From swim schools to eye clinics: how families of 7/7 victims used heartbreak to help others | 7 July London attacks

In the city of Bubanswar, the capital of the state of Odisha in the northeast of Odisha, there is an eye clinic that turned the lives of thousands of children.

Before the establishment of the unit in 2008, according to its president, there was no dedicated eye care center for children in the entire eastern part of India, which is a country house 20 % of the blind children in the world. The clinic now sees about 3000 children per month and performs 350 eye surgeries – a large percentage of them without any cost of poor families that you often need.

This is one of the legacy Myriam HeymanA 31 -year -old photo researcher, amateur artist and ancient dancer who was killed in the London bombings on July 7, 2005, along with 51 other passengers.

Her older sister, her older sister, and after her death, says her family was determined that good would come from the act of terrible violence that killed her life. Thanks to their money and general donations, they funded the equipment needed to create Maryam Hayman Eye Care Center In Popanswar. Thanks to her work, among other accomplishments, doctors have taken important steps towards eliminating one form of blindness in childhood, RetinopathyIn the surrounding area.

“It makes our hearts happy with the knowledge that they have been mentioned in this way,” says Estir Heman. “The center is the memorial of the living Miriam. It is a place that benefits people, and this is the type of person that was Mary.”

After twenty years of attacks, the families of those who died to gather on Monday are preparing for mourning and remembering those who were killed in the four suicide bombings on 7/7, three on London The raids are underground and fourth in the DouBledECker bus.

However, besides their deep sorrow, many family members will also be able to refer to positive and great, great hope, which followed the death of their loved ones.

Among these small rays of light, spread all over the world, is a project in Blaise, which taught thousands of children to swim. It was prepared after 7/7 by a family Fiona StephensonOriginally a lawyer from Cheshire who was killed in the explosion in Aldgit.

Stevenson recently described a business trip to the Central American country, where she proudly gained diving qualifications, but she learned that many children in the country have died because of drowning because few of them had a chance to swim.

“To try to find some positivity from this terrible time for us,” says her sister Andrea Watson. “He gave us something to focus on it, and reminded us of how much I loved Fiona Belize when she was working. Although our hearts’ break will never be fixed, it brought some of the comfort that those who gained a skill of life in her name.”

The scheme also trained hundreds of young people as a life for life and swimming coaches. On the side of a swimming pool in the city of Belize, there is a plate and a picture explaining more about the life of a woman whose calm heritage may be is to prevent countless child deaths.

On the other side of the world, at the same time, a box was created on a memory Michael MatsushitaWho died in Russell Square, distributed the money between the role of the five orphans for children in Cambodia and Vietnam. Matsushita, from New Yorker, was born in Vietnam and recently moved to London to join his girlfriend, who, like him, worked as a tourist guide for bold travel.

Other souvenirs are closer to the home. On the day of the attacks, the Great ORMOND Street Children Hospital treated for the first time since World War II; Just later learned from the hospital that two of their employees – Behnaz MozakkaA vital medical officer, and Mala TrivadiThe radial photographer – was among the dead. They are now remembered in a hospital garden where employees can find a shelter of crowded transformations and experience patients in the long run fresh and calm air.

A large donation from the family and employers Helen JonesThe accountant originally assisted from Lockerbie, in financing the opening of the children’s unit in Aden Valley Hosspeus In Cumbria, which has since supported the families of hundreds of sick children and children. On the memory Benedita SucaxiaItalian business analyst born in publishing, gives Birkbeck, the University of London, the annual outlets for students who study it, the course from which Ciaccia comes out recently.

Despite all these good projects that these souvenirs are doing, they did not come without cost for family members who deal with extensive personal losses. “Very effort” says Estir Heman, the first contract after Myriam’s death. Educational resourceName Myriam’s visionTo help teachers explore reconciliation issues.

“I now realize that in the first ten years, I was not dealing with my feelings, I was suppressing my sorrow by directing it to constructive efforts,” she says. After this teacher, I felt burns and had to retreat for a while, and spent several years abroad. “I couldn’t live the rest of my life in light of my sister’s death. I had to find other channels, other ways to exist that I do not care about the death of Mim.”

With the government Review the national curriculum, Esther and her mother, MAVIS, focus on campaigns to obtain the subject of social cohesion, explicitly listed. “It is unfortunate that it is unfortunate that those who were affected by social cohesion to speak for social cohesion, but I think it is understandable. We do not want anyone else to go through what we went through.”

Once this review ends, and with the established clinic, they may be reluctantly concluded that it is time to end Miriam Hayman’s souvenir confidence “Unfortunately, and perhaps with some satisfaction,” says Esther. “We have done everything we can get our arms. So there is a feeling of contentment.”

Other plans continue, however. Family and employers Philip Russell28, the financial manager who died in the bombing of the bus, funded the travel scholarship in his memory at Kingston University, aimed at enabling students to make a change in projects abroad.

Gabriel Oyol recently used a travel grant to Ghana, where he worked as a teacher for students and developed his skills as a therapeutic doctor. He says that the Russell family could have put money on anything they wanted, and perhaps the easiest projects, but they chose to help students who need help and the good profession and personality. Maybe they changed, not only mine, but perhaps a lot of people’s professions and personal life to do so. “

Philip’s father, GrahamWho sat with the mother of Philip, Veronica, in the committee that granted the grants, he died recently. “He was very proud to work on this forum for 20 years,” says Philip’s sister Caroline Stedman. You will now take his place on the painting, and continue to support young people who are enthusiastically looking for their future, just as her brother was two decades ago.