Anchorage Daily News, January 22, 2006
A Miracle for Yulce
By DEBRA McKINNEY
Carl Cady of Fairbanks was a long way from home. And even though he'd seen a lot
and heard even more, he was feeling anxious.
It was February 2004, and he was sitting in a split-bamboo hut on the island of
Halmahera in the East Indonesian province of North Maluku.
[PHOTO: After a year of surgeries and therapy in Los Angeles, Yulce Dailangi
returned to Indonesia and a welcome from her village. Here, she's hugged by an uncle;
her father is at right. ( Photo by DAVID HALL)]
As U.S. director of International Friends of Compassion, a Christian humanitarian
organization, he'd heard of a child who'd been horribly burned more than a year before.
Cady and the IFC medical director, Esther Scarborough, had come to her remote
island village to see if there was anything they could do to ease her suffering.
They arrived while the girl was away working in the family's fields. Her mother invited
them inside to wait. A visit from Westerners is an oddity in this part of the world, and
soon a crowd of curious villagers gathered.
Cady and Scarborough had been waiting nearly an hour when the throng outside
suddenly fell silent. That's when Cady knew she was near.
[PHOTO: After a dozen surgeries to reconstruct her face, Yulce and her mother were
ready to go back home. ( Photo by DAVID HALL)]
As the girl walked through the door, he felt the wind knocked right out of him. As
though made of wax, her face, starting from where her lower lip should have been, had
melted into her neck and chest.
Her name was Yulce Dailangi. She looked worried, not knowing why these people had
come to her house. But that day would set in motion a series of events that would
deeply move people on the other side of the world, not to mention heaven and earth, in
ways Cady considers a miracle. Within a month, he and countless others would pool
the ideas, resources, funds and skills it would take to give Yulce a new face.
Marie Topczij, formerly of Fairbanks, is one of many who heard Cady's stories and
then volunteered with the IFC. She has been to Indonesia twice and greatly admires
Cady and his! work.
"Carl will go to great lengths to be used by God to help a young girl like Yulce laugh
and live again."
THE BURNS
Yulce (pronounced "yul-cha") was 11 years old and caring for her younger brother and
sister when the accident happened in 2002. She was pouring kerosene into a
container when the flame from a nearby lamp ignited the fumes, which then exploded.
Yulce dashed to the door, struggled to get through it and collapsed outside. A
neighbor saw her fall and ran to put out the flames and pull off her burning clothes.
[PHOTO: Three years ago, Yulce was horribly burned when kerosene exploded in her
face. With the help of many people, including Carl Cady of Fairbanks, the girl found
help in the United States. Right: After a dozen surgeries to reconstruct her face,
Yulce and her mother were ready to go back home. (Photos by CARL CADY)]
The girl's burns were devastating, the pain unspeakable. Her parents took her to a
traditional healer, who bathed her wounds with coconut oil but could do little else.
Most everyone expected her to die. Yet somehow she didn't, in spite of the high risk
of infection.
By the time Cady and Scarborough came to see her, scarring had pulled her face so
far down toward her chest that the pinks of her lower eyelids were exposed and she
couldn't shut her eyes. Nor could she open her mouth or eat without effort. She spoke
in a low whisper. Her face and neck were fused to her chest, and her arms from the
elbows up were fused to her sides. And while her face and neck were being pulled
downward, her young body continued growing upward, tweaking her bones and
causing curvature of the spine.
Cady asked permission to take pictures of her injuries. Given the catastrophic
damage, he didn't want to give her or her family false hope.
[PHOTO: Villagers awaiting Yulce's return lined up from the outskirts of town all the
way to her house to welcome her home. ( )]
But when he left, he said he would do everything he could to help.
The question was how.
HOPE FOR YULCE
Back in Fairbanks two and a half weeks later, Cady sent a photo of Yulce out on his
e-mail list, asking supporters for ideas, doctors or burn centers that might be able to
help. A friend mentioned a similar case of a girl from Afghanistan being treated by Dr.
Peter Grossman of The Grossman Burn Center in Los Angeles. Her name was
Zubaida, and she too had been horribly disfigured in a kerosene accident, her lower
face melted into her chest.
[PHOTO: Carl Cady is former pastor of Door of Hope Church in Fairbanks. (Photo by
CARL CADY)]
Cady tracked down an e-mail address and sent Yulce's picture to Grossman with a
note: "Would you have any interest in helping this girl?"
That night, Cady and his wife, Cathy, sat down to watch the Discovery Channel. It just
happened to be airing a documentary on Zubaida's recovery.
"We saw the transformation of Zubaida step by step in this documentary," Cady said.
"It was awe-inspiring to see what Dr. Grossman did for that girl. We went to bed and
prayed, had a few tears and thought, there's got to be a way."
The next morning, a reply from Grossman was waiting for him. It offered no promises
but did say he was interested.
So Cady sent more photos, including those showing how much good skin Yulce had
left for grafting. Within a week, Grossman agreed to take her.
The Children's Burn Foundation would be footing the bills for her surgeries and
therapy.
Cady couldn't have been happier.! But a lot of details remained, like how to get her out
of Indonesia.
A friend arranged a meeting for Cady with Sen. Lisa Murkowski.
"She saw the photo and said, 'I'll do whatever I can to help.' " Murkowski contacted
the U.S. ambassador in Jakarta, Cady said. So when Yulce and her mother traveled
there to apply for a visa, what normally would have taken three months took a day.
Everything else fell into place too, with Grossman and his wife, Rebecca, using their
connections as well. An Indonesian church in Los Angeles provided a translator and a
family willing to take in Yulce and her mother. Donations poured in to cover their
airfares.
A Los Angeles-based film compan! y, LMNO Productions, decided to document
Yulce's story from beginning to end. (See Page D-1 for details.) In addition, IFC hired
Jorge Arciniega of Valdez, who knew Cady and his work, to do a short documentary
for its supporters on this story of hope. Or, as Arciniega puts it, "how God responded
to the prayers of a beautiful little girl."
Esther Scarborough, medical director of IFC, praises Cady's role in making this
happen.
"Carl is a man of integrity, and this is seen in the story of Yulce," Scarborough said
via e-mail from Kusuri, Indonesia, where she and her family live. "Carl said he would
find help for her, and he did."
Scarborough escorted Yulce and her mother to Los Angeles in August 2004. Yulce
kept the lower half of her face tucked into the top of her shirt so ! people wouldn't
stare. But there was no hiding her eyes.
After they landed, the culture shock was overwhelming.
"Their host family took them out to dinner at a smorgasbord, all-you-can-eat place,"
Cady said. "And Yulce and her mother looked at all that food, and you know what
they ate? Nothing. They could not believe all the food. They had nothing."
There was no time for acclimation. Just a few days later, Yulce spent her 13th
birthday at Disneyland and the next day was admitted to the hospital. During her first
surgery, Grossman and others dubbed "Team Yulce" freed her neck and, in the
course of it, found her lower lip hidden beneath the scar tissue. This was unexpected
and great news since lip tissue is so difficult to re-create.
"I found a little girl under those scars," the doctor told everyone.