A Glimpse of Truth

Back to school after Christmas break: new rules, old madness. Post-Christmas  on-line staff meetings  have reached unbelievable levels of senselessness this year. Here is a sheer example.

Principal (smiling): Welcome back to school. Can you hear me? Yes? Good. I have had some problems with my connection this morning……So, we are gathered here today to implement the new dispositions from the Ministry of Education which have just been dispatched……

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Maria) : Here is yet another scam! To be sure. Ready?😤

 ( Mick) : You bet!😤

Principal:  (keeps talking)….. the teaching activity will continue in presence, with the obligation to wear FFP2 type masks….

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

( Mick) : With 220.000 cases per day, in presence!!!😤

 (Susan) : They want us dead!😲

 (Maria) : Wear the mask and go to war, well, I mean, to work! 😆

Principal: (keeps talking ) …….yet, I am afraid  we have no such masks at the moment. We have piles of boxes full of chirurgical masks, actually, nobody wants to wear, but I am confident  FFp2 masks will be sent soon.

Mick: Soon, when?🤔

Principal ( a bit annoyed): I don’t know. Soon!

Mick : That means never.😤

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Marco): Good point, Mick!👏

 (Susan): So it is mandatory to wear masks we are not provided with!

 (Maria) : What did I tell you?

(Lory) : I have been wearing FFp2 masks since… ever, so  far nothing new .

(Marco) : If it is mandatory at work, I expect  my employer  to  provide for them.🤨

Pricipal: (still talking)“that is all………..Do you have any comment?”

Teachers (at unison) : Nope.😑

Principal: (hesitating) And…….there is the question  of  the recess. Starting from tomorrow students will be allowed to consume their  meals only  outside school. As a distance of at least two meters is to be  guaranteed……

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Maria) : Two meters?🙄

(Lory) : Can you figure the scene?

(Marco) : It may work only if we were provided with a whip too!!

(Mrs Tink) : We could make marks on the ground!

(Susan) : We could even play green light/red light like in Squid Game!🤪

(Mrs Tink ): I would like to be that doll! 🤣

(Mick) : A class a  thirty should require 150 square meters to keep such distance, multiplied by 26 makes……………3.900 square meters!😧

Principal (keeps talking): ………. the mask outdoors can  be  lowered only for the time strictly necessary to eat meals….

Mrs Tink: What if it rains?😒

Principal: In case of rain, students  will remain inside the school premises.  Of course, they won’t be allowed to have their meals, unless  the two meter  distance is  kept.

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Susan) : So now you need two meter distance to eat, after having  abolished school distancing. This is madness.

(Mick) : I will never be in class while they eat, for sure.

(Marco) : This is just ridiculous!😤

Principal (scanning the screen) Any questions?

Teachers ( at unison) Nope.😑

Principal: Yet.…we have studied  a way to save  recess………….😏

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

( Mick) : Have they? I can’t way a second more!🤨

 (Maria) : Are you ready for another chaotic procedure?

Principal: First of all, the rooms occupied by the students are to be carefully ventilated….

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Marco): nothing new, what have we been doing so far?

(Susan): there is more, for sure.

Principal (keeps talking) : ……………. student could  have  their  snacks  in turn….. in alternate rows,  and …. in each row………..every two desks . Of course, they will never  have to move from  the assigned station and they will be allowed to lower their masks  only for the time necessary to eat.

Mrs Tink: but as we have only 20 minute recess,15, actually, or less if you consider the time we need to have the rooms ventilated, they would have only 3 minutes to eat, more or less.😮

Principal: More, Mrs Tink,  as there are many of them quarantined  and follow classes from remote.

Mary: But they will come back from their quarantines sooner or later!

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Mrs Tink) : I don’t give a damn, I will let them starve .😈

(Susan)     : So will I. What have we become? Guardians? Cops? Janitors?

Principal (cutting short): ……talking about quarantines, I want to remind you that with two Covid cases in the same class, on-line teaching must be provided for those who have not had their booster dose yet . In  case more than  120 days have passed  since the vaccination cycle has been completed or virus recovery, the quarantine will last 10 days and it will be possible to come back to school only after being tested negative.

Mick: And what about the others?

Principal :  All the others will continue the  activities in presence wearing  FFp2 masks for 10 days . If the cases in the same class are three, on-line learning will be provided for ten days for the entire class.

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Mrs Tink) :More than 120, less than 120….I am lost!😵

 (Susan) : My head spins.😵‍💫

Mick: But what about the matter of privacy? We had been clearly told at the very beginning  of the school year that we were ABSOLUTELY forbidden to make enquires  in matter of vaccines, and now I am entitled to pry even  into the timing of their choices!😠

Principal: Things change!

Teacher WhatsApp chat (Mick): For worse!😠

Principal: One thing more….😇

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Susan): it’s not over yet!

(Maria): this is a nightmare!😲

Principal: Well, in case, you, dear teachers,  haven’t  had  your booster dose yet  and more than 5 months have passed since your last jab, if  you are quarantined (hesitates) …ehm… you  won’t be paid……ehm…. for the time you have to stay at home (coughs).

Mrs Tink: What?🤬 You mean that if a couple of these brats from one of my classes are infected, I  may end up quarantined  and unpaid, despite my booster dose has been scheduled for the end of the month,  because more than 5 months have passed?

