That Saturday Kevin met Jeremy at the dojang for their weekly training.
“Say, Jeremy,” Kevin said as he pulled on his dobak, your mom mentioned that you’ve gotten involved with writing about social problems.”
“Oh yeah, I am,” he replied. “I think that governments and even religions have too much control over how people can treat each other, like when we were talking about honor killing—that’s a religious idea gone haywire, and the Naked in School Program, which is a crazy government idea.”
“So you’ve gone and poked a stick into a beehive?” Kevin grinned. “I hear your opinions have annoyed some people.”
“Yeah, at my school is one place. I’ve been putting my thoughts on my Facepage and writing opinion stuff, and now I just started collecting horror stories from kids in the Program this year. That’s upset some people and wow, I even hear from people who say they’re kids’ parents and what I post is scary for them to read. Some say they’re trying to keep their kids out of having to do the Program.”
“Hey, we gotta get to work now, class is starting. Talk later?” Kevin interrupted.
“Sure.” They went into the training room.
After class was over and they were dressing, Kevin mentioned that Jeremy’s mom had suggested that he talk to Denise about what she had done with the teacher-training students.
“That’s a super idea. When can we do that?”
“You have time now? Let me see if Denise is around.” He called her while Jeremy called his mom.
Kevin called. “Denise, can Jeremy come over now?... She’s at the club?... How’s she feeling? ... That bad, huh... Yeah, using the whirlpool was a great idea... No problem, she doesn’t have to be home; Jeremy wants to talk about the dragon-slaying you did... ha ha... Okay, be there soon.” He turned to Jeremy. “Okay?”
“Mum says it’s okay if Denise can,” he reported.
“It’s good then, let’s go. Your um... bodyguard... okay with me?”
Jeremy laughed. “Sure. Dad gave Security your and Denise’s photos and they’ve vetted your passports and probably have a whole file on you too. You were with the president, right? So you passed the security checks, no problem.”
Kevin rode with Jeremy while the embassy security person drove. “Jeremy, do you think you’ll get to learn to drive soon?” Kevin asked as they arrived at his flat.
“Gee, I hope so,” he replied. “Although I don’t need it with my executive car service, but when I start dating I don’t really want a chauffeur, you know.” They grinned at each other.
“Denise, we’re here,” Kevin announced as they came into the flat.
“Be right there. Snack’s on the table; you must be thirsty too, right? In the fridge.”
Kevin got some drinks from the refrigerator and Denise came in and hugged them both.
“Jeremy was telling me that he’s doing an anti-Program website,” Kevin told her with a wink.
“So I heard,” she said. “Jeremy, do you know about the one that the U.S. kids used? It’s inactive now since the Program in the U.S. has changed so much, but we know how to reach the archive.”
“I heard about it but it doesn’t come up in searches,” Jeremy said.
“Well, it might, but it might be pretty far down the listings because no one visits it anymore,” Kevin said as he started up his laptop’s browser.
They spent a while looking over some of the old anti-Program site’s blog pages.
“Cool; there are some ideas here that I can write about! You think I can use them?” Jeremy asked, excited.
“I’m sure that no one involved with that site will stop you,” Denise grinned. “Anyway, your mom suggested I tell you what happened in my college a couple of weeks ago.”
After she related the story, Jeremy was even more excited.
“Man, what great ideas. You two are the coolest ever! Even the president thinks so! I can’t wait to use some of this stuff in my posts and I really love how you turned the ‘safety equipment’ into clothes! Hey, what time is it? Oh gee, I gotta go now. Can we get together again so I can show you what I’ve been doing?”
“Sure,” Kevin said as Jeremy ran out to the waiting car.
“We didn’t get his Facepage address,” Denise mentioned after Jeremy left.
“Yeah, I’ll text him to ask.” Kevin replied.
