Step Up Orphan Opportunity Centre

— Let’s ask them, what kind of music is there?
— Yes, yes, they’ll say something like “happy and sad” and we can take it further.

When working with children with learning difficulties, you can’t predict anything. Those who are usually shy might suddenly start singing or screaming. And those who usually shout might get carried away with a tambourine, forgetting about everyone and everything around them. You can’t even predict the answer to the question “What kind of music is there?”. The answers we got were: fast, slow, rap, rock, loud, sound, but not happy or sad. Well, one supervisor said happy, but Katya Maksimova said there’s no sad music! It’s amazing.

How did our classes go? ‘Madly’ is probably the most suitable word. Especially in moments of shared joy and with regard to my “Orchestra of strange folk instruments found at Belsky Ustye”. Jars of rice, a drum made from a cookie box, a rattle found in the far cupboard- what else do you need to be happy? A ukulele, piano and students’ smiles.

Music is wonderful in that it has no right or wrong, no winners or losers. You can choose your instrument, you can play loudly or quietly, you can suddenly quieten down, you can rattle, jangle or sing a certain rhythm or melody. You don’t need much to have fun; we convinced ourselves and everyone around us of this. Sometimes, shouting very loudly, like you’ve never shouted before, brings you happiness. Or singing or turning the triangle round to make it sound nicer.

The main thing is that everyone enjoys the process and tries new things. I think we succeeded.

Did you know that there are four verses to the song “Little Christmas Tree Cold in Winter”?

Lots of people were interested, so we decided to hold this activity on a regular basis – the boys are waiting for new face masks!

Of course, I had no idea whether the students would enjoy this. And in this case, as always, we had a plan B. But, to everyone’s surprise, it was abandoned. I loved telling them all about the different types of skin, about pores and how to properly care for yourself. It was fun to tear off a charcoal face mask and ridding the body of all bad things. It’s nice to look at their well-groomed, glowing faces. I think Katya even seriously thought about a career change…

As part of the process we learn about fruit, vegetables, animals and birds; we develop speech skills and do motor skill exercises and articulatory gymnastics. But it’s so dry and it doesn’t portray any facial expressions – no smiles or and shakes. But we go and do it, every volunteer interacts with the students and the students find a way to communicate with us.

Play or practise? What’s that – whatever is possible? We did both in our activities, but it was all in a smile – every student will remember our songs in the summer and will sing them with the actions; they will speak to me and ask whether their language has improved; they’ll ask whether we can play speech-related games. And we will play! We’ll sing too!

This year I wanted to teach them something new, to look after themselves. So I avoided all talk of yoga. And when they asked me when yoga classes were, I’d jokingly reply: “What? Yoghurt?”

But one day I decided to hold a class for wheelchair users, because I understand that it’s more relevant than ever for them. They aren’t able to go to the sports hall and run after a ball whenever they feel like it. All they can do is go around the orphanage.

A volunteer was assigned to each student: they helped them get into the positions, they held and balanced their spine and provided moral support by simply being there. And I was so happy to be with them, to breathe and relax along with them. I didn’t even realise that we continued for an hour and a half – rather than the 40 minutes we were supposed to do!

I’d like to say thank you to the students for their willingness to learn. Despite the difficulties, they really wanted to learn, experience and try something new. This gave me strength and motivation and of course, the knowledge of what we’ll be doing this summer!

At the first class, I realised that all my fears were justified. Until then, I had interacted with hardly any of the students and therefore, didn’t expect any support from them. Also, I was told right at the last minute that the class would take place in the sports hall, where it’s easy to lose a small group of people.

At first I couldn’t get everyone’s attention and some of the students were just wandering around the hall. At that moment, I thought it would be better to abandon my initial plan and work individually with each of them. Then a group of girls came and everyone began to take part in their own way: one of them came up with a story about a princess being saved, another was just happy to poke others, and some began to learn about the techniques of protection and response.

I later realised that the first lesson was the most difficult – after that, everything became easier. Some of them were interested in fencing, others just in playing with swords.

From the second day, people were approaching me and asking me whether they could fence. I was proud of their progress and I was happy that I could share my favourite sport with these lovely people. Thank you for the wonderful lessons!

