Open 3 days after your arrival in your host community
Take one hour today to talk with a community member (NOT a non-local staff member from your host agency) about the social issue you are addressing. Take the time to listen to their point of view, without imposing yours. What do they have to say?
So since I opened this just now at about 10:30 p.m., it's like way too late to talk with a community member about my social issue. However, I will summarize what I can from the talks I've had with my supervisor at Projects Abroad (he is a local member, so I'm guessing it's ok?) and the workers at Maria Cristina (MC). What I say will be more geared towards MC, so it won't be quite as broad about people's overall framework when it comes to working with those with special needs, but perhaps what I write will reveal their underlying thoughts. I'll be able to ask the workers at MC more about their thoughts tomorrow.
Also, I think my interactions with people at Rice and the pre-trip Loewenstern meetings prepared me to really desire to listen and observe during the beginnings of my time here, rather than try to change everything up. So I think I've inherently been aware of not imposing my own views or my own thoughts of what should be done, although perhaps sometimes the questions I ask are geared towards my own viewpoint of how things should be done.
It appears that Freddy, who has worked with children with special needs for a number of years, seeks to have the residents at Maria Cristina do activities that are basic life skills and to exercise their body. We fortunately had a meeting with all of the Care people in Projects Abroad today (or maybe it was just the people who were working at Maria Cristina... I'm not sure) to talk about MC, which I think usually doesn't happen. It sounded like the first time this was brought together, but perhaps that's because usually there aren't so many volunteers at MC, even though it is apparently hands-down the placement that needs the most help. Freddy and us talked about activities that the residents could do.
MC is extremely disorganized, and apparently the nurses steal things from the orphanage, like the soap and toilet paper that one of the volunteers brought. Maybe "steal" is a little too loaded--they may have took the soap and the toilet paper from the bathroom so that the residents wouldn't use too much. Well, soap I don't really understand (perhaps it is an indication of how desperate these people's needs are and how poor they are? Just a speculation), but it appears that the residents must ask the staff for toilet paper to use. Which in a way, does make sense, because one may not always know how much toilet paper to use, and the toilets in Bolivia probably aren't powerful enough to handle massive amounts of toilet paper. Or actually, in the toilet that is closest to where the residents are (so not their dormitories, but near their "classrooms," if I can even call them that), apparently people just throw the toilet paper on the ground rather than putting it in the toilet.
The first morning I visited, people literally did just sit around. Some music was played in the room which I think is deemed for those with autism, although to me, it doesn't seem like all of them have autism... I don't really know how they group the kids, which is something I should ask. For some reason that I couldn't quite understand, they would have a staff member stand at the door and have two chairs blocking the entrance so no child would escape... I asked why the kids couldn't go outside, and I think they said because many of the kids go to another school to play sports on that day (Wed.), and for that reason, there weren't people to take care of the kids? Or there wouldn't be stuff for them to do? Or maybe there wasn't a set "class" for them because these were just the leftover children who had not been taught/could not handle going to that school and playing sports. Also, they said that the kids would escape if they let them go out... except the doors are locked so I'm not really sure where they would escape to. If anyone wants to get out, they have to wait for someone from the nurses' office inside to come unlock the door.
In any case, one child about the age of 10 or so would escalate and then meltdown, screaming and throwing things such as toys, his shoes, his clothes, and chairs. I tried to look for what could be triggering him, but it was difficult to pinpoint... I'm not very good at identifying triggers because the kids in my summer camp that I've had almost never broke down and were not too difficult for the most part. Regardless, the kid was clearly having a tough time and overstimulated, (there was music playing, but I don't think that was it... he seemed like he would enjoy that. Maybe it was the particular song? The walls were rather colorful with murals, but I think he's in that room a lot, so maybe he's used to it. The room also constantly smelled of feces, but since he's in it a lot, maybe he's used to it? The lights were just this one sad unprotected light bulb which for a while made me think that the lights weren't turned on until I looked up and saw that they were. Maybe it was a combination of all of these things).
I observed the staff members in how they reacted to him, and made no suggestions, but occasionally tried to calm him down by just a normal, comforting voice when the staff was paying attention to other people/things. He pretty much runs away when I try to approach him, even when he's not necessarily breaking down, so I wasn't effective at all.
The staff would yell at him and tell him to stop doing whatever he was doing (which obviously I don't think would help... just more stimuli that would make him even more unhappy), and they tried to put him in a hold, but I'm not sure how effective that was. Considering that he could be endangering others with his actions, I can see that being important to do. The staff has no training about children with disabilities, as far as I know, so I understand they aren't being mean... they just are doing the best they can. I think I would have taken him outside and seen if that would help, but then again, since many kids were outside the room in the courtyard, it may have disturbed them and made them unhappy too. Although the other kids inside the room seemed to not be fazed.
