MOVIE SESSION
We truly believe that Disney movies has an extraordinary impact on children`s development. Movies challenges the imagination, it is a break from reality, a gateway for a parallel world where everything is possible. Movies show children the importance of being yourself, knowing that people will like you for who you are, not for who you pretend to be. Movies encourage children to believe and hope in happy endings. Movies enhance relationships and how is important to preserve bounds with friends. Movies teach us to never give up to follow our dreams.
In order to make the movie sessions possible, we needed to have a source of energy, just in that way we could project the movies since that the 12 communities with who we work don’t have electricity at all. So we decided to invest in 4 devices:
a solar panel to harvest energy from the Sun;
a solar battery to store the energy;
a solar charge controller to control the flux of energy;
an energy inverter to transform direct current (DC) electricity into alternating current (AC) electricity.
The next step it was to carry some of these items to the primary schools. In fact, it’s a very tough task. We live in a mountain region where the accesses to the communities, also in mountains, are destroyed by heavy rains. The tracks are often muddy and rivers became full. Besides this, the battery has more than 30kg and together with projector, computer, solar inverter it overpass 40 kg. Carrying these by bicycle, our mean of transport, is the only way to arrive to the majority of the communities because they are isolated and inaccessible by car. Just few exceptions had already seen a movie. For the rest of the students was the first time and we were so sincerely grateful to see such a joy.
Besides this, children at every age can learn different words, objects and their meanings. They can also be involved into new languages, new expressions mimicking their favorite characters.
Each movie has their own expressions that remains in children’s memory for years. Our first choice for the first movie was The Lion King. This movie takes place in Africa and actually, some of the most remind expressions from this movie are in Swahili, an African language. Some of these expressions are the famous Timon and Pumba’s Hakuna Matata that means no worries (for the rest of your days) and Asante Sana that means thank you, Rafiki is always singing “Asante Sana, squash banana, we we nugu, imi mi apana”, among other expressions.
The Lion King also teach us some lessons in the course of the movie, for instance a conversation between Mufasa and Simba: “- Everything you see exists together in a delicate balance. As king, you need to understand that balance and respect all the creatures, from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope. – But, Dad, don’t we eat the antelope? – Yes, Simba, but let me explain. When we die, our bodies become the grass, and the antelope eat the grass. And so we are all connected in the great circle of life.”