Oct 22, 9:15 a.m., I took a 30 minute taxi from my hotel to the outskirts of Kyiv (Kiev) to visit the Institute of Children and Adolescents Health Care of the Academy of Medical Sciences and donate more netbooks filled with games. This institute is dedicated to the treatment of children who suffer effects from the horrific Chernobyl nuclear accident (blast) in 1986.
The hospital serves as many as 40 children (in-patient beds) at a time. The children receive a wide array of treatments for illnesses (some terminal) they suffer from as a result of directly living in the nuclear contamination zone, or from their parents who were nuclear radiation exposed from the blast or were exposed to the radiation while working on the clean-up of the Chernobyl disaster. Any way you look at it, it’s a terrible scenario.
For health and safety reasons before entering the hospital, I was required to wear medical attire – mask, gown and foot covering. This was a little startling at first, but made sense given how fragile the children and their immune systems are.
During the time I was there, I visited 3 rooms, each with 2 – 5 beds per room, and had the amazing opportunity to meet several children, age 3 – approximately 13.
What can I say, the kids were amazing!
Despite suffering major medical conditions, they were all up beat, happy and thrilled to receive a computer to play some games (as well as share with the other children in their rooms). Before describing why I was there, I asked them (via my great interpreters) whether they liked games, more specifically, computer / video games…Their smiles instantly lit up the otherwise stale medical environment. Even at 3-4 yrs old, as soon as I showed what I had brought, the kids were fixated on the computer …and it hadn’t even started up yet! And as soon as the games were shown…well, I wish everyone could have seen it. These are little game masters in training.
In addition to meeting the children, I also got to speak with their wonderful parents (again, thanks entirely to my very caring interpreters). Not having any children myself, I know I can’t fully relate to what these parents must be going thru. But what I could see in their eyes, hear in their voices and feel in their hugs will always be with me. It was obvious that they’d do anything to change places with their children or do whatever they could to help eliminate the pain their children go thru on a daily basis from both treatments and the illnesses, and yet, there really isn’t anything they can do but simply be there for them.
To see their child smile. To see their child forget about everything else in the world, the hospital, and what they were going thru, even for a brief moment by playing some games…well, it’s impossible for me to put words to that, so I’m not even going to try.
I’ve put some pictures below from the experience (and yes, both the children and parents happily wanted me to take pictures to share with you).
Das vi danya
Institute of Children and Adolescents Health Care
A surprise gift for me from one of the boys...Priceless.
2 Comments
October 25, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Great post! It’s always humbling yet inspiring(though not always joyful) to know that the world we live has different faces and shapes, human’s lives have different colors and shades. Being rich or poor, being healthy or ill, we inspire each other’s dreams by sharing what we enjoy!
I also enjoy reading the world travel stories by Jim Rogers and Anderson Cooper. Mr. Rogers looked at the world at macro-economic differences, while Mr. Cooper followed his unstoppable passion to uncover extreme human tragedies.
World is huge, but authentic individual perspectives bring it closer to us. Keep up the great post!
October 28, 2009 at 10:56 pm
[...] Foundation/ChildRescue's rehabilitation center. Wild World of Sean's Blog reports on a charity visit to a Kyiv hospital for children affected by the Chernobyl catastrophe. Cancel this [...]