Page 14 THE VILLADOM TIMES II • April 13, 2011 “green” – but they must be lying or trying to conceal their basic bigotry. When was the last time you walked into a corporate office and spotted a green receptionist? Our guest arrived, and we took the tour. Our guide, a charming young woman named Carlene, took us into the General Assembly Chamber and the Security Council Chamber. Carlene had to explain what the tapestries on the walls represented, because it was not obvious. The abstract tapestries, she said, depict the founding of the UN. Perhaps in rebuttal to the racist propaganda art of the war that had just ended, the artists who produced the UN art seem to have rebelled against any specifically human images. You could have hung most of these tapestries upside down and most people wouldn’t have noticed. They contained no figures where race or gender could be discerned, but they were striking all the same. When the UN was established in 1945, the world was producing human images of Nordic supermen, some German, some American, and some Russian, who were beating up on less favorably depicted adversaries. Americans showed mostly Anglo-Saxon types with a hint of Irish in the Four Freedoms posters by Norman Rockwell. Of course, one major constituent of the United Nations movement, the Soviet Union, wasn’t very big on freedom of religion or freedom of speech. (Long after Stalin, my wife spotted a Russian delegate she sometimes saw in the hall sitting in the sunlight, wearing a striped sailor shirt and a gold earring as he played the guitar. She warned him that he had better be careful because his colleagues didn’t appreciate Soviets projecting that kind of image. His impromptu concert was the last time he was ever seen.) Later, we sat in the viewer’s area and Carlene answered some questions. She admitted that the three biggest contributors to the UN budget are the United States, Japan, and Germany. No one pointed this, out but if the UN lost these three countries, the United Kingdom, and France, they would have one heck of a time making payroll. The U.S. share is 22.5 percent of the total. Since Japan and German also pay double-digits, there is one area of global politics where the industrial nations are not automatically the Bad Guys. Most developing nationals pay less than one percent. Farther up the hall, Carlene showed us a glass case full of land mines and told us that the UN campaign against land mines was remarkably effective. A couple of the land mines in the case were American-made. The Vietnam-era Claymore with the words “front to the enemy” in English was pretty obvious, but the damage that land mines do to civilians, illustrated in more posters, was horrific. The South Africans got rid of most of theirs some years ago. Our companion was South African and he still remembered the noise the land mines made when they had been dug up and detonated. Residents of the former East Germany reportedly got rid of their land mines some years ago – about the time the East Germans simply became Germans and stopped injecting testosterone into their female athletes. I think the North Koreans still have land mines in place, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the South Koreans also do. The best thing that came out of the tour, as far as I was concerned, was FREERICE, a game invented at Harvard to save the developing world from starvation. Carlene explained that you can visit FREERICE.com, and participate in a guessing game that features simple-to-difficult questions about English vocabulary, simple-to-difficult mathematics, and basic Italian, French, German, and Spanish language questions. Each answer you get right gives somebody 10 grains of rice. The cost is covered by an endowment. All you are donating is your time. What a great game! I tried playing it a couple of times, and I donated 1,000 grains of rice before I made my first and last mistake. I resolved to play on a regular basis. Feeding people is one of the UN programs that I think everybody endorses. On the way out, my wife and I asked who wanted to pose for a group photo. Our guest and Carlene volunteered, a Japanese woman and her son were willing, but ran out of time. A Chinese-American family of five stayed for the photo. As we left, Kwame returned my pocket knife at the security booth. I noted with relief that it hadn’t been dusted for fingerprints. We then spotted a photo-op of a shattered globe in the courtyard. Some Chinese people were there, but they stepped aside for us, then we stepped aside for them, and finally we opted for a picture of both groups – and the Chinese man’s wife jammed the shutter of their camera. My Chinese is a bit rusty, but as we left she was explaining why it was his fault. Outside the UN Compound, gender is still relevant. I hope the UN flourishes and I hope that the FREERICE game becomes a popular pastime in America and around the world. It’s a lot more fun to go online and prove you know that “remission” isn’t a synonym for “Russian wolfhound” and that “dweeb” is a synonym for “nerd” than to tell the world of the Web what you don’t know about Muslims, or Japan, or China, and prove you don’t know how to spell. In this life, you’re either part of the problem or part of the solution. The FREERICE game is part of the solution. I hope the UN is, too. My wife and I recently took a trip to the United Nations and reflected on how times have changed in the world. My wife once worked at the United Nations. I won’t say just when, but it was before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the Soviet Union. I had never been inside the building until two weeks ago, but the trip to New York was an education in itself. Trips through the Port Authority Building always remind me of Odysseus in the underworld. I know they have to save electricity, but more illumination would be cheerier. The signs could also be a little more convenient and explicit. Having said that, one stereotype that fell by the wayside was the idea that New Yorkers are rude. The people we met were a kaleidoscope of kindness and helpfulness. We didn’t know that the cross town bus requires coins only, but the driver let us on anyway and a nice woman volunteered to make change for my wife. In the process, the woman gave my wife a present of 50 cents rather than accept another bill for only two quarters. One woman laughed at me when I got up and offered my seat to another female passenger. “Where I come from, the young give their seats to the old. It must be ethnic,” she said with a smile. I didn’t mind the ethnic reference, because when you’re a blond guy who won’t carry an umbrella, everybody knows where your ancestors came from – but where did she get this “old” stuff? Inside I’m only about 28. Aren’t we all? The people in New York are not the problem. The problem is that there are too many people crowded together, and everything outside the apartment operates like a turnstile. During our visit, the United Nations was undergoing renovations to reduce its carbon contribution to the atmosphere by 45 percent. Getting in was a challenge. Once we got through the doors, the real fun began. A half-dozen policemen and women politely but firmly told us to put everything above our trousers and shirtsleeves into big plastic trays to be X-rayed. When a sharp-eyed security guard spotted a utility knife with a two-inch blade on the car key chain, the knife was detained and I was told I could claim it on leaving the building. I’m not a good knife thrower and I have no grudge against anyone at the UN, but I didn’t see a pocketknife as a lethal weapon. I handed over the pocketknife and received a receipt for my “knife” and the name of the man (Kwame) who said he would return it to me when I left. Inside the building, we waited in the lobby for our guest to arrive and take the tour with us. The Metropolitan Museum of Art will ruin you for the décor in the United Nations. So, indeed, will the Morris County Museum. The lobby contained giant-sized photographic posters of frozen mummified animals in Antarctica, and a full-size cast of an ancient Greek statue of Poseidon. I didn’t recognize Poseidon at first. UN Security must have confiscated his trident. Still mulling the previous comment on my age, I noted that while Poseidon was obviously older than I was, he was in somewhat better shape – except that he was green. Some people will tell you they don’t care if another person is The rice game: What a nice game! Don’t panic! The Players’ Guild of Leonia presents ‘Panic,’ a musical based on events leading up to the famous War of the Worlds radio broadcast-east coast premiere, book, music and lyrics by Stephen Dolginoff and directed by Linda Wielkotz with musical direction by April Elsasser. Performances are April 29 through May15, Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sundays at 3:00 p.m. at The Civil War Drill Hall Theatre, 130 Grand Avenue, Leonia. Tickets are $20/$18 seniors and students. Call (201) 9479606 for reservations and information. www.leoniaplayers.org. Standing: Tim Larsen, Glen Rock; Jonathan McDevitt, Leonia; Dan Giordano, Leonia; and Dominick Denucci, Ridgefield Park. Seated: Susan McDonald, Clifton; and Megan Taylor, Maywood.