By now I’m sure many of you have seen photos of our Christmas parties we had in Corozal (if you haven’t yet, please check out the video!) The parties have such a great back story too. So please, let me take a little of your time to tell you all about it and introduce you to an amazing young woman.
Payal
Payal Chulani is a young junior college student in Corozal who contacted me over the summer upon recommendation from Milagro. She wanted to zoom with me to ask questions about Autism Belize and find out how she can help… or so I thought. When we ‘met’, she did want to learn about Autism Belize and she did want to see how she can get involved, but also, she had some pretty excellent ideas of how she can help children with disabilities in her community too.
Next-Level Volunteer
Since our first meeting, she has been in regular contact. She attends our parents and teachers trainings (she DID say she wanted to learn). She even made contact with a US Based nonprofit organization and arranged meetings to see how they can help us with future projects. She is obviously determined to make a difference!
Over a month ago she contacted me saying she wanted to host a Christmas Party for kiddos with disabilities. I told her it would be work. However, if she was willing to take the lead (I was already swamped with other projects), I would assist. She said absolutely she would.
She Did
She totally took the lead. Many times it seemed like I had just hung up the phone with her after giving her some suggestions and she would be calling me back telling me, “Done!”. Honestly. She had great ideas. She obviously wasn’t afraid to put in the time or do the work. Her passion shone like a bright light.
The Christmas Parties
She got over 30 volunteers to help with the event. She ensured all of them showed up for a sensitization training – that she helped me conduct. She found sponsors and got so much of the community involved – from the Hon. Elvia Vega Samos, Minister of State, Ministry of Human Development, Families, and Indigenous People’s Affairs, and her entire family, to the Police Department who stopped by to visit with the kids, and the business community too. She ran the event too.
Special Mention
We ended up hosting over 40 kiddos and teens that day (in various sessions). Some kiddos have wheelchairs, some have Cerebral Palsy, some have Down Syndrome, Autism, and/or intellectual disability, some visually or hearing impaired – ALL these amazing kids have tremendous potential. From the smiles and laughter and engagement, I know they all had fun. The young volunteers impressed me so much too. They really focused on their buddies and when they were free, they kept asking what they could do next. By the end of the day, they were exhausted, but still had smiles on their faces too. They even stayed and pitched in to clean up.
The Future
These high school and college students were exemplary and if it’s youths like these who will be leading Belize in a couple years, I’m very optimistic. No bull$h*t. They kept talking about what we can do next year for these kiddos with disabilities. They don’t want to wait until Christmas either. And as for Payal? She has already called me several times to start planning an event for the city by Easter. Pretty cool, right?
How’s that for a pretty amazing Christmas story?
Mateo and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and an AMAZING Inclusive New Year!
Thanks for sticking with us and for all your support…
