with the hope to find “good answers”. I wanted to believe in their explanations and that it was only “the way they were” (the way they treated us many times). And I didn’t have the time to look for answers either, nor the strength (one Week I slept 5 hours/ night in a row just to have the time to do everything I had to do and wanted to do). It was also very easy to look above it and just “follow the stream”, listen to their “accusations”, try to deal with it and go on. I mean, it was for a good cause (?!) and I really wanted to go to Africa. I wasn’t the only one in this situation either, and I had a great time as well with all the lovely people I got to know.

Two months of hard physical and psychological work went on and the closer I got to Christmas, the more I was looking forward to come home and “breath”, take it easy and sleep in!

I went home and promised myself not to be so eager and to take it easier the next four months, because I knew that I wouldn’t make it otherwise. And how could I explain for my family and friends that this really is a good way of learning? How could I tell them about the hard times without making them worried and how to make them as convinced as I was about this? Because this was a right thing to do, the thing I wanted to do! Wasn’t it?…

I spent a beautiful Christmas with my family and I enjoyed being home. Although it was difficult to just sit down and relax. It felt (and still feels) like I have to do something with my “spare time”. Something’s wrong if I don’t do anything all the time.

After the Christmas weekend, the same day I was suppose to take vaccinations for the “trip”, two of my very best friends came and visited me. I thought it was “just” a happy surprise, but this visit changed my future big time!

We sat down with my parents and they told and showed (!) me all the information they’d found about Humana, CICD, Tvind and the whole movement around it. It was a big shock and the more I heard and read, the bigger it got. It was so scary because I could finally see the connections, the structure, explanations, answers and I saw the meaning of everything. I had hoped for “good answers” and I couldn’t realise that it was so big and world-wide, but suddenly it made sense. I could never imagine that something like this existed and that I, myself, would be “involved”. This was something that happens to other people, but I was in the middle of it.

The first thing I could think about was how to get in touch with everybody else in my team, and the other team who was at the college. A big “information- society” started and the following Week consisted of translations, e mailing, phone calls and so on. I planned to go back to the college, but just to pick up my things, get the chance to see the others again, and to confront the “teachers”. It was like a movie and the one and a half day I was back at the college I saw everything so much clearer. The way they reacted and acted when we told them what we knew and our reasons to quit, it just made it easier to leave the school because they realised everything I’ve read and heard about it. To see how little they cared when we walked out of the room and left the school was only that a confession for me that I did the right thing. How could I be safe in Africa with these people if they didn’t care and tried to do something to “keep us” when I was still in England?

The hard thing though, was to say good bye to all my friends before going. Will I ever see them again? When? What will happen how? What about the ones who weren’t able to go? I’m sure that some day we’ll meet again, even if it won’t be “tomorrow”, but feelings and confusion was (and will be) around for a long time a guess…

We were seven people leaving the college the following two days and the reason why is still “in the air”. Hopefully we can together come out with as much information about this as possible, before it’s too late.

I’m sure that if I would have stayed two more months before going home, it would be very difficult to get myself out of there. You start to think like them after a while, and how couldn’t you, when all you see around you is the college and all you hear stay and come from the “inside”. That’s why it’s so important to spread the both sides of information. The outside is too good to doubt and very easy to believe in, but if you come to close to the inside and the middle it will be very difficult not to get stuck in it. And that could be even dangerous…

Annelie, 20 years old from Sweden.

Annelie, 20, from Sweden, was among seven students who left The College for International Cooperation and Development (CICD) at Winestead Hall, England, in January 2000.

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Do you have a story? Tell us.

Posted: 2000

IICD Michigan, One World Institute, 2000

I am sure you are inundated with personal stories of experiences with Tvind. Please let me add my own.

My name is Jodie Giroux from Canada and I joined the One World Volunteer Organization in 2000 after visiting a Planet Aid school in Michigan. After making what I thought would be a life-changing experience, I made my way to the hogskole in Norway close to Lillehammer to be a part of a team that would travel by bus from Norway to India to document the lives of third world people for others to see.

It turned out to be a nightmare. We were forced to hitchike to Sweden from Norway to ‘fundraise.’ If we didn’t make our target for the day the head teachers would get upset with us. By the way, a day consisted of 8 hours of street selling a magazine we had to put together ourselves, and 4 hours of evening door to door selling. The average amount we were to raise was about $150 per day, and we were given about $2 Cdn to use for food. The rest we had to ‘klunse’ which was essentially begging for food at restaurants.

