andorc.org

Voyles at Pavlovsk Update #2

Sunday, 20 July 2008

I arrive around 9:00, and head into the room that holds Group 10, the group I'm working with all summer. As I mentioned before, 12 kids live in this room. When I arrive, the sanitarka has already prepared their breakfasts, usually made of kasha and some sort of soup broth, whether chicken or borsht or something else. Since all of these children are invalids, I have to feed them all myself. Two of them have started to learn how to feed themselves with the help of a developmental specialist, Dasha, but I still have to help Masha physically hold the spoon and help Ilya actually get the spoon to his mouth. The process of feeding 12 children takes approximately an hour, although occaisionally there is another volunteer in the room, which cuts down on feeding time (and allows for more playing time!) Around 10:00, or whenever feeding is done, I have 2.5 hours to engage the kids however I'd like. For maybe a half hour, I walk around the cribs, talking to everybody and getting all of the kids ready for the next few hours of free time. Some of them are able to sit strapped in high chairs, so I generally put Kolya P., Olga, Vasya, and Ilya into them. These four are able to sit comfortably for a few hours. Many of the others cannot sit for that long. Either their spines are too twisted, their back muscles not strong enough, or have other conditions that leave them lying in their cribs all day. For these children, I'll string toys across the top of their cribs for them to look at / bat at. For some, the sight of these toys brings squeals of delight. Chinghiz, for example, will laugh for 10 minutes after putting some toys across the bars of the crib. It's definitely something I look forward to. After everyone is kind of "situated" for the time being, I'm able to take a few of them out for a walk in the strollers if the weather is nice and to the playroom down the hall if it's rainy. We keep track of who has walked or played everyday, to ensure that everyone is getting an equal amount of turns getting special attention. Each day, I'll take 2 kids out walking (or playing) - each one for an hour. On days when two volunteers are in the room, of course, four kids get to go out. This in itself shows the importance of volunteers - if there's only one per room, each child only gets to leave the room once every 6 days. For 6 days, they're in one room, most of them lying on their backs. It makes me sad to think that Chinghiz, the oldest in the room, has had such a life for 16 years. Some of the others, being 10, 12, or 14 years old have also been doing this for over a decade, perhaps their biggest hope when they awake every morning is that maybe today they'll get to go outside. It's tragic. So after walking or playing, it's around 12:30, and the volunteers have a half hour break for lunch. After that, I return to the room to see 12 bowls prepared with the children's lunch. I set out to do the tasks of feeding everyone (with the help of the sanitarka) and then brushing everyone's teeth (which I do myself). The whole process generally takes between an hour to 1.5 hours. After being fed and having their teeth brushed, the kids are generally in a pretty mellow state. Some begin to drift off to sleep, while others watch me patrol the room. I generally take this time to stop at each crib, while having one child in my lap and give everyone some individual attention. However, I have discovered a few ways to hold everyone's attention at once. Even though I'm sure to an adult I'd look like a total fool, a sure-fire way to get at least 8 kids laughing at once is to bound down the middle aisle of the room in a zig-zag type fashion. How I came up with that, I don't even remember...but the sheer unexpectedness of it gets an uproar of laughter and definitely stops any tears that may of come up from anyone. I continue visiting/zig-zagging until it's time for the volunteers to go home at 3:00. Other times, there are various tasks that I need to help out with afterwards, such as cleaning dishes, vaccuming the playroom, etc. Of course, I'd love to stay longer, but this is naptime for the kids, so they don't really need me around. Sometimes I leave exhausted, sometimes not, but I always leave looking forward to the next day.