Seeing and being seen

One of the things I take for granted is the freedom to walk out of my front door whenever I want to. But because we have so many children with disabilities  in our Xining Children's Rehabilitation Centre, and we can't take them all on outings, their view of the world outside the walls of the Centre is very restricted.

What's more, the view that the community has of children with disabilities is also very limited.  This is the barrier we are seriously trying to break down in order to end the tradition of child abandonment.

The disabled children in our Rehab Centre were either abandoned very early in life or whose parents live in areas where there is no access to any type of services.

Last month, an excursion was arranged for the Early Childhood group to the centre of Xining where there is an indoor children's playground.  There were seven children with disabilities, four Centre workers, and three parents from the community.

The objectives of the activity were to help the children to adapt to an unfamiliar environment, to initiate greetings with people they don’t know, and to promote the social skills of the children as they played with other children at the playground.  The U.K. COCOA Fund covered the playground entry fees and the lunch expenses for all participating children.  For the first time, the children enjoyed a ball pool, the giant blow up slide, and a KFC meal at the end of it all!

The children enjoyed the whole afternoon very much.  Even Lei Ming, who has cerebral palsy, surprised us. Usually he is very shy and always leans for help toward those he knows.  But this time he was so excited about being out in the community that he waved at strangers and had some simple communication with them.

Yanze, a little girl with PKU (an inherited disorder), normally plays by herself and doesn't want to interact with others.  But this time she joined in the fun with the other children. The two parents who have little boys with Down Syndrome, were glad to see their children playing with other children in a community setting.  The joy that everyone experienced is evidenced on their smiling faces in the photographs.

A big Thank You to our UK supporters, COCOA, a UK based charity, committed to caring for China’s orphaned and abandoned children, who I will be seeing during this trip!