After our first two week period of fundraising my team and I (consisting of 8 people from 7 different countries) decided that if the school couldn’t show us where all of this money was going to, we would leave. Surprise, they couldn’t. Our entire team left the school, but had to fight tooth and nail to get our tuition fees back (they were in the neighbourhood of $2000-$3000 Cdn.) Finally we got most of the money back after finding a loophole in the contract we had signed.

Four of us didn’t want to give up our dream of going to India to volunteer. In January of 2001 we headed to India on our own and volunteered independently, all the while hearing horror stories from our friends who
decided to stay at the school. One man got sick with TB and they didn’t offer medical services, another group who went to Angola (right in middle of a civil war) had their passports taken for ‘their own protection,’ and were stranded.

The reason I write this story to you now is that in my local newspaper, a very small daily in a town of 15,000, I have just seen an advertisement asking for volunteers who would like to go to Africa and teach HIV awareness. The websites given…humana.org and drh-movement.org. with an email contact of elsemarie@humana.org.

This may sound strange, but in order for us to get our money back they made us sign some kind of agreement that we would not seek retribution for what happened. We did not receive a copy of this, nor do I remember the details. We were all so physically and mentally drained at that point that all we wanted to do was get our money and get out. After seeing that ad, however, and the thought of others getting involved, I give permission to use my name and email address

I’m writing a letter as we speak to the Better Business bureau here in Canada to try and get these terrible ads taken out of unassuming newspapers. Any guidance or advice you can give would be greatly appreciated.

I thank you for your time and good luck with exposing these monsters who prey on young and well-intentioned people from around the world.

Kind regards,

Jodie Giroux
Pembroke, Ontario

email: tofugiroux@hotmail.com

by Kamila, a student from Prague

After having finished my studies at a language school in Prague I didn’t want to spend other five years studying at a University. Instead I wanted to do a kind of “charity”. At that time I found information about Travelling folk high schools in Denmark and Norway and about Humana people to people.

From Denmark I got further details about the program – and it sounded really marvelous. They promised perfect preparation for the solidarity work in Africa, including learning practical things and Portuguese (for the people going to the countries where Portuguese is spoken.).   After reading this newspaper I was enthusiastic and decided to join this organization.   The only problem I has was the money because I had to pay 2500DKK per each of the eight months spent at the school. Considering that at that time I’d just finished my studies I was completely broke. I refused my parents’ offer to give me the money (now I am happy I didn’t say yes!) because I wanted myself to make it through all the problems. I was determined to make the money and after go study to Denmark.

I intended to start the school in April 2000 but suddenly in September 1999 the people from the school contacted me and told me that I could join NetUp program (thanks to which people can make to money for the school fees.) right at that time and so I could join the October team. I made up my mind in one day, agreed and three days later I arrived to Denmark.

I enrolled in the program, paid 1700 DKK enrollment fee and was sent to Holland to work in a sorting center of second hand clothing in order to make the money to pay for my school fees. The work there was hard enough but I didn’t care because I had my goal in front of my eyes: make the money to be able to study at the school and than go and do something useful to Africa.

There was another disappointment though. I realized the majority (I guess more than 95 per cent) of the clothes donated by the people had not the destination “Africa” or other poor countries of the world but the clothes of the best quality were sold in the second hand shops in Holland and Belgium instead. For Africa we were told to sort the worst clothing: T-shirts with holes and spots, shorts, shirts, skirts and other stuff people in Europe would never touch. As a Dutch friend of mine said: “We keep the best and the Africans get the garbage…” It was exactly the same as I thought and I felt so terribly ashamed for myself doing this.

It was the firs big disappointment for me and although their explanation was they earn the money for the projects in Africa in that way it did not convince me and the first doubts were born somewhere in my mind.

After the Holland period I went to the school. I was one month late and was a bit afraid that I had missed so much of the studies. But after a while they turned out to be useless fears. Instead of leaving for Africa after six months spent at the school I left after seven weeks but back home. It was not easy decision and I had to fight a lot with myself. but I felt it was the only way for me. There were several serious matters I couldn’t overcome and that made me leave.

