Misbah

"It was not an especially complicated case," remembers Prof. Sailer, "but if I say that from the viewpoint of a doctor, I do of course not forget that each of these individual cases represents a complete life change.
 

For the children concerned it represents an unbelievably large change in their fates - for the better; something which for us doctors is almost a routine operation."
Misbah was his parent's third child and was the first in the family to be born with a cleft. Luckily his parents, who lived in great poverty, had heard of the chance of a free operation. They had heard about it from friends. They all went together to the Cleft-centre.   
 

Before the treatment they waited with other parents and their children in the yard, where they were given food and could talk about things, and when Misbah woke up out of the anaesthetic, his father was already sitting at his bedside. The treatment was quickly overcome. During the days after the operation he carefully fed Misbah, but soon he could eat by himself - without the impairment caused by a cleft: he learnt to eat and speak just like other children of his age, and his smile was the best thanks he could give us and his parents.