Dana L. Yeoman, DDS

Dentures and Implants

The Power of a Smile to Transcend Borders Part 29

In a crowd of orphaned kids, it’s hard not to fall in love.  Sometimes a particular little face captures your attention.  Other times it’s an endearing quirk in a personality.  At the orphanage for street kids in the depths of Kiev, little Natasha grabbed our attention and with it our hearts.  It was difficult not to be captivated by the little girl with flashing dark eyes, a mischievous smile, and a penchant for learning English words.  At age eight, Natasha was a bright little beauty exuding confidence not common among orphans.  The rest of the girls of the orphanage were her ladies-in-waiting, and she was a good, kindhearted miniature-sized Queen over her court.

Natasha took a liking to one of the fellows in our group.  Every morning she would call up to the window of the second floor, “Willy-yam!  Willy-yam!  Come!”  She would beckon furiously with her hands in case he didn’t understand what she wanted.  Impossible to turn her down, William would join the small group of girls waiting on the playground after breakfast.  Natasha and her ladies-in-waiting would squeal with delight.  Never before have I witnessed a human jungle gym. At one point, poor Willy-yam had four eight-year-olds balanced on his shoulders and clutched to his legs as he struggled to stay upright under their weight.  He muttered something about needing a chiropractor later that day as he rubbed his sore muscles.  Either he was a really good sport, or else he was a sucker to a set of bright eyes.

Not only was Natasha a beauty, but she was brave as well.  She stepped right up and volunteered to be one of the first patients in our make-shift dental clinic.  Without a whimper, she climbed in my chair and let me get her numb.  With more curiosity than anxiety, Natasha sat quietly while I extracted some baby teeth that were interfering with the eruption of her adult teeth.  Afterwards, she looked intently at the baby teeth rolling in the palm of her hand as she chomped on gauze.  

As a reward for being brave, Natasha received a beanie baby in the form of a red robin.  Going through the bag of toys, she instructed me carefully on how to pronounce the name each animal in Ukrainian.  I learned more Ukrainian words in that one lesson from an eight year old girl than I did from any language book I tried to study.  

As far as I know, no one sat down to teach Natasha English, but by the time our week-long visit was over, she had a whole arsenal of words.  Most of them were shouted up to poor Willy-yam’s window.  Of course, William encouraged some of these antics.  They had a game where he would drop dried apricots from the second story window and Natasha would catch them, sometimes with her hands and sometimes with her mouth.  The more goodies that came plunging down from the windows, the increased frequency and number of girls that came calling for Willy-yam.  The M&M’s nearly caused a feeding frenzy.

The little Queen of the orphanage surprised us by taking on both leadership and motherly roles.  Natasha, by choosing to be one of the first patients, had thereby used her experience to be a comforting mother to her terrified girlfriends.  She would hold their hands, pat them sweetly, and tell them with conviction that they would not feel a thing.  Natasha did my job of calming my patients for me, and because they trusted her, they trusted me.  She was a joy to have around.

It was easy to forget that Natasha was anything but a normal girl, smart as a whip and charming as an autumn campfire.  Only when Willy-yam came up with the brilliant idea of throwing a group birthday party for the orphans did we realize that there was more darkness to her past than met the eye.