Recently I went to a village called El Khnaim. I was with the disabilities department in my association. The town was an hour's drive from the association and I spent most of it looking to the side of the road, at Sandy Mountain, behind which lies a desert. On the other side are rolling fields and small villages and farms. The villages where made of small houses, a mixture of sandy tones beige, terracotta, white and grey bricks in very simple designs - most of the time remaining unfinished – with another floor waiting to be added, or a room to be capped with a ceiling, not being able to distinguish where each adjoining building joins with the next. There were a few well painted apartments emerging in between with elaborate and beautiful Islamic decorations and bright, exuberant colors. Occasionally we drove through areas with small cluster of finished apartment blocks, or finished villas.

The roads out to the towns and villages are like the streets of Walldeyia: they accommodate a continuous fluctuation of cars, people and animals that seem to stream past in a disjointed harmony. The journey therefore involves a lot of sharp turning, swerving, sudden stops and seat clutching. But the atmosphere was very peaceful.

In the village we went to check the progress of a few disabled children registered with the association. There is no concise maps of the small town, as people just build their houses, on their land. This means you have to ask people on the street where to find the house of the children, and it normally takes a few sets of directions to set us in the right way.

Today, we where showed directly to the childs door and also to the houses of the other children on our list. The villager (now a guide) also introduced us to two new cases - one was a five year old girl with mental disabilities, who had been to see various doctors and given different treatment and medication, but the family couldn’t afford medication. We advised them to come and see one of our doctors, and also told them that we can get the government to pay for any medication they need. The next family had two sons who had problems in their coordination and struggled to walk, we also advised them to come and visit the association. This seemed a very positive day as we reached out to more children than who would benefit from the support the association had to offer. However, one of the other children we went to see had passed away.

Seeing the children and their standard of life really puts a lot of things in perspective. Even just a smile from one of these kids, who face so many problems, made me smile. Also, knowing that our visit helped to support them was very rewarding.
 

Read more about Bede's travels at www.bmunnings.blogspot.com