Last Tuesday I had the pleasure to be invited to a Sohour and live show of famous Iraqi Singer Ilham Al Madfai by the Autism Mena Foundation. The event took place in the King Hussein Club, near 1st circle and was a fundraiser to support Children with Autism and their parents.
Several mothers of children with Autism were highlighting the need for education, awareness, and support for these kids and their parents. Unfortunately, it also needs a lot of money besides the time, to give the children the special attention they need, to train parents and teachers how to interact with children who have Autism, and to raise awareness about the illness and that you can actually improve the life of the children and their parents, if known how. The Amena foundation, therefore, aims to collect money in order to implement the following programs:
- Internship program for students of Special Education, where we train and create jobs.
- Parents training and workshops on behavioral methods that can help them improve their children’s skills.
- Parents support groups community workshops.
- Community awareness and advocacy workshops.
- And most important our early childhood training program for children with autism.
Beside the nice dinner, there were several mothers who took the opportunity to sell homemade goods and foods. These included soap, cheese, filled dates, and others. We took home some filled dates and ordered some cheese to support these mothers. It didn’t take long until most of the items were gone. It is good to see that people are willing to help the ones in need. It also was great to see that in general the parents don’t give up but they engage themselves to improve the lives of their families.
Later that night, Ilham Al Madfai and his band entered the stage. He is – to be honest – one of the few Arabic musicians I really like and I was so glad to have the chance once again to see him live after I had to cancel it a few times due to our kids. Of course, he played his well-known hits such as “The Pomegranate Tree” or “Khuttar”
For more information on the Autism, Mena Foundation see below
For more on Ilham Al Madfai see below:
This waas lovely to read