Chances Day

Saturday 7th of may, the city of Kaposvar organized an event dedicated to the disable people with the aim of sensibilize the citizens to the problems related to the disabilities. The mayor Szita Karoly has taken an active part to the event to invite the politic to do more together with Lajos Hegedus the president of the Handicapped association. 

• “Disabilities is an umbrella term, covering impairments, activity limitations, and participation restrictions. An impairment is a problem in body function or structure; an activity limitation is a difficulty encountered by an individual in executing a task or action; while a participation restriction is a problem experienced by an individual in involvement in life situations. Thus disability is a complex phenomenon, reflecting an interaction between features of a person’s body and features of the society in which he or she lives.”

• Reading this description, it appears clear to most of the people and everybody may agree with it; but not everybody has experienced it in first person so to have a complete picture of the situation and the problems related to it.

• The pivot of the event was the stage in Kossuth square, where were held performances by both disabled people and not. Form there started two rows of gazebo in Fő utca set by several kind of voluntary associations where it was possible to learn more about them and how the volunteers can make the difference in helping disabled people. But it was also possible to see what disabled people can do for example in hand-making objects that than can be sold to support the association.

• As Compass association we had our own gazebo with our proposals and chances of voluntarism. Beside that the event has been very important from a human point of view for the volunteers, especially for those who never had any experience with disabled people before. “I haven't took part on this kind of events before, because I feel to sorry for disabled people” said Robert, from Romania “but seeing all the people how glad they were, that others made this event just for them. I started to open up, and I felt more loose around those men, women, children. I even meet a 10 year old boy, whose name is Istvan, who was very nice. We played football, he was asking all different kind of question, and was very interested in everything. And I'm pretty sure, that for the next time I will be even more comfortable”. While Ali from Turkey said“This showed that disabled people can sing and dance like other people. Luckily, the people is really altruistic in Kaposvár for disabled people”.

• “I really enjoyed this day, the weather and the location were just perfect. I think this event was an excellent opportunity to show how disabled people may successfully get over the daily difficulties they meet and be a fully integrated, active and auto-sufficient part of a society. It’s on these occasions that we better understand how lucky we are and, with our presence, we wanted to give a message of friendliness and collaboration to people with any kind of disadvantages” said Luca from Italy; it was also an occasion to see how the problem is faced in other countries “In Italy,” continued Luca “voluntary associations play a very important role in the field of disability and many people dedicate their free time within non-profit organisations supporting this cause. Our ‘being there’ last Saturday was also to promote the importance of volunteering in modern society”. Ani from Armenia, “This day was very important not only for the disabled people but for us and for the citizens of Kaposvár because this was the way to show that though they have some health problem but they still can be useful, they can work they can create they can sing they can dance in short they can be active part of society. From our side we should create special conditions for them, they should feel our attention and support all the time not just in such a special days. I was a member of one charity organisations which was supporting disability people and trying to help them as much as possible and from my own experience I can tell that the only thing they need it attention.”

• While Sevgi from Turkey said that “joining the Disability Day was a very good and different experience for me. Because, in my country i haven’t been joined an event like this. I think these organisations are necessary to see how they feel in their daily life. And also, they can see that we aware of them and doing something. But of course, we should do more. In Turkey, local government and non-governmental organisations are carrying out some studies. But in some countries unfortunately somewhere is not suitable for disabled person. Government has a quota application at the recruitment phase for disabled people. But it is not enough yet. On third of December, World Disability Day, events are arranging all of the Turkey like here.” Ottavio from Italy talking about his experience said “I've never took part to a Disability Day like this, it was a nice day and a good experience. Even if sometime I felt sad seeing all the disabled people, but I think that this kind of event are important to sensibilize the people in matter of disabled people and their problems.”