~~~~
On Monday, Amelia arrived in school early; it was chilly outside so she went to the commons area outside the lunchroom to wait for classes to begin. Her treatment session on Friday had been particularly intense; her pelvic area was still very sore and sensitive. She saw one of her new acquaintances, a girl named Darra Sekibo, sitting in a row of chairs and eased herself gingerly into the seat next to her.
Her friend looked at her with concern. “Are you hurt?” she asked.
Amelia looked at her. “Pretty sore. I had some therapy Friday for an old injury. It was gross. I’m still achy there. I had to stand on the bus!”
“Ooooo... What happened? Your bottom got hurt? In privates? Um, I know how that must feel because I was hurt in my privates when I was younger in a religious rite.”
“Oh my,” Amelia exclaimed, “You mean you were cut in your privates?”
“Errr, yes, that’s so... I was um... eight,” Darra said softly. “I don’t remember that much about it except that it hurt a lot.”
Amelia went on. “You came from Nigeria, you told me. Are you a Muslim?”
She nodded. “Huh uh.”
“Are there a lot of Muslims there?”
“Oh yes, I think maybe half the Nigerian people are Muslim,” Darra answered.
“I wanted to ask—I thought people in Africa had very dark skin but your skin is pretty light,” Amelia commented.
“I’m a Hausa and most of us have light skin. Actually there are a number of ethnic groups in West Africa that have light-skinned members, like the Igbos—about half of them are very light. But you said you had old injury to your bottom—umm, Amelia, your name is Hadad; isn’t that Arabic? Are you a Muslim too? Is... oh dear... is that why you’re sore?”
“Oh Darra, it’s complicated... my mum’s extended family’s Muslim but my papa and I don’t practice. My mum was Muslim and her family was very observant but she wasn’t. And yes, my injury was getting cut in my fanny a few years ago; my auntie kind of kidnaped me...”
She very briefly related her tale, culminating with her current medical treatments. Just as Darra began to ask her further questions, the first bell rang.
“Amelia, let’s talk more at lunch, okay?” Darra said as they left for their rooms.
When lunch period began, Amelia got her food and looked for Darra; she found her with a few other girls at a table in a corner. Amelia had seen those girls around the school but had never spoken to any of them. When she joined them, Darra went to her.
“I got us a mostly private table,” she indicated its isolation. “My friends here—I don’t think you met them yet—are also Muslim and they were all cut too,” she whispered. Louder, she continued, “This is Estelle, Mariama, Tisa, and Fayola. And this is Amelia.”
The four girls greeted Amelia shyly; Mariama and Fayola were wearing hijabs.
Then Darra spoke to the group. “Before school started today Amelia and I talked about being cut—isa aru my people call it—and she told me that she was cut only three years ago.”
The others gasped and told Amelia that they were younger than eight and two were babies when they had the FGM procedure done to them.
Darra went on. “In Nigeria FGM is banned now. I’m sure it must continue in places, but I heard that many imams agreed it isn’t part of the Islamic laws. And my mum told me when isa aru was done to me, there were a lot of girls done at that same time. And she told me that she had heard that until pretty recently, something like 20 percent of the girls from my little province died afterward!”
Mariama spoke in agreement. “Yes, I heard that too from my villages. I’m from Côte d’Ivoire and a Voltaïque. I was cut when I was two, I think. I came from the north. They didn’t use sanitary conditions and rubbed ashes and herbs on the cuts after and many kids were poor and malnourished. When they got infected, lots died.”
Fayola offered more information. “I also heard that babies born to girls who were cut have a greater chance of dying after birth.” The others nodded that they had heard that fact.
Then they began to discuss some of the medical problems they had experienced. They all had some scarring and keloid formation. Darra said her cutting was only of her clitoral prepuce and it turned out that none of the girls had had the most radical form of FGM which included the excision of the clitoris, removal of all of the vulval lips, and sewing up of the remaining area, leaving only a small opening for the passage of urine and menstrual flow.
“Ugh,” Estelle commented. “I heard they do that in Somalia!”
Darra said, “Not only there; other places too, my mum says. Amelia, what are your doctors doing for you now?”
Amelia told them how they were working on breaking up her scar tissue and then trying to repair the damaged nerves.
“And it really hurts!” she exclaimed. “They have to press deep into my skin there and rub it around...” the others winced, “...and then I’m sore for a few days after. But it’s helping, I can feel it. They also warned me I have to keep myself very clean or I’ll get a urinary infection.”
“Oh yes!” Darra said. “That’s a constant problem I have, I get them lots and I do keep myself clean there, but it keeps happening.”
The other girls said they had repeated infections too. And then they compared how much sensitivity they had and most girls, while not experiencing intense pain, said that the feelings in their vulvas was mostly discomfort and could even be painful when the area was rubbed.
Tisa grimaced. “In PE, Carley, that blonde girl in year eleven with the big titties, was giggling to her friends about getting herself off by tickling her fanny,” she said. “I can’t imagine what it would feel like to have that kind of feeling from there. It hurts if I press there when I wash myself.”
“You know, we should try to do something,” Amelia ventured. “Like a blog? Write about how awful that cutting is to happen to girls? There are five of us here and there must be more girls at our school who are cut ‘cuz so many come from Africa and the Middle East too. Maybe we can have girls tell us their stories and we can put them on the web and if enough people see them, they’ll see how bad it is for girls and maybe make the practice against the law.”
“That’s a really good idea, Amelia,” Darra said. “But I only know how to post on Facepage. We’ll also need help if we have a blog. Those look hard to do.”
Estelle smiled. “Maybe I can get help. My uncle knows about those things, I think. I’ll ask him how to make a blog for us.”
~~~~
That evening at home, Kevin told Denise that Jeremy had given him his Facepage address.
“He’s made it open to everyone, not like a personal page, Denise. Ha, like a music group, I guess. He’s got links to news items on school problems that could be related to the Program here, see? Wow, there isn’t anything like the censorship we had when the Program was in the States.”
“Oh look, Kevin—here’s a link to that blog that Amelia mentioned,” Denise pointed. “In the recommended sites. Where it says ‘Visit the human rights and dignity blog by The Realist.’ Click there, sweetie.”
Kevin did. The blog opened and the current article was titled, “The Program: Human Rights Abuses Coming to a School Near You.” There was an introductory paragraph which discussed various government-sanctioned torture methods—or what some governments called “enhanced interrogation techniques”—like sleep deprivation, binding the victim into contorted positions, water-boarding, and exposure to prolonged extreme cold and heat. It then mentioned how most people believed all forms of torture, no matter the justification, to be morally repugnant.
The blog article continued, “We’ve all heard of these acts of abuse from media reports and know that they have been perpetrated on people, usually with the justification that the information the torturers seek is supposed to save lives. But the public is totally unaware of the abuses, tortures actually, committed on our own children in our own schools every day, by the people who we have entrusted to protect them. The following is a first-hand account of such a human rights crime, written just this week by a girl in year 11 in a school 30 kilometers north of London.”
Yesterday I learned I was in the [Naked in School] Program and today I had to be a subject in Health class. The teacher saw me come into class naked and decided to cover sexual response, even though the lessons didn’t cover that until later this year.
She told me to lay down on the front table so the class could see between my legs. I’ll write down what she said as best as I can recall.
“Class, you know that pupils in the Program have to allow Reasonable Requests, but in class lessons, teachers can exceed the limits of what the pupils normally must permit. I think the only limit we have is that we can’t force a pupil to have sexual intercourse.”
I was totally shocked; I’m a virgin.
“The most effective way of obtaining sexual arousal in boys and girls is by oral sex and since we have a subject to practice on, this is a perfect time for everyone to learn how to do it with a girl.”
I tried to jump up but she was holding my shoulders down. Then she asked for a volunteer to go first and I saw almost every boy in the class raise their hand—even some of the girls did too!
She called a boy up and he began pushing his fingers into my crotch to open my lips and I cried in pain.