Principal: It is the law.😑

Mrs Tink: it is the law of two days ago, nonetheless,  my Green Pass won’t expire before February.😠

Principal (smiling): Sorry I can’t hear you. There must be some problems with the line again. I see you want ask que…..que……..stions, but , really………. I can’t hear……………. you. (The image freezes. The principal vanishes).

Teacher WhatsApp chat:

(Susan) :This is outrageous!😤

  (Mick ) :This cannot be endured!😤

  (Maria) : This cannot be borne!😡

 (Mrs Tink )  : This …….ahhh…I see  there is a chance I might anticipate my jab on January 20^th   6:15 p.m.!

  (Susan) : It’s today!

 (Mrs Tink) : So, I have only 20 minutes…. Byeee!!!🥺🙋‍♀️

 After all the show……oopss…… school must go on.

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Malaussène Scheme

Haven’t you ever wished to have a Benjamin Malaussène in your family or circle of friends? That is, somebody always willing to take all the blame, even if it is you who has been caught with your hands in the cookie jar? Well, in case you have never heard about him, Benjamin Malaussène, is the protagonist of Daniel Pennac’s  popular saga of crime thrillers, and he works as ……scapegoat. Actually, he is in Quality Control of  “the Store”, but de facto he is the person called upon to take the rap when customers come in with complaints. It works more or less like this: Malaussène manages to assume all the blame, confessing his guilt in such an affecting way that customers take pity on him, so, “the Store” doesn’t have pay for any refund, and everybody is happy.

Being the scapegoat is Benjami’s fate outside “the Store” too. Even if the situations he finds himself are caused by a series of interests and precise logics which have nothing to do with him, he ends up hopelessly guilty. This scheme, which I would like to call Malaussène scheme, is fun on books, but when you realize that what you call fiction is nothing but the reality, you start to look at it with a different eye. In short, the scheme in constituted by the following 3 main steps : 1) spotting a problem, 2) finding the scapegoat, that is, demonstrating that somebody/something else caused the problem, 3) using the scapegoat as means to go back to the status quo ante or simply to upset the status quo, as scapegoats can be used both ways. The field of application I want to use to demonstrate how this pattern works is the one dearest to me: school.  

Step 1: PROBLEM. Every year in Italy there is a learning assessment that we call INVALSI.  It is aimed at measuring the level of competence in Italian, Mathematics and English of different groups of students: in essence, it photographs the state of health of our school system.  Well, it seems the  Italian school system is far more than sick, it has a foot in the grave, actually. Just to give you an idea 44% of high school students do not reach satisfactory levels in Italian , 51% in Mathematics, 51% in English-reading and 63% in English-listening in 2020/21. The figures for Italian and Mathematics are shocking, as for English, well, everybody knows there are no good English teacher in Italy, so, no surprise.

Step 2: THE SCAPEGOAT.  If data were  taken seriously, after such an outcome new strategies would have been studied, and quickly, but, of course, effective strategies have a cost,  particularly, if we think that there have been no investments on the school for decades here. Furthermore, I wonder whom the strategist might be, as I detect no such mind capable of drawing the guidelines of the new school or somebody who is not  in the pay of political forces. As it was crystal clear that there was no intent for a change and , of course, no money on the table, a scapegoat was necessary to justify such a downfall.  It  was not so arduous to find one, but  quite the opposite, it was handed on a silver  platter.  Since these were the first tests after the outbreak of the pandemic, the designated scapegoat couldn’t but become what had characterized education in the years of Covid 19: on-line learning.

Step 3: THE  SCAPEGOAT  EFFECT. Hence, on-line learning has become the source of any ill regarding school and more. Is a student depressed? It’s because of on-line learning. Anorexia or bulimia? On-line learning. Demotivation and frustration? The same answer. Even when talking to parents, on-line learning has become the perfect justification to any behaviour and achievement below the expectation, thus demanding indulgence on my side. The consequence? On-line learning has been banned. We are about to go back to school with more than 200.000 Covid cases per day, in small classrooms with about 30 kids, with no ventilation system working and with the most absurd plan to follow in presence of  Covid cases in class. In short, 6 months of on-line learning in two years have caused a drastic drop in the levels of competence of Italian students and mined their psychological stability. Is it to be believed?

THE VARIABLE. Scapegoats cannot always work, as sometimes significant events, let’s call them variables, happen.  These variables contradict mainstream narration so manifestly that they can neither be overlooked nor hidden.  The fact in questions was the selection of magistrates held from July 12 to December 2 2021: out of 5,827 candidates only 88 passed, and most of them were “rejected” because of the written test. The writing skills of the aspiring magistrates were regarded poor, as there were not only technical but also grammatical deficiencies . We are talking about candidates who have a university degree and a master at least and, this is no small detail for what I want to demonstrate, they must have been in their early thirties, so they could not be the product of on-line learning, but rather the clear effect of years of policies made of cuts only and reforms at zero cost. For years all the methods concerning education have constantly converged to one main goal: inclusion. What’s wrong with inclusion, some of you may ask? Absolutely nothing, it  is a very daring objective, but the only way we have to include all, and avoid what today is considered a mortifying selection, is by lowering learning standards. There is no other way, no other miracles can be done, unless governments decide to invest on education.  Hence, in order to avoid depopulation, universities couldn’t but lower their learning standards too. And this is the result.

