Although I graduated from the United World College Red Cross Nordic (UWCRCN) over a decade ago, I still think of my two years in Flekke often and refer to them as the best two years of my life. It was during these two years that I not only learned a lot about myself, including my core values and passions, but also about the world. I am grateful to have lived and learned with other young people from across the world and different social, economic and cultural backgrounds at such a tender age. Not surprisingly, my two years in Flekke have had a huge impact on who I am today, and the choices that I have made.

When I graduated from UWCRCN on a sunny spring day in May 2004, I was not exactly sure what career path I wanted to take, so I was thrilled to do a UWCRCN supported Third Year Option Project that allowed me to volunteer at a school and hostel for children in rural India for several months followed by travelling around the world. I felt a keen sense of wanting to contribute to making the world a better place after having lived a life of plenty of opportunities growing up in northern Europe. When I reflect back on my time with the excited and curious kids I was fortunate to meet, I am certain they taught me more than I ever taught them.

After a year of learning, growing and exploring, I moved across the world to study Sociology and Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. Resisting the urge to select a program that had a clearly identifiable career outcome, I decided to learn more about how society and the world we live in shape the health of individuals and communities. In my final year, I found myself as an intern at an Indigenous community health centre in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside – one of the poorest neighbourhoods in Canada. There a dedicated Family Physician and advocate showed me the many possibilities for promoting social change as a Family Physician, as he tirelessly helped and advocated for patients whose lives were complicated by poverty, homelessness, complex medical conditions, addiction, and trauma. I remember clearly the day when I decided: “I want to do what he does!”

My path in medicine has not always been linear or easy, but it has been guided by my core values, which has always provided me with a sense of purpose and being “at home”. It is this “at home” feeling, which I can take with me wherever I go on my journey, which is one of the greatest gifts that the UWCRCN experience has given me.

Jeanette S. Pedersen is half Danish and half Thai. She lives in Vancouver, Canada, with her husband. She completed her medical school training at the University of Calgary, Canada, and is currently a Family Medicine Resident at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. She considers herself fortunate to be training at St. Paul’s Hospital and in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside – the community that inspired her to become a Physician.

For profiles and news of other students and alumni, click here.

Here I am in an airport waiting for another plane to catch and my thoughts turn to my decision to grant Angie and Edmund a two year leave of absence from RCN.

As I look into the kaleidoscope of working together with these two, lots of images flash across my eyes:

Edmund emitting his unparalleled generosity of spirit from the office opposite my own; Angie walking at speed down the path outside my study window clutching a baking tray of delights for her students below; Edmund sitting in the sun on the bench outside my office window talking and, much more importantly, listening to the students and staff around him; Angie standing at the bus door of a minibus to welcome wholeheartedly visitors from our local mottaks; Edmund, behind the lens, capturing the magic of RCN; Angie knitting and listening in an Education Staff Meeting; Edmund exhibiting an unlikely knowledge of the social lives of Hollywood C-listers at staff quiz nights; Angie twirling around the dance floor at Gammaldans; Edmund sporting a vibrantly coloured kurta; Angie looking magnificent after a trip to the Hair Salon Vidal Edmundo; Edmund introducing students of all profiles to the wonders of Theory of Knowledge; Angie sitting cross legged in the Silent House with students on our Survivors of Conflict and Foundation programmes; both Angie and Edmund cresting the top of Jarstadheia on May Day in blazing sunshine.

Edmund is always there in the wings for me – with his ability to make me laugh, his gift of saying an encouraging word at an opportune moment, and his quiet stillness in the midst of my world of chaos.

Angie is also always there for me – fresh with a new idea as to how we can develop learning support at RCN or run a new project for our partners at the Mottaks.

As they have been there for me, I am most certain they have been there for generations of students and staff here at RCN.

It is always such a pleasure to read the testimonials they have drafted for their advisees – beautifully scripted and exhibiting a deep care and understanding of those in their charge.

A few weeks ago, Edmund kindly offered to give staff, on our of Koselig evenings at Sperrestova, an insight into his life as a Zen Buddhist monk for fourteen years – it was fascinating and myth-busting.

I had always liked to imagine that, for love, (double O) Edmund had lowered himself out of a tower window on knotted sheets to the rooftop of the monastery in the middle of the night, commando-crawled to the back wall of the cloister and then, timed to perfection, dropped into the moving open-topped car with Angie at the controls.

My imagination had clearly run away with me.

With full permission of the Abbot and the community, Edmund stepped beyond the monastery to start a new life with Angie. Indeed some monks were reported to be relieved that he was no longer in charge of recording educationally interesting and morally uplifting documentaries for communal watching on a Friday evening.

One of my absolute favourite images of Angie and Edmund is seeing them on the road to Flekke – walking in all seasons, hand in hand.

I am going to finish with some words of wisdom from Albert Schweitzer – a French-German theologian, organist, philosopher, physician and Nobel Peace Prize winner – which for me capture what Angie and Edmund give to our community here at RCN:

‘Much that has become our own in gentleness, modesty, kindness, willingness to forgive, in veracity

[truthfulness], loyalty, resignation under suffering, we owe to people in whom we have seen or experienced these virtues at work, sometimes in a great matter, sometimes in a small.’

As I said in the welcoming address at graduation, you have been role models of humility, integrity and compassion to us all – and you both, as individuals and as a partnership, have ‘lighted’ new flames within each of us.

We wish you some wonderful adventures and look forward to welcoming you back to RCN.

Richard D A Lamont
Rektor
6th June 2017