| During recent wars thousands of children have become targets of heavy shelling and sniping from the areas which surround their towns. Many endured the loss of one or both of their parents, and suffered through severe food and water shortages. For long months and years they could not play outside or enjoy the innocent games of their childhood. Project Life - A Rehabilitation Program for War Orphans is located in Water Port, New York, U.S.A. Apart from the U.S.A., the project has operated successfully in the U.K., South Africa and Canada for Chechens and Bosnians. Since 1997 the program has returned forty orphans from Chechnya and Bosnia to their homes in better health, with greater confidence, new skills and higher hopes for the future. This year twelve young orphans of war, four each from Afghanistan, Chechnya and Bosnia, will be invited to participate in a three-month program which begins in June 2002. There is a strong possibility that their activities with young orphans will lead to the establishment of relative services within Pakistan and other areas in the Gulf region. The volunteers and host families have also gained immeasurable benefits from their contact with Project Life children, and learned valuable new skills through their involvement in this program. Their personnel are dedicated to the alleviation of suffering and the restoration of the human spirit without regard to race, creed, colour or national origin. All time and services are contributed on a volunteer basis. Funds sought are utilized to provide education, health care, recreation and travel. The children return to their homes with greater confidence in their skills and abilities, so that they may be able to better contribute to their community and country.  After understanding and watching the results of their service I decided to volunteer in their program last August. My trip to Afghan camps in January was my very first assignment selecting the orphans for this summer. Through the Corniche Chronicle I am sharing the experience of my three-day trip to the camps. 20th January, 2002 - PESHAWAR. Amidst chilly cold and drought, thousands of Afghans, mostly women and children, live under the open sky in various camps around Peshawar and the United Nations affiliated agencies as well as the host government along with some NGO\'s struggling to fulfill the needs of these helpless people. Apart from shelter, the newly arrived Afghan refugees lack food services. I witnessed that the majority of these people lack warm clothes and shoes. Without blankets and quilts, they pass prolonged winter nights and are compelled to sleep on the ground. Jalozai camp is the largest Afghan refugee camp on the outskirts of Peshawar, near the Afghan border in northwestern Pakistan, where more than 80,000 Afghans live in squalid misery. In addition, dotted with torn plastic tents on a treeless plain, Jalozai has been the point of arrival for thousands of new Afghan refugees fleeing drought and war in their homeland since September last year. One of the sights I witnessed was a woman boiling the skin of a sheep her relative had found in the garbage. She was going to give the soup of that skin to her kids to survive the night. Kacha Gali camp is another site similar to the Jolozai camp, but a smaller living \'graveyard\'. This is where I registered the first war orphan for Project Life\'s rehabilitation program. I visited the camp once again the following day only to register some more orphans. All I saw was excitement, hope and eagerness to be able to witness the world outside the camps. My visit to these camps was an eye-opening experience for me - something that I had heard about through the media only. I felt I was healing them by showing them some ray of hope in the form of this program. I will be returning at the end of June to chaperone the selected orphans to the United States and Canada. Currently, Project Life is in its first stages of development. With plans to expand the program in the future, Project Life hopes to be able to help many more children who are in desperate need of aid. Finally, I would like to state the sooner we can begin to make a much-needed contribution to improving communities the faster we will witness a way of life free from conflict. Wars and displacement have interrupted the future of tomorrow and it is our duty to secure the future of our own children and make this world a better place. Can you contribute towards the program? |