Visiting children at the orphanage can be challenging sometimes because some children do not like to open up. A game of questions thankfully helped Allies volunteers break the ice and earn the children’s trust.
“What is your dream? And where do you want to go?” asked the Allies volunteer. They have discovered the children are not afraid to dream—in fact they have many dreams!
“One girl named Masha is dreaming to go visit volunteers in their city. For us it seems to be very easy, we just get into the bus and go to visit,” says an Allies volunteer. But for the children at the orphanage, there are many every day things that might not be as easy to do.
Thankfully, volunteer visits at the orphanage always infuse joy and hope in the children. “They share with us what they would like to hear and know from us, and what things they would like to do,” the volunteer reported.
“As we found out, they love to sing. When you sing, you forget about everything,” the volunteer said. So the volunteers continue to conduct activities and games that help the children grow intellectually and emotionally as well as lighting up the children’s hearts. “I am glad to help the children. They are happy and friendly. I like to spend time with them.”
The volunteers also learned during this recent visit that the children wanted to know more about God and how to communicate with Him. “It brings us joy to hear about that because they were not interested in that before.” Apart from teaching the children, it also helps the children open up when the volunteers themselves are vulnerable towards them. “We tell them about our life, our difficulties. We say that every person has hard times in his life and it is important to go through trials without losing hope.”
An interesting thing happened recently—while a tech-savvy volunteer was helping to fix a computer at the orphanage, a girl named Juliya was showing around a picture of her dad, who she had never met. This volunteer saw Juliya’s dad and recognized him. The volunteer took action, and just recently, Juliya met her father for the first time. He did not even know about her.
Perhaps it was one of Juliya’s dreams to meet her dad, and thanks to Allies, she was able to do so. Nurturing dreams and building hope is important in children because it gives them purpose and goals. Thanks to Allies partners and volunteers, some of these important children can see their dream—big or small—become reality today.