Many school children in South Rotterdam need something extra
Johan Muurlink provides breakfast for children at three primary schools. Teachers and masters receive him with open arms. “But those school directors are quite stuck in their own traditions.”
Image: Angeliek de Jonge
It is empty in the kitchen of Community Center Irene in South Rotterdam. The fridge is buzzing, it's at 3,5 degrees Celsius, it's got butter, cheese, fruit. Johan Muurlink cleans the counter, there were still some breadcrumbs, some smears of butter. He spread eighty sandwiches early this morning: a regular shot, every school day, luckily Johan is a morning person. If all goes well - Johan looks at the clock for a moment - the bread is now more or less finished, the schools started well over a few hours ago. A satisfied grin on his face. That does him good: that the children eat their breakfast. That they don't have to hear their stomachs rumble. “Hunger should not be allowed, but it just happens, you know, also in the Netherlands.”
rottenness
He saw it with his own eyes, almost five years ago. His son, then 11, had once again taken a turn, 'his father's child'. “So I had to get on the mat. I talk to the director, chat some more with the teacher, and in the corner of my eye, through the window, I see my son handing out his sandwiches. He felt caught, but I immediately said: 'Okay boy'. And that was the push right away.”
The push towards what is now a professional foundation, Niet Like Een Empty Maag, which provides breakfast for three primary schools and soon a fourth for children who do not get it to school. For whatever reason. “It makes me angry,” says Johan. “Breakfast is the engine for your son or daughter. They need that engine to play, to learn, to develop.” But, on the other hand, sometimes there really isn't any money. Most of the children he feeds come from poor families. A small proportion have parents who forget or are 'too easy' at it.
Plastic bags
Johan started making sandwiches from his house. He put them in what he now calls "provosorically" in plastic bags and took them to his son's school. Now he smears from the community center, which, due to hanging plants, full bookcases, lazy armchairs, low tables and the pertinent smell of coffee, feels like a living room. “Nice, isn't it”, says Johan as he opens a cupboard. “We worked with lunch boxes for a while.” Bright blue copies are piled up there.
Bright blue sandwich boxes were too striking. 'Children were then bullied that they are poor, that they have no money: you know what children are like.'
“But they were too conspicuous. Those children were then bullied, that they are poor, that they have no money: you know how children are. Now we have the best way: the teachers say at the beginning of the year: 'There are sandwiches, fruit, packs of drinks and a snack for those who don't have it with them.' Then the crazy is over.”
Outside is a microcar van, which he uses to heat up from school to school, where they call him 'Master Johan'. “I really think that word 'master' is an honor”, he says. “And they sometimes call me 'the bread father'. Nice huh."
In the media he has been renamed 'Johan de sandwich man'. “Nice, that's how journalists are, they like to give it a name, but I'm just Johan. Sometimes I am approached when I walk through the city. Do people want to take a picture with me - but I don't, damn it, I don't want that, I only do my story on TV and in the newspaper because I want to publicize the poverty problem in the Netherlands.”
“Does Rutte read this magazine? (Education magazine, ed.) Well, maybe not, but I just want to say that breakfast should be subsidized by the government. You don't think that only the schools I happen to visit have children walking around hungry and without food?"
Johan pays for his bread with money from his foundation, donations, and also: generosity from the Bakkerswerkplaats Rotterdam. BlueBand sponsors the butter, he gets the peanut butter from another supplier, he gets 70 kilos of fruit a week for free. “I get benefits, can't take it out of my own bank account. I grab every potential sponsor by the tie.”
Criminal
He now has time for that, because he employs volunteers and a secretary. "I! A secretary!" He smiles. "Who would have thought. My mother always says: 'Johan has a badass head'. And I was a crook too. A real criminal, you know. I didn't harm people, but I was involved in the criminal circuit from the age of eighteen, I'd rather not elaborate on that."
Image: Angeliek de Jonge
Johan is happier than ever, he says. “Recently a girl came to me, holding the teacher's hand. If she could also - she whispered - a sandwich with roooooo beef. I'm a 97-pound guy, but then I melted. So, yes, the next day she got a sandwich with roooooo beef.”
I've had so much shit all over me when parents and teachers found out I used sweet fillings. You quickly do things wrong.
There are also sometimes struggles, says Johan. “I had so much shit when parents and teachers heard that I used sweet fillings. You do things wrong quickly. So now it's cheese, different halal meats, peanut butter, apple syrup.”
Teachers and masters receive him with open arms. “But those school directors. Well, they're kind of stuck in their own traditions, to say the least. There is shame. I have to approach schools myself, they actually prefer not to, because they are afraid that they will be known as 'black school' or 'poor school'. But then I think: it's about those children, isn't it? And not for your business card. See what your kids need. If that is food, then provide food.”
Sighing softly: “Those schools see so many bears on the road. Then I get questions like 'yes, but what time do you come exactly, and between which classes, and how are we going to arrange that logistically'. Don't be so difficult, I think, I'll just deliver that bread, and then I'll go again."
Image: Angeliek de Jonge
He continues to do that. He consults with the management every week: what went well, what could be improved, is the bread good? He also talks about the importance of breakfast at parents' evenings. And Johan is in talks with an ROC where they offer cooking training. “If only those student chefs could make meals with my ingredients for poor children at primary schools in the area,” says Johan. “Rice, soup. Light and healthy. Wouldn't that be nice?" He smiles. And yes: 'third parties' see bears on the road again. But if necessary, the bread father sweeps away all those bears with his own hands.
This article is from the Education Magazine of October 2021. All members receive the magazine in their letterbox every month. Do you want that too? Become a member!
