.

Q: When and why did you start the Bodhgaya project? Was the school in Sarnath not enough?

Actually, you are right. The school in Sarnath was more than enough. Six years ago, we had financial problems and we did not know where to find the money for the teachers' salary. So, any thought of a second school in Bodhgaya was very far from my mind. Then, something happened and things started going in a different direction. The director of Root Institute, Tony Simson, asked me to help his wife Debby to run five schools that they had in the villages around Bodhgaya. All the schools were situated in a very remote area. When I visited the schools I was impressed by the intelligence of the village children and their willingness to learn. The schools were rather isolated and we had to travel for many hours (by jeep and then on foot) to reach them. They were very nice, simple and well maintained by the local teachers.

I thought, ”Finally a good start!” Of course, there were some problems, but everyone seemed ready to cooperate in order to find solutions. The first problem was the lack of training of the teachers. So, we decided to start a teachers' training program in order to improve the teaching standards. 25 teachers attended the program. At the end of the course, we requested the head of the department of psychology at Magda University to help us to select 6 teachers for the village schools and for a new school that we were going to start at Root Institute itself.

This is how I started my strong connection with Bodhgaya. Of course, I was familiar with that holy place, but I had never worked there. I thought of it as a holy place, but also that it was extremely corrupt.

Q: Could you elaborate on that a bit?

Bodhgaya had a bad reputation. It was a place where tourists were cheated and robbed. I had heard many negative stories related to foreigners who spent huge amounts of money for social projects (schools, hospitals, charities) and who had been misguided by local guides or dishonest businessmen, losing all their money. Everybody knows in Bodhgaya the game of hide-and-seek played by many schools that flourish during the tourist season and disappear when the tourists are gone. The “students”, the “teachers”, the building… everything is fake. Just a show for the naïve buddhist tourists who want to receive merits practicing the paramita of generousity.

.Q: So, how did you start your work in this difficult environment?

I thought that professionalism was the best way to start. Bodhgaya is a very important place for Buddhists all over the world, but, unfortunately, it is situated in the poorest state of India, Bihar, with the highest number of illiterates, the highest number of criminal cases (killing, raping, stealing, kidnapping), the highest number of child deaths, and so on. How could we change the negative trend? We believe that only right education can give hope to the new generations. We thought that Universal Education-Alice Project would be the best answer to people's poverty, criminality and unhappiness. As we have said many times, it is not enough to study maths, science, geography, history and English… We cannot change the negative trend in Bihar through all this. We believe that, as well as the traditional curriculum, the students must receive the opportunity to know themselves, to know how their mind works and how to transcend the rational mind: the special program of Universal-Education-Alice Project. The results were very encouraging according to our previous experience. Then, suddenly, I had to leave Bodhgaya.

.

Q: What happened?

Unfortunately, the director of Root Institute decided to change the name of the school, from Universal Education-Alice Project, and it became Universal Education – Prajnaparamita. Changing the name in itself was not a big issue. I was worried that this change could signify something more than a simple modification of the title of the school.

When I left, the Bodhgaya schools were well organized, the teachers were using Alice Project material, books, meditation (the so called special program ), and the timetable was the same as the one we had in Sarnath. The only difference was the students' uniforms.

I thought that that was the end of my Bodhgaya adventure, but it was only the beginning.

I remember one night, the director of Maitreya Project, Ven. Marcel, came to visit our school, in Sarnath. He was very impressed by our work and he suddenly asked, “If you had enough money, what would you do?”

Sometimes, we used to ask our students the same question. “You have a magic stick. You can get whatever you like. What is your wish?”

I remember a child who replied: “A mountain of cakes!”

I did not have to think a lot to give an answer: “If I had enough money, I would design a structure like Sai Baba has done from kindergarten all the way to the University!”

I came to know that the schools of Root Institute had been given to Maitreya Project. So, Maitreya Project was going to start one of the social activities collateral to the Statue: a school. The second social project was the construction of a hospital.

A few weeks later, the director of Maitreya Statue called me and he asked if I was ready to work for the educational project of Maitreya. I got the feeling that my dream was going to become reality. “Come to Bodhgaya,” said the Maitreya director, “and make a school like the one you have in Sarnath!”

I accepted because the request came from one of my teachers, who asked me to forget the past and start a new experience.

.

Q: Then, you went back to Bodhgaya…

Yes. I returned to Bodhgaya in 1997 and I found that the five village-schools had been closed. Only the ex-school of Root Institute remained. 90 per cent of the teachers I trained had been sacked because they went on strike.

I found myself in a very embarrassing situation. On the one hand, I had to be in charge of the ex-Root Institute school, now Maitreya school, and on the other side I had to face the pressure of the teachers who lost their job. They were chasing me everywhere, asking to be reinstalled in their job.

