My nephew

A lesson for all of us about how to both fight bullying and prevent kids from getting into trouble.

My nephew Dima (Vadim), is reliving my own young years, only worse. You may recall I posted how being bullied eventually got me into a bad company, gnags, and all that. With Dima, it is worse. I grew up in Moscow, large city, in a relatively prosperous area, good school. I got into my own troubles, but it was still harmless, for the most part, I mean, I beat people up and got beat up myself; but nothing more.

Now, Dima, he is in Gus Khrustalny, a small town so near and yet so far from Moscow. Once known for its crystal chandeliers and dishes; but now known mostly for poverty and high crime and vicious gangs.

Dima had been raised to believe that being bullied is shameful; that a boy, a man must be able to stand up for himself. If you cannot, you are weak, pathetic, disgraceful. That is the culture over there.

That culture eventually led him here
http://img696.imageshack.us/img696/4568/1f2d224294.jpg
(I covered the face, in accordance with this forum's rules)

Through a school friend, he met this guy, Artur G. we will call him, his friend's older brother, a local gangster, drug dealer, and overall scum and lowlife
http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/174/ ... 768347.jpg

Now, he is carrying a gun around, as the photo shows, and, I am told, sells drugs and cigarettes at the school for Artur's gang, him and other boys. Every morning, this Artur, or some of his people, would drive up to the school, give the boys the "product". Then, they would drive up again in the end of the school day to get their money. And if they don't get what or as much as they want, there is punishment. I was talking to Dima on the phone not long ago, he says a guy he knew at the school is in hospital now: he did not sell enough of Artur's marijuana; so, later, when he could not come up with the cash, one of Artur's guys beat him with a baseball bat, and they all had to watch, as a lesson...

I don't even know what I could do. I am on the other side of the world. But, something must be done, he has to get out of this. I am going to try to get him into Canada, sponsor him, if I have to. I must, to save his life.