~My Childhood Pages~

CANCER CENTER
Originally uploaded by evolver115

By Nasra Al Adawi

~My Childhood Pages ~

Its crayon that I like
Painting rainbow skies
I can swim in watercolors
Color Splash beyond my room
Blowing bubbles in shining colors
Mixed with giggles and laughter
And my trees are drawn
No only in brown and green
I'm painting a bright new world

Recently Dar Al Atta Association introduced Connecting With Colors, a calendar of art collection by children with chronic illness at Sultan Qaboos University Hospital with the support of Qalhat LNG.

What makes this collection unique is that on each page it takes you to a child's journey. A child who often has to deal with many challenges of having chronic illness from continues hospital admissions, the frequency of medication, often a child misses school and not to forget the massive medical procedures and testing. Yet, in the calendar, each child creative work had taken us into a brighter world; not only the usage of color but the subjects that had been explored by the children themselves had been nothing but a hopeful side.

Connecting With Colors had translated a simple message that art is not just a form of play, it is a medium of expression a linking point for the body and mind. One can only agree with Semir Zeki, a former professor of neurobiology at the University College, London and co-head of the Wellcome Department of Cognitive Neurology, who published an article, “Artistic Creativity and the Brain,” in Science Magazine, in July 2001 where he stated that artistic expression is the key to comprehending ourselves. Now hearing words like Art Therapy makes so much sense, if you take time to view the creativity of the children at SQU Hospital you will find no difference between their art and any ordinary child. Art is a medium of therapy that helps to eliminate a frightening experience into fun and creative atmosphere.

Here is an immense applaud for those behind such creative difference, hope all our pediatric wards and waiting rooms be filled with colors and paper to encourage children's art especially for children who faces social and emotional difficulties related to illness or disability.

Connecting With Colors Calendar can be bought at Dar Al Atta Association in Madinat Sultan Qaboos Tel: 24692996 for benefit to encourage children's art in Sultan Qaboos University Hospital.

Photo is taken on TUESDAY JANUARY 31 2006 -- Jackson Fontenot, 3, of Mascoutah, Il., paints a picture frame at the St. John's Mercy Hospital, David C. Pratt Cancer Center while waiting for Gail Dietl, the local organizing committee member for the U.S. figure skating championships held in St. Louis this month. Dietl donated about 150 stuffed animals to the children at the St. John's Mercy Hospital, David C. Pratt Cancer Center. Jackson was at the cancer center with his older brother Brandon Fontenot, 6, who is afflicted with aplastic anemia, a condition in which the bone marrow is unable to produce blood cells. It has been in remission since August of 2005.
PHOTO BY JASON E. TAYLOR / ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH