Dima from the 3rd form was a journalist. He was interviewing the models Julia and Tanya.
The sunshine of children’s smiles shone last Saturday in the orphanage #3 of Zaporozhye. The kids gathered together to get acquainted with the interesting guests that came to tell the kids about themselves. “In the Circle of Friends” – that is how these meetings are called. We decided to organize them every weekend for the children if the 3rd orphanage. At the first meeting our guests were the TV host of the program for youth “Lestnitsa” (interpreter: the name of the program is translated as “Stairway”) Yuri Volkov; and the guest from the USA Patrick Anderson.
Both the guests told the kids about the secrets of their jobs. Yuri explained the way the cam works and what the teletext is; and Patrick Anderson informed the kids about his military everyday life and his military service in Iraq and the Afghanistan. The children joined the discussion and were telling about their dreams.
Yura`s performance was very emotive and informative. It turned out that in order to achieve something in your life; you need to be able to dream and to conquer your aim, no matter what the possible misfortunes and the other people’s mockery might be. The children learnt about the way the TV programs are created and how the speakers manage not to forget the text, as well as how to ask the interesting questions during the interview.
Dima, the pupil of the third form, showed the greatest interest to TV journalism and also had a possibility to receive the first experience. The boy interviewed the “models”. Unlike the journalist Dima, the girls turned out to be not very talkative, and Dima had to demonstrate all his imagination to get the answers to his questions. But gradually the kids relaxed and began to ask Yuri about everything in the world. Especially outstanding was Dasha Romanchenko`s question: “Do the journalists always tell the truth?” And Yura honestly answered: “No, actually not always.”
Then Patrick Anderson form Oklahoma, the USA, told about his activity. He is a military constructing engineer, he served in Iraq for 2 years and this year he serves in Afghanistan, in the city of Kandahar. His sub-unit is involved in building the military as well as the civilian objects, such as the schools, hospitals and roads. He knew about Zaporozhye and the orphan children by chance, when in summer of 2005 he read the information at the site deti.zp.ua. Now he is helping to the orphans and the unhealthy kids. Also he visits his friends and has some rest. In a few days he will return to serve in Afghanistan.
After the meeting we arranged the survey, with the help of which we tried to find out what the kids dream about and how they imagine their future. Among the main questions there can be named the following: “What profession would you like to have?” and “How much are you going to be earning?” The spelling and the punctuation in the original version is left without any changes.
At the first meeting “In the Circle of Friends” there were 28 children from the 3rd-8th forms.
The most extraordinary and surprising jobs that were named at the meeting were the traveler and the racer. Maslov Dima 10 y.o. wants to study at a “travellering school” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake) and wants to earn 1,500 hrn a month. And Matvienko Anton 10 y.o. wants to earn 100,000 hrn and to study at the driving school.
Among the children also there are the admirers of creative jobs. Tolik, 11 y.o. dreams of becoming an artist. He is planning to enter the college and earn 5,000 hrn a month. Tolik is confident about the achievement of his aim and tries not to miss the classes of drawing. Edik, the 3-form pupil, also wants to create new images, but not with the help of a paintbrush, but with the help of a camera. He supposes, that this profession is taught at a university and that his income would be $1,000. One of the kids that somehow didn`t sign his paper wants to be involved in the sphere that deals with music. This kid wants to become a sound producer and to “record people” and their music and supposes that in order to master the profession, the good knowledge in physics is essential.
Two of the boys informed us that they want to be the pilots. One of them plans to earn 1,600 hrn but has no idea of where this profession is taught, and what school subjects are essential for the profession. The second one, Serinov Maxim, wants to become not only a pilot, but also a football player and a kickboxer, and he supposes that one of the most important subjects from his point of view is physical training.
In one crew with the two pilots there also will be the stewardess Dasha from the 6th form. The girl wrote that she`ll be explaining the safety principles to the passengers. She chose this profession because she “like communicate with people and get to know them better” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake). Dasha supposes that one of the most important school subjects is language studying. Unfortunately, we could not answer to the girl immediately to her question concerning where the stewardesses are educated, but the next time we will surely tell her about it.
The other girls chose the female professions: a teacher, a barber, a doctor, a nurse. Litvinenko Julia wants to “explain maths to children and they learn” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake). And she supposes to be earning “about 10,000 thousands a yer” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake). Teaching people, but this time not Maths but computer science is the dream of Bondarenko Ruslan. He is planning to earn 2,000 euro for it. He supposes that in order to be good at this subject, he needs to be learning at the lyceum.
“Curing the kids and the older” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake) is the intention of Julia 3rd form, that wrote in her paper “wish everythinbegood” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake). Khokhlova Tanya from the 6th form group 3 is planning to have a profession of a “spich therupist” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake). And by some reason the girl thinks that physical training is essential for it. She supposes that a speech therapist should earn 3,000 hrn. And a real nurse – Sveta from 3rd form group 1 will be helping to our doctors. She is planning to graduate from the university and achieve the income level of $1,000.
Two girls – Nastya and Tanya – showed the wish to become the barbers. Both of the girls like to set hair. Tanya supposes, that she would be paid 300 and Nastya – 1,000. Tanya already knows that the barbers are educated at special courses and in the Kiev University, and Nastya doesn`t know yet where she will be studying.
A notary, a policeman, a sniper – it is now clear that the 3rd orphanage is under the patronage of the juridicial branch. 9 year old Ilyusha is planning to become a policeman and to catch the bad guys. He is evaluating his work in 20,000. According to the price, Ilyusha is going to be not less then the Secretary of the Interior. Boyko Vladik is going to earn 8,000 working as a notary. But the leader in the income level demands for the moment is Kostya, 12 y.o. who wants to receive 80,000,000. He supposes that snipers can receive that much money. Frankly, such choice surprised me and even frightened a little, but Kostya wrote below that he would be shooting only the bad guys. All the three guys – a sniper, a policeman and a notary are planning to graduate from the Law University. One of the eldest guys that was present at the meeting was 15-year old Sasha who chose the occupation of an electrical welder. He even knows that such profession is taught at the college at Shevchenko, 2. He considers maths and geometry one of the most important subjects.
Anton who is 11 y.o. wrote “don’t knou” (interpreter: originally written with a mistake) to all of the questions of the survey. He might be shy or perhaps he doesn`t dream of any occupation at all. But we hope to improve the situation.
“I fashion. Will be walking the catwalk.” It turned out that this questionnaire was filled in by a boy – Litinenko Ilya. Perhaps Ilya decided to joke or he might indeed be dreaming of becoming a model – it`s yet unclear, but next time we will definitely ask him about it. The results of the questionnaire turned out to be even better than expected. First of all, the children can dream. Secondly, they still have the hope to be have those professions that are usually unavailable to the orphan children – a racer, a teacher, a doctor, a traveler. In our country the orphan children can only have the blue-collar occupations, but the professions that require the creativity are unavailable for the children that have no parents. But at our meetings we are going to try to help the children not to lose the youth dreams and to achieve their aims in life.
Well, perhaps in 5-10 years you will turn the TV on and see the faces of the graduates of the 3rd orphanage. The people, that have become the famous artists, TV hosts and hostesses, barbers, teachers, stewardesses, doctors and policemen.
Translated from Russian by Natasha Guzenko
