Hope For Better Tomorrow- Mallavi Kids With Cartwheel Team Slideshow: Manori & Parveen’s trip from Colombo, Sri Lanka to 2 cities Anuradhapura and Mallavi (near Jaffna) was created by TripAdvisor. See another Sri Lanka slideshow. Take your travel photos and make a slideshow for free.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Friday, December 2, 2011
Sri Lanka's Journey in Reconciliation
Sri Lanka’s Journey in Reconciliation
Part 1
After almost a year of preparations, the cARTwheel
Initiatives’ project to support children in post-conflict Sri Lanka, got off to a flying start at Mallavi Central College
in Mullaitivu District today.
The cARTwheel’s team
of artists from New York led by Ashok Sinha, a renowned photographer,
spent the
first day at Mallavi Central, engaging the children in 4 workshops of
art/graphic design, music, collage making & photography, and
imparting knowledge, techniques and coping tools & bringing them
hours of joyful learning
experiences.
The project, initiated by Ashok Sinha and Parveen
Dassanaike, CEO of United Holidays and co-founder of cARTwheel Initiative,
hopes to bring the therapeutic and transformative power of the arts to children
in post-conflict Sri Lanka
through 10 days of workshops in 3 schools, namely, Mallavi Central
College, Pandiyankulam
GTMS (Thunukkai) & Poonekary Maha Vidyalam, Pooneryn (Killinochchi)
The workshops, designed to open the minds of the children to
various forms of artistic expression, hopes to help children move forward from
a dark and depressing time of their lives,when they lived under the cloud of a
war which raged for the most parts of their childhood. Having had no “normal”
childhood, these children have been the innocent bystanders in a war which
divided our nation, built hatred and acrimony between communities and kept Sri Lanka from
reaching its full potential for many decades.
Psychosocial activities have been promoted in the north,
since their time in the IDP welfare villages and has continued with the setting up of Happiness Centres in many schools
in the north since early 2010. The cARTwheel Initatives' workshops are centred around the Happiness Centres
(Mahilchi Illam), which provide children a happy and safe environment in rebuilding their lives
after, the conflict.
Watching the smiles spread across the faces of the children,
slowly loosening up and engaging with the instructors, absorbing new techniques
and ideas and broadening their minds, were a heart warming moment, bringing
me close to tears. To finally witness the unfolding of the project and seeing the impact of the workshops on children was an
overwhelmingly emotional moment for us all.
The workshops will continue till 10th
December,
with each school having a community exhibition to displaying their
talents to
their families and friends, followed by a visit to Colombo and an
exhibition of art and music at the SL Foundation Institute on 14th Dec.
It is only through such acts of caring and support can we reach into their hearts and build trust, acceptance and hope for a better tomorrow - a tomorrow, where all our children will live in harmony.
To be continued ......
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