Bassim
VIP Member
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2008
- Member Type
- Student or Learner
- Native Language
- Bosnian
- Home Country
- Bosnia Herzegovina
- Current Location
- Sweden
Dear people
Please, help me and proofread this text.
The part of the city I live in was in the past a huge mental hospital dating from the nineteen century. It was a home for thousands of patients who were kept like in a prison behind thick walls and high fences. One can still see fragments of the rusty fence that prevented patents to get lost in the nearby forest. Nowadays, the majority of the buildings are destroyed and in their places they have build expensive flats. However, there are still two buildings where they used to keep the most violent men and women.
The walls around are about two meters and a half high and very thick. The buildings are two storeyed, with high ceilings. One day I met an old Swedish men who used to work there as a male nurse. He is now eighty four years old but still vital and remembers everything. We talked at the bus stop while waiting for our bus to arrive. He sat on a bench holding the stick in his right hand and pointing with his left at the pavement said, "Just where you are standing now it was a high wall that continued about fifty meters and surrounded other buildings." When I asked him how it was to work there he told me it was difficult because at that time tranquillisers still did not exist and if someone got violent, which happened often, the only solution was to tied him up to the bed and wait until he became calm again.
"At least they got food three times a day and a roof over their heads." he concluded.
Nowadays students live behind the thick walls and probably the majority of them do not know how much suffering is hidden inside the walls. I am glad I do not live there because I do not know if I would ever be able to sleep peacefully thinking about all these humans who became free first when they died.
There is a museum where one can see how the patients were treated at that time. When I visited it for the first time I felt such an uneasiness. Looking at the beds with wide and strong leader belts and bath tubs where patients were kept in a cold water one can only imagine how much suffering they have experienced during the years. The majority of them died behind the walls and they were buried in a cemetery some hundred meters away.
But one can still see that among all the madness there were still creative people who painted, made sculptures or did other creative work. It is interesting to see how a human mind fought with illness and tried to make sense in all confusion. There are dozens of paintings on the walls who witness of the state of mind of their creators. One of the patients got an idea to make a perpetual motion machine. He surely spent years sawing weed parts, filing them away, gluing, until finally a huge wheel was ready to prove his theory which unfortunately was wrong.
If one continues to walk for about fifty meters one can see the building that dates from the very beginning of the hospital. It is a white painted, oblong two storied building, about fifty meters long with the windows that still have metal bars. The part of the building is still hospital for drug addicts and the other part occupies a high school There is also a church inside for those who still need help from God.
Every day I take the bus to the centre and during all these years I have seen almost the same faces coming and going from the hospital, trying in vain to get rid of their addiction. Some of them remind me of robots; they take strong medicine that make their speech slurred and movements slow.
When the weather is fine I use to take a stroll downhill only to escape my prison flat. On the left there is a villa which belonged to the hospital's chief in the past. It is situated in the middle of the forest with a few trees and a lawn in front of it. Nowadays, they hold lectures for the medical staff inside it. But mostly it is empty.
There is a little river and path beside it that one can walk all the way to the centre. It is very peaceful. The only passers by are joggers, bird watchers, walkers and students cycling from and to their lectures.
There is only one bench around and I use to sit on it watching the river passing slowly. There is a little jetty where I always find a flock of ducks. They enjoy the sun or bob gently on the river. Whenever they see me, they start to quack loudly. We know each other for many years and I believe when they see my figure moving slowly and despondently they talk to each other, "Here is he again, the unhappy man." said the one
"He is always alone," said the second. "He must have gone through the terrible things, said the third.
I sit on a bench with a notebook in my hands and try to write down my feelings. Behind me are orchards and gardens where in the past patients used to cultivate the land and grow fruit and vegetables for their own use. Nowadays, they have turned into weeds and grass. The little river is like a balm for my soul. It reminds me of the river in my home town on which beaches I used to spend months of the summer. This river, however is cold and the quality of the water is bad and not recommended for swimming in this part. There is a little metal plate which reads that in the eighteen century just a few meters from the bench there was a bridge that collapsed
killing nineteen people. So the river was not so peaceful all the time.
On the other side there is a field where Danish and Swedish armies met in a bloody battle which ended up in a massacre. Nowadays, every spring thousands of white and blue flowers bloom all over. People use to say the white are Danish soldiers and blue Swedish.
Whenever I sit there a feeling of deep sadness fills my heart. I feel like a prisoner deported to the far away place where nothing joyful happens to me. I never could have imagined that life of a refugee would be so difficult in this country who prides itself as one of the best in the world. It was more then fourteen years of suffering, feeling pain and powerless.
We are not welcome here. We are outsiders, strangers. Even our children who are born and speak the language fluently are called "immigrants."
I am living in a vacuum trying to keep my mind sane in a society where expediency is one of the main ideals. I never heard before of such an idea but here it has been existing for years and people are simply following the orders of their politicians. Ethics and moral are not important any more. Nobody talks about a character of a person or his or her feelings. What is important is the material gains, profit and gadgets.
And I who came directly from the war where thousands of innocent people were killed, women raped, property destroyed have ended up in a society without love. I know, I can search for it for the rest of my life and never find it because love is such a rare "phenomenon" here.
