Date:
01/2009
Country:
After a two-hour journey to Feodosiya on the other side of the peninsula, we joined a local church group who is already prepared to give out dozens of shoe boxes to needy children. Arriving at two children’s homes, the group performs a number of musical numbers, including a dramatic portrayal of the life of Jesus and a traditional Ukrainian Christmas folk song.
As the youngsters awaiting their presents applaud eagerly, it becomes clear that the audience of children and young teenagers may not be as poverty stricken or as needy as you would expect to be helped from a global charity project like Operation Christmas Child. However, as appears to be the case with much of the Crimea, and the Ukraine, appearances are deceiving.
Behind the well-dressed children being looked after and educated in the surprisingly clean and tidy orphanages, is a background of serious alcohol abuse, drug addiction and abandonment. Throughout the country, parents can be instantly stripped of their rights and separated from their children if the government feels they are unable to raise them.
In one visit, four-year-old Diana had arrived six weeks ago, with her brother Nikita, six. The teachers tell us their mother was a serious alcoholic who could not care for them and they will be likely to remain there until they are 16. Dressing in their best clothes for visitors, the orphans seem to represent the nature of the country, in that beneath the surface lies a troubling amount of social problems and deprivation.
Author: Corey Stephenson, Daily Echo, Hampshire
Photo: Gordon McCann