“Not so rough,” the teacher warned him. “You want to be gentle. Remember, your goal is to give her an orgasm. We want everyone to see what it’s like to do that.”
I shuddered. Did she mean that she was going to have EVERYONE in the class try to make me come? I’ll be a total mess! How will I be able to walk to my next lesson? Anyway, I felt icky from the first boy’s having his tongue in my fanny; it was disgusting and his fumblings did nothing for me. I also felt nothing but revulsion with the next few boys too, except now I was getting sore. The teacher was sounding annoyed, probably because I wasn’t getting aroused, and sent the sixth boy back to his seat. How could I feel aroused if all I felt was pain and disgust? Then she alarmed me with her next comment.
“Our subject seems unresponsive, so perhaps she needs manual stimulation too. Sometimes stroking one or two fingers into a girl’s vagina helps their arousal.”
I twisted around and yelled, “I’m a virgin! You can’t put anything in me!”
She had two boys come up to hold me down and called another boy up.
“Try licking her clitoris while you slide your finger in her vagina.”
He put his finger there and pushed. I was dry and it hurt. I screamed!
“Oh, is she too dry?” the teacher asked. “Lick your finger and try again.”
I yelled for him to stop, but he shoved two fingers in and the pain was awful and I must have passed out because next I knew I was in the nurse’s office with a bloody pad over my fanny. And my poor hymen was torn to shreds.
Of course I will have to face more of this abuse tomorrow since I was told I have to stay in the Program in spite of the abuse. My parents are livid but there’s nothing they can do. I think that the Health class wasn’t a demonstration of sex, it was a demonstration of torture.
“Oh crap, Kevin, it’s just like we saw on our old website,” Denise groaned. “Abusive teachers were almost always the biggest problem.”
“Yeah. There are more stories like this one in the blog’s archives,” Kevin observed. “Whoever this blogger is—wow, I think it must be a solo project. Hey, didn’t Amelia say she heard someone in her school was the Realist blogger? Maybe she knows something.”
“She’s studying at a friend’s place till... oh, that must be her now...”
“Hi, I’m home!” Amelia called as she opened the door.
“Hi there! Amelia, honey, does anyone know who writes that ‘Realist’ blog?” Denise asked.
“Hi Denise, no; I haven’t heard, but that stuff posted on it is really scary. The kids in those schools must be terrified of the Program.”
“It’s very bad when the teachers use the Program as an excuse to mistreat or humiliate the kids like some of these stories tell about,” Denise said. “I know of cases where some kids liked the Program and I’ve even spoken to some of them, but since those kids aren’t outraged or hurt by what they experienced, most don’t write anything about it like the Realist does.”
Kevin looked at Denise. “Say, sweetie, looks like they don’t censor Facepage here. I wonder if kids tell of any good experiences on their personal pages. But I wonder how we’d find any instances if someone isn’t in their group of followers.”
“I can put up a question on a couple of music groups’ pages, ones that high school kids follow,” suggested Amelia. “Even if they take it down, the word might spread and we’d see if anyone answers.”
“Good thinking, honey, but do you want to use your own Facepage persona for that?” Kevin asked.
“Oops... um... no; that’s not such a good idea then...”
“Well, we could set up an anonymous page—that’s not really legal and we could get trouble if it got traced. Ah, I know. Let’s use one of the shell companies we used to register our anti-Program website. Those empty offices are still paid for, Denise. I think I have the records for the names and addresses on my laptop. Let’s see... yes I do. Okay, we can set up a new account with this name and address. Next, Amelia, don’t connect to the new account on Facepage with your usual browser. Your internet address is probably saved in the Facepage logs and could be traced back to us. We’ll set you up with the Tor browser—always connect with Tor and no one can trace your connection back to you.”
“How does that work?” Amelia asked.
“It uses relays—several different computers that the connection hops through—and hides the message and destination in encrypted layers so each relay can’t be traced back. It’s pretty complicated but it works well and my activist friends swear by it,” Kevin explained.
