Today is the International Day of the Disabled People. Institutions, specialists and care takers all around the world draw their conclusions of what has been done in facilitating those people and what is still to be done to make their hard lives easier. Our society, however, still has a long way to go but should not keep closing its eyes for the problems of the less lucky among us?
Let us take a moment to think about the disabled kids ? it's a hard fate destined by birth or acquired as a result of an accident? The fact that we do not see disabled kids around us in our busy life does not mean they are invisible or does not exist. They breathe, they suffer and they struggle to survive each day of their lives just as all of us, the ?healthy? ones. We are living in constant worries and concerns about our kids and are so focused on the joys or problems they pour over us. Let us give some thought today about disabled kids ? misfortune might have come to our kids ?.
Today?s issue of the Maritsa newspaper tells a story of an almost blind boy who studies in one of the secondary schools in the Trakia Housing Complex in Plovdiv. Thanks to the constant support of his family and his teachers, he is doing fine with the schoolbooks. But he is not able to get back home alone ? he always needs an escorting person. In case that person is late ? the boy sits and waits? ?Our standard school facilities are not equipped to take kids with 'specialized educational necessities' ?, points out Dr Dora Lefterova, Dean of the Pedagogy Faculty of the Plovdiv University. ?Plovdiv does not have a single school featuring a sloping facility for wheelchairs or marking facilities for blind students yet.?
Our society as a whole shares the will of all the young people with seeing, hearing, motion or mental disabilities to develop in social integration and not be isolated. Alas, the real-life story is somewhat different ? each of the disabled kids (and their brave parents, of course) has faced detachment or neglect? At the present moment, 24 kids with different kinds of disabilities are integrated and attend standard secondary schools in Plovdiv ? unfortunately, there is no precise statistics of what has been happening to the rest of them. The sad story is that the percentage of disabled kids is constantly increasing on a world scale. Bulgaria could hardly stay away of that sad tendency ?.
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Disabled people have painted an icon
Disabled people from the Regional Association of the Bulgarian Union of the Disabled People have painted an icon. The icon of St. George the Victorious was started May 25th this year, to celebrate the first anniversary of the Regional Association?s court registry.
?We placed the consecrated icon in the large hall of our new center ? to inspire us and give us strength to endure hardships??, said Lilia Georgieva, representative of the Regional Association.