Photos of Delia Alexia Andreea and Matei

Welcome to Delia, Andreea, Alexia and Matei

And Ilienca and Maria are still with us and recovering well

Good bye’s and Hello’s

Elvis listening to music

Elvis just chilling

Elvis loved the blankets

It’s always hard when we have to say ‘Pa Pa’ to the children when they get taken back to the placement centre. That is what happened on Friday, the wonderful,    inquisitive, full of life Luiana went back along with the sensitive knowing Livinia and the beautiful, chilled little Elvis.

 

Lavinia loved music

Lavinia and I chilling

Lavinia loves yoghurt

Luciana with Mihaela

Luciana loving her yoghurt

Luciana and Dan

A few photos

Questions but no answers

The past couple of days have been quite emotional as 2 of the children are really sick. Little Ilenca has got pneumonia and is on a drip. The nurses tied her to the cot which really upset me but I guess it is to stop her pulling the cannula out.

What is the alternative? She has no family to sit with her and there are not enough nurses to give her one to one attention. Thankfully during the day Jane sat with her so she didn’t need to be tied.

What happens overnight? I just can’t bring my self to think about that.

Then there is Maria with such a high fever and an awful cough. The nurses put a cold tea towel around her body to cool her down, yes that worked but then she was left lieing in wet clothes. I sat with her all afternoon and had tears running down my face as every time she coughed she cried in pain. Again she has no one to watch her or stroke her head once we have gone.

Is she left alone all night? I will never know.

Thankfully the other children were full of beans and happy but I still have the same questions – is it better that they don’t know any different and don’t know what they are missing or is it worse that they have no idea what it is like to be loved and have a family to care for them? Surely every child should know what that is like but the reality is so different.

Cooped up

Face painting time!

We had to spend the morning all cooped up in one of the tiny bedrooms as the play room was being used for counselling sessions. Thankfully we only have 5 children to look after and only one is mobile.

It was lovely to just hold and cuddle the kids that were happy to sit with us, they all seemed to enjoy it as much as we did. These children crave human contact, if we weren’t there they would have been left in their cots.

Poor little Ilenica is so poorly, she was burning up with a fever but we had to keep her fully dressed with socks on her hands and windows closed. The Romanians have a real fear about drafts and believe children get ill if there is a draft in the room. As quick as we opened  the windows they got shut, as quick as I pulled the socks off her hands they got put back on! We ended up blowing on her face to cool her down without the nurses seeing.

Maria was full of beans this morning and I had lots of giggles and smiles. So different from last year when all she did was rock, head bang and grind her teeth.

Lavinia loved sitting with Cathy as long as she had her doll, heaven forbid anyone who tried to take it away from her!

Elvis just smiled and smiled, he is so so tiny for a 5 year old. I did some gentle leg exercises to try and encourage him to straighten them out, not sure he was overly impressed but he didn’t complain too much!

Then there was Luchiana, our boisterous wonderful full of life little 4 year old. Oh dear did she get bored in the little room as all the toys were in the play room. I bought my face painting kit which lasted all of 5 minutes as she wanted to do it her self. We watched a movie for all of 10 minutes, she escaped at every possibility and by the end of the morning she was really playing up as expected! Oh to be able to take her outside and let her run around like any other 4 year old.

Face painting time!

I’m back!

I have just had my first morning in the hospital and it is so good to be back. We are a team from 4, 3 Australian’s and me! Today there were 5 children, Maria, Luchia, Lavinia, Ilenica and Elvis. As well as the normal feeding we blew bubbles, played with balloons, stickers and endless buggy rides up and down the corridors!

Going back!

I can’t believe that I am sitting at Heathrow airport on my back to Romania to see all the lovely children, volunteers and cares that I met a year ago. Such a mix of emotions bubbling away in side me but excitement and joy far out way the apprehension. I will do my best to post photos and updates here, Internet connection depending.

Journal entry

Every morning one of the group read an exert from the team journal. My date was the last full day, Thursday 9th April and this is what I wrote

Thursday 9th April

The day started off dull and grey but our spirits were not dampened by the weather conditions. For the first time in a week I was actually able to join everyone for breakfast. Cathie went off to the school to play jeopardy with the children while the rest of us set off for the hospital.

We arrived to find the children in the midst of getting dressed and changed. As always I am amazed at the general calm and acceptance of the children. They seem to know their routine and accept it with grace. Once they had all been taken into the play room I was taken off to test drive the new nebuliser, it felt slightly surreal sitting in the children's bedroom using their newly purchased nebuliser. 

On returning to the playroom I noticed the bag of Cheerios was doing its rounds along with a few bottles of milk. As always I am slightly concerned that the children do not get enough food and can only hope that those who didn't have milk had had it earlier. Little Ionela couldn't get enough of the Cheerios and had them in a small plastic ship which she was using as a bowl. Vanessa was feeding the two boys, Christian and Marian on the floor while Jane kept Delia occupied. Lynda was once again caring for Ionut and Maria and Kathy was watching out for Leviu and Luca. 

Not long later the yoghurts arrived which as always the children devoured as quickly as possible. Luca did his normal trick of going around the room trying to get a mouthful of everyone's! It was then time for some more play and some buggy walks along the corridor. Kathy took Christian for a walk while I took Ionela. She seemed to love the ‘machina’ and we spend a fair amount of time going up and down the corridor waving at the nurses in the rooms. One nurse even rewarded her with a wafer biscuit from a cupboard! I can't help but feel sad that this is as far as we can go with them, how I would love to be able to take them out side to the park, let them run around on the grass. Ionela has such a sense of adventure and likes nothing more than trying to escape from the playroom and run. Children her age should be able to run and have the freedom to explore more than just a corridor and 3 small rooms. 

The afternoon bought a feast for the children thanks to Mihaela! There was mashed potato and chicken, pretzels, biscuits and best of all chocolate! It was great to see them all tuck in to some proper food and they all seemed to love the potato! Delia and Ionela had some fun with lipstick and sunglasses while Liviu drew on the white board and the rest played happily. The end of the day came all too soon and yet again we had to leave the children in their cots. As we walked out we all said we wondered how long they get left on their own once we have gone. Sometimes it is better not to think about it.

Time to leave

I had to forget that yesterday was the last time I would be seeing these children. How can you say goodbye knowing you will never see them again?

It was business as usual in the morning, Cheerios doing their rounds and pots of yoghurts. The big excitement for everyone was the arrival of the new sofa for the other playroom. It is so hard to explain what a huge difference this will make to so many people. The nurses were as delighted as the children. Leviu was determined to spend the morning in the new playroom, not for the sofa but for the cartoons on the telly. We had changed his beloved Turtles to Madagascar and he was not too pleased!

Lunch time came round far too quickly and I was able to feed Marian his bowl of slop, watery soup with bread. I was pleased he had a large bowl even if it wasn’t very nutritious. Having put the children in their cots we were back in the playroom to say goodbye to all the nurses including Dr Magda who came to thank us for all our hard work. Her heartfelt thanks and appreciation of all Global Volunteers do was heartening to hear. She assured us that we are making a huge difference to the children’s lives and long may we continue to come.

I didn’t then have the heart or strength to go back into the bedrooms to say goodbye to the children. Those that would have understood were asleep and those still awake would have thought we were getting them up. We left the hospital to the pitiful sound of Christian moaning, did he know we were going? I’ll never know the answer to that.

I really hope that one day I will be back to spend more time with these wonderful people and special children. It has been an amazing experience and such a privilege to spend time with these special children. I can only hope that these two weeks of love has made a tiny bit of difference in their little lives.