“Um, I should tell you this, I guess,” Amelia said, “I’ve been talking with a group of girls at school. They all had the FGM done to them when they were a lot younger than me...”
Denise looked at her in alarm. “Are they okay now? Do they need medical care?”
“Oh, no, Denise. They all do have problems but we looked their problems up on line and looks like they aren’t unusual for FGM victims. No one has their pain as bad as mine but they get urinary infections and only have pain when their, um, fannies? are rubbed.”
“Fannies?” Denise asked. “Their buttocks?”
Amelia giggled, “No, silly. That’s a rude word for... you know, between the legs—vulva, or um... pussy, that’s it. I know that some of the girls—not the ones who were cut—were saying in PE that they can rub their fannies to make it felt really good but none of us feels anything there but pain. Anyway. We wanted to write about how awful that FGM practice is and how it’s an awful health risk for girls. We want to do a blog about it.”
“What a wonderful idea, sweetie,” Denise exclaimed. “Can you work on that and not have it interfere with your schoolwork?”
“Yeah... I think so. Right now we’re not sure just how to start.”
“I have an idea. I’m sure there are women’s organizations who are fighting the practice. Let’s ask at the hospital on Friday if they have any information for someone to contact. I’m sure they’d love to have your voices added to their fight against FGM. And that brings up your treatment on Friday. How do you feel now, sweetie?”
Amelia shuddered. “Still hurts but I’ll get over it. That was really bad—I hope next time isn’t like that!”
“Well, they must have found something there, honey. I heard from Dr Singh’s office today and they want you to meet with him this Friday to talk about your treatment. They said not to worry, they think it’s probably good news.”
Amelia had tensed up at Denise’s first words but visibly relaxed at “good news.”
“Ooohh, I sure hope it’s good news...” she sighed.
~~~~
On Friday, Kevin and Denise accompanied Amelia to her neurology appointment with Dr Singh.
After Singh greeted them, he pulled a sheet out of a folder he was carrying and passed it to Amelia, who glanced at it and looked at him questioningly. “I need surgery?”
Singh smiled at her. “That’s the surgical information sheet we give to our patients for microsurgery, Amelia. I gave it to you so you could see that the incision you need is tiny, and that means rapid healing. When you had that very bad reaction to the last treatment, I’m sure you recall how painful that was, the therapist felt something right on or next to the little nerve at your injury, so she had to press in harder to see how large it was. Your earlier therapy broke up the scar tissue around it enough that she could feel it move a bit; it’s a little nodule that’s buried in the scar tissue but we know all about what causes such things. One possibility is that it’s a granuloma, that’s a lump of coarse tissue that the body makes in response to either infection, inflammation, or a foreign substance.
“Another very likely possibility for the nodule is a traumatic neuroma; that sounds bad but it’s not. Let me explain what that is. It’s a kind of nerve injury that can happen as a result of surgery, and your genital cutting there could certainly have caused one to develop—neuromas usually are formed at the ends of nerve fibers after they’re injured. Then if something goes wrong during the healing process, the nerve sometimes regenerates improperly. We see neuromas form most commonly near a scar, either close to the skin surface or sometimes deeper. They can often be very painful and this could actually be the primary source of your continued pain.
“We don’t know which of those you have but it doesn’t matter since they’re both treated the same; we make a little incision, then carefully separate the growth from the surrounding healthy tissues, and finally we repair any damaged nerve fibers using a microscope.
“Okay, I’ve given you all lots of information; is everything clear? Any questions? Yes, Amelia?”
“Yes, sir. How long is the operation and do I have to stay?” she asked.
“Only a few hours for the repair, depending on how much nerve involvement we find. We’ll keep you overnight simply to make sure you have adequate pain relief because sometimes the body produces all kinds of pain signals following this kind of surgery and sending you home with a narcotic pill just won’t do for the first 24 hours. You should be fine for sedentary activities on the third day, and you’ll need to keep the area clean and protected from pressure—wear loose-fitting undies—till I see you for the post-op visit a week to ten days following. Using a menstrual pad might be good, too.
