At the group meeting on the Saturday, we had been given options as to what we would like to do on the Sunday. The options were as follows: (a) Catholic church (b) Baptist church (c) Timis Children's home (for children with severe physical and intellectual disabilities).

I chose (c).

We left everyone else off the bus first, then about 15 of us headed to Timis. It was a big white building with the stones on the outside corners painted different florescent colours. Not what I expected appearance-wise. We weren't allowed cameras, so I left my bag on the bus, filling my pockets with chocolates and balloons. We had been told to double up, so Helen and I became partners and we started off on the second floor. In the main room there were about 20 kids watching a daffy duck movie and, as we came in, they all turned around and just looked at us. When they realised, though, that we had sweets, the helpers couldn't control them - I felt hands reaching into my pockets to get at the goodies. When we first walked into the room there had been about 3 other sets of people with us, but they all headed out, leaving Helen and myself with all the kids - at one point I couldn't see Helen, she was swallowed up by this crowd of wee children looking for sweets and balloons. Sometimes it got a bit intimidating - there were only two helpers and they appeared to have their hands full - I think they were in charge of the whole second floor. We just made balloon-dogs, and messed about with the kids.

I think the kids were all boys but it was difficult to tell as they all looked quite similar. There were a couple of kids that caught my attention in that first room -: 1: there was this tiny boy that kept climbing up me - at one point he was sitting on my head! He didn't talk, he didn't beg sweets or balloons or attention, he just liked to climb up me. 2: As we were leaving the room, we spotted a boy with his arms tied to a chair to prevent him from moving - up until that point it hadn't really hit me. The staff really couldn't cope, and the children were the ones suffering because of it. I used up almost all my sweets and chocolates in that first room.

From there, Helen and I went to a dorm of cots - there was a 10 year-old girl, who looked about 7, who had these massive eyes and a really swollen head - she was blind, but she responded to touch really well. I sang to her a bit. There was another child in the room who just lay and cried. I heard that one of the girls on the trip had gone over to her and had tried to comfort her, but had been told to leave her alone by one of the nurses. A bit of the child's blanket had drooped, and the girl from the trip had seen that, under the blanket, the wee girl's hands and legs were tied together. Shocking, yes, but saying that, one of the children had been 'untied' for a girl on the trip to play with him. He was walking and laughing with her for about 2 minutes, then he started to hit and scratch himself uncontrollably, and had to be restrained again. The hospital just doesn't have the resources to deal individually with each of these children, which is what they need.

Upstairs, on the third floor, there were a couple of kids, who just were a bit hyper, and you got the impression that each floor had a 'level' of disability. The ground floor was quite tough - the children were heavily disabled and many were strapped up to restrict movement. There was no stimulation - there were about 12 of them in a room, unable to move, with a tape player in the background. There was cot with 4 children in it. Unbelievable.

There was a beautiful wee girl in a cot and she looked about 7, but Eileen, the nurse, noted that she had all her adult teeth. We asked how old she was - it turned out that she was about 13.

Timis was an experience, and it was so hard not to feel that we were there out of pity, as opposed to being there to entertain and play with the children. I don't think that I will ever forgot that day, I'm glad that I went. It was tough, but I do believe that the children enjoyed us being there, and that, although in the long run we didn't change much, we made that one day just a little better.