1.   The only way how to study is the computer. We had to read hundreds pages of useless text and write many essays on various topics. It meant sitting hours and hours in front of the computer screen and typing. We had to achieve 500 study points and 1 point was equal to one hour of studying. 250 point had to be achieved by experiences and 250 by courses. Considering that you could prepare a course about political situation in your country or about habits and traditions in your town, it seemed to me it had no sense. But we had to do it.

We all thought we needed something completely different to become good solidarity workers: talk to doctors, attending courses about tropical diseases, being told how to deal with children, try to teach ourselves, discuss methods of teaching, talking to doctors and nurses about child illnesses or AIDS, about the first aid, for people going to work in agriculture talking to experts in this field etc. But not for sure sitting the whole days at a computer and putting what we’d read into our own words.

2.   We’d never found out what happened to the money we had to pay. We asked about the money many times but never got convincing answer. The headmaster wasn’t able to explain where was the money going. We had to pay 6000 DKK (2500 before and the rest by fundraising) but we didn’t get almost nothing for it. We had 28 DKK per food per person for one day. We cooked, cleaned, repaired and run the school and did other stuff. They paid for the internet, water, electricity and heating (usually in a building there were around 15 degrees Celsius; there was constantly somebody cold or sick) but that was it. But what happened to the rest? We’d never found out.

3.    Fundraising was the worst experience of the school period for me. In total we had to fundraise 28000 DKK by selling our school newspaper in the Danish towns. It was hard to stay the whole days in cold and rain and try to convince people to buy the newspaper for 50DKK. We heard many negative reactions, many people disliked or hated Tvind saying that they would have never supported such an organization. But although it was not easy it was not the matter why I refused to fundraise anymore. I just couldn’t ask people for their money if I wasn’t sure what happened to it. If I had known for sure that the money went to Africa or helped us to become good solidarity workers I was determined to fundraise but not if the things weren’t clear.

4.   I felt like a slave over there. Nobody really cared about us. To express own opinion, disagree with certain things happening at the school or even want a change of something meant having a kind of troubles. We spent hours and hours discussing useless things (e.g. discussion about a “day structure” ) and never reached any conclusion.

After several weeks I decide to quit the school because I didn’t want to be part of this organization. It was ridiculous to spend 8 or 9 weeks of the “Africa preparation” in the streets selling the newspaper, earning money for a very obscure purpose.

Even if they sent me to Africa at the end I am not sure I would go. Without any real preparation I guess I would feel a bit useless as a solidarity worker that should be highly qualified after a 6 month course of intensive preparation. I left the school and felt a kind of “injured” inside. This my dream to help where the help is really needed failed and even though I knew I couldn’t solve all the problems that should be solved I am still terribly disappointed. I knew the way to reach what I wanted wouldn’t have been easy I expected at least the most possible support from the people at the school- teachers and headmaster. But here nobody cared abut us, nobody helped, they cared only about the money- at lest as I think.

I haven’t written this as a revenge to the school, this is not my style. I only act in accordance with my conscience, I want the world be students to hear also experience of a former Tvind student who came with good intentions but in order not to lose her own face as a human had to leave. I am convinced that if you want to do “good” you shouldn’t be a part of “bad” or more exactly you shouldn’t do what you don’t totally agree with. But this is up to everybody.

There must be some better organization and I will continue looking for it.

Chicago

“I was forced to lie…”

It took me two years to be able to write this.   I haven’t been able to deal with all the emotions since I drove off the hill at IICD, Williamstown in the summer of 1998.    I just did not want to talk about it or think about it.

It even took me a minute to remember Ester Neltrup’s name  -  that’s how deep I have suppressed everything about my 5 years in the Teachers’ Group.

I even kept defending them long after I left, and denied I had been in a cult or had in any form been “brainwashed”.

I know better now – after a little time and distance.   Being back out in the real world really cleared my eyes!

Ester – the then Principal of IICD screamed “just leave!” to me while Michael Norling , who also lived there for a year , tried to keep me in the TG by offering me to be the principal of the new California campus! Since I started signaling my “friends” in the TG that I might get on with my life outside of the TG , I experienced all kinds of reactions from them, from extreme hate or golden promises, and people i had regarded as my closest friends stopped talking to me whatsoever. I was no longer to be trusted and “frozen out”. They held meetings behind my back, and kept paperwork about new developments hidden when I entered the office building.