“And that brings me to the next part. We can schedule the surgical part of the treatment of the scarring in your vagina at the same time. That’s a very routine procedure and there isn’t all that much work needed. I see from your chart that we can avoid your menses if we schedule a week from this coming Wednesday. Your periods are very regular so you should be over your period by that Saturday or Sunday at the latest. But I’d like to get this done soon, like on that Wednesday, so we don’t lose much time in your continued treatment. Will this work, Miss Roberts, Mr Coris?”
Denise glanced at Kevin who nodded. “Dr Singh, everything you said sounds clear to us and we’d have no problem with that date. Is that okay, Amelia?” she asked.
She nodded, and then asked, “Dr Singh, if it’s that neuro... thing, does that mean that when you take it out, the pain will stop?”
Singh tented his fingers and leaned back. “You know, dear, that we can’t make blanket promises, right? We’re only physicians, not seers. But based on my experience in treating neuroma cases, I think that there’s a very strong possibility that this might be the source of much of your pain. There’s still scarring there that needs treatment and could be a source of pain, too. But if I were a betting man, I’d say that this is the major reason you’re in that kind of pain. I hope that’s a reassuring opinion.”
“Yes, sir; thank you,” Amelia said shyly. “And will the part in my... vagina... um... hurt a lot?”
“I won’t be doing that part, dear,” he told her. “Dr Jeffries—you met her—is the gynecologist who’s consulting. She told me that you’ll feel, ah, ‘uncomfortable,’ as she put it, for a day or two. I’m sure that you’ll feel discomfort from the aftermath of the microsurgery more than what her procedure will cause. But in any case, don’t get overly anxious about pain; pain can be well controlled for the first day or two post-op and shouldn’t be much greater than the pain you experience every day. Is that what you mean?”
Amelia nodded. “Thank you.”
Singh nodded. “Good. Okay, then, let me show you to the surgical scheduling nurse to confirm the time and get you your pre-op instructions. And you can go to your therapy session next week; they’ll do some pre-op scanning to better locate that possible granuloma or neuroma.”
Soon the group left for home carrying a sheaf of papers and prescriptions.
~~~~
Back at school the following week, Amelia met with her friends to discuss their blogging project.
After they settled at their table with their lunches, she began, “When I went for my last appointment, I spoke to a nurse. She told me that the United Nations and the um... World Health Organization and others all have anti-FGM programs. She gave me some flyers from Unicef, here,” she passed them over, “and said since we’re kids these might be the best materials to begin with. She also suggested that we decide about the topics we want to write about, so I made a list.”
She put a paper on the table and Darra picked it up.
“Okay,” Darra said, “this looks like a really good place to start. Let me read it: ‘number one, talking about organizations doing educating about preventing the practice; two, list of countries where it’s practiced; three, number of girls affected by the practice; four, countries making laws against it as a medical or human rights issue; and five, international groups trying to get other countries to ban the practice.’ Amelia, we should also write about what happens to girls, right? Like the different kinds of health problems it causes—complications, short and long term.”
“That’s right, I should have thought of that,” Amelia said. “After all, it’s what brought us together. Hey, maybe even have personal experiences if we can get people to tell us.”
Fayola shyly reached for the paper and looked at it. “My mum says she regrets now having it done to me. She told me that she’s heard that there’s no religious law in Islam that requires doing it, too. Maybe that can be something to write too?”
Darra grinned at her. “Brilliant! Sure, let’s split up these topics and pick who gets which one and will write something about them, okay?”
~~~~
Later that day, Amelia was speaking to Denise about her meeting with her five friends.
“So we split up the topics, Denise, and I decided to take the one about the laws and international groups. That’s ‘cuz of Kevin,” she giggled, “he’s into the laws and stuff and knows all the diplomats too. I’m gonna get him to help me lots.”
“Didn’t you want to write about the health effects, though?” Denise asked.
