Teenagers from India, Pakistan Bond at Seeds of Peace camp
Washington File (US Department of State)

BY WENDY S. ROSS | OTISFIELD, MAINE For three weeks in June and July a group of 36 boys and girls from India and Pakistan lived together, played together, and grew to understand one another at the Seeds of Peace summer camp in rural Maine.

The camp, started ten years ago by journalist John Wallach, brings 13- to 16-year olds from opposing sides of regional conflicts together for several weeks each summer at a lakeside camp in the hopes that by getting to know the “enemy” they can learn ways to avert violence and war between their peoples.

The Indian and Pakistani youth were among 166 campers at the first summer session of the 2002 Seeds of Peace program. The other campers in the first session came from Afghanistan and the Middle East. Two other summer sessions are scheduled.

Aside from regular camp activities such as sports, art, music, cabin life, and meals together, the youth at the camp meet daily with trained facilitators in coexistence sessions, where they discuss their regional conflicts—in the case of the Indian and Pakistani youth, the tension over Kashmir.

Wasif Munir, a 14 year old boy from Lahore, Pakistan, said that when he first arrived at the camp in Maine “there was a big barrier of hatred” between himself and the Indians. But gradually, he said, he was able “to demolish that barrier,” and, in fact, to make friends with all of the Indian youth at the camp.

“Each and everyone from the Indian delegation is my friend,” now, he said in a July 9 interview.

Wasif said that before coming to the camp he knew nothing about the festivals, culture, or religion of the Indians, but now has gained a lot of knowledge. He said he was worried about the camp’s coexistence sessions before coming, but when he arrived he realized that the atmosphere was friendly and that it “was quite easy to communicate” with the Indians. He added that when he returns home to Lahore he is going to tell his relatives and friends and teachers of his experiences at the camp, and is looking forward to writing some articles about what he has gained from Seeds of Peace.

Fourteen year old Madhumita Venkataramanan, from Bombay, India, also interviewed July 9, supported Wasif’s positive evaluation of the camp experience. She said when she first came to the camp she too was “very apprehensive. I thought I had to prove my point to the other side to make them understand our side of the story.”

“I never thought that I would also be learning so much from them,” she said. Madhumita explained that in the daily coexistence sessions the Indian and Pakistani youngsters “opened up to each other,” and talked a lot about things connected to their regional conflict that they had never talked about before.

“We cried together, we told painful stories about things that had happened, everyone was crying for each other, so I know these are going to be relationships that will never break,” Madhumita said.

“Yesterday, we were discussing Kashmir, and we had to list our fears about what would happen if Kashmir either goes to India or to Pakistan,” she said. “We finally realized that we actually understood each other’s fears, we might not accept them, or agree with them, but we understood them, and we knew what they feared, and they began to understand us.”

“Many of these Pakistani friends are closer than friends I’ve made at home, and I know that it’s going to be a lasting thing,” she said.

“When you come here, nationalities are not important,” she said. “There’s no barrier of any kind. When we come together we’re all just kids playing and teasing and having fun. Of course there are serious moments also. But when we come here it’s like we’re all as one. A totally different experience over here.”

Thirteen year old Anum Mehmood from Lahore, Pakistan, said when she first arrived at the camp she did not like the coexistence sessions. “At first there was pointless shouting, no one even looked at each other or listened to each other, and they just kept on shouting and raging,” she said in an interview.

“At first none of us were able to admit to anything. We were so firm in our beliefs that we are right, we are not going to believe anything they say because they are wrong and we are right,” she said.

“Everyone had bad faces. It was really terrible. Our two facilitators really worked hard. And now we listen, even if we don’t accept. We really, really have made some progress,” she said.

“Today we were thinking about a suitable solution to Kashmir agreeable to both sides. We didn’t have 100 percent agreement, but we got about 75-80 percent agreement,” she said.

“We decided a plebiscite should be organized by India and Pakistan and a third neutral party which can join these two forces,” she said.

The problem, she added, “is that we could not think of a party neutral enough to do that.”

Next summer, according to Seeds of Peace staff, the program is hoping to have young people from Kashmir at the camp. Told about this possibility, the Indian and Pakistani campers interviewed all thought it was a wonderful idea.

Also interviewed were the adult delegation leaders from India and Pakistan, two from each country, who accompanied the youngsters to the camp, and who participated in a program similar to that of the kids. Noella De Souza, a teacher from India, said she was “happy to be part of the process of our kids learning to listen to each other and understand each other.”

She said she was “amazed at the way their understanding for each other had grown at the camp.”

Arifa Habib, a physics teacher from Pakistan, said “Personally it’s been very rewarding to see prejudices fall away.” She said the children “are fed with a lot of propaganda,” about the conflicts of their countries and “they need to learn to analyze, and not simply accept, everything that is told to them.”

Dilip D’Souza, a journalist from India, said “the most interesting aspect of this whole exercise for me is what’s happening to the kids, watching them grow.”

He added that in some ways the four adult leaders, may not accurately represent the views of their respective countries “because the four of us tend to agree on a lot more than we disagree on. We just tend to agree, we all four of us, are somewhat cynical about the way our respective governments work and how that has contributed to the hostility. So in that sense, perhaps there should have been adults who are more gung ho about going at each other.”

Sajjad Ahmed, a clinical psychologist from Pakistan, said he also liked the Seeds of Peace program. “A new journey is always a learning, for our kids, for myself as well,” he said.

“From our program,” he said, “we learned to be more accepting, more cooperative. But the most important part is the kids program. It’s quite amazing to see how the kids have grown from when they first came to the camp.”

“It was quite amazing to see the Indian and Pakistani kids do their activities together, and become friends, it was great,” he said.

All four adult delegation leaders said they hope to write a series of articles together that will be a springboard for discussion in their respective countries to mobilize political thought. At the end of each article, they said, they want to write a note that all comments are invited and encouraged. The first article would be a report on the camp and the experience, and then they would move on to the topics raised in the replies they receive.