Deaf Youth Stage Circus in Sihanoukville
AFSC (the American Friends Service Committe, or the Quakers) has a community-based rehabilitation program in Sihanoukville, on Cambodia's southern coast. After finding many deaf children in the area, they set up a small deaf school program. Recently the deaf students--coached by two professional buskers, John and Maggie, from the UK--put on a circus performance for the neighborhood. It was quite a show!
Maggie tapes and ties the homemade stilts to the legs of a deaf teenager. Maggie and John are professional performers from Great Britain who have volunteered their time and talents to teaching the deaf children circus skills.
Significantly taller than before, these three deaf youth prepare to walk out to the main road to drum up business for their show. They were quite confident in walking along a very rough dirt path to the street.
Several of the deaf youth were involved in juggling stunts, either alone or with one or two others. They must spend hours and hours practicing!
Many of the young people showed a great deal of skill and wizardry with these "tops" that spin on a string instead of on the ground. They could manipulate them in a hundred different ways!
There was an amazing variety of acts in this little circus and the deaf youth performed them amazingly well.
John and Maggie, the circus people from the UK, had a chance to show off some of their own skills.
John tries to recruit a "volunteer."
All the performers came on stage for the final bow.