You may now object that all this talking didn’t but demonstrate that scapegoats are ineffective. Quite the contrary. In case of variables, strategies have only to be integrated a little: you overwhelm means of information with contrasting data, thus creating chaos and wait till the event is forgotten. And this is how we keep proceeding to nowhere.

Propaganda, Mysteries and Slip-ups

“Art. 36 .It is necessary to prevent direct or indirect discrimination against persons who are not vaccinated, for example, because of medical reasons, because they are not part of the target group for which the COVID -19 vaccine is currently administered or allowed, such as children, or because they have not yet had the opportunity or chose not to be vaccinated. Therefore, possession of a vaccination certificate, or the possession of a vaccination certificate indicating a COVID-19 vaccine, should not be a pre-condition for the exercise of the right to free movement or for the use of cross-border passenger transport services such as airlines, trains, coaches or ferries or any other means of transport. In addition, this Regulation cannot be interpreted as establishing a right or obligation to be vaccinated”( REGULATION (EU) 2021/953. 14 June 2021).

“The habit of thinking ill of someone/something is a sin, no doubt, but very often you guess it right” was of the most famous mottos of Giulio Andreotti, who was a shrewd protagonist of Italian politics for more than half a century. So, yes, I am a sinner because I thought ill, when I read the Italian translation of EU Digital COVID Certificate Regulation, published in the Official Journal of the EU, and I realized that the reference relating to the choice of not being vaccinated was missing. Yet, that part was not missing in the translations of the other EU countries and this makes me an awful sinner even more. It was just a slip-up, we were told. Nothing more.

Propaganda is a truth devoid of facts, some useful omission here and there, which makes the narrations of events slightly, conveniently different, but still remaining a truth. Words, images are chosen carefully, so that to impact on the irrational part of our brains, evoking fears or sometimes a sense of emergency. This new “emotional” truth is so effective that we are prone to accept it just the way it is. It does not mean to be discussed. A recent example? The narration of the  lockdown of the unvaccinated in Germany.

In Italy we have been bombed by all media for weeks and weeks on how effective the lockdown of the unvaccinated in Germany was, so effective, that after few weeks the rate of infected people had dropped drastically. So we were told. A miracle. No article actually explained in what this lockdown of the unvaccinated consisted. That was omitted. Everything was let to one’s imagination and my imagination associated the word lockdown to the very first lockdown, when queuing at supermarkets was one of the few chances to be in the open air, as we couldn’t even move further than 200 meters from home for a walk. Those were the days when at 6.00 p.m. we all gathered together to sing our frustration from our balconies, as if we were part of a propitiatory rite. This is what the word lockdown evokes to me, and many others have interpreted it the same way too, as more and more articles and comments started to claim to do as in Germany, that is, to lock all the rebels in their homes and throw the keys away. This is what we believed. For a while.

Germany is not that distant from here, so it has been inevitable in the long run to get reports which mined the authenticity of mainstream information. Different voices stated that in Germany the measures were similar to those adopted in Italy, although modulated in a different way, concretely in three levels, which overall offered more flexibility than the Italian system. Hence, there was no such lockdown for the unvaccinated. It had been proposed by parliamentarians in Austria, but rejected in Germany. Furthermore, the reported drop in the number of infected was incorrect and mostly due the a reduced number of tests.

At this point, whom should I have trusted? My thirst of truth brought me to disturb Aladin, who blogs at Lampmagician and lives in Germany (he was on vacationwhen I called him, actually), and he confirmed that such lockdown never existed there. This means that whatever we read should be subjected to intense investigation before being accepted as real, as today’s information is nothing but an endless ocean made of truths and lies, which are presented to us with same aura of credibility.

Hence, not only Italy and Germany adopt similar measures, but, and this is not a small detail, in Italy, the unvaccinated are not allowed to go to work, even if they make a test every other day. Vaccines are not mandatory, they say, only, you cannot work without the pass which proves you have had your two -and now three – doses. When I booked the booster jab, it clearly appeared on my screen, I was acting by my “free” choice, which was pretty annoying, as for teachers full vaccination has been mandatory since 15th December 2021. The article n°1 of our Constitution says that: “Italy is a democratic republic, founded on work”, but you may lose that Constitutional right if you refuse to be “voluntarily” vaccinated.

So, yes, I think ill and I am a sinner. Pretty soon the obligation of vaccination will be extended to all working categories, which could also be a good thing, I don’t mean to discuss vaccines here, but my fear lies in the fact that we have legitimized a method, that is, if you don’t do what it has been decided you lose your freedom and constitutional rights and, in my opinion, the word which better explains what’s going on here ends in –ism.

There is Always a Bright Side

Here comes the time of yearly wrap up, and now that I think about it, I have really no  particular achievement to share. This blogging year has been pretty much  the same as the previous one: not many posts written, same amount of visitors, the “Mythical Method”” is still the most read article, which makes me ponder a bit, actually, as that means that I have been unable to write something as interesting or useful since 2014, ah, yes, I have one thing worthy to be mentioned, I reached level 10.000 of Candy Crush, which makes me a world class player indeed.

