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Marr
College Mission Trip with the
Smiles Foundation
October 2008 |
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In October, 2 staff and 9
senior pupils from Marr College travelled to Romania to work with the
Smiles Foundation. We were financially supported by
GlaxoSmithKline and the Marr Trust. We stayed at the
Mission Centre in Cihei where the pupils enjoyed the comfort of
on-suite facilities. The recreation area had a pool table, table
football and a TV with the latest DVD’s for them to watch.
Kevin Hoy (Founder & CEO of The Smiles Foundation) and his
staff organised a whole range of activities for our pupils to
participate in; these included preparing and delivering food parcels
to the needy along with Angie and Marius the Smiles Social Workers,
working in construction under the guidance of Tudor where we
worked to retrieve the wooden window frames, door frames and wooden
floors before the demolition of the building took place.
We were taken to visit the various projects that Smiles are involved
in like the Children’s Centre in Cihei for abandoned kids, the
Community Centre and Horticultural Project in Gepiu and
the Emergency Housing Centre in Mierlau. All of these visits
gave the pupils a great insight to the support that Smiles offer the
community and where all the money raised through the charity is
targeted.
The pupils visited the Community Complex in Tileagd which
included the School, the Church, the Opticians,
the Dentist and the Nursery. They observed a lesson on
apples and then worked alongside the staff during ‘active play’ with
the youngsters. Both sets of pupils found this most enjoyable as they
overcame the language barrier, interacting with each other and playing
games.
The pupils spent one afternoon playing wheelchair tennis with
Taco Nijhoff and John Noakes. Taco first taught the pupils to move
around in the wheelchair before teaching them the skills of tennis.
Everyone had a fantastic time trying to out manoeuvre Taco on the
tennis court – and that was when they were out of the wheelchair!
The final day was spent painting and cleaning the Domakos’s
house. Mrs Domakos and her daughter were a family that the pupils had
met when delivering food parcels earlier in the week. They were so
moved by the conditions in which the family lived that they wanted to
help improve their environment. Angie liaised with the family who
were more than happy to receive this additional help from Smiles.
Kevin and his team organised the materials required for the day and
again, under the supervision of Tudor, we set about our task. At
the end of the day the whole house had 2 coats of paint added to the
walls and the ceilings. Two new beds, mattress and bedding were
bought and a new stove was ordered. There firewood store within the
house was also cleaned out making it easier for them to access
firewood required to keep the stove burning.
 Kevin
also organised a visit to the city of Oradea where the pupils visited
various sites before enjoying a McDonald’s and a game of bowling.
This was an educational visit with a difference! Through the
excellent organisation of the Smiles Foundation our pupils got the
chance to experience the culture of another country while working
alongside the foundation to improve the life of others. This was an
excellent experience which I would recommend to any educational
establishment.
Mrs Shona Stevens (Lead Teacher) |
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Below are some of the stories of the pupils
who attended: |
Bobby’s Story
On the morning of October 8th, I had little idea of
what I had let myself in for.
By the time we landed in Budapest, the thoughts of what might lie
ahead started. I was looking forward to inspecting the
accommodation. Being pleasantly surprised by just how comfortable the
mission centre was, I slept in preparation for the next day.
Our first full day had dawned and after preparing food packages –
containing necessities such as oil, sugar, rice, flour, pasta, peas,
and washing powder – we were ready to deliver them.
And then we saw for the first time, how the impoverished of Romania
lived. Our three visits took us to see different families. The
houses of these people were sparsely furnished and often lacking
space. Large families had to share two rooms which made me think of
the difficulties I faced living with my sister in a comparatively
large house. A thought, I confess, which pained me.
 However, not until
Saturday did the group of us truly understand the horrendous living
conditions in which some lived. An elderly woman and her daughter
lived in a two-roomed house though not many people in Britain would
agree that it was a house. Black walls surrounded a solitary stove,
two mattresses and a small collection of knick-knacks. Personally the
sight of this brought a hard hitting wave of realisation and sadness
crushing down on me. With an additional visit to the village Salard,
we met a man living with his 5 children in a miniscule house
consisting of one room and made almost solely of mud brick. It would
be impossible to exaggerate the difference between our comfortable
lifestyle and their world in which they had literally next to nothing.
Apart from witnessing the devastated lives of those in poverty, our
group made visits to several facilities set up by the Smiles
Foundation. This illustrated the effort that has been put into Smiles
by those involved and how effectively the charities donations had been
spent.
