Fourth Day

The fourth day at HOA brought a different, but similar setting. The day started with overlooking a physical therapy session with a six year old boy and his mother. The nurse did a physical massage and then some therapy for his muscles (or for other reasons) but again with the language barrier, all I can do is report these simple facts.
After this session, I went back the children and played with them. They were very eager for me to do more portraits, and they lined up to be official on who will be next and so forth. The girls still wanted wedding dresses and the boys wanted to be drawn "as is".

After drawing (and now my arm being quite sore as I was racing to do a portrait under 5 minutes each), I pulled out my camera and the children reacted wildly. They started flipping, jumping and doing faces and posing. There was a loud uproar of "Jana! Jana!" They wanted me to take a photo every second, and ofcourse that just can't happen. The children smiled and put their style of conflict resolution aside for this happy moment to be captured. A few older boys got so excited that they sqeezed my arm quite hard (yes, it hurt!). I reacted immediately so they knew that they shouldn't have done that. They stopped and backed off. Their excitement mounted and before long they wanted to take photos and tried grabbing the camera. Ofcourse, I let them know that they can not operate the camera, and then they accepted it. I don't think they understood, but nonetheless, we carried on just fine.

After the photo frenzy, the children and I sat down for some quiet colouring. One small boy threw a balloon at my face, and was repremanded by the HOA staff for that. However, a few minutes later he came back to test my patience (or to see where I stood), and I invited back to colour. He smiled and sat immediately right beside my leg and did not leave until it was lunch.
These children truly are very sweet, and they honestly want to be loved (what child or adult does not want love?) However I do see trauma and some very primal emotions written on their faces. It is sad to see them engage in such a negative conflict resolution style, but as I have reported before, I believe they don't know any better AND that they are doing this for survival. The girls and younger boys have been especially loving and sweet to me. Always holding my hand, hugging my waist and making eye contact. I just wish I could stay longer...