Love Comes in Styles and Moods: Ayadina Changes People's Lives

Right: Maya Najjar speaks on "Ayadina"

The marginalization and depression of Lebanon's two "critical" groups, children (of age three onwards) and the elderly (65 and above) are the main concern of the Lebanese NGO Ayadina. For the past ten years, the association has been taking under its wings about 125 children and 120 senior citizens.

"Love comes in different styles and moods," said founding president Maya Najjar, in introducing Ayadina's mantra to members of the Women's League in West Hall on February 4. The same goes for misery and poverty, adds Najjar. The children and the elderly who flood the Ayadina center situated in Sin El Fil are not disabled, retarded, or sick; they are only poor. The center focuses on entertaining and on giving a taste of art to those who are unable to attain it on their own.

Before receiving legal government status, Ayadina was no more than a mere group of women fund-raising and looking to get bigger. Now, the women are giving those overpowered by poverty and misery the chance to enjoy their lives in a better way instead of along the cold corners of their lonely one-room homes.

Ayadina has been offering the women four programs of activity to ease the dreary pace of their daily existence: music (choir), modern dance, classic dancing, and painting. There are professionals as well as volunteers to help in giving these hopeless a chance to realize some of their dreams. The children dance, paint, and play, while the elderly chat, sing, and dance.

Ayadina never gives up on the elderly, says Najjar, but strives to provide both the old and the young to find another home away from home. "I consider it a human exchange that saves many from the delinquencies of the streets," she declares.