silence
It's wednesday morning, I spoke to frances, and Jeremy, saw Andrea and emailed steve, in the last few days in London. I had posted something before but I deleted the post, still trying to analyse and think of last week. I think most of us are trying to make sense of this trip, trying to see what to share and what to keep to ourselves as Andrea said. One thing for sure is that it changed something in our lives, and it made us think a lot. the silence you are seing on this blog, is not because we have nothing to say, we have too many things to say, but we are not sure what to say, and how to say it.
we will try to post soon, once we find a way to process all what we have seen and done
posted by samar @ 9:41 am
4 Comments:
good post, samar
I hope that the experience was a positive one for you guys. I jus have to wonder whether this kind of work is damaging for the people doing it ? And is any damage a fair trade-off for the benefits to the kids ?
no mikey, it is not this kind of work that is damaging. It is just that in Lebanon, I personally had to face two things other than the project, one was my return after being away during the war, because the last time I was there was end of May; and the other is the complex political situation.
All of this was mixed with the project, so feelings and impressions were about evrything together, the sadness for what I saw in Lebanon, challenged by the happy recognition of all the children.
What this team had brought to Lebanon, and to the children was definitly a very positive thing, and Fatmeh, one of two girls I interviewed, said to me that the first day of Andrea's workshop was the most beautiful day of her life. when I heard this I didnt know if I should be happy because it was this project that brought her a beautiful day, or sad because she had nothing to start with, she never had any contact with music.
For this reason, to me, I cannot praise the project so publicly, because I cannot see it in its small frame of 7 days we spent in beirut, where all the children and volunteers we were with, were enjoying themselves.
The situation in Lebanon is far away from any happiness, and yet, those children were the most generous I ever worked with, despite everything they lived. It is difficult not to project one's perceptions in such a field. I feel these kids have every right to be angry and bitter, but no, they were the loveliest kids, all of them.
These are some of the feelings I am trying to accept, to accept their generosity and learn from it, and at the same time to accept that they can deal better maybe than me, or had dealt better than me, with what happened in Lebanon in the last month.
We will be posting soon some reviews, but we need to have some time to step back and see more clearly.
hi mikey,
just like to endorse what samar's been saying about the kids: they were fantastic. as for us, the trainers, we've all probably been touched by insanity, but that's ok. we'll survive. it's an insane situation, for a beautiful and cultured country to have received such a pounding for 34 days. But it will recover. It will survive. And that's the most important thing.
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