 I have nothing more to say about  the topic, but  I would like to make a wrap up still on the positive side  of this pandemic year –  there is always a bright sight even in the darkest moments -,  as resilience made me develop new interests, habits, opportunities,  some of which will not be altered, I hope, when everything ends, because it will end someday.  So, here is my top five list of facts, for which I have to thank Covid 19:

N°5 I  SAVED  A LOT OF MONEY ON MAKEUP .  As I wear a mask most of the day,  lipstick has become useless. Why should one put on something nobody can see and that, besides, stains the mask?  Talking  about stains, the first time I saw a friend of mine taking off her mask, I found it so repulsive, as there were not only the marks of  red lipstick left on it,  but also those  of brown foundation. No need to say,  I immediately dropped using foundation myself. When we wear masks, after all, only our eyes can be seen, so make up must focus on eyes mostly, any other effort is a waste of time. On this purpose I have watched an endless gallery of tutorials on how to obtain a glam,  sexy  smokey  eye effect with lots of glitter, which, I might rightly define chic, but not that fitting for one day at school. What a shame.

N°4 MY SKIN QUALITY IMPROVED DESPITE MASK ALLERGY. I have spent a fortune on masks as I soon developed a tremendous mask allergy, which took the form of a sort of acne or rosacea on my  nose and cheeks. After many months of skin disaster, during which I had to use topical antibiotic and cortisone,  I came across a blessed cream : Ceravè ( I don’t know if it has the same name outside Italian borders). Well , “cera” is the Italian word for wax and this is exactly the effect produced on your face and body: a soft , moisturising wax which forms a barrier between skin and mask. I have not had a single blemish on my face since I started to use it.

N°3 STAFF MEETINGS AND SCHOOL MEETINGS OF ANY KIND PLANNED FROM REMOTE ONLY.  Schooling has been in presence these last months, but all meetings have been planned from remote to avoid dangerous school gatherings. This means  I can now  enjoy a certain freedom during these inexorable rituals, which cadence teachers’ lives , as they have  become the occasion to put into practice all those little tricks I have learnt from my students during  online classes: freeze  effects when boredom reigns, so you sneak out  and make a coffee;  disturbing noises whenever you are asked to give your comment;  pretending the line does not work if you are caught unprepared because you were somewhere else, or just quitting unseen if the session  is too prolonged.  

N ° 2 I  LEARNT NEW TEACHING TECHNIQUES. During online classes months, I had to reorganize my way of teaching and communicating in order to be more effective, as the atmosphere and learning environment is not the same as sitting in a classroom with lecturers and classmates. I imagined that my words needed to go hand in hand with images in order to be catchy. Hence, I have learned to use GIMP, a cross-platform image editor, to make my power- points as attractive as possible. I have now become addicted to GIMP. I could spend hours and hours refining, cutting, colouring, giving effects, editing pictures. GIMP is my new totem.

N°1 THE KITCHEN HAS DEFINITELY BECOME MR RUN’S KINGDOM.  Weren’t my husband named Mr Run, he would certainly be known as Mr Cook. Cooking has always been one of his greatest passions, which he develops to such a level of accuracy and perfection , that could actually be considered a professional on this matter to all effects . We have dozens and dozens of pots, pans , the most disparate cooking tools, one of which, in particular, has always  been the target of my mockery,  as to my eyes  it completely useless – we have two actually – : a sort of big plastic spoon with a slit, with which you can divide the yolk from the egg white . It is a must have, he assures. When lockdowns came to an end and I was back to school in presence, as my husband was still allowed to work from home,  I thought it had arrived the right time to make a definite handover of kitchen responsibilities. Nobody  has ever regretted my cooking talents so far, if there had ever been any.

That’s all for this year. I hope we will be able to see the end of this endless tunnel as soon as possible. Happy 2022 everyone!!!

That’s How Schools Become Covid Super-Spreaders

Schools are  Covid super-spreaders and this a truth which could be universally acknowledged if there were not so many attempts to deny it. Why? Because schools cannot stay closed for long, no matter how fast the virus spreads. On this purpose, we are given the most extraordinary procedures on a daily basis, which, however, underestimate one question: those who are in charge to think and plan believe that students observe rules in the same way North Korean parliament does, when Kim Jong-un attends sessions,

while they should likely reason more on the Italian parliamentarian model of behaviour to get something right.

For example, making the use of  masks mandatory for students is a good thing, but it would be really effective only if they kept them stuck on their mouths. This means that those teenagers should never move from their seats and pull their masks down to make themselves heard by the nearest mate sitting 50 cm far as soon as you turn your back or nibble food when unseen. Only in this case this measure has a chance to work. The perfect scenario school advisers have in their mind cannot happen, because it is not in the youngsters’ nature to be diligent statues and I am not Kim Jong-un. Those thinkers don’t have a clue of what happens in a school and how difficult it is to deal not only with adolescents, but  also with  their families, who are overwhelmed by a great deal of issues these days.

