This documentary left me very sad, and not because I feel this is a special case.

It made me feel that I really wanted to do something practical to help these kids. I have been contacting organisations including TBACT (the Bulgaria’s abandoned children), Unicef, the Bulgarian consulate in Australia and can confirm that Mogilino Orphanage has not been closed and many of the children are still there. The reasons are simple, they are trying to find alternative accommodation for children, but not all of them will be adopted and new homes have not yet been built. Siobhain from TBACT told me that they will fight for these children and will not allow them to be sent to another place until they are satisfied that the new place is better than Mogilino. Vasky – I was highly touched by a girl who I thought was eight or nine and she turned out to be 18! Yes, it is Vasky. She was born blind but with no other medical condition and entered Mogilino as a baby. After 18 years of unimaginable neglect and loneliness, she now is bedridden and has osteoporosis (the bones of a 60-year-old woman).

My first concern was that due to her condition: blind, bedridden, osteoporosis, malnutrition and most likely other medical conditions, she has very little chance of being adopted or will be able to lead an independent life. The place she is highly likely to end up in an adult institution, which are even worse than childrens’ institutions, from what I have been told. I therefore began my investigations regarding how to help Vasky. After nearly three weeks of daily emails and phone calls, I now know that some of her medical needs are already being looked after. However, apart from her physical condition, I feel that her psychological wellbeing is paramount. Just think, she never had anybody in the world that truly cared for her or loved her as a child. I wanted to be able to keep contact with her in a form of letters etc but this is not so easy for numerous reasons. However, Siobhain from TBACT advised me that they are looking into Baba services which allocate people (locals, usually retired seniors) which have continuous contact and visits, one child on a regular basis to provide a stable companionship/friendship for that child. I thought this would be one of the best things that Vasky could ever have. Let’s get together: I think that there are likeminded people who are interested in helping these kids. I want to get a group of people who are interested in providing help, even if very small, for instance get together to pay for at least one Baba (grandmother). A Baba for a child costs about 100 euro a month, and Siobhain from TBACT (www.tbact.org) suggested that she can make our donations go directly to sponsor a Baba for a child or children. If anyone is interested, please e-mail me at Gabriele.Hermansson@hotmail.com for more information. Thank you!

Gabriele Hermannson
Australia

I urge everyone who has seen this doco to look at the following website: www.tbact.org and offer whatever support they can as I am sure this is not the only social care home in Bulgaria with the same sorts of horror stories. I thought I might have mistakenly been watching a doco from the concentration camps of World War 2.

Steve Maron