One of the founders of NEED, Kelly Kinnunen, is working on a video documentary project in Kabul, Afghanistan. He is travelling with Dina Fesler of the nonprofit Children’s Culture Connection. Among other places, they have been visiting Charahee Qambar, an IDP camp where people are living in desperate conditions with very little aid. Dina emailed an update about what they are doing and we wanted to share it with you.

First of all, the good news is that baby Rahim is recovering nicely and, inshallah (God willing, as they say), on his way to a full recovery. Of course, the bad news is what we all know he has to look forward to once he leaves the hospital. That part breaks my heart. This whole scene has opened a window for me to the realities faced by victims of war.

Yesterday morning we returned to the camp, where Wusim was finishing up his medical assessments of the children there. We saw so many more tragic cases of children who need serious medical attention, but we were most surprised when we stumbled upon an actual health tent operating at the camp. The word “clinic” would be an overstatement as it’s basically a small tent stocked with simple medicines such as painkillers. Although we were relieved to find out that at least something was serving the 5,000 people in the camp, it’s like having a high school nurse’s office on hand for an entire city.

Najib talked to the people running the health tent to learn more. Apparently it is run by a local organization that is funded by a Dutch NGO, and they will be there for 10 months (May 2009 to March 2010), at which point nobody knows what will happen next. Najib likes answers so he immediately contacted the director of the organization here in Kabul and told them we need to meet right away. I just love how Najib operates. The guy is seriously cool.

A couple hours later we met the directors of the health tent operation, who are good and hardworking people facing a major lack of support. They have to refer any patient whose case is more serious than a cold to the hospital. The problem is that people who are living in a pile of mud usually don’t have the money to pay for a taxi ride to the hospital, let alone treatment once they get there. The health tent does treat pneumonia but living conditions in the camp make it impossible for residents to get better. So the kids take the meds, which keep them from dying of pneumonia, and try to live with it.

The directors are overwhelmed considering that the camp has grown from 70 families to over 800 families in only two years. They told us that their written proposals for more funding have been turned down. We explained the story of baby Rahim and how we are trying to raise money to personally take as many kids to the hospital as need it and they responded by saying they were so happy and grateful that we could help.

So happy and grateful? It blows my mind. So many countries and NGOs have become involved during the eight years of this war. How is it possible that these war victims are so overlooked that the only organization serving them says they are glad that we are there to help? We aren’t a medical team; we’re just a few people who stumbled upon a dying baby by accident.

Donations are starting to come in (go to www.warkidsrelief.org/donate and earmark HCMF in the memo), and we will begin bringing more kids to the hospital as early as tomorrow. The girl in the photo at right will be among the first we bring. At this point, I am just hopeful that we can keep as many kids alive as possible until this “distress signal” I’m sending is seen by those who can help in more long-term ways. These people deserve so much more.

After the meeting, it was back to business to work on our film project. First, we visited a school and met a few hundred of the most adorable children ever. We asked each one to tell us what they liked most about school and what they wanted to be when they grew up. Interestingly, whether they were boys or girls, they all wanted to be doctors, engineers, airline pilots and teachers. I think there might have been a journalist and a couple police officers as well. I love how these kids think big. Every one of them wants to reach for the sky.

We also visited a local TV station where we watched a live taping of “Ask the Mullah,” a call-in show where you can get good advice on life and religion. Najib let me use his cell phone to call in and ask a question. For the record, my question was whether you had to be wealthy to go to the Hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. He replied that if you have the means, do it. If not, don’t sweat it. Or something to that effect.

I’ll have more to report soon!

HCMF Donations at War Kids Relief Children’s Culture Connection

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 3rd, 2009 at 12:01 pm and is filed under NEED Magazine, Organizations, Photo Essays. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.