AAT needs to be done more often

HAPPY

DEEPAVALI FROM PETPOSITIVE!

PETPOSITIVE DEEPAVALI PARTY UPDATE: We are pleased to announced that a multi-religious group of 13 blind and 10 physically disabled persons have been registered to attend our Festival of Lights gathering on Sunday Dec 2 at 3pm at the Hanuman Temple in Brickfields in Kuala Lumpur.

We would like to thank the Malaysian Association of the Blind in KL and the Independent Living and Training Centre for assisting us in inviting these groups.

There is still more room for disabled persons to participate as well as volunteers for the event - especially those who can offer transport for the handicapped to the event and back on that day.

To get invited, please send an email to petpositive@yahoo.com with all your particulars and we'll get back to you to confirm your attendance. Please hurry as our invitations to our special event will be closing soon.

For further info, visit here.

On the eve of our Valentina Project in the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia (FRIM), I received a call from Ruwaidy Mat Rasul requesting to attend our event. He had read my article about the event in Wheel Power in The Star and was interested to join us for his current research on disabled people and their mobility needs.

Waidy who intends to come up with better and more affordable wheelchair-designs in future, wrote me to share his experience of the magic that happened that day on Tuesday, October 30, from 9am to 1pm at the Kepong Botanical Gardens in FRIM.

Enjoy! aNt :)

Animal + Nature = Therapy
Story and pictures by Ruwaidy Mat Rasul

Nature, in the broadest sense, is equivalent to the natural world which is untouched by human activities. The word "nature" is derived from the Latin word natura, or "the course of things, natural character."1.

The Valentina Project was a pioneer project to give a chance for people with disabilities assisted by their pets and able-bodied volunteers to go on a nature walk. It was a successful project handled by Petpositive. The event was financially sponsored by the Association of British Women of Malaysia (ABWM) at the Kepong Botanical Garden on 30th October last month.

The session was opened by Suhakam Commissioner, Dato' Siva Subramaniam followed by a very enthusiastic and encouraging speech from the President of Petpositive, Mr Anthony Thanasayan.

The Valentina Project comprised an animal assisted therapy session and a walk through the jungle guided by Mr. Elango Valautham who is a research officer from FRIM.

Walking through nature stimulated our minds and made us more relaxed. This is a good treatment to relieve a stress.

Miss Norsham Yaakob from FRIM presented everyone with a good explanation about some of the frogs that live wild in the jungle.

The need for conservation of our nature is a must to balance our diversity in the food chain system.

"The importance of preserving each type of frogs is crucial because it will preserve the food chain system in the jungle. Without it, the food chain will become unbalanced and affect the human lives as well." said Miss Norsham.

The Razak Trail is specially made to meet the requirements of people with disabilities such as those using a wheelchair or walking aids. This is a very good example for the community because it gives a chance for disabled people to build up their self-esteem.

The main point of the trail I thought is to show to able-bodied persons that wheelchairs and walking aids are not an obstacle to move freely. Thus, the experience was good mentally as well as physically.

Animal-assisted therapy (AAT) is a type of therapy that involves an animal with specific characteristics becoming a fundamental part of a person's treatment. Animal-assisted therapy is designed to improve the physical, social, emotional, and/or cognitive functioning of the patient, as well as provide educational and motivational effectiveness for participants.2

Apart from that, a trained animal such as dogs, cats and rabbits are therapy animals.
Dogs are man's best friend. This was proved by Mr. Anthony's pet companion, Soo, a very obedient pal, as well as a cute dog.

"He will do whatever I ask him to do. Collect a newspaper, holding a bag and the most important, he looks after me."

Even though the Razak Trail is made for disabled people, it still needs improvements in order to build confidence for disabled people to use it. A few things that still need attention at Razak Trail are:

1) The pathways are still slippery for people who use wheelchairs.

2) Assistants are required each time handicapped people want to get through the trail

3) A steep trail is not suitable for people with walking aids

The outing was a very good move taken by Petpositive for disabled people who use animal/pets for their daily activities as assistants or companions. They provide very good therapy both mentally and physically.

Therefore, this kind of activities must be held often and apart from that, everybody is encouraged to take part in it.

(The writer is a PhD Student, UiTM Shah Alam, Faculty of Art and Design.)

"Nature." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 27 Oct 2007, 22:49 UTC. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 1 Nov 2007 .
Animal-assisted Therapy. (2007, October 30). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14:24, November 1, 2007, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php

COMING SOON IN PET+BLOG:

1. Petpositive's own account in glorious pictures and words on all that transpired at our first animal-assisted therapy session.



2. Details of how you can tune in to TraxxFM's live interview show with Petpositive guests on how the Valentina Project went.



3. Page 2 of our Positive Lives! Newsletter and what the disabled at our Charity Dinner last July thought about Dance Doyen Ramli Ibrahim's sensational performance with his Sutra Dance Theatre troupe.

SO STAY CONNECTED!

The End