START is a non profit organization established by Art Dubai and the AlMadad Foundation which applies the universal language of ar to heal, educate and enrich the skills and opportunities of children in the poorest areas of the Middle East.
The programme seeks to educate and empower the younger generation by giving them a voice through the expression of art by engaging them with their communities and their peers and by teaching them a sense of self-worth.
START has a permanent prescence in Jordan offering art education for refugee and orphaned children, along with operating workshops in Palestine and Lebanon. In the UAE, START also provides workshops for children with special needs including Autism and Down Syndrome.
START uniquely encourages artists to become volunteers in the field of humanitarian aid and education by participatig in the workshops,
Tanaz Dizadji, START Director
"The philosophy underpinning START is that art or the creative process invoolved in artistic self-expression is healing, empowering and can help children resolve inner conflict, gain a measure of self worth and self awareness, and achieve insight.
...Art is our one true global language. It knows no nation, it favours no race, and acknowledges no class. It speaks to our need to reveal, heal and transform. It transcends our ordinary lives and lets us imagine what is possible. I creates a dialogue between individuals and communication between communities. It allows us to see and to listen to each other."
Richard Kamler.
"Children and young adults are the building blocks of the future. We live in a world ravaged by natural or human devastation and divided by geographic, political, religious, linguistic and cultural boundaries. Art is a language without bordders that communicates across boundaries."
Richard Kamler, (artist and creator of Seeing Peace Project.}
START has an artist in Residency programme in Jordan, inviting international artists to stay i the "START House" and volunteer their time in the workshops. This provides a great learning opportunity for the children which uplifts, inspires and promotes expression."
Not a great picture quality wise but its the best i got taken by 'The Genius" Adam so it iwll do. My niece and her two other boys the youngest girl was sleeping down with Chicken pox. 
Sometime on the twentieth of March I visited my nephew and niece in Kuwait and spent soemtime with the kids .. my grand kids!! It was a memorable experience which helped me to come back to earth in a sense after living with my son for the past few months having a huge villa all to myself! 
So the father decided to take the boys and me for a trip to downtown Kuwait and to the Science Muzeum where they had an aquarium and many other entertainments for children. 
It was located on the water front with speed boats zooming by every now and then and ther was also a permanent display of the local heritage boats from days gone by. 
We had fun and I was thrilled by the 3D movie we saw of the dinasour era of the sea creatures, it was very fascinating and brought out the child in me watching it. 
On the way home i caught a cloud bank far off in the distant horizon and mentioned it to my nephew who did not think much of it at the time. 
As we kept heading homeward the cloud bank seemed to loom larger than before and I started for my camera... 
The mosue stood still ni comaprisson as the cloud bank rose and continued on menacingly towards us...
Foreboding thoughts began to infest my imagination as we dreove on and I noticed other drivers driving alongside us raising their eyes and making gestures towards the sky like..what in heavens name?? 
Like in a movie of horror natural disasters the sky began to become darker and the traffic began to pick up. 
As this cloud bank looms even more closer I thought of the movie "The Fog", naah, I told myself I am sure this is something that happens here every so often.. 
The ooldest of my nephew was asking my to roll up the window and I kept snapping away every few hundre yards as we drove along... 
Thie drive of the pickup truck drove by looking at me questioningly raising his two palms skywards as if praying... 
We camt to a junction with a street light and where we had to turn left otwards the apartments but had a hard time doing it because the crossing traffic was not stopping even when the red light had turned on for them. There was alot of honking as everyone it seemed were running from the oncoming wall of strong wind and sand. 
Fortunately we made it towards the apartments where my nephew and niece lived and as we pulled into the parking lot the whole sky was almost covered in darkness. 
It was like night had fallen withing fifteen minutes from the moment I noticed the cloudbank till we got to the parking lot. 
We barely made it into the elevator before we were slammed by sandblasting of mother nature. 
I opened my rear window trying to catch the last remaining light bust was too latr, the picutre I got was just full of sand! 
Next morning I took a look at the swimming pool area down below and what a sight it was! Even the walls were covered with sand from God knows where...perhaps as they said in the News media, from the Iraqi desert somewhere. The News paper claimed that wind guste at no less the eighty miles per hour and that all flights were and cancelled, it was a storm of the Century for Kuwait...and I was there!! 
