The streetwise become wiser
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
I started a new class today at the Aschiana Orphanage. My good friend Nouria Salehi (Doctor in nuclear mediecine at Royal Melb) fundraises in Australia for Aschiana. The kids are between 8-18. They don't go to school. They work the streets through the day and sometimes the night, selling phone cards and other miscellaneous things to make some money for their families. Some are homeless, loosing their parents in the past wars. Others have been kicked out of home, because the parents cant afford to keep them. Some have even darker backgrounds.
Aschiana offers the children free classes in everything from music and maths to carpentry and masonry. Now they are learning to use digital cameras, to enable them to make visual contributions to the children's newspaper created at Aschiana and sold on the streets by the same kids. I have interacted with some kids around my NGO compound, buying phonecards from them and sending them on errands for a little pocket money. When I entered the class and saw their faces light up I was as pleasantly surprised as they were!
www.aschiana.com
Aschiana offers the children free classes in everything from music and maths to carpentry and masonry. Now they are learning to use digital cameras, to enable them to make visual contributions to the children's newspaper created at Aschiana and sold on the streets by the same kids. I have interacted with some kids around my NGO compound, buying phonecards from them and sending them on errands for a little pocket money. When I entered the class and saw their faces light up I was as pleasantly surprised as they were!
www.aschiana.com
