But I will let Deanne guest blog for today!
Today we visited two villages to conduct therapy clinics. We set off from Karakol just after 7am and drove for a couple of hours along the southern shore of Lake Issy-Kul. There was heavy fog rising from the lake making visibility quite poor and travel slow for much of the journey.
On arrival at the furthest village we were ushered into a room at the school. There were about twenty children and their parents at one end of the room and at the other end two tables covered with cloths and a row of seats. We were seated in correct order with Anne in the middle as the eldest. We felt very honoured. Introductions were made along with a lengthy speech from the NGO coordinator. Then the clinic started.
The children were organised into groups - those who had come with a communication/speech problem and those who had come about a physical issue. Then we set to work with children, parents and other people crowded around waiting for their turn. It was a very different therapy experience to the usual Australian clinic. Most of the consultations I did at this school were about speech issues, mostly articulation and the inability to say sounds like the rolled r, l, s, ch and sh. It's difficult to teach a child to produce a rolled r when I can barely produce it myself.
Many of the parents spoke only Kyrgyz so because my translator spoke only Russian and not Kyrgyz we were using three way translation for consultations. I would ask a question or give suggestions in English. The Russian translator would pass it on in Russian to another person who spoke Russian and Kyrgyz who would pass it on to the parent and child in Kyrgyz and then back again from Kyrgyz to Russian to English. I only hope the message didn't lose too much in the translation.
Now lunch, what can I say. Just look at the photo and that was only the first course.
We drove back to another village after lunch to see some children with cerebral palsy. We did our best to provide some useful advice in one brief consultation. I would dearly love to spend more time working with some of these children.
We had a scenic drive back along the lake in the afternoon. Fortunately some of the fog had cleared so we could see part of the lake and across to the mountains on the other side. In every direction you look there are enormous snow capped mountains. Anne and I had the pleasure of being driven around all day by one of our translators in her lovely comfortable Audi sedan. We were pleased to return to Karakol again just before dark.
Thanks Deanne!
My experience was pretty similar, although the translator I was working with spoke Kyrgyz and Russian, and she became a fairly good diagnostic speech pathologist by the end of the day. I asked her if she had ever seen children with disabilities and she said no. But she jumped in and helped us when she could. She was also able to come up with words in Krygyz quickly when I asked for words with a particular sound in. I am wondering if there is any research on sound development in Kyrgyz???? I saw some very interesting cleft palate cases, and also one child who had 'too much imagination and no attention'. I remarked that he sounded like many other 6 year old boys I know.
Some photos:
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| the view of the mountains across Lake Issy-Kol that we enjoyed for most of the drive (apart from the 2 hours in the mist) |
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| you can see wonderful mountains all the time |
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| this boy had 'too much imagination'. He was fun. |
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| Deanne talking with one of the girls with cerebral palsy |
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| This young man was so handsome. He had been impeccably dressed to come and visit us. He needed a little practice with some speech sounds. |
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| Working on getting some flexion and soft body with this boy with CP. |
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| Introducing this lovely boy and his mum to some picture symbols. They both picked it up instinctively and brilliantly. |
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| our tasty tasty lunch |
Onwards.
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