“At first I thought so, but my cutting wasn’t like the other girls’ FGM; Papa got it got stopped before anything was cut off me. Maybe my struggling made that first cut worse. The other girls had their cutting done with their mothers and grandmothers there and comforted them, they told me. Besides, they know other girls and can get them to tell their stories too.”
“Okay, sweetie,” Denise said. “I’m sure Kevin will be happy to help.”
“Denise, I just remembered,” Amelia said, reaching into her backpack. “They gave out these letters today. They said that they should be opened by our parents only. Oh, here’s Kevin.”
“Hi, guys, what’s up?” Kevin asked as he came in.
“Denise just offered your legal help to me,” Amelia giggled. “I need to write up something on anti-FGM laws for our blog and you know all about diplomatic stuff.”
“Hmm, well, I’m not so sure what I know goes into those areas, but I’m sure we can figure out where to get the facts you need,” Kevin smiled.
“Kevin, listen to this,” Denise said. “Amelia brought this letter home. It says that the government’s Department for Education has ruled that Amelia’s school is subject to running the Naked in School Program.”
“What!” both Amelia and Kevin exclaimed.
“Apparently because the school gets government subsidies. The letter says that Amelia’s school is something like the specialty state-funded schools that they call, let’s see... ‘City Technology Colleges.’ Those are secondary schools that specialize in technology subjects, and there are only three of them in the whole country. Amelia’s school is a little different. It’s a specialty school like the others but it’s in arts and performance subjects. Also, it’s not a state school, it’s a tuition-based independent school. But because it’s a specialty that the government is interested in supporting, they provide a small subsidy—they call it a bursary—to offset some of each pupil’s tuition to support arts education. Now the government has decided that the subsidy they provide makes the school subject to running the Program. The letter says that the school’s governors will meet to discuss this and will meet Monday evening. They invite parents to speak at the meeting.”
“Oh no! I couldn’t do that...” Amelia moaned, eyes tearing. “I heard about what happens in those schools...”
“No fear, honey,” Kevin said, embracing her. “We won’t let anything happen to you and we’ll definitely be at that governors’ meeting. Denise, is there anything else in the letter?”
“Only that there will be reps from the Lambeth-London Borough Council and the Common Council of the City of London at the meeting too. Um, let’s see; there’s an info page. Those are the local authorities responsible for administration of state-funded schools; the London Common Council approved the Program for London state schools but the local councils had to approve it too. Because Amelia’s school is a special case, it’s a specialty school that draws pupils from a wide area, and since it’s independent, the educational authorities don’t have administrative authority over her school. So it looks like everyone is just feeling their way around here. We really do need to make our voice heard, honey.”
Kevin looked thoughtful. “Does it say who gets the final word on whether the school has to have the Program?”
“No, it doesn’t, Kevin. But the school is that ‘independent’ kind and it’s run by a local board, not by a borough council like the state schools are. The stationery lists the school’s governors—I guess they would be the ones who decide.”
Kevin took the letter and looked it over. “Hmmm, I see different governor titles. Staff, parent, co-opted, associate... well, the first two seem clear but what’s a co-opted governor?”
“I’ll bet we can look it up,” Denise said as she pulled the laptop to her. A minute later, she looked up. “They’re community representatives—say, that’s like American school board members. I wonder if they’re elected or appointed, this is the government site and it doesn’t say.”
“Well, three of the nine are parent governors,” Kevin mused. “That’s good since it gives parents a reasonable board representation. I have an idea; maybe we can use that meeting to our advantage.”
“Uh oh,” Denise chuckled. “You got that evil look in your eyes. Watch out, Norwich Academy!”
Amelia had been listening anxiously, now she spoke, her voice full of trepidation. “Are you sure you can keep me from having to do that Program? They make kids masturbate and force them to allow other kids to grope them in their privates. I couldn’t bear it if...” she dissolved into tears.
