At the height of my craving for challenge I was presented with the opportunity to visit the local orphanage everyday to work with a little boy name Xiun Nang. I didn't know anything about him but becasue my eyes has begun darting back and forth and my sensors were on high alert for "something more" I accepted the offer. Xiun Nang is a beautiful little 6 or 7 year old Chinese boy with cerebral palsy. He used to live in one of the Eagle's Wings home that I was working in but he got very sick and had to be hospitalized. His CP makes it very difficult for him to swallow so he doesn't get enough food and water on a daily basis which inevitably leads to dehydration and malnourisment. When I met Xiun Nang his 6 year old body looked to be about 4 with the strength of a rag doll. Because of this he will need to remain in the orphanage rather than go back to the Eagle's Wings home.
I remember walking into the orphanage and getting this very somber feeling. The halls were cold, the rooms were lit with a grayish yellow glow, and it was quiet. Eerily quiet. We, my teammate Dusty, and I walked into one of the nurseries filled with abandoned babies and quickly found Xiun Nang. He was easy to spot. He was the only 6 year old in a crib.
We took him across the hall to another dimly room where we laid him on the floor and wondered what to do with him. We felt sort of lost – 1. He doesn't know English so he can't understand us. 2. He doesn't speak so he can't tell us what he wants to do. 3. He can't move to play. 4. We don't know what kind of physical excercises he needs . . . and as Dusty and I discussed our options I saw Xiun Nang follow our words with his eyes. Then, as we bated the words of our discussion with a motheresque tone his face began to fill with delight. That's when it clicked. I don't need a B.S, a Master's, or a Phd to know what this child needs from me. So I took a rubber ball and tapped it on the tip of his nose and he responded by creating my favorite sound in the entire world – the pure, delighted, giggle of a child. From then on Dusty and I stopped treating him as a child with a disability and started treating him like a child.
Xiun Nang lives a very lonely, quiet life, but for at least one hour a day he had something to look forward to. He had a family. He had Dusty and I to pick him up, hug him, touch him, talk to him, laugh with him, sing to him, play with him. And even though he could never talk to us, his actions spoke loud and clear. Everyday when we walked into the nursery the biggest, most beautiful, most adoring smile spread across his face and he raised his right arm up out of the crib toward us as a plea to be picked up. He knows us. He waited for us. He longed for us. Xiun Nang loved us and we loved him.
He taught me that it really isn't about how much you know or how talented you are. It's about being willing to love, to wrap your 2 good arms around a child and squeeze.