Philippa has been fencing professionally for over 20 years; she has taken part in competitions and is a member of the Great Britain national team as well as the London School of Economics team.

Let’s say we’re cooking pizza. We prepare various ingredients: olives, tomatoes, cheese ham. Each participant can base their work on whatever they want; they can choose how much they want. Even if they just want cheese – it’s their choice.

At the camp, as well as pizza, we made cookies and pasta with various sauces. Again, they each had the choice to decorate the cookies however they wanted. As for the pasta, we had different types, and we used a variety of spices and flavours for the sauces – many of them for the first time. Turmeric surprised them the most, because it makes the sauce yellowish. And of course, they all loved the traditional tomato sauce.

Of course, I wouldn’t have been able to keep the students’ attention or spend time with each of them if I were alone, so thank you to all of the volunteers who helped me and shared these culinary discoveries with me. It’s great when the pizza is almost ready, there’s an appetising smell permeating the corridor. Volunteers and children flock towards the kitchen to try our cooking. For me, the culinary masterclass is inspiring. In the past, it has gone wrong: green muffins and sushi rolls falling apart. But time after time, I see the students’ interest and progress. And the best thing? They know more culinary life hacks than we do – they teach us!

Well. Impromptu: the genius of pinterest and an infinitely inspiring fact – that’s what we do it all for.

And they have paper, scissors, pencils, hands, artistic flair, openness, curiosity, sincere job, amazing obedience with their class hierarchy system (they have people ‘observing the order’), and love. That’s all!

And it works! We made houses (milk cartons) and larger ones with light bulbs. We did a pantomime game about the history of design; the team was me, Misha, Artem, Andrew, Valeria, Peter, and the rest.

It was a very happy holiday.

I’ll tell you three stories about my life.

1) The orphanage. I lived there for 15 years. A lovely lady called Lyubov Alexandrovna raised me. That’s where I learned to love others.

2) My foster family. I lived with them for three years. Again, I learnt to love others. I became wiser, more mature, started thinking and acting differently.

3) Belsky Ustye. That’s where I got to know students with difficulties and where I had my first volunteering experience. It’s with the students there that I learn to be happy and kind, to value every moment in life.

Why do I keep going back? I see the students’ progress when we give them the choice; they can decide whether they want to go to the beauty salon or the cinema, to fencing or ballet, yoga or music class.

There’s a holiday atmosphere and energy; students are happy and smiling. In line with the traditions of the Belsky Ustye 2018 winter camp, they choose their own activity: fencing, yoga, fortune-telling, juggling, bowling.

Each volunteer picks up their group at the ‘station’ – there are lots of special meetings and happy moments. Students don’t choose what’s happened to them; they need to feel trust and sympathy towards those they interact with. By the end of it all, there is toilet paper wrapped up by volunteers – it’s the final climax. It turns into a salute as it flies into the air, wraps around people and bursts into confetti.

All of the small meetings are part of one large one, which began with an enchanting disco a week ago and ends with an equally fantastic fair today.

It was the last day of camp, the sunniest and snowiest day of the whole week. We got ready quickly – just a few minutes to prepare the ‘tokens’; volunteers cut them up and that was that. All that was left was to choose an outfit for the seller to take the gifts in and then we could go on. Here’s what happened (it was very chaotic 🙂

We could not, and did not create a list of how much things cost, because all the children are very different, and the value of each token was very different depending on who brought it to you. Therefore, the inflation was a problem. The first thing we bought was a tin box with sweets, the most expensive thing)) – 20 tokens gone already. After this, it was calm for five minutes, as no one else realised that they could buy anything and everyone was spending their hard-earned tokens on compote and cookies.

But it was gone, and the children flowed with the river trying to get me chocolate bears and hares for three tokens, or even one. But I didn’t give them to anyone for less than 7, so many left to get more. The hardest part was giving slippers, since they had to be the size of the buyer. But they were sold- for 18 tokens. As a result, everything was gone in 20-25 minutes.

On average, children took two attempts to bargain and succeeded on the third, having already collected the right amount of money to choose and purchase something. For the children themselves, in my opinion, this was very unusual and interesting, because they are not generally very successful in situations where they can “earn” and choose what they want. I’m very glad that we managed to do something similar.