19.02.2011
Designed by popular children’s artist Romana Andelova (www.angelart.cz), the newly installed Dr. Clown floor games are already a hit with resident children in hospitals in the greater Prague area.
“Installing these colorful floor games is just another step towards having a round-the-clock presence of Dr. Clown in the hospitals our clowns visit”, comments Rafal Wojas, project manager of C4C’s wildly popular Dr. Clown program and co-founder of C4C. Rafal has been working hard on his vision to have a 24/7 hospital presence of Dr. Clown to help children alleviate the trauma (and the boredom) that inadvertently comes with prolonged hospital stays.
According to Rafal, the floor games are meant to fill the boring afternoon hours kids have to endure, with fun games, getting out of the rooms and making friends with other hospitalized children and their friends and visitors. The games can be used by anybody at anytime, they are there waiting to be used and played by all – not excluding the hospital personnel who welcomed them with enthusiasm and big smiles on their faces.
“Our regular clown team visits are of course the highlights of the Dr. Clown program and the children eagerly look forward to the arrival of the clowns”, explains Rafal, “but we’re trying our best to create a playful and fun environment for the times the clowns are not there – which is actually most of the time.” Even in a best case scenario, the clown teams visit any given hospital only a few times a week.
Being an inspirational power-house (and a father of three healthy children as well) Rafal never tires of thinking up new ways to help his “little patients” to make it through the day. His track record is quite impressive. Here’s what he dreamed up so far to make Dr. Clown an all encompassing and comprehensive effort:
– Dr. Clown Agents (recruiting nurses, seminars on how to be seriously funny…)
– COD (Clowns On Demand for emergency distraction)
– Dr. Clown corners (coloring books, balloons, even air pumps and games)
– Clown visits without preset limits (also called by our clowns “being flexible”:-)
– Dr. Clown floor games
– Dr. Clown coloring books (all 50.000 of them)
As anybody working in the so called non-profit sector knows, it can be a long way from the conception of an idea until final implementation. You guessed it – it usually has to do with money and the present scarcity of it! Watched the news lately…?
These days, to get any given project off the ground, it usually takes a few wildly willing companies to defy the gloomy financial realities of the day… So, to give credit where credit is due, here are our heroes, who through their generosity made it possible to produce the Dr. Clown floor games without busting our bank:
· HSW (www.hsw.cz) – project coordination and lots of good advice
· MACTac (www.mactac.be) – foils and lamination materials
· ATLAS (www.atlas-ag.cz) – printing, laminating and cutting
· HP (www.hp.com) – buckets of ink… 🙂
· PELEN-hry (www.pelen-hry.cz) – figurines, board dice and odds and ends…
Thanks to all of them and also to our regular Patrons and Partners (look them up on the home page and do business with them if you can!) without whom there would be no C4C… THANK YOU!
