November 30, 2021

We completed a week of wheelchair training.  LDSC provides thousands of wheelchairs around the world.  They sent a small team of specialists to Iraq to train our partner charities on how to assess a person for the correct type and size of chair and how to assemble and customize wheelchairs.  We spent most of the training days in wheelchairs so that we became familiar with them as well as sympathetic to those who needed them.

Jim listens attentively to the instructions.  As we had several only-Kurdish language attendees, several only-Arabic attendees, and several only-English attendees (and teachers) - all instruction had to be given in three languages.

Several attendees specialized in wheelchair construction.

One of our local instructors was Mahdi (left, on the floor) from Sulaymaniyah who had polio as a child and has limited use of his legs but a huge, wonderful personality.  Despite his challenges he has degrees in bioinformatics, teaches at the university, and is a happily married man with a daughter.

Geri also enjoyed the class, experiencing life in a wheelchair, and having conversations with the other students.

Jim, Barbara, and Geri formed a powerful wheelchair team.

Jim was assigned to play a role pretending he had a stroke and was consequently paralyzed on the right side…. with other students having to determine his medical problem and what type of chair would best suit him.

On the last day of class we had a public clinic with real people being brought in who were in need of a chair and we had to assess them. This young man, who could not stand and had slightly deformed legs, was brought in by his father.

A dear, older woman who could no longer walk.

Another view of this young man so in need of an appropriate chair.

A brave, intelligent young man who had lost his legs.

Another young man with deformed legs.

The same young man in the process of getting measured.

This beautiful young lady tripped coming out of her home in a small, rural village and hit her head - leaving her paralyzed.

Fine tuning and customizing some finished chairs.

And we were able to send some of our little bears to new homes with children who were shy, but happy to get them.

Happy child, happy bear.

Fine tuning his active wheelchair.

A family happy to have a wheelchair - and the footpads were customized to accommodate the shape of the young man’s limbs.

Our paralyzed young lady in her new, all-terrain wheelchair that will handle the rough, dirt roads of her village more easily.

Heading out with her new wheelchair.

This gentleman amazed us all!  He hobbled in with a cane.  He was missing his right hand.  When he received his wheelchair he hobbled out to his old motorbike with a built in cart, asked to have it placed in the cart (you can see the LDS logo on the chair) and carefully road off into the distance.  What another amazing example of perseverance and living life to the fullest possible!

Jim receiving his certificate at the end of our training.

Barbara receives her certificate.

The flags of the key partners: Iraq, Kurdistan, Barzani Charity Foundation, and Latter-day Saint Charities.

At the end of the long day we had one more stop to make.  The LDSC team piled into one car and headed out to see Rana, Jim’s and my paraplegic friend, to do a wheelchair assessment for her.

Here we all are with Rana.  The Andersons did an assessment and a custom wheelchair is being built for her.

The next day the LDSC and BCF teams headed to the Bersive 2 refugee camp for Yezidi to assess persons needing wheelchairs.

This stately gentleman was both in need of a chair and now blind.

As he is assessed he is supported by his son.

Yezidi women at the camp waiting patiently for an assessment.

Patient recipients….

The gentleman on the left had lost a leg and was in need of a wheelchair.

Team work to customize a wheelchair.

Another happy bear going to a forever home…

We became the center of attention for some of the children at the camp.…

Children are children the world over….

Earlier we had done some follow-up wheelchair visits and this lucky bear found a forever home.

Happy bears for the little sisters of a wheelchair recipient in a small village.

I saw these two little girls standing so forlorn on a village street while finding our way back from a wheelchair follow up.  Jim stopped the car and I ran over with two bears for the girls.

Happy bears, happy girls…

Arriving at our wheelchair follow up visit in another small village.

Visiting a wheelchair recipient in a wonderfully loving family who were overjoyed to adopt a bear….

We will find him! …. We had met this ‘shepherd in a wheelchair’ long before our training as we were driving along our road to Duhok.  Now that we know more about wheelchairs, we are going to search the villages till we find him again so that we can fit him with a sparkling new all-terrain wheelchair.  We will keep you updated on our search!

The brother shepherds….