There's Hope, Joy, and Music All Around!

New Volunteer, Rebecca, helping out at Healing Family Foundation

 Hailing from overcast Seattle, Washington, I had no idea what to expect weather wise when I signed up for a six month study abroad program in Chiang Mai Thailand. The instant I stepped out of the plane and into the heat of Thailand it became clear that Chiang Mai was going to be nothing like Seattle, even the rainy season was hotter than I had bargained for. 

A Colorful Work in Progress

After five months of studying environmental science in the sporadic thunderstorms up North and the suffocating heat down South I still haven’t grown accustomed to the hair frizzing humidity or the bone chilling nights. But I have learned to always expect the sun to shine, and that is exactly what it did on my first visit to Hope Home.

  

I had been a volunteer for Art Relief International for one short week and upon entering Hope Home I was introduced to a beautiful girl named Joy, a child at Hope Home with cerebral palsy.  Alongside my fellow volunteers and the youth of Hope Home I settled in next to Joy’s stroller with a handmade noise maker and began shaking, in no time the musical notes of the noise maker had reached Joy’s ears and she smiled with, well, joy.  She tiny hands clenched and unclenched along the smooth side of the noise makers edge and with my help we shook it side to side and up and down. Joy’s smile became bigger with each shake and the addition of my voice, singing “Hello, hello, hello, how are you? I’m fine. I’m fine. I hope that you are too.” And I could believe form her smile that she was in fact fine too.

Phil works with his feet, while Joy observes the activities at Hope Home.

Once the music had calmed down it was time to introduce the lesson plan. Brightly colored paper, that too made noise in the tiny hands of the children, was passed out and promptly Joy began crinkling and pasting the paper to a sticky sheet of paper that soon would become a mural of bright, three dimensional colors. With a little bit of prompting and help from the volunteers the soft noise of sculptural paper being balled up and stuck to glue, with both feet and hands, filled the sunny front yard of Hope Home.  Joy concentrated on the task at hand, smiling and laughing alongside her fellow helpers, watching a magnificent rainbow being created on the page.

       After no more glue could be seen, except on tiny fingers and toes, Joy relaxed, blue sculpture paper still in hand. Her and her house mates had each created an individual piece of work, as bright as the shining sun, which had helped exercise stiff muscles and brought music, laughter, and joy to Hope Home.

        Just like the weather, people come in and out of Joy and her friend’s lives on an almost regular basis. They don’t know whether to expect a new volunteer one day or a new family the next, but each day they bring sunshine and warmth to the hearts of those blessed with the chance to know them; just like the city of Chiang Mai. 

Joy creating Blues Music!

David and Phil posing for the camera.