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Internat Visit 18th of December
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Internat Visit
When Mr. Parker first mentioned the upcoming visit I didn’t have any idea what to expect from it. I have never visited an institution such as this one ever before and for me it was like a revelation. Although I must admit that before I came I was heavily influenced by certain prejudices of our society that the place we were about to visit was something completely different and frightening. Instead what I have seen was a very light and open building with a very welcoming atmosphere. We have been given a very thorough tour by the Internat , shown where the patients live work and rest, I am incredibly thankful to the manager of the Internat for sparing us the time to do so it was an enjoyable visit. Even in the beginning when we all struggled to create our own bahily, it was already a success.
The studio of the painter who lives in the Internat was one of the rooms which I remembered the most mostly due to the incredible paintings that I have seen there. I especially liked the painting which depicted the gods looking down onto the earth, which the manager remarked was one of her favorites too.
In my opinion, even as I hope that our visit had at least entertained the patients in the Internat and gave them some kind of joy, I think it was more important to us so we would understand that people with such disabilities exist and live in our society and that instead of shying away from this fact we should accept it and make these people feel at ease , rather than bearing the role of outcasts as it so often happen, since though they may have physical disabilities they are no different from us.
For me the most moving part of the visit was when the manager of the Internat read us the work of the poet who resides in the Internat. The poems were truly wonderful and I was especially touched by the one from the love section, which was extremely sad because it was clear that the poet realized her situation but nonetheless one could feel that instead of falling into a depression she used her emotions to create a brilliant piece of work. The fact that she had printed her poems for her friends only made them even more special; it was as if we have been allowed to read something so personal that it should have been illegal for us to do so. Even so I think that through her poems the poet had successfully established a link with the people around her. It said a lot about the fact that we should never give up and even if we cannot say what we feel we can write about it!
Overall the visit has completely exceeded my expectations and I really enjoyed it, mostly because everyone reacted so positively there during our visit and were genuinely happy to see us. As for what the visit gave me personally I think it was just that I was able to see clearly and for the first time that a subject such as this is nothing to be shied away from but rather embraced. I hope that the next time we visit the Internat we can chip away at the final pieces of whatever prejudices we have left! We should also realize how lucky we are because like the manager of the Internat who has worked there for about 30 years said “It is important to remember that even if it seems that everything is falling apart around you, you still have hope”
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