By Christina Greenberg

What is the biggest treat 21 Russian street kids could ever ask for?

A holiday to Ireland.

The children literally had the time of their lives, thanks to Dermot Brannick, Deirdre Mullen and company who organized this real life experience. Brannick worked on organizing the holiday for an entire year; raising funds needed for 21 children to travel, accompanied by teachers and Love's Bridge staff.

Few of these kids traveled outside of their main city, Perm, herein Siberia, before the trip-let alone gone abroad. Due to circumstances, none even dare to dream of flying on an airplane. At departure, as the plane progressed down the runway, little Oleg turned to me relieved and said, "Flying isn't scary at all," not realizing that the plane was still grounded. Every day in Dublin was planned to include a variety of thrilling activities, adventures and good food. The countryside camp that they stayed in while in Ireland had a playground, giant tube-slide, gym, assault course, rock climbing facilities and an archery range.

With Perm being an industrial city, the children were not accustomed to such clean air, and they all commented that their hair grew more in ten Dublin days than it had in months. The kids went many thrilling places during their stay. These included the Dublin Zoo (they were fascinated with the big holding areas for the animals, as in the Perm Zoo the cages are just big enough for the animals to turn around in), the wax museum (they dived for the coins in the wishing well), a farm-museum, the local swimming pool, a bowling alley, a football match with Irish kids, canoeing (their favorite part was tipping the canoes over), a restaurant (complete with entertainment-figure balloons and magic tricks) and a disco that exclusively catered that one night strictly to the kids and volunteers.When it came time to leave, the kids all cried. There were no dry eyes among the Irish volunteers, either. Most of the Irish volunteers are already making plans for future trips to Perm to spend time with the kids.

After arriving back in Perm, two of our young wards, Maxim and Marina, went home to spend a month with their families. We are very happy that they are slowly growing closer to their families again, and that there are future prospects for these two young children (9 and 11 years old) to return to their families. They have both made a lot of progress during their time in the shelter, including building a healthier lifestyle and resuming their studies. While the team was in Ireland, our remaining staff was very busy renovating the shelter, including changing out sewage pipes and, thanks to the American Cathedral in Paris, we were able to install ventilation in the shelter. Perm's Sister City, Louisville, Kentucky, gave a donation towards new bunk beds, as the ones we built almost two years ago were in need of replacement. All in all, our "Step Toward Home" shelter now has a new look, and is better able to reach out to more of the many Siberian street kids in this area.

Christina Greenberg is a Project Manager of the FCF Project in Perm, Russia, Love's Bridge.

Email: fcf@familycare.org
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