By: Dr. Revital Schwartz-Swirsky

An original promotional project on the subject of access and acceptance of "the other" started at the beginning of the school year with a unique meeting between our volunteer in the north, Lilach Metargrem Vashli and the Headmistress of the Galil Maaravi High School at Kibbutz Kabri.

Headmistress Kalia Hilo, a captivating and charismatic personality, proposed producing a film on the subject by eighth form pupils in cinematic studies.

During the year, the project's pupils, guided by teacher Rani Ben Zeev, met many times to film at the Ilan Sports Centre in Kiriat Haim, at the centres for challenging sports "Etgarim" in the north and in private homes of volunteers who participated in the film.

The year flew by and recently the film was shown at the Galil Maaravi High School in an interesting and exciting evening.

Representatives of Access Israel in the north who were present at the screening were Giora Lev, Lilach Metargem, Naama Shelah and Rachel Shefak.

The first film shown was "The Challenged" which opened with Lilah giving a short account of her life.   It continued with a presentation of sports activities for the disabled, which included a dance class at Ilan, with participants in wheel chairs and Friday cruises of the "Etgarim" sailing association in the north.  The sports activities in the film threw a new light on people with special needs and contributed a fresh aspect on acceptance of the different.

The three students who filmed and edited the film were very excited to meet the association's visitors;  they sat with them the whole evening and were very attentive.   It could be seen that they were interested to know what the volunteers thought of their special work and the whole presentation.

Nevertheless, comments on access were important and merciless:  Giora was interviewed from the back of the hall because the elevator was not operating and as there is no handrail to the stairs so he could not go down to the stage. Giora spoke about this at length as the perfect example of accessibility problems in various locations and different areas. He pointed out that he was forced to speak to the audience from the rear of the hall due to these accessibility problems.