It was a pleasure to be part of this mission trip as it really
educated me on the issue of poverty in Romania and helped me
appreciate the hard work of the people who have generously dedicated
time and effort to helping those less fortunate than themselves.
I shall return home more knowledgeable and with an improved
understanding of how charities like the Smiles Foundation function. |
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Katie’s Story
I always thought I knew about poverty and understood how bad
it was, but it wasn’t until I spent a week in Romania with the Smiles
Foundation that I realised the extent of poverty and just how horrific
it was. During one week, I saw many forms of poverty and the
different people it affected whether it was the family of 9 living in
a house containing 2 rooms, the 89 year old lady who now had no family
and no one to visit her, to the children of a gypsy community who had
never seen dental braces before and became extremely excited over a
bag of balloons. Poverty is not something that can be shown through
photos and videos, it has to be experienced and this has been an
experience I will never forget.
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Emma’s Story
When in Romania for a week with the school, it is fair to say we
all went through every emotion imaginable. On the first day we went
with a social worker on family visits. The last house we visited was
an 89 year old Hungarian widow. She was pleased to have company for a
change and took pleasure in sharing her life
story with us. I found her story heart breaking as she had lost
almost every person she has ever loved. Her Mum died when she was 2
years old and her Dad when she was aged 5. Her brother was also
paralysed when he was 5 which must have been an awful strain on her
already fragile life. Her first husband, with whom she had a child,
was abusive towards her so she left him and remarried. She showed
such energy and courage to carry on with her life. When her first
husband died she had to bury him as he had nobody else. I found this
amazing as I would never be strong enough to go back and forgive him
despite all his wrongdoing.
To show her appreciation of our visit, she gave us grapes from her
garden, although we were cautious about how clean they were! We ate
some to be polite. Just as we were about to leave she told us that
she was waiting to die as she had no one left.
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Caitlin’s Story
Before I
went to Romania I couldn’t have even told you in what part of the
world it was in – geography never having been my strong point! But
now it is somewhere I will never forget!
By the end of the first day my whole perspective on my own life had
changed completely after being on family visits and seeing how poorer
Romanian families lived. The first thing I noticed when entering the
first family’s house was the smell which made me gag. The second
thing was just how small the houses were; two rooms for six children.
This house wasn’t even the worst we saw as later on in the week we
went to visit the Domakosh’s who lived in a sort of cave. It was two
rooms that were so dark we didn’t see the old woman who was lying on
the straw mattress on the floor. The walls were black with soot and
it made me realise how bad some people have it.
As a group we went back to paint the house and try and bring a little
light into the Domakosh’s life.
My trip to Romania has really made me realise that I am lucky to have
what I have and although much of the trip was heart breaking I would
do it again.
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Emily’s Story
I spent a week in Romania with the school and it was an
amazing, horrific, devastating, fantastic and heart wrenching
experience. We did so many things and saw so many different places.
Each place we visited touched all our hearts and I’m sure we will
remember them for a long time in the future.
The 89 year old that has no visitors, the Domakosh family who lived in
the worst conditions I have ever seen or could ever imagine, the
gypsies whose teeth were black and had a habit of biting and
 all
the children at the gypsy nursery and school. They all now have a
special place in my heart and whenever I think I am in a bad situation
or find myself moaning about something trivial all I need to do is
think of them just to realise how lucky I really am.
I loved every minute of the trip and will now always appreciate the
hard work that the Smiles Foundation does to help Romanian lives.
I’ll always remember my mission trip to Romania |
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Mhari’s
Story
Smile! In this
short, full week, I have met people who have very little to smile
about.
I find it difficult to understand what it feels like to live in a mud
hut, sharing the two rooms with my parents and nine brothers and
sisters. It is hard to believe that in today’s society an ill,
elderly lady stays with her daughter in a dark, damp room without any
running water, without electricity and without hope. I can’t even
begin to comprehend how the father in Salad lives in a ‘home’ the size
of a wardrobe and each night sleeps in a straw bed with his five young
children, suffering from long term illnesses and the prejudice of
being a Roma gypsy.
And so I could go on …………
 There are endless
stories to tell, many people to meet and a never ending number of
situations to address, these are just a few. Although the problems
seem overwhelming at times I feel that this week, we as a group
through working with the Smiles Foundation have given people something
to smile about. Whether that is a food parcel, an extreme Romanian
make-over or just a balloon, I am glad that we did. We may not have
changed the world but I believe that we have changed the world in
which a few people live – and that is something to smile about.
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