I didn't get to see what happened next because as I was observing them, the other two volunteers from Projects Abroad peeked in and asked me if I was ok, since it was my first day and all and things were rather intense and shocking. Awww, so sweet that they were concerned for me. I walked out and talked with them for a bit, since I was getting a little tired of how the situation was going. I was pretty much not disturbed at the melt down, since I've seen plenty before, and it's really not the kids' fault, but more at how the staff was handling the situation. The way they handled it showed that they probably felt that this was a behavioral problem, rather than an involuntary response that the child had to stimuli. I asked one of the volunteers if she'd ever worked with children with disabilities, and she said no, and said that it was really shocking her first day coming here. I nodded and agreed that, for sure, if one never has worked with children with disabilities, this would be a lot to handle and certainly shocking.
So there appears to be a lack of understanding about how the kids react, but I can understand that the staff try to take care of them and be understanding as best as they can. However, I learned from Freddy today during our meeting that since this is a government-run orphanage, all the jobs have a contract of only one year, so after a year is up, the staff gets pretty much completely replaced. (not sure if the staff can stay longer for a year, but I think they almost never do). So there's practically a 100% turnover rate that is obviously a big cause of the disorganization, which is why Freddy wants to change in MC to happen through Projects Abroad.
I'll keep observing, but there are things I really really wish they have and want to see happen before I leave that have been running through my mind constantly:
Staff meetings. At least once a week, if not more. However, a couple of staff would be needed to watch the kids, and I'm not really sure how that would work. I need to stay over at MC to get a better idea.
A schedule. I think there might be some schedule? Us volunteers are not informed of such things, and they kind of just do random things and pull kids in to do things which confuses us as to what's happening and when we can implement our activities. I am still confused as to if what I'm seeing is a daily occurrence, or if it just happened to be special for that day. Which is again why staff meetings would be really nice. Also, apparently according to my host family who has hosted volunteers from Projects Abroad for 8 years, a teacher from some country who taught kids for many years came up with a schedule that MC could use for every day of the week, except then for some reason after she left, they just stopped using it. Probably due to the turnover rate of the staff, lack of communication, disorganization, etc. I don't quite want to make a really negative comment, but it seems also that some of the staff are just not motivated and don't want to help the kids.
Ok, actually, no, that is probably completely true, because I almost teared up today when I decided to stay a bit longer to see what lunch was like. They didn't have enough spoons for everyone for their lunch. And since they had two courses of soup, it was pretty tragic. But I guess the majority got spoons--out of 54 people, probably only about 8 or so were missing spoons, which is obviously unacceptable, but people make it work. One person just took the spoon from another person after he was finished, and started eating. I got some forks for some people to try to eat their soup with (Bolivian soup often has many vegetables and rice/potatoes in it, so it's not a terrible deal). I also tried to encourage some people to eat their soup by drinking it from the bowl, which I guess is not the best practice to encourage, but I felt pained to see them just sitting there with a bowl of food in front of them. I asked one of the staff why Maria Cristina didn't have enough spoons (or rather, I phrased it more as, "Maria Cristina doesn't have enough spoons?") and the staff member answered me by saying that they used to have enough spoons, but they would lose them as time went on. At which I kind of wanted to be like, HOW DO YOU LOSE SPOONS? But I figured maybe I didn't understand the cleaning process or what the kids would do... ok, well, no, I still can't imagine how they would lose them. Unless people were stealing them, but I don't understand why you would steal them either... well, maybe that's because I don't understand the depth of poverty that people are in? That they have to steal from an orphanage for people with special needs? Maybe they should count their utensils as they were collecting them.
I guess it could be worse--the residents could be starving. At least they could eat their food even if that meant that it would take a bit longer for them to eat it.
What annoyed me of course, was seeing some of the staff eating with spoons--naturally, the same staff that were more interested in their phones than the residents usually. Maybe they weren't aware of the fact that some residents didn't have spoons, but the fact that they weren't even aware kinda shows how much care they put into the residents. Perhaps staff meetings could boost this morale as well.
Still, lunch time was my favorite because the residents all sat quite well-behaved and ate, and I could walk around and interact with anyone I wanted to, and entertain them as they were waiting for their food. haha. I could also bring food to them and serve them as well, which was fun, and as they were getting their medicine, I could learn their names as well. Already, I'm finding my favorites, so I should be careful not to neglect others.
Long-term goals/some kind of mission statement for MC and the residents there. What do they hope to provide for the residents, and what are they working for? They do work a bit of physical therapy with some of the residents, and I talked with one staff member who says that they teach more life skills rather than actual sort of teaching in school (like history/math/science, etc.), such as cooking, laundry, and some other fun activities like sports and art. I personally would like to see if they could provide all the residents with some kind of work to do, either at MC or out in the community for the high-functioning residents, as well as a bigger focus on personal hygiene and taking care of themselves and being self-sufficient. They do have some cooking/laundry/other stuff schedule that is going on right now, which is good, although there doesn't seem to be a lot of them on the schedule. Since none of them have families, they may never be able to really leave MC, so it's kind of difficult.
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