Greta Thunberg

Dear friends,

For a few months we have been active again in the women's prison here in Nairobi. Unfortunately, that's not true, because we are still not allowed to go there due to Corona, nor are visitors allowed to be received. However, after a long back and forth, we were allowed to teach online again.

Creative Writing and Music are back twice a week.

In creative writing classes, I always try to include reality. So today we got to the topic of injured nature. I played a video of Greta Thunberg and mentioned her main idea - to stop going to school, while denouncing the erroneous behavior of adults. As expected, I found disagreement - one reacted in accordance with being imprisoned - not going into it.

I then explained why a writer should not follow a preconceived notion. Literary creativity grows best on its own crap! I am aware that it will take a lot to even come close to the envisaged acceptance of the specification.

The statement that adults, nota bene parents, behave badly towards children corresponds to an affront of particular proportions everywhere, especially here in Kenya and pronounced in prison. Mentioned falsehood is best swept under the big carpet. With reference to the injured nature, however, the accusation made by Greta should be correct and one should even take it seriously as a collective charge.

So, after Greta fell silent, silence took over the classroom for a long while.

Her message had been received, her request understood.

But the spell was then broken by a female guard. The blue and white striped had to leave the training room.

I will certainly pick up the thread again next Tuesday and continue to deal with the explosive topic.

I am aware of the effect of the word prison. You don't want anything to do with it. The thought of the broom and the carpet comes in handy. However, I would like to point out that our students were all driven to do something by inhuman living conditions, often over many years. This is not meant to be an excuse for the act, rather an opportunity to include thoughts of collective guilt.