To be continued...
Please, help me and proofread this text.
The part of the city I live in was in the past a huge mental hospital dating from the nineteen century. It was a home for thousands of patients who were kept like in a prison behind thick walls and high fences. One can still see fragments of the rusty fence that prevented patents to get lost in the nearby forest. Nowadays, the majority of the buildings are destroyed and in their places they have build expensive flats. However, there are still two buildings where they used to keep the most violent men and women.
The walls around are about two meters and a half high and very thick. The buildings are two storeyed, with high ceilings. One day I met an old Swedish men who used to work there as a male nurse. He is now eighty four years old but still vital and remembers everything. We talked at the bus stop while waiting for our bus to arrive. He sat on a bench holding the stick in his right hand and pointing with his left at the pavement said, "Just where you are standing now it was a high wall that continued about fifty meters and surrounded other buildings." When I asked him how it was to work there he told me it was difficult because at that time tranquillisers still did not exist and if someone got violent, which happened often, the only solution was to tied him up to the bed and wait until he became calm again.
"At least they got food three times a day and a roof over their heads." he concluded.
Nowadays students live behind the thick walls and probably the majority of them do not know how much suffering is hidden inside the walls. I am glad I do not live there because I do not know if I would ever be able to sleep peacefully thinking about all these humans who became free first when they died.
There is a museum where one can see how the patients were treated at that time. When I visited it for the first time I felt such an uneasiness. Looking at the beds with wide and strong leader belts and bath tubs where patients were kept in a cold water one can only imagine how much suffering they have experienced during the years. The majority of them died behind the walls and they were buried in a cemetery some hundred meters away.
But one can still see that among all the madness there were still creative people who painted, made sculptures or did other creative work. It is interesting to see how a human mind fought with illness and tried to make sense in all confusion. There are dozens of paintings on the walls who witness of the state of mind of their creators. One of the patients got an idea to make a perpetual motion machine. He surely spent years sawing weed parts, filing them away, gluing, until finally a huge wheel was ready to prove his theory which unfortunately was wrong.
If one continues to walk for about fifty meters one can see the building that dates from the very beginning of the hospital. It is a white painted, oblong two storied building, about fifty meters long with the windows that still have metal bars. The part of the building is still hospital for drug addicts and the other part occupies a high school There is also a church inside for those who still need help from God.
Every day I take the bus to the centre and during all these years I have seen almost the same faces coming and going from the hospital, trying in vain to get rid of their addiction. Some of them remind me of robots; they take strong medicine that make their speech slurred and movements slow.
When the weather is fine I use to take a stroll downhill only to escape my prison flat. On the left there is a villa which belonged to the hospital's chief in the past. It is situated in the middle of the forest with a few trees and a lawn in front of it. Nowadays, they hold lectures for the medical staff inside it. But mostly it is empty.
There is a little river and path beside it that one can walk all the way to the centre. It is very peaceful. The only passers by are joggers, bird watchers, walkers and students cycling from and to their lectures.
There is only one bench around and I use to sit on it watching the river passing slowly. There is a little jetty where I always find a flock of ducks. They enjoy the sun or bob gently on the river. Whenever they see me, they start to quack loudly. We know each other for many years and I believe when they see my figure moving slowly and despondently they talk to each other, "Here is he again, the unhappy man." said the one
"He is always alone," said the second. "He must have gone through the terrible things, said the third.
I sit on a bench with a notebook in my hands and try to write down my feelings. Behind me are orchards and gardens where in the past patients used to cultivate the land and grow fruit and vegetables for their own use. Nowadays, they have turned into weeds and grass. The little river is like a balm for my soul. It reminds me of the river in my home town on which beaches I used to spend months of the summer. This river, however is cold and the quality of the water is bad and not recommended for swimming in this part. There is a little metal plate which reads that in the eighteen century just a few meters from the bench there was a bridge that collapsed
killing nineteen people. So the river was not so peaceful all the time.
On the other side there is a field where Danish and Swedish armies met in a bloody battle which ended up in a massacre. Nowadays, every spring thousands of white and blue flowers bloom all over. People use to say the white are Danish soldiers and blue Swedish.
Whenever I sit there a feeling of deep sadness fills my heart. I feel like a prisoner deported to the far away place where nothing joyful happens to me. I never could have imagined that life of a refugee would be so difficult in this country who prides itself as one of the best in the world. It was more then fourteen years of suffering, feeling pain and powerless.
We are not welcome here. We are outsiders, strangers. Even our children who are born and speak the language fluently are called "immigrants."
I am living in a vacuum trying to keep my mind sane in a society where expediency is one of the main ideals. I never heard before of such an idea but here it has been existing for years and people are simply following the orders of their politicians. Ethics and moral are not important any more. Nobody talks about a character of a person or his or her feelings. What is important is the material gains, profit and gadgets.
And I who came directly from the war where thousands of innocent people were killed, women raped, property destroyed have ended up in a society without love. I know, I can search for it for the rest of my life and never find it because love is such a rare "phenomenon" here.
To be continued...
Last edited:
