Blog 67. Adangabey Royal Academy visits Lumen Mundi Foundation

Yaw Adangabey is a man that I know already since he was a little boy, living in Horizons Children Centre. He sits in a wheelchair and has spasms. He is normally intelligent, but because he was not able to enter a school, he didn’t attend school at all.

There were always children in the centre willing to bring him his food, bath him, wash for him and push his wheelchair to town and back. i was not happy with that, so I spoke to Joe, the manager ofthe Children Centre. Don’t give hime food, unless he picks it himself from the kitchen. Give himwater to bath, but don’t bath him. Everything Yaw can do himself, he should do himself!

At that time Yaw was not happy with my interference, but now he is. He even came and told the children in the Lumen Mundi School about what happened!

First Yaw came alone to speak to our children: he told them how I forced him to get his food himself, to do the laundry himself and bath himself.

Look at him now: he opened a private school in Gbedema and he has 8 people working for him. He is the director of Adangabey Royal Academy! He told our children that they should learn as much as possible, so they can look after themselves as much as possible. He said: Imagine you are as old as me, and you need somebody to bath you. He also said: ‘What abled people can do; we can do better!’

A week later, November 28th 2023 he took some children from his school to visit us. It was a great visit, as well for their children as for ours! The children saw all three groups, beginning with the children who are able to move to a regular school. They didn’t see that much difference with their school. The second group was a bit more different. And the last group, with the children that cannot walk or talk, was a bit of a shock. In the end they all played together. You could see the way the children were interacting with each other.

We, the adults should learn from these children. No assumptions made, no judgements: just playing along!