My Own Two Hands: Clear Path Volunteer Writes from the Mae Sot Refugee Clinic on Thailand - Myanmar Border

Do you know that feeling when a plan works out? When your efforts seem to result in truly making a difference? When some crisscrossed points turn out to show just the perfect picture when you draw a line, connecting the dots? When your goal comes clearly into sight after broadly checking out the environment, not exactly knowing what you were looking for at first? Well, that's the kind of feeling I had when I met Imbert, Wolfgang, Lori and James last weekend. They were on the last leg of a three-week trip to see all of Clear Path's projects in Southeast Asia. I had just started volunteering in the Mae Tao clinic in Mae Sot. The perfect time to pass on the baton!

It was earlier this year when I first learned about Clear Path International. I returned home after tavelling through Southeast Asia and decided that it was time to stop dreaming. �If you really want to work with landmine victims, you'll have to switch into action-mode. Just go and do it,� I told myself. And so I did. It took another few months, a detour through different coutries and several emails back and forth to Imbert, before I finally met them.
And there I was, among this small group of special people, everyone in their own way dedicated to the work of CPI, sitting in the Care Villa at the Mae La refugee camp on a Saturday afternoon in August.

Imagine that you lose both your sight and your hands in a landmine accident. Besides the extreme difficulty in staying �in touch� with the world, what would you be able to do, practically speaking? How would you feed yourself, wash yourself, find the toilet before it's too late? I never realised that this might be the most limiting combination of physical disabilities one might get. Many of the landmine survivors who stay at the Care Villa have to face this fact. These severely damaged, still beautiful people found a way to spend their time, to challenge and express themselves by making music and singing their own, personal songs. That Saturday we were there to record their voices, their stories, their lives. It is hard to catch this amazing experience in words or in pictures. An experience that will stay in my mind for a long time.



One song in particular hit me and, to use Imberts word's, �Went straight to my heart�. Freely translated, it goes something like this:

�I lost my eyes, so I can't look at you.

I lost my arms, so I can't hold you.

I lost my legs, so I can't come with you.

My heart is broken, but I've still got my voice.

So I'll sing.�

It reminds me of a song from Jack Johnson and Ben Harper, who are fortunate enough to live in a country without the ongoing threat of landmines and unexploded ordnance. Their song contrasts with the one of our friends at the Care Villa, but brings it together at the same time.

�I can change the world, with my own two hands.

I can clean up the earth, with my own two hands.

I'm gonna make it a safer place, with my own two hands.

I can reach out to you, with my own two hands.

But you've got to use your own two hands.

Use your own two hands.�

It reflects my idea about the work of CPI. People who know that the world can only be improved by using your own two hands. I see, with my own eyes, that we can make a difference. That I can make a difference. By using my own two hands.

Lobke Dijkstra, physical therapist & Clear Path volunteer