THE ROAD TO BEST INTENTIONS IS OFTEN PAVED LIKE HELL
I’m on to Plan “B” here, but it’s a good one.
In the first week of October I will be flying to Beirut in order to take Me and My Mirror on another road-trip.
I will be working, at first, under the aegis and with the invaluable assistance of the International Committee of The Red Cross. They have invited me to present mirror therapy methodology workshops to a congress of their physical rehab therapists and surgeons from all over the world. It’s a massive chance for massive outreach and a big spike in credibility, visibility and, I hope, sustainability – there’s that magic word.
My next task there is equally exciting. The Red Cross has offered me access and support to ride my mirrors into the enormous and swarming Syrian refugee camps along the famous Bekaa Valley.
Every fourth person in Lebanon now is a Syrian refugee. They pour in daily along the 360 kilometer-long border and pour is too from the street-fighting in Tripoli and other regional conflicts. And plenty of them are wounded and plenty of those are new arrivals to the world of amputee-ism.
Syria is the biggest humanitarian crisis in the world today – and is so by a Middle Eastern Mile. There are over 9 million Syrians in need of both aid and protection. I’m stoked to do my tiny bit.
There are plenty of hospitals and clinics in Lebanon where I will have access and a chance to lay down some mirror therapy and a big whack of goodwill. In addition to all this largesse, the ICRC has also given me the opportunity to present at their ‘Weapons and Traumatology Course’ in Tripoli and to take the treatment to the city’s hospitals. Major.
From there I hope to push Me and My Mirror along the road to Gaza City in Palestine and continue work with both the ICRC and Medicins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders). And if funds hold out I don’t know why I wouldn’t push on into the ‘Horn of Africa’ and try my luck with Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia and the Sudans. At least those are my intentions, hell.
