Talking on the Big White Phone

It’s a week since we left for Albania. We’re currently in Gibraltar visiting Tom’s brother. Yesterday we saw an Aunt of theirs who told she us about the various places she’s lived in Gibraltar. We realised the situation she described during her early marriage in the 50’s – 3 families living in one 2-roomed apartment, no running water, limited employment, one shared toilet for all the homes on a corridor – had some similarity with places we visited in Albania.  While conditions in Gib are completely different today, we didn’t have much hope for the unregistered informal homes we saw in Bathore.

When we boarded our Alitalia flight from Tirana to Rome then onwards to Malaga, there was some discussion of not feeling 100% well. We arrived in Spain exhausted, unwell and in great need of easy access to a latrine.  Our host had prepared our room with en-suite toilet, sink and shower, a comfy bed, clean sheets and towels. We used all the services in the night. We slept most of the next day – able to drink water from the tap to rehydrate. Situations like these only serve to reinforce our own privilege and remind us that there are millions of people around the world who cope with gastroenteritis – which to us was a minor 3-day inconvenience – without running water and sanitation or even a clean dry cool place to lie down, rest and recuperate. I can’t imagine how much longer it would have taken to recover if I’d had to fetch or buy water, I’d only had a dirty mattress - and rats for company, and there was no cool place to wash. And we could keep our bathroom clean and disinfected…. It may be gross but maybe we shouldn’t close our minds to the potential indignity of poverty in a similar situation.

Anyway… in case you wondered, were at about 90% now (Mum please don’t worry - we’re fine).
Imagine a child living in the kinds of homes we visited, and knowing that Monday to Friday a big yellow van will come and take you to a light bright clean place where kind people are waiting to play with you and help you start to learn letters and numbers? They’re preparing you for school when you’re 6 – giving you the same opportunity to learn as children whose parents can afford private kindergartens. When you start school, you can still go to the Centre for help with homework – and have opportunities to play with other children.  When you’re a teenager, you can go to the Youth Group. And imagine the parents of children with autism, who had no hope, nowhere to go for help, no access to therapy. They know their children can have individual and group therapy – as well as education and play alongside the other children.

On our last day I handed out the kit donated by friends in the UK. Specialist toys and aids for the therapy unit, and a ‘Wightman’ parachute (they’ve donated several play parachutes to Uganda, there’s one in Lebanon, and now one in Albania!). The staff were particularly pleased to have parachute games books and Oh Joy, they asked me to teach them some new games (their old parachute is unusable). There’s nothing like having a couple of challenging days making home visits then see the same children round a parachute, laughing, shouting, enthusiastically not listening. 

Thanks everyone – it’s really appreciated.

I love it!

I’ve got a whole notebook of stories to write up – so Albania isn’t going to go away from daily activities for a while.  There’s also the proposal to finish and then discuss, and hopefully hand over to the Grants and Trusts team in the UK to start applying for funding. I’m so glad we went, that we saw first hand what they’re trying to do. Now we’re determined to help the UK Global Care team work with the Albanian team to find ways to ensure the Centre can keep on providing services.