A students' dorm

there was just one problem

There was just one problem with the place: its political smell . It was run by some kind of fishy foundation that centred on this extreme right-wing guy, and there was something strangely twisted - as far as I was concerned - about the way they ran the place. You could see it in the pamphlet they gave to new students and in the dorm rules. The proclaimed "founding spirit" of the dormitory was "to strive to nurture human resources of service to the nation through the ultimate in educational fundamentals", and many financial leaders who endorsed this "spirit" had contributed their private funds to the construction of the place.

This was the public face of the project, though what lay behind it was extremely vague. Some said it was a tax dodge , others saw it as a publicity stunt for the contributors, and still others claimed that the construction of the dormitory was a cover for swindling the public out of a prime piece of real estate. One thing was certain, though: in the dorm complex there existed a privileged club composed of elite students from various universities. They formed "study groups" that met several times a month and included some of the founders. Any member of the club could be assured of a good job after graduation. I had no idea which - if any - of these theories was correct, but they all shared the assumption that there was "something fishy" about the place.

In any case, I spent two years - from the spring of 1968 to the spring of 1970 - living in this "fishy" dormitory. Why I put up with it so long, I can't really say. In terms of everyday life, it made no practical difference to me whether the place was right wing or left wing or anything else.
Each day began with the solemn raising of the flag. They played the national anthem, too, of course. You can't have one without the other. The flagpole stood in the very centre of the compound, where it was visible from every window of all three dormitories.(…)

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