Denise held her. “Sweetie, we’ll try to keep you out of it. And if you met five other girls who were cut in your school and they all have pain in their privates like that, I don’t see how this stupid idea could ever be suggested here. This isn’t something we ever came across in the U.S., Kevin.”
Kevin blinked. “Huh. Yeah. No idea why, either. The U.S. has plenty of immigrant groups and I’m sure there must have been girls who were cut. Maybe they found ways to avoid the Program—home school or religious school. I wonder.”
“Well, for the research on our blog on FGM, maybe we’ll find how many girls in America there are with FGM,” Amelia said softly as Denise stroked her hair gently. “And you said you’d help me with the laws about it, Kevin. Can we do that after I finish my homework?”
“Sure, sweetie,” Kevin said.
~~~~
Next day at school, all the students were buzzing with the news about the threat of the Program coming to the school. The teachers had difficulty keeping order in their classes as the students wanted more information; finally, there was so much class disruption that the head teacher was forced to announce that no decision had been made by the school governors as yet.
Amelia met with her friends at lunch to plan their blog; yesterday she and Kevin had located a lot of information on the Internet about laws banning FGM in a number of countries, plus a United Nations convention and a treaty on the rights of the child and one from the European Union. Although the international treaties didn’t specifically mention FGM, the practice could be considered a human rights violation and was thus banned by those treaties. But instead of their blog work, most of the girls’ discussion was about the threat of the Program.
“I would just die,” Mariama moaned. “I have permission to wear a modest PE kit too.”
“Me too,” said Fayola.
“How is it different?” Amelia asked. “I don’t go to gym so I haven’t seen those.”
Fayola answered, “Oh, right, you wouldn’t know, then. We traditional Muslim girls have to cover our hair, arms, and legs, so our kits are loose and long-sleeved. And we wear the hijab with it too.”
“What about showers?” Amelia persisted.
“Oh, we get an excusal note saying light exercise only and no showers,” Mariama put in.
Amelia pressed on, “Does that mean you never go swimming then? When I lived in Indonesia, the Muslim kids in my school did go swimming; the girls wore modest one-piece suits but their arms and legs were bare.”
Fayola giggled. “Yes, you should see my swim costume then. Such high fashion! It’s very modest and covers me all up—it even has a hoodie and a skirt but it’s comfortable to wear in the water.” She laughed. “Some people actually call it a burkini!”
Mariama groaned. “If I’m not allowed to show my bare arms and legs in public, how could I take all my clothes off? I would rather die than do that.”
“Yeah, and at another school where Muslim girls were forced to be starkers, I heard a girl was killed by her family too,” Tisa wailed.
All the girls groaned.
“My guardians are gonna do something to try to keep the Program away, I think,” Amelia said hopefully. “I just pray that they can do it, too.”
The others echoed that wish and then began to discuss their blog again. Estelle’s uncle had helped her to set up the blog and showed her how to post articles on it.
“It’s not that difficult,” she told the others. “It’s a lot like putting stuff on Facepage. And each one of us can add their own articles. Can you come to the library after classes? I can show you on a computer in the library.”
Darra looked thoughtful. “Say, how do we let people know about our blog? When it’s ready, I mean.”
“Oh, good point,” Amelia said. “Well, how about if I ask my nurse at my next therapy session if she knows how we could publicize it?”
The group agreed that was a good suggestion.
Then, after school, the teens gathered and began to enter their articles in the blog. Amelia had written up a description of the anti-FGM laws adopted by various countries so she copied the files from her cloud-storage hosting account and added them to the blog. Then she decided that she wanted to add quotes of selections from the human rights provisions of the U.N. treaties and include a discussion of how those provisions could be used by country organizers to persuade those countries to adopt anti-FGM laws, but doing that would take more time to research. She would do that later, at home, and discuss her idea with Kevin.
By the end of the week, the blog was developing nicely, and at her therapy session on Friday, Amelia’s nurse gave her a list of organizations she could contact which might publicize the blog on their web sites.
Copyright © 2016 Seems Ndenyal. All Rights Reserved.