Yesterday, I ended my alloted time with Nicky's Drive. This does not mean i am finished with the work, but I am finished with the backup research. The goal of Nicky's Drive is to provide funding for people with disabilities to have their cars adapted to fit their needs. My task was to develop methods for Nicky to evaluate applicants. To do this, Nicky arranged multi-day visits for me with two organizations. During the days between these visits, I wrote, researched, and met with other leaders within the disability sector. At night, we had dinner often with some of her friends who I approve of as they were all fun to be with. I have become increasingly bad about updates so here is a summary of July 2 - July 8.
I visited the Chailil Campaign July 2 and 3. The Chaili Campaign was founded by Chaili who has Cerebral Palsy, her sister, and two friends. The original goal was to simply gain money to buy Chaili an electric wheelchair . The organization now funds and organizes 8 programs. These include art therapy, providing occupational therapy, writing contests, social entrepreneurship and leadership training, and educational services. For this, Chaili was recently awarded the Children's Peace Prize - the youth version of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Unfortunately, due to school holidays, I was only able to visit one of the programs operated by the organization. I went to hospital where the South African Government now operates a residential facility for people with disabilities. In the past, a popular way to deal with disabled people was to put them in residential homes. When parents did this, they essentially signed away their parental rights. Sadly, this was a welcomed contract for many parents. In recent years, the policy has been to limit residential segregation since the goal of legistation and the disabilitiy sector has been "inclusion." With that said, there remains people in homes. Within the last 10 years, many of these places were deemed inadequate. Zelda, the CEO of Chaili campaign, explained how rats were found to be climbing and even chewing the faces of patients. Even more, many were limited to their bed with no movement for years, and as a result, their bodies formed to that positions that they were left in. This is devastating because through theraphy these people could have maybe used a wheelchair or even moved on their own. As the inadequate homes were shut down, the patients became wards of the state. The hospital that i visited is one of the places where they now stay. The Chaili Campaign provides an occupational therapist and speech therapist once a week to visit patients. It was truly a sad place - a home for the forgotten and abandoned (One of the patients had not been visited by a relative since 1976). When I walked into the first ward (for children), I really could not believe that this was a real place. I really don't know how to describe it in words and won't try. I should note that there were some aspects of hope in this home.Thrrough the assistance of the therapists sent by the Chaili Campaign, the patients are now being engaged in deeper ways by caretakers. There are now rooms, which provide places for the patients to relax and engage in socio-dramatic play (This is when children role play situations. It is an essential element in developing social skills). Following my visit to the hospital, I was able to interview the CEO of the Chaili Campaign. I am thankful for all the time that they gave me.
In this paragraph, I will summarize Thursday to Sunday of last week. On Thursday, I moved into NIcky's flat in Milnerton (pictures of the nearby beach to come). Then, on Friday, I had a meeting in the morning with the Association for People with Disabilities and then in the afternoon had the most exciting meeting in a long time ... Nicky and I met with Cathy Arendse who had just returned from her time in the US through the Humphrey Fellowship. It was so great to have time to meet with all the players in the project (minus Professor Shields who will join us via Skype sometime soon). We had fun catching up, reflecting, and discussing ideas. That evening, I attended a Shabbat dinner. I am so thankful that NIcky arranged this for me. It is always amazing to experience this Friday night custom somewhere other than home. There is something so spiritual and exciting about it (and I should add delicious as Challah and herring and roast chicken are never bad! . On Saturday, I went on one of those double red decker busses around the city. I took the person that replaced me at Rene and Clive's. THey were going out late for the evening and asked me to etnertain and stay the night since it was his first Saturday. He was a French student. On the tour, we saw Hout Bay, Camps Bay, and other major sites of interests. It was truly one of the top 3 most beautiful drives I have ever been on. I really wish i had done this earlier in my stay as I really learned more about places I wanted to see. Following the bus tour, I showed the stuent around the area where Rene and Clive live. Sunday was so rainy that my plans to go to the Hout Bay Market were canceled. I just relaxed and then took the red bus (which I had a 2 day pass for) back to town to head to Milnerton.
On Monday, I had another meeting with the Association for People with Physical Disabilities and at night, I went with NIcky to a meeting about professional speaking. Some of the people were true characters in the best sense. On Tuesday, I had two meetings. I was pleased and excited to be joined by Cathy for these. We met with the coordinator of the Western Cape Network on Disabilities and then with the director of a major disabilities organization (this was an interesting experience. This man was deaf and we communicated through a translator). On Wednesday, I visited the Orien Center for the first of two days. My next post will focus on this!
- Feldman
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