It was time for me to leave…

I would like to share my experiences. I did a search for IICD and found this site, I got a lump in my throat when I read Steen, Britta and Elses stories. I was not with the TG from the beginning, but I worked with many from the very first years and heard a lot of the same stories from them (in confidentiality). Thank you for getting the TRUTH out.

I was part of the Teacher’s Group for 5 years. 1994-1998.When I look back on what I did as part of this movement, I am not proud; I was in the end well aware that we were lying to our students at the schools and even helping them only tell half-truths in order to fund raise. I was part of cheating the authorities in any way we could get away with , and we fooled the public to gain a pretty decent share of the huge profits in the second- hand clothes market. We were deceitful in almost all aspects of our operations. In the three years since I left the group It’s been hanging as a black cloud over my head. I suppressed everything that had to do with my “five lost years” but now I feel like I owe to my former students, friends and general public to do some explaining. What the hell happened to me, how could I change from an idealistic, honest volunteer until one that five years later was trapped in a network of lies and deceit?

I was all the time insisting to my family and friends outside of the TG that what we were doing was good, no – we were not a cult, and no – I have not been brainwashed! (It was just that i had so much to do that I could only come home one week a year)

I first came in contact with the TG in fall 1993. I started as a Solidarity Worker in Hornsjoe, Norway (I am Norwegian in January 1994. I went as a volunteer to Guine-Bissau, knowing very little about the country or Development Aid from People to People(AKA Planet Aid, Humana or the Gaia Movement)

Our team dug 75 latrines and 10 wells in one of Africa’s poorest countries. For me the biggest shock was to return to a industrialized, almost decadent county where people just didn’t”t care or wanted to hear about how 4 out of 5 people on this planet are living below the poverty line. I always had to think of my own path to recruitment, when we later on discussed if any of our students were “ready for the TG yet”. The practice of sending unsuspecting volunteers to the poorest countries in the world has since the start of the TG been a method of prime people to be ready to make the life changing decision it is to join the TG.

I was sure enough ready to continue doing good work. I mentioned to my teacher that I would like to continue working for the organization. They sent me to Denmark to see the different schools and talk to long-time members. I had all along noticed a great deal of amateurism within the organization and met quite a few TG members who were incompetent in their positions. After seeing more of the same in Denmark I was ready to leave without making any commitments with them. I told this to my host, the principal of the school in Lindersvold, and said that I expected to get on the train home the next morning. The next morning Steen Conradsen arrived at the school and the teachers there made a big deal out of that this TG big shot had taken time to meet with me. A teacher explained to me that Steen was one of the top people in the TG. His job is to travel all over to help with schools or projects in trouble. He takes over as executive director for a 6 months and turns around schools or projects that are about to fail.

They sure built him up ,and I was pretty exited when we met. He seemed to be exactly what they had said: extremely intelligent and charismatic.

I met to him for four hours straight. He did listen to my concerns and he told me about some of the ideology of the TG . Yes, some of us are less able and we sometimes take on too big tasks – but where else in the world could anyone work in a system where you can do anything you want wherever you want in the whole world. This is exactly why we need more intelligent people like yourself -to improve and spread our alternative way of life. You can stay on the outside and criticize or you can enter a group of like minded people who have all dedicated their lives to Do Good. The TG provides start up capital for the life of your dreams and it is impossible to get fired! You will no longer have to worry about loans, insurance or social security – the TG provides for all that. He asked me what I wanted to do with my life if money was no obstacle. If I could picture my ideal life what would it be?

I said that I would like to travel all over the world, to learn and to help people. I am not religious or belie in any sort of afterlife. I think we all have one chance to live here on earth and want to do my best to change the conditions for other more unfortunate people. He said that this is what they thought about in the beginning of the TG also. How could people free themselves from the ties of the capitalistic society and do what they really wanted ? – By creating their own independent society. A group of 20 people met in the late sixties and early seventies to explore a totally new way of relating to each other. The common was to be set in front of the individual. The true democracy was when all decisions were made in common – and everyone agrees.

So paradoxically,the most important of your individual freedoms – your time, your money, your decisions – has to be given to the common to decide if you want to be free from the normal ties of the society. But instead of creating an elitist utopia – anyone who decides they want to join can join! This is why we are in no way perfect as you say, but we are a long step ahead of anyone else. Imagine what you can do with the power behind 20 yearly salaries, or 200, or 2000! We have farms all over the world, we run our own clothes factory in Morocco, we have a TV crew who sail around the world making documentaries, we have doctors and scientists even our own art museum and symphony orchestra!We are not revolutionaries, or a secret society . But we do want to change the world. When they hear about us, people can decide if this is something they want to be a part of or not. We don’t force anyone, and I won’t be sad if you or anyone else decide to go on living their lives outside of the TG.

The way it works is that anyone who wants to join the TG , does so on a trial period of two years. He or she can then decide if this is something they want to continue to be committed to. They extend their commitment from a two year agreement to an indefinite agreement. It is not a written contract, we call it an “agreement” – your word is enough. In the TG we value a mans word, maybe more than out in the rest of the society. If you promise something in the TG , you have to keep it.

I decided to try it for the two years, and was sent to Grindsted to be sworn in. I was read the same speech as all the other teacher group members where you say yes to common time, common economy and common decisions. Then ,as the first of many surprises, there actually was a few things to sign, but in the excitement over joining I would certainly not make a fuss. The timing of this was perfect -I had decided to join, just been sworn in and they downplayed these documents that was presented for me to sign, (all in Danish) They said it was just to keep our common bookkeeping easier and so they could do my takes for me etc. The papers I signed gave them authority to sign documents for me, and allowed them to use my use my name in bank transactions, they can put my name on a board of trustees or representatives for an organization without having to inform me first. I asked them to explain, and they said that this was a way for the TG to keep most of our hard earned money, we try to manage our funds as good as we can, and pay as little tax as we can. It is the same as any individual would do , but since we are a group it really helps when there are just a few good economists who works full time to take care of the economy in the best way we can. The other members can then spend more time on what they want to do. Of course everything we do is legal, but why should we be punished for pooling our money? The society is built up around the core family, and have all kinds of laws and regulations that hassles a bigger unit of people. We have taken the decision to live our lives together in our way, and we do not want to be punished by paying extra to the government for our choice. When i left the TG i requested to have all my paperwork, and documents sent back to me. I did never get the documents I signed (or copies of them) back, but they sent me my tax records and a letter that stated that my file now is empty and closed. I guess I will never know how much my name was being used, but just from the tax records I received it states that I received money from the Danish government as a teacher in government supported Traveling Folk High Schools, the course I led lasted 11 months, 6 of these we were in Africa, where the papers I now have show that I also had a salary as a project leader (31,000 a year) . I remember signing that I had received my salary on a document that showed the transactions from Development aid from People to People (now Humana/or the Gaia Movement) ‘s account to a private TG bank account in Switzerland! I also had the maximum allowed tax deductible gift to a foundation – which happened to be the the “Foreningen til almene formal” .This is also where we sent our regular salaries, and from where we got travel and pocket money as we needed it.

I lead teams from Denmark to Guine Bissau and from the US to Nicaragua. We traveled to Sweden, Norway,Great Britain, Finland and Germany with students for work at the second hand stores or canvassing. During my five years in the TG I fund raised about 40 weeks. Everyday up to 10 hours of aggressive street solicitation or door to door canvassing. This is part of every group’s training and is how the US schools get the money to run their programs. The primary goal is money, but it also have a secondary effect on the people who do it, and I am not sure how intentional it is – but this is where I can see similarity to brainwashing: Every day , for long periods of time, you have to approach strangers and try to convince them about what you are doing is good. So good in fact that they are willing to give you cash or a check to help you and your group in your work. Everyone has a goal to reach and we are not quitting until all the money is raised. Each person on has to raise $5,600 in seven weeks, and we left it pretty much up to the individuals exactly what they said to get the donations. You don’t really know a whole lot about your organization, or exactly where the money goes. You have a binder that shows the 501C3(non-profit) registration, the city or village permit,articles and letters of recommendations. About 20% quit the program because of the fund raising experience. The rest convince themselves of what you we doing is really good, or at least that the reward – going to Nicaragua or Africa is worth it. That is the effect it had on me, anyway .

Even after I saw how most of the money we raised went to the TG, and the other branches of the TG also just seemed to generate an income for ourselves , I justified it by thinking that the then the TG gets more money to expand and start other good things.

This is in essence why I stayed with the group as long as i did. I had the basic notion that we were doing something good for the world. This made me ignore the lies . We felt we were above the law. We were true revolutionaries , an elite, way ahead of normal people. We were a group of people who had dedicated our lives to our way of creating an new society.

We had an unwritten rule: to try to deal as little with authorities and governments as possible. The goal seemed to be to be totally cut off or independent from the rest of the world. We even had our own fruit-of-the month thing going, where some of the TG plantations sent boxes of fruit to us. Each step in expanding the TG ‘ s power was therefore good.

A significant amount of money find their way to the TG trough what on the surface are non-profit organizations. That actually do help people, which makes for a great cover-up and motivates people to support it, but the TG do a lot of selling and buying between themselves, both with clothes and services, and the profit, rent and salaries from all these operations go to our common economy.

We were pretty frank about this when we discussed budgets among ourselves in the TG. We looked at the budgets in two ways: How can we make sure that the TG benefits most from this, and how do we make sure that no outsiders can prove that this is happening.

For example when I transferred to the US on a tourist visa, I could only help as a volunteer without salary. We solved this by giving another teacher a 100% raise to make sure that the TG wouldn’t loose money on me. I was listed as an unpaid volunteer in all official documents, and I had to explain for my teams not to call me team leader or teacher when we crossed the borders.

When IICD started in the US a mailbox-company in Jersey, UK (a tax-haven) bought the grounds and buildings, so the TG actually collect rent from themselves. We justified this by saying that it is nobody else business who really have the ownership. One company can legally own and rent a piece of land to another. It is nobody else’s business who the people who controls the company is and who they are friends with. Legally, nobody can tell people what to do with their privately owned money. Why should it be wrong for people to share?

Legally we were untouchable, but IICD/Humana/Gaia etc. is dependent on the fact that the public does not know who they really are.

Here is just a few personal stories from the top of my head:  I was forced to lie to my students by the rest of the teachers at IICD , (Ester, Michael, Mattias and Uli) Mattias and I had “slipped up” and told some of our students that we really owned the place as members of the TG. There was a big uproar amongst the students – who of course were bright enough to realize that a significant amount of their fees and fundraising went into our pockets -since IICD pays rent for the property and buildings to Argyll -Smith.

They held a big “common meeting” to try to calm the students and denounce any TG involvement with Argyll- Smith.

I told Ester at the pre meeting that I did not want to be part of directly lying to the students. Of course they all attacked me, asking where my solidarity was, with the students or the TG? and that it was non of their business who owned Argyle – Smith. All I had to do was to pretend I didn’t know. I am ashamed to say that I sat trough the meeting with the students and listening to the teachers lie and the students accusations being right on. A few students didn’t believe us and left. This happens almost with every group at every TG school I have been involved with when they get a hint of that something is wrong with the way things are being presented.

Another recollection -  when leading a team from The Traveling Folk High School in South Sealand to Guinea Bissau – we did another little salary cheat. While 6 months in Guinea-Bissau, the TG got my salary as a teacher for the group I led abroad.  Dag Rune Hauglund, The Country Director, had me sign a contract where I was employed as a Project Leader  .I later was sent a earnings record document , from Grindsted, with a note to sign and return it. It said I had earned $31,000 in that period and my salary had been sent to a Swiss bank account!

I thought that was amusing , so I took a copy of it , (which I still have)

I first came in contact with the TG in fall 1993. I started as a Solidarity worker in Hornsjoe, Norway (I am Norwegian) in January 1994 I went to Guine-Bissau, and was ready for more! I joined the TG on a two year contract which i later changed to a 5 year contract. I lead teams at DRH Sydsjaelland, to Guine Bissau, took trips to Sweden, Norway, Great Britain, Finland and Germany with students for work with Fundraising ,The Flea Market, UFF -work ,Olympics and more fundraising. I saw most of the TG places in DK, before I went to IICD , Massachusetts and led two 11 months teams to Nicaragua. I have so many stories from this part of my life, I don’t know where to begin!

It feels great to being able to share this to people who were in it with me. I look forward to hearing from you, and maybe write more as a way to expose, warn others or just to a form of self therapy concerning my 5 “lost “years.

I live in Chicago, happily married and work as a firefighter. I haven’t told many of my new friends about my past. It is kind of embarrassing to admit I spent 5 years in a cult.

Keep up the good work.

Lars
Chicago

(Name changed)