THANDI XABA
A smile is the ticket that warms the heart of others. It embeds inner happiness and hardly regarded a luxury. But for 27 toddlers who were born with various facial deformities, smiling triggered public humiliation and merciless snares from their peers.
Fortunately, that will soon end as these children will be under-going life changing facial reconstruction surgery at the Universitas Academic Hospital.
In celebration of Vodacom Smile Week, which is throughout the entire first week of September, Smile Foundation partnered with Vodacom and Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery to perform surgeries that assist underprivileged children with facial conditions, further alleviating backlogs in the hospitals and encouraging skills transfer. The foundation also offers psychological help before, during and after surgery to the parents of the children.
Operations Executive Director of Smile Foundation, Moria Gerszt says “Smile Foundation is a registered NGO and we support the Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery with their needs. We help with extra equipment that maybe the hospital’s budget does not allow, a scalpel that a surgeon uses on my skin and your skin is not the same kind that they use on a baby.”
The fifteen year old organisation has managed to change the lives of over 1500 children nationwide. Tshepo Ramodibe from Vodacom Group Corporate Affairs and Operation sheds light that being part of such a heartfelt initiative for Vodacom is humbling.
“To be able to partner in a project where literally day one and two are chalk and cheese means a lot to Vodacom, because it changes the lives of the affected children for their rest of their lives.”
One such young life that will be remarkably changed forever is that of 11 year old Bauné Ernest who was born with a deformed nose. “She started undergoing these operations when she was ten months and this week will be her third follow up operation.
It’s through Smile Foundation that my child can be seen as a normal child, she is brave and afraid but knows all of this is for her future,” says Brenda Ernest, mother to the chirpy Tjokkies learner.
The brave Grade 5 scholar still needs two more operations done on her nose. With an infectious bright smile, young Bauné shares she wants to be dance teacher when she grows up.
Gerszt echoes that Smile Week embodies an aura of closeness, togetherness and caring for each other, which is what it’s all about.
