Just in time for the International Day of Charity on 5 September, we ventured on new territory. For more than two weeks, we let the RED NOSES Clowndoctors International tour through our focus country Ukraine, where they played, worked and above all laughed with our fosterlings.
Raiffeisenbank AVAL, which has been helping us for years, especially in the Lviv region, has a crucial share in organizing this tour. With help from our local colleagues as well as Caritas-Spes, and financially only made possible by a funding of the EU's Creative Europe Programme, the Clowndoctors, with their unique visits, conjured not only a smile into the children’s and adolescents’ faces. To make the needy or sick laugh is not merely entertainment for them, the clowns bank on humor to foster the recovery process and the psychosocial health. They combine scientific knowledge and artistic skills to donate levity and new optimism. In more than ten countries and 660 medicinal and social institutions, they help more than 700.000 people, especially children, a year to go through difficult situations.
Their programs were specially tailored to the needs of the individuals our projects support: both the socially disadvantaged in the Children’s Town Pnikut and the Eastern Ukranian refugee camp in Vinniky, and the mentally and/or physically challenged of the holiday village Yablunitsya as well as the Centre for pottery as therapy in Kamianets-Podilsky. The interactive programs shall encourage them to unfold their creativity, strengthen their self-confidence and draw strength and hope for their further lives.
„Our projects‘ emphasis lies on education making possible an autonomous life for the children later on. As a mother I experience every day how important tender affection, humor, and laughter are: they as well contribute to the personal development und strengthening of a child’s confidence. Hence, to us it is a matter of the heart to bring our fosterlings joy and an experience which they will always remember as a happy moment”, says Christine Anwander-Hirsch, RBI-staff member and Charity founding member.
The pictures and video show how successful the Ukraine-tour turned out to be. We would very much like to work with RED NOSES again. Please support us in doing so!
