Sunday was on of those travel days. My flight to Miami and then Bogota was scheduled to leave at 6:00 A.M.so we stayed in a hotel at the Philadelphia Airport, literally attached to the airport and ventured to Philadelphia for dinner. So far so good. Lots of calls from American Airlines during the night and the 6 AM flight was finally moved to 9:30. Being awake, went to the terminal to check my bag at 4:30 AM and, after a wait of over an hour, got a seat to Miami and was re-booked on a much later flight to Bogota. After breakfast went through security and waited. And waited. 9:30 became 11:45 and we finally took off for Miami. American Airlines graciously gave those of us in steerage a granola bar for free. Oh joy. So, instead of getting into Bogota in the early afternoon and touring a bit got to the hotel at 9 PM and unpacked and tried to sleep. Not much luck there.
In the morning on Monday went with Ines Escallon from Inclusion International to visit Fundacion Fe (www.fundacionfe.org). Ines grew up in Columbia, in Bogota actually, and living in Toronto has not hampered her fluency in Spanish or knowledge of the city. Foundacion Fe was started by a mom, of course, and she is still involved and on the board 4 decades later. Programs there range from early intervention to programs for school age children. The staff all wear white coats, in part because the history and funding tie back into the health agency for funding. The challenge here is that for adults, there are essentially no services unless the family gives up custody and the person is supported in an institution by the Ministry of Protection. Nothing except a small pilot for supporting families or for supporting people to live in the community. The school age programs include a lot of therapy services, as does early intervention which is a clinical model of services. Parents, mostly mothers, bring their children daily for two hours of therapy and other services. Pretty much a huge time investment without consideration of the family's needs or other ways of providing early intervention benefits to families. An official from the government agency ICBF was present and she seemed to understand the need for changes to the system.
After a lunch which was delicious and surely consumed an entire cow, we met with staff working on inclusion from the District Secretariat of Social Inclusion for Bogota. The city, with 8 million people, is divided into 20 districts. The staff, including one senior official, were primarily young and, after my presentation about CRPD, asked questions for 45 minutes. They have developed programs to include over 3,000 children in early childhood programs and are working their was into the primary grades. What a wonderful experience. We talked about the challenges in closing institutions and developing alternatives, and in how to change the culture which is not supportive of poor and struggling families.
Dinner was with Diane Richler and Gordon Porter from Inclusion International, along with other guests, including Ines, her sister, the Director of the Inclusion International chapter in Colombia, essentially a Down Syndrome parents group, held at the home of Ines' mother-in-law who, at 85 is going strong with some full time support. I have been in many beautiful houses over the years but this one was magnificent by any standard, and she has lived there for 46 years and is quite the gardener. Beautiful flowers, lively discussion and a wonderful meal.
That's it for Monday. Off to visit more programs on Tuesday and an unexpected free day on Wednesday due to a meeting cancellation. An enormous amount of work to be done here. Interesting that the government signed and ratified the CRPD yet there is no plan as to its implementation.
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