Let’s take one of those families as example to make myself clear. It is seven o’clock of a December morning and the silence of Mario’s home is broken by an: ” aaaachooooooo!!” It’s Mario. Mario’s mother hurries to see her boy and realizes that he has a cold. Yet, he does not look unwell, but she does not dare to take his temperature: if Mario were 37,5 , he should remain at home as school procedures recommend. She has the entire day scheduled. Her husband has already left for work. What can she do?  She decides to read the horoscope: “After 3 years Saturn is aligned with Jupiter again”. “Uhmmmmm, it must be a good thing”: she thinks. Mario is sent to school.

It 9:30 a.m. and Mario sits right in the centre of a classroom with about 30 kids and myself. The boy looks sick and pale and has a pile of tissues on his desk. He must have a cold, but I realize he is not the only one. I feel surrounded by the invisible enemy, which must house in at least one those visible kids, I am sure. Then, my attention is caught by Mario again. To my horror, I see the boy take off his mask and” aaaaaaaaaaccccchhoooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!”

Mrs Tink 😱😱: Mariooooooooo, what the heck are you doing? Why did you take your mask off while you were sneezing? Why do you think are masks for? You didn’t even put your hand before your mouth! Are you nuts?

Mario 🤧: I didn’t want to spoil the mask, I have only this one with me.

Mrs Tink 😠: but we have thousands of masks, you can get as many as you need .

Mario😥: But Teach ! I don’t like them, they look like underpants and are smelly! Couldn’t I have one of yours? Yours look different .

MrsTink🙄 (lying): Ehm, this is the only one I have got. Mario, you look feverish🤒, go and have your temperature measured.

I call a janitor who takes Mario to the Covid room. The janitor comes back:

Janitor : Mrs Tink, Mario has a temperature of 38,2, but he swears he is absolutely fine and wants to come back.

Mrs Tink🤯: Good heavens, lock him in! Get someone to call his mother, so she can take him home.

Mario’ s mother comes to get her son. She is quite annoyed. Parents are always annoyed when they are called in, as if we were not taking care of their children’s health, but acting out of spite. The kid was fine the morning she says 🤥. The following day Mario is not at school, and we are informed he is Covid test positive.

Last year in such a case remote lessons would have been organized, but this year things have changed. For worse. If there is one case in a class the entire group is to be tested as soon as possible and then again after 5 days, but they are still admitted to attend lessons in presence. Only if there are 3 cases in the same class the lessons will be from remote. In the meanwhile panic is generated, some parents prefer not to send their children to school to skip Covid tests and the risk of being quarantined too. You have also to take into consideration that these days, after the new Covid surge, being tested, means a queue of hours and hours here. 

Christmas queue in Rome

Thank God, Christmas has arrived  to give us a break or this is what I thought. On Christmas night, exactly at 0:05, an email has informed me that Piero, who was seated next to Mario, has been tested positive. I will be sent the procedure to follow soon, as the very last day of school I was heroically with them to play “tombola” 🥳( a Christmassy Italian Bingo). What did that song say? No more heroes anymore!!!

Together

In a previous post, at the beginning of this outbreak, I had stated  that the experience of disasters often promotes social changes and the coming together of communities in order to help one another, as the presence of a common enemy, like this virus, reinforces the impression of being an active  part a community. And, this is how it started: together. Despite the shock, fears and heavy lockdowns, we all gathered singing together from our balconies, showing our rainbows of hope, hands together, brothers and sisters from all over the world saying: everything will end well. We truly believed so. I did. However, after almost  two years, not only the battle against Covid hasn’t ended yet, but that feeling of brotherhood seems to be lost. What went wrong?

After such a long time it is natural to feel psychologically worn out and restless. We all have the impression to have been caged in an invisible prison unaware of how many years we have ahead to serve this sentence. Pandemics have been a constant threat  in the history of man, and for centuries they have been tackled more or less in the same way: quarantines, social distancing, lockdowns. It  has also been very  similar the growing sense of dissatisfaction and intolerance with which people endured those restrictions in the long run, as despite all those measures, future was still shaky. Vaccines have constituted  the only solid difference from previous pandemics, our wild card, but it is exactly on this matter that the most insane radicalization in the perception of reality has happened.

A war between pro-vaxxers  and anti-vaxxers, whose tones and fury remind me of the religious fights of the 16th century, has broken out most violently and I am talking about religion on purpose, as during debates I notice that dogmatic approach to the question of vaccines, which  is  more typical of faith rather than science. The means of modern communication, I have to say, actually help our natural propensity to polarisation. We have got used in time to grabbing meanings quickly stopping at headlines, which are impactful on purpose, thus avoiding the effort of going beyond  the first paragraph of an article. This is how information becomes misinformation. Such superficial approach, in fact, tends to a simplification of the reality, which offers no different interpretation from:  black or white, pros or cons . Yet, “A truth is rarely pure and never simple” warned Oscar Wilde, but it cannot be denied that this approach has resulted  into a radicalization of opinions: you are with me or against me.

Politicians have made their good part in radicalizing the situation even more. At the beginning of this outbreak governments couldn’t but navigate by sight, trying to avoid the rock of an economic crisis and protect the health of people at the same time. We were still all together on that ship then. When vaccines were made available, things changed. Hailed as the panacea for any problem: the end to the state of emergency, school openings, the saving of global economy, lives and more, vaccines became totemic. It was at that point that the most unexpected turn in the narration of this pandemic from almost all governments took place: all of a sudden we were not all together against the ominous virus any longer, but those who refused to be vaccinated and those who questioned the totem were the new enemies, the scapegoats of any possible future failure.

In short, I , Mrs Tink – fully vaccinated – was relegated to the side of no-vaxxers, flat-earthers, virus deniers and such, because I am unable to read the reality as either 0 or 1. I don’t want to discuss science, I am not qualified, but I want only to make a point on what we know for sure on how these vaccines work today and draw a conclusion:

CERTAIN OUTCOMES 

 1. After 1, 2 even 3 jabs I can still be infected and pass on the disease, as vaccines do not provide full shield.

 2. People who were previously protected because of a prior infection can now be quite vulnerable to getting reinfected and passing on the disease.

POSSIBILE OUTCOMES

1. The vaccines’ protection against severe disease holds strong .

At this point I don’t think it is blasphemous to state that vaccines have not worked as hoped. Reports suggest that large indoor gatherings of fully vaccinated people can become super-spreader events, but governments, and Italian government in particular, keep  passing off responsibilities to the small minority, who has refused to get the jabs. All the others, who have been provided with a Green pass or Covid pass which allows free outdoor/indoor  circulation –  without the necessity of wearing masks – , have been told to be bulletproof, therefore, as far as we know now, free to catch and pass the disease all the same. This measure is particularly odious in Italy, as, if you are not vaccinated you are suspended from work, hence, our constitutional rights are at stake here.

And now it’s about Christmas. Just in time to “celebrate” yet another variant , which , as far as we know, compromises the effect of vaccines and most antibody therapies . We have been recommended to stay at home, avoid family gatherings with more than 6 people, wear masks, keep distanced etc. again . This Christmas, the same as last Christmas and, if governments don’t understand than we must fight this thing together, educating people rather than blaming them, the next too. Alone.

There is always a bright side……

Pastiera Napoletana

White, green, yellow, orange, dark orange, almost red-orange… red. Red is the colour of Easter in Italy this year. In the whirl of colours which determine what it is possible to do and what it is not during these vacations, the colour red has been drawn by lot: red = maximum restrictions possible. Allow me a little bit of  sarcasm, as, actually, here we don’t understand any longer upon what ground colours are decided and for sure it is not the number of infected or Rt or whatever more to determine it.  Just to understand, with more than 20.000 infected per day, 500 dead, we were orange yesterday, but red a week ago with the same figures and we will go back to orange next Wednesday to allow schools to reopen. One thing more, when schools were first closed at the end of October last year, there was an average of 10.000 infected and 200 dead per day, hence, I am firmly convinced that the choice of colour must be due only either to the alignment of planets or the powerful winds which arise from those who shout the most. For this reason we Italians are not taking these colours so seriously any longer, in fact,  whatever nuance is announced, you see a lot of people indifferently strolling around.

For those who miss social life so badly, any colour downgrading is nothing but the chance to give way to their old habits. Repressed by too many claustrophobic months, you see them darting out at the first occasion, as if they were running out of air. I can understand them, but I have to say that this is not my case. I don’t see why I should fret to do things I can’t fully enjoy. Why should I go to a restaurant? To jolt any time somebody sneezes or stations too close my table? No, thanks. Where is the fun? Actually, I have to say that I have never felt claustrophobic all these months at home, but rather, I have found out that there are a lot of positive sides in this lockdown matter. First, I spend less money, I wouldn’t use the word save, but I do not need to squander all my money in clothes and shoes  any longer, as I have no occasion to exhibit my fancy trophies, which is good. I have also had the  time to practice GIMP, an image editor, which I use to manipulate the images for my power points. I have become addicted to it, it is even slowly  replacing Candy Crush ( I have reached level  8437 in the meantime), if you understand what I mean.

Certainly, transforming  our “Neverland” into “Carbs-land” is the occupation that has taken much of our time, as since the very first lockdown, more than a year ago, we have developed  our cooking skill to a level which borders on perfection. By the ways, I believe that the usage of “we”and “our” may be quite misleading for the reader, so, I need to give a further explanation, as “we”, actually, means that my husband Mr Run cooks and I eat.  In particular the purchase of the Kitchen Aid has helped a lot in this transformation and if you don’t believe me, I’m about to give a sample of some our, ehm, his recipes in the jolly field of Carbohydrates.

Let’s start with bread. We make bread every week and this is what it looks like: tomato and oregano bread on the left and healthy walnut bread on the right.

And this is our super pizza:

If you like Italian home made pasta, here is a sample of what Mr Run usually makes: pappardelle with wild boar sauce and tagliatelle with mushrooms and sausage sauce.

And if you like cakes, here is a Bonet:

More cakes:

And this is what we have prepared for Easter lunch: spinach and ricotta cheese ravioli and special Easter cheese cake (it is still warm) :

I fear, I’m putting on weight only looking at these pictures.

So, this is all from “Carbs- land”. I wish you all a very Happy Easter. This is no the best of our times, I know, but it will end sooner or later, won’t it?.

The truth is rarely pure and never simple”

 

Everyone, who has been teaching for many years now,  knows how learning has changed, since we started. We are now requested to be entertaining, dynamic, technological and on this purpose we are continuously overwhelmed by new educational theories in a sort of didactic frenzy. Another thing I keep observing every year is that school books have become way less extensive than they used to be with a great deals of patterns, photos  and alluring covers. When I was a high school student, schoolbooks were made of words only, dull and the very few pictures were usually/unfortunately placed  at the very end of the book, so when we had a daily assignment of twenty pages, twenty meant  twenty, no discount.

 Books nowadays are 50% made of pictures. Learning must have a visual and quick impact to catch the students’ interest, who actually strain in being focused for more than 20 minutes. One of the most recent learning theories is to segment the lesson in 3, 4 different moments in order to keep their attention constantly alive. But, is this what we have become ? Comedians who seek for the audience’s clapping by means of a good laugh or the wonder of a magic trick? As, there is another thing I noticed. There has been  a growing lexical gap between me and them in time, and I don’t mean in English, but in our language: Italian. Not long ago, I remember translating the word “bedside” into “capezzale” and they looked at me as if I had all of a sudden started to speak German. We are talking about  18 year old teenagers who have never come across a simple word like that and  which they understood only translating it literally from the English: bed= letto,  side = lato, “ al lato del  letto”= “capezzale”. They are of age and can vote.  What has become clear to me is that the outcome all our endeavors in order to keep them away from  the  “boredom-land”  of activities like reading, writing etc.  has only brought to a dramatic impoverishment of their language eventually.

Several studies have demonstrated that the outcome of the decrease in lexical knowledge and the impoverishment of the language consists not only  in the reduction of the vocabulary used, but also in the linguistic subtleties that allow to elaborate and formulate a complex thought. The gradual disappearance of tenses, for example,  gives rise to a thought almost always in the present, limited to the moment: incapable of projections in time. How is it possible to capture a temporality, a succession of elements in time, whether past or future, and their relative duration, without a language that distinguishes between what could have been, what has been, what is, what could be, and what will be after what might have happened, actually happened?

The use of capital letters and punctuation has become on option of late. An increasing number of my students (who theoretically  are supposed to  be used to studying  Latin, philosophy, physics..) are absolutely refractory to start the sentence with the capital letter , for example,– due to the extensive usage of WhatsApp, I know -, but,  every now and then,  they use it with some nouns, like “ Book”, for instance.  Why? Are you German? No useful answer is produced, but distraction. Let alone punctuation. They master “the stream of consciousness” technique without having read a single line from Joyce’s Ulysses;  it just comes natural.  These “deadly blows” to precision and variety of expression  are but symptoms of the difficulty in organizing thinking,  which affects not only learning, by the ways.  Fewer words, fewer conjugated verbs, lack of speech organization mean less ability to express emotions and process a thought. Without words to construct an argument, complex thinking is made impossible. The poorer the language, the more the thought disappears. If there are no thoughts, there are no critical thoughts and  there is no thought without words.

The historical moment we are living, dominated by mass medias way of communicating, reflects exactly what we have said so far. What is this constant polarization in any matter : vaccines, masks, politics, football, but the consequence of the habit of simplification, which leads to the rarefaction of critical thought? We are no longer used to seeing or better understanding the nuances of a question; everything  is black or white, and you know why? Because it is the simplest thing to do, but “ the truth is rarely pure and never simple”.

School should give the tools to understand what is complex, rather than yielding to this process of simplification. Let’s start from words again. Let’s make read and practice the language in its most diverse forms, even if it looks complicated, especially if it is complicated, because in this effort there is freedom. Everything that creates complexity is the real architect of the improvement of human mind. Without complex thinking there is not any truth.

AstraZeneca Drama

I am a very punctual woman, annoyingly punctual, somebody would say. I don’t like to wait, so I don’t make people wait. It comes natural to me. I was born punctual.  So, it was pretty normal for me – but  not for my  husband  –  to arrive at least half an hour before the scheduled appointment to be vaccinated at 4:30 p.m. just yesterday . Actually, I arrived even much before than planned, because there weren’t many people sticking around, due to lockdown. It was 3:45 p.m., when we reached  Fiumicino Covid hub.  There was  just one person queuing before me.” How strange”, I thought. 🤔 When it was my turn a man of the Red Cross scrolled with his finger on the list till he found my name: “Ah, yes , Mrs Tink“. He looked  up and said: “ You are very fortunate. There were a lot of people just an hour ago. It won’t take you long”.🙃 “What a stroke of luck”, I replied. 😜 I hate queuing as much as I hate been kept waiting. Then I started to follow the trail, documents in hand, which took me to the doctor for the anamnesis first, then to another doctor for the jab and then to the final destination, a common space where I was supposed to wait 15 minutes for observation. When I got to that spot, it was 4:10.”Wow, what a wonderful organization” , I thought.🙃 In order to kill time, I soon grabbed my smartphone and I saw that the school chat was jammed with a lot messages, which actually were comments on the following article 😳😳😳:

 “the use of vaccine Astra Zeneca has just been suspended in Germany, France, Spain and Italy  as a precaution, while checks are made into whether there is a link between the shot and an increased risk of blood clots.”

😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱😱

“Just ?” “Just, when?”😨 It appears that “just” was 4:00p.m.😰 , that meant  I was very likely the last person to be vaccinated in Italy with AstraZeneca!! 😱That is why there was actually no queue, when I arrived. Everybody knew but me! 😫The most difficult part was  telling it to my husband, as the frustrating thing is that whenever he is right, I find myself reviewing the Conditional sentences, which I hate😤 :”Hadn’t we moved so soon, you would have had the time to be informed” (3^rd type),😡  “If we went to the doctor straight away, we could still find him (2^nd type) and ask, if you could get any Cardioaspirin to avoid clots (mixed type). 🤔” You have to know that if you get sick , I won’t take you to the hospital near home, I’ve never trusted them”!😠(1^st type) How vexing! 😩I let to your imagination, which level of anxiety he reached the hours that followed. Just to give you an example, in the middle of the night😴 I found my husband awake, while he was delicately perusing, if I was still alive.

But here I am. 😜Apparently I had no side effects, not even the most common ones, till now, at least. The point is that it is absurd to suspend vaccinations in such a way, thus giving rise to general panic. Of course, we must know if there a link between AstraZeneca and the risk of blood shots, but without fueling a general climate of mistrust towards vaccines in general and Astra Zeneca in particular. Once you spread doubt, it is very difficult to uproot it. Let’s hope this won’t be not the case.

What’s Wrong with Teachers

Few years ago my previous principal summoned me to ask my illustrious opinion about the introduction of the latest trend in matter of education, that is: CLIL. Our eminent thinkers, who people the aisles of the Ministry of Education in fervent industriousness, had thought that it would have been fine to introduce the teaching of one of the school subjects in English for at least 50% of the allotted hours, and this the last year of high school. Before my dormant reason could react to make me hold my tongue, I heard myself saying: “bullshit”. Yes, bullshit; because we have a few or no such teachers that can explain a subject like Physics, for example, in another language. Bullshit; because, that is the year of the final exams, and even if there were such experts, this switch in language would inconvertibly mean in a consistent loss in the quality of contents. Anyway, as I feared, I had gone too far – Mrs Tink is not used to such a language, after all – I looked at my principal blushing a little, but she only said: “I agree”, “ the matter is your hands”. Mine? Oh, my! And this is how I have been put in charge of CLIL organization in my school, a position which have held firmly for years as nobody wishes to snatch it from my hands .

Of course, this meant attending tedious meetings at the Ministry of Education, of which I only remember the most amazing lasagne ever tried. I still recall myself attending boring conversations without saying a word , but with the corner of my eyes I endeavoured to spot the next tray carrying, more steaming lasagne to dart over them. Of course, as if the morning sessions were not enough, I was afflicted by  afternoon meetings too. I could hear no word that could convince me of the goodness of the project, till, one last speaker caught my attention, which was still blurred by the enormous  quantity of carbs swallowed. More than a full concept, it was a word: mission. Wait a minute, wait a minute: “How did we get there? What mission are we talking about?” I whispered to my neighbour. They were talking about money and career. This new figure, which they meant to introduce, was actually over qualified for high school, hence, somebody had enquired about which benefits such teacher would have had, in short: “what’s in it for me?”.  “Well, nothing”, he answered. “Let’s call it …. a mission”, he replied candidly.

A mission. This is the greatest trap teachers have fallen into these last years. We have been led to believe that we are not qualified professionals but something more, missionaries, that is people who have received a divine call at the service of education and because of such vocation are expected to grow accustomed to whatever situation or to respond to any requirement students, parents, politicians may develop for……nothing, of course.  That is why for teachers there is not a real career or any prospect of wallowing in gold, we are supposed to be content with the outcome of our vocation only. And whose fault is this? Ours,  just ours, because in time we have abdicated to our original nature of educators to become a sort of hybrid with no more defined identity or clear goal. When did it all start? I don’t know.

The events during this pandemic have made no exception. We have been asked to acquire new skills, mostly technological to tackle remote learning at the best and we did it. Once back to school, we have become computer technicians, Wi-Fi experts, Zoom and Meet masters, but that was not enough yet.  When we realized that the computers we had given or the line did not work properly, we instantly started to bring our own devices or to use our own router Wi-Fi, as it was our impellent mission, of course, to make things work anyhow. When school closed, even if our efforts were actually doubled, or privacy annihilated, for the public we had become do-nothing privileged, who should have gone to work to school in any case, taking the example of supermarket cashiers who never quitted their workstation, real heroes of the situation.

Now, think about any other worker. I would like to know which company requires its employees to use their own devices, or to buy more gigabytes in case the Wi-Fi does not work and use private routers. But we are missionaries, we are expected to find a solution to make things work with nothing in return, and if you dare say something, you are reminded that you are lucky enough in these days to still have a job.

In time we have accepted all this and the pandemic has made it only more clear, if possible . Yielding to all kinds of expectations, different from educating, without even attempting to a fight, has greatly contributed to the breakdown of the old education system, which was mostly based on merit, discipline, effort, to supplant it with a pointless approach where subjects have been replaced by projects, discipline by a maternal, over protective attitude and effort, well, it is a word to be used only for sport, nowadays. We teachers are also responsible for all this and the possibility of a change is all in our hands. I think and it is high time we take off the  – I fear for many comfortable – disguise of  missionaries and change direction; a little exercise could be of help : let’s try and remember what made us want to be teachers and I am sure it was not a matter of vocation , but something more. We have to go back there, from where we started.