OUTING TO SIDI KAOUKI

 

ORGANISATION

 

An outing to Sidi Kaouki, was organized on Thursday December 25th 2003 with the collective decision taken by Miss Jennifer, the French voluntary monitor and Mr. Mabrouk , the treasurer of the APEHE and with the consent of the president ,Mr. Moudoujy and Mr. Essakkat, member of the association. It was meant to give the disabled kids of the centre, who suffer from different disabilities, an opportunity to go in a team far away from home and to get away from the usual space of the APEHE centre and to go out into nature so that they could discover themselves through the direct contact with the sand, the sea water and other elements of nature they hadn't seen before.

 

 PARTICIPANTS 

 

A list of the kids who were to participate was established with forty people in the whole among which, there was Mr. Mabrouk in his quality of supervisor of the trip, representing the APEHE, Miss Jennifer, Fattah, the door keeper, Abdellatif, the driver and the one who is in charge of the carpentry workshop together with the educators ,Mrs Elgarne, Mrs Bentajer Fatima, Miss Idrissi Fatima Zahra as well as Mr. Abdennasser , Miss Maslouhi Bahija, Brik and Labzar. That makes a total of 11 supervisors for a  number of children that reached 29 kids, among which there were 5 dumb and deaf girls, 6 autistic children, and 6 mentally disabled children, 7 physically disabled children and 5 kids suffering from 'trisomie 21'

 

GETTING READY

 

Chicken sandwiches  were prepared early in the morning in the centre kitchen by the female educators. We bought 5 kilograms of banana, 5 kgs of orange,12 litres of mineral water as well as 6 bottles of coke and Fanta . Everything was packed into paper, plastic bags and cardboard boxes. We also took some first aid medicine with us. The kids came with their own sandwiches that we packed separately in a cardboard box.

 

THE TRIP

 

 Since the vehicle we had was not large enough to carry everybody, we decided to divide the group in two teams that went one by one. The first team left at 9 in the morning and the second team at 11. It was cloudy and there was a little rain that didn't last long. However, it was sunny during he rest of the day .

 

ENTHUSIASM

 

The kids arrived at the centre earlier than usual, they were looking forward to the trip which hadn't been organised before. They were so happy, this was apparent in their looks as they were watching every movement the educators did and listened carefully for fear that there might be something that would cancel the trip.

 

 ON THE SPOT

 

When we arrived, the children were so happy, the large  beach was almost deserted and the tide was down .everybody enjoyed sitting or running on the wet sand. Some started playing football, others played volley ball, tennis or Frisbee . everyone did what their physical and mental capacities allowed to express their joy. There wasn't much sun , but the weather was very nice. it was a memorable day for the kids, and an opportunity to realise that disability could be challenged. 

 

THE PICNIC

 

Around 1 o'clock we gathered all the kids and everybody sat down on the sand round the educators who were in charge of distributing food and drinks. everybody helped themselves except little Amine. who was in a wheelchair always smiling and sparing no opportunity to express himself. He was dumb, but not deaf and could understand what was said. Jennifer and Saïd Ezzine fed him in turns.

 

By: Mohamed Mabrouk