At the Bunyat Center YMWA in Amman

  Amman, Jordan
Thursday, June 26, 2008

Today was a full and very interesting day. I wanted to sleep in this morning but the call to prayer from the nearby mosque woke me at 4:30. I didn't sleep soundly after that, but still felt reasonably rested when it was time to get up and have breakfast.
 
David Baker arranged a taxi to the YMWA Bunyat center not too far from the quarter where we are staying. We arrived about mid-morning and were happy to meet the YMWA staff as well as to see our Youth Corps volunteers: Melea Martin, John Nichols, Kristen Waldrup, and Garrett Wayne. This summer camp serves students that attend the WMWA school on site during the normal school year. The students at this center are mentally challenged, about half of them due to Down's Syndrome, other from other conditions. The school takes students of normal primary and secondary school ages, and sometimes students that are older.
 
For David Baker coming to this school is a trip down memory lane. He worked here for a year as a volunteer under the auspices of the Ambassador Foundation, when he was an Ambassador College student in 1983-4. Herbert Armstrong the founder of Ambassador College and Ambassador Foundation had a personal friendship with King Hussein of Jordan. During one of their meetings, the subject of the school came up, and it seemed possible that through the foundation help might be provided to expand the vocational aspect of the curriculum. A number of Ambassador Students served here over the years. Dave showed me a doorway leading to a showroom for ceramic and woodwork the students produce. He had broken the hole in the concrete wall and framed the door, which is still in use, back when he worked here as a volunteer some 25 years ago.
 
The summer camp was to last 5 days from Sunday through Thursday. The campers are all older students in the late teen, young adult range. They sleep in the classrooms while the male staff sleeps in the common activity room in sleeping bags. The women have separate quarters. Due to the needs of the campers, the staff doesn't get as much sleep as they normally would, being "on call" 24 hours a day. By the time we arrived Wednesday morning, the staff was tired, but the program was running well. The staff was helping the campers make paper bag puppets, while other campers were making colorful drawings that would be made the covers of notebooks they would take home at the end of camp.

Melea, Kristen and John at the YMWA camp

The campers were very curious and friendly. Some of the campers come from well-to-do families and have learned musical skills. A few spoke some English, one or two quite well. For the others we made do with our simple Arabic vocabulary and gestures, calling on the Jordanian staff for translation help when necessary.
 
The campers, though older in age, behave very much like young children, which is the mental capacity of most of them (there is a range of abilities and capacities among them). So they are very friendly and inquisitive, their emotions show readily, whether joy and excitement or sadness. There is a great deal of laughter and smiling, and occasionally there are bouts of heartfelt tears over homesickness or other issues. Several of them love to shake hands; a few show their affection by kissing on both cheeks in the traditional manner. It takes a little adjustment to begin thinking of their actions, and needs for affection and encouragement as those of children, when they appear to be adults. That's perhaps not a perfect analogy, but it has been a helpful way to encapsulate the situation.
 
The Jordanian staff is very attentive and intervenes as necessary to keep things running smoothly and appropriately. If the campers become too intrusive (some of them, in their curiosity and affection, can literally become a little too "in your face", a firm "la" ("no" in Arabic) does the trick.
 
Every so often during the day there is a dance break.

Garrett dancing with the campers

Most of the campers love to dance to Arabic music, and the room really moves when the music gets turned up. Some of them dance very well, having learned some of the traditional moves to local dance. But everyone has fun. One fellow was quite a drummer on the traditional Bedouin drum; when he starts to play everyone stops to listen. It is mostly a very joyous camp.
 
Lunch was traditional: pita break, falafel, hummus, some raw vegetables and a pastry desert.

Breakfast at the camp

The campers get right down to eating and make short work of it.
 
What do our volunteers do in the middle of all this? They look for ways they can help the Jordanian staff: work with the campers on projects (cutting, coloring, gluing), interact and play with them, encourage them, and keep an eye on things to help everyone stay safe. It is not en extremely structured situation, but rather entails being ready to jump in and help with whatever needs to be done. The staff told us several times that
 In the afternoon there was camp cleanup and preparation for the visits of parents and relatives that evening. Cleaning the driveway-entryway bricks with water, brushes, and squeegees was quite a spectacle.

Our soggy volunteers and the water fight

It started as work and ended with a gigantic waterfight including water balloons specially prepared for the occasion. Dave Baker, Marjolaine and I hid behind our cameras to avoid becoming "casualties" of the battle. It was great fun for everyone, including some of the campers themselves, who doused their school staff and our volunteers with great glee. The event was well attended that night, and the families were very pleased to see what their young people had been able to accomplish and prepare during the camp.