What could I do? I remember I was doing a powa course with other foreign students. It was a very hard course. My mind was divided between the powa teachings, the pleas of the jobless teachers and my responsibility as Maitreya school coordinator. Suddenly, I decided to start a new project in the countryside, mainly to employ some teachers who had to feed their children.

We opened a branch of Sarnath school in the village of Barbatta , with 70 children and two teachers. I was very worried, because I did not have the financial support for this new project, but I was confident that I was doing a good action. But I did not take into account the reaction of other NGO's working in the same area. Few days after, I saw the teachers coming back from school before the scheduled time. “What happened?” I asked. They told me that the workers of an old NGO operating in the same area where we opened the school had barged inside the school and physically pushed the children out of the classrooms, shouting, “This is not Valentino's territory of work!”

There are hundreds and hundreds of children on the village streets. There is work for several NGO's, not only one or two! There is urgent need of hundreds of schools like ours… So, what was the reason behind this competition?

Q: Did you close the school?

I asked a great Lama, who lived in Nepal , Lama Konchiog, who was famous for his clairvoyance. “What is more beneficial, closing the school or going on with our project?” I received the answer very soon. He said, “Move the school!” I decided to move the school to the next village,

Q: Where did you find the finantial support for this new project?

As I said before, I did not have a proper budget for this new adventure. For this reason I was quite worried. The powa course was going to finish and I had the idea to distribute among the foreign students some booklets with information about Alice Project. I was very embarrassed because I felt like I was begging money! It was the first time that I did this. One night, before the last session of teachings, a lady approached me and said, ”I read your booklet and I like your project. What do you need?”

I was really very shocked and I did not know what to answer. I started saying that I had some teachers who lost their job and I had to pay their salary…The lady was very practical and said, “Come on, what do you need?” Then I was sincere and I said, “I need money!” “Fine, I will help you!” said the lady, and then she disappeared. Fifteen days later I received a fax where the lady informed me that she had sent 40 thousand dollars for the Bodhgaya school! This is how we started the construction of what is now one of best schools in Bodhgaya.

.

Q: What about Maitreya school?

I thought that I could run both schools, since Universal Education-Alice Project embodies a methodology that can be applied in all schools but with previous proper training for all the teachers. I worked for Maitreya school for almost one year. It was a very challenging experience. I tried my best to implement Lama's Yeshe vision into the traditional curriculum.

Q: H ow did you start implementing U.E. Alice Project?

I knew the students since I had started the school a few years back at Root Institute. As I said before, 90 per cent of the teachers who received my training were unemployed because of the strike. The first thing I did was to rehire the old teachers. This helped a lot to improve the discipline in the school and to create a positive atmosphere. Then, I asked our clinical psychologist, Prof. Sharma, to come to Bodhgaya and screen all the students. Particularly, I wanted to know about their Intelligence Quotient, moral values, socialization, attention span and memory, antisocial traits. The final report was not encouraging. It seemed that the students had been affected by the confusion and the negative events of the past. With the full support of those responsible for Maitreya Project, we started an intensive program in order to improve the results of the tests. We introduced yoga, meditation, special techniques for memory and attention… One year later, we asked Prof. Sharma to check all the students again. The results were beyond our expectations, this proved that the school was headed in the right direction. I felt I could decide to leave the full responsibility to the current director, Doctor Dick, so I had more time and energy for the new school in Barbatta.

.

Q: What was the reaction of the people in the village?

Our school is between three villages: Dandawa, Barbatta and Sijua. We are eight kilometers from the main Stupa of Bodhgaya. The road is muddy during the monsoon season and in the past we had to walk. We could not use either our motorcycle or the bicycle. It was very difficult for our teachers and for all the resident people, because they were almost isolated during the rain season. The villagers are farmers. Few work for builders. Eighty/ninety percent are illiterate. One hundred per cent of the local women are illiterate. The income from farming is very low. Very few families can afford to send their children to school. There are governmental schools in the village, but the quality of teaching is absolutely poor. The parents blame the teachers for the low standard of teaching. The teachers blame the government for lack of funds and no salary. In some cases, the teachers are not paid at all! Of course, they do not have the right motivation to teach. This is the most common situation of almost all the primary schools in the villages. For this reason, the parents do not care to send their children to school. Those parents who have some extra money, prefer to send their children to private schools.

So, when people came to know that we were going to build a new school, they were very happy and they had great expectations. The villagers trust foreigners much more than the Indians. The presence of foreigners means English language. For the villagers, learning English means a good job, a good chance to get admission in a prestigious college, a good career… We brought a ray of hope to the villages. We purchased the land at the end of 1997, but we started the school three years later with three teachers and 50 students.

Q: Why was there a gap of three years before starting the school?

It's a sad story. For three years we tried to compromise, but with no result. In the meantime, the villagers were mounting pressure on us asking why we did not want to open the school. They spread rumors that we were cheating the sponsors, wasting and misusing their money. We were in a very difficult position. Finally, we decided to give up and we wrote to our main sponsor about the situation informing that we were ready to give back the money. I will never forget the answer of the sponsor: “ Dear Valentino, I too had problems in the past when I wanted to start a new educational project in my country. I understand your problem. I do not want the money back. Please, use it for your Sarnath school. I promise you to send more money for the success of your wonderful educational project!”

I was so moved by this answer! It gave me the courage to react and to fight back. I took very painful decisions. I ended my relationship with very old friends and I opened the school in Bodhgaya in 2000, as I mentioned before.

.

Q: Is the school free of cost?

No, we charge nominal fees and admission fees (that we will give back when the student leave the school). The parents must understand that they have to cooperate in some way with the school. If they receive everything free, they do not appreciate what they receive.

.

Q: What about people who cannot afford to pay the fees?

There is no problem. We told the parents that they can come and work at our school. With the salary they would receive in one day they can pay the fees for one whole year! In spite of this offering, some parents refused to send their children to school, because they did not accept to pay the nominal fees. “Why should I work to send my child to your school?” complained a parent. These are the people we have to work with. They are not easy people. They are illiterate and their behavior is unpredictable. My feeling is that life in the rural areas is degenerating year by year. More and more people are turning to wine and alcohol to cope with their stress. Alcoholism is a real plague in rural areas. You can guess the problems for children and women! Then, there is the problem of violence.

Q: Usually, we believe that farmers are peaceful people and that life in the countryside is not as stressful as in the city…

May be this romantic picture was true in the past. Nowadays farmers are facing terrible problems: no roads; erratic electric power supply, low income from their products, no medical assistance, unthinkable hygienic conditions, harassment of the women, violence… Recently, the villages around our school have been involved in a terrible crime: five young people from Dandawa have been lynched by the villagers of Barbatta (just two hundred meters away!). The victims were accused of being thieves and rapists. We do not know the truth. The fact is that the young were tortured to death for almost six hours. The most aggressive and cruel were the women. One of them cut the tongue of a thief! It is not a consolation to know that the woman who did this was not from our villages. I'm telling this horrible story so you may understand how difficult it is to work in the countryside and how challenging our mission is. Now, we have many parents of our students charge sheeted. Soon or later, they will go to jail and God knows if they can be free! This is another good reason to propose Alice Project to our students: to help them to change their mind and develop compassion so that they can substitute the law of the jungle (killing for killing) for the law of the good heart: forgiveness instead of revenge, love instead of hate.

.

Q: What is the situation like today?

We have almost 250 students. The school is improving day by day. More and more parents are asking for admission. We built new classrooms for the new students and we offered special facilitations for girls. In fact, after we witnessed the violence in the villages where the women were the main protagonists, we decided to open new classes for illiterate girls. This year, we accepted 60 girls, free of cost. If we will receive support from our sponsors, we will increase the number of girls. Our dream is to see all the street-girls of the villages coming to our school! We started a vocational training course and literacy project for the women and girls of the villages. Around 20 women come everyday, in the afternoon, for three hours. Two female teachers are involved in this project.

.

Q: How much does it cost each student?

We calculated that the real cost of each student is around 300/400 rupees monthly, if he is not a resident. If he is living in our school, the cost, of course, is much higher: from 2000/25000 Rs. We should mention that we take care of the resident students even in when they have to go to hospital. We pay for everything. As you know, the cost of a good hospital is quite high. We have to send our children to the best hospitals possible, since we cannot take the risk of an inappropriate treatment. So, we have a high standard of health care and, also, a high standard of education. We provide our students with the most modern pedagogical tools. For instance, all the classes have CD players and television; the average number of students in a class is around 20; we offer uniforms and medical assistance to the poor… We also have some resident children from very poor families. In fact, the school was designated to be a boarding school with all the facilities required for this kind of structure: bathrooms, bedrooms, playground, kitchen, room for prayer and yoga, and a beautiful garden… We have no secrets regarding our administration. The annual expenses for normal administration for Bodhgaya school is around 30 thousand dollars. We use to say to our sponsors: “If you give us 100 dollars, we will spend 101 for our schools!” What we want to say is that we do not use our sponsors' money for our personal expenses, salary, traveling and so on. The volunteers who work for Alice Project – including Luigina, the co-founder of the schools, and myself - do not receive any money for their work and they are asked for a contribution for food and lodging. I have to say something about the high standard of education. When people in the West see the photos of our students and schools or watch videos, it is not unusual to hear this comments, “Oh, these children look so happy, so healthy and well dressed! They have something that even our western children do not have!” The question behind these words is, “Why are you asking for help, since you have a super school?”

Luigina and I always suffer when we hear such irresponsible judgments. Western people want to see poor children with tattered clothes, a swollen stomach, studying in a hut without water, air, fans or electricity. It seems that they want to be moved by the “spectacle of poverty”. That's why in Bodhgaya, there are many local experts on the art of showing the misery of children. That's why even the beggars show their wounds or scars to the tourists. We want to show people the other face of children: how beautiful they can become if we give them a chance to live and study in a different environment. We want, also, to show to our sponsors how we are using their money. If someone gives the money for building a new room, we feel our duty to show the students smiling and enjoying themselves inside the new room, with all the possible comforts.

 Q. How is now your relation with other NGO?

Time can heal the worst wounds. This is what happened with us. It is not easy to find a serious NGO in our area. There is an exception: Maitri Project, run by Adriana Ferranti. She is Italian too. She is a very active, courageous and dynamic woman. She was the first woman to establish an institution for the prevention, treatment, care and rehabilitation of leprosy patients and other disabled persons. I'm sure, in the future, we will join our hands for the welfare of the poor and destitute children of the villages.

.

Q: What are your plans for f uture programs?

Future programs? We have so many! First, we want to improve the quality of education and teaching, giving more training to the present teachers. Our aim is to turn the school into a pilot school, an example of how schools in rural areas should be! As I said before, we are planning to open new classes only for girls. We will organize more vocational training courses for illiterate women. We will start an evening school for the illiterate people of the surrounding villages as I did when I was responsible of Maitreya school. Then, we will work in order to have the schools recognized up to the 12 th class and on to a college degree. Now the school is affiliated to Sarnath school, and we are following the Uttar Pradesh Board program. We hope to be able to have the school affiliated to Sanskrit University up to degree college (BA in Arts). We are trying to purchase more land. We have already three ekars of land (enough to run the school till twelth class and beyond!). We are going to build new classrooms for senior high school and Degree College . We will accept more students as residents and we will offer more places for Chakma students.

.

Q: I know that you have several Chakma students from Harunachal Pradesh. How did you come in touch with these refugees?

----------------------------------

  It was in the year 2000. A representative of this minority came to Sarnath and asked us to accept some poor children from Harunachal Pradesh. I did not know about this persecuted population from Bangladesh . Their history and suffering struck me and I accepted to offer free boarding school to 5 students. When the first group arrived, I found… two more guests, so I had to arrange for seven resident children. They were between the ages of 12 to 13 years. They adapted themselves very well to the new situation in Bodhgaya and they were very cooperative. They did not know Hindi and they were very poor in English too. They only spoke their own language. So, we had to teach two languages in order to allow them to follow the teachings with the other students. I have to say that these Chakma students are very brilliant and with a strong determination to learn, to study, to succeed. They do not waste their time and they always say, ” We want to succeed because we want to help our people !” They know that they have less chances than the other students, since they are refugees, without a passport. So, they are very concerned about their future. Their parents live a very difficult life in the hills of Arunachal Pradesh, working as farmers, fighting against nature and, sometimes, against the selfishness of the local population who sees them as intruders. It's a war between poor. In the past, the Chakma population was victim of attacks and violence from some Hindu extremists who want expel them from the country. “Where can we go?” say the parents of our students. “We have been living in India for fifty years. In Bangladesh we lost everything and we were persecuted by the Muslims since we are Buddhist. Our children were born here…We are Indian, now!” As Alice Project we want to help these students not only to get a good education and an academic degree, but also to be recognized as Indian by the Indian Government. It is a matter of time, but we hope that very soon our students will get Indian nationality.

In 2002, a new group of 8 students came to Bodhgaya from Arunachal Pradesh. They were all very young (6/7 year old). Now, we have 13 Chakmas. Two senior students decided to return home, for personal reasons.

.

Q: And w here do you expect to find the money for all your old and new projects?

This is the question I used to ask to myself. I calculated that we need around 20.000 dollars only for the new buildings plus the cost of running the new classes… I'm confident of my positive motivation. Alice Project is not only for the poor children of Bodhgaya and Sarnath, it is for everybody, since it is a proposal to solve some of the problems of this Century. I hope that people will understand and help us to complete our educational research.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alice Project
Ghurahoopur
Sarnath
Varanasi
221007
UP
India
valentino1@rediffmail.com
v_giacomin@hotmail.com
Tel. +91-542-2595062, 3117028
Fax. +91-542-2595379, 2585380
Bodhgaya + 91-631-2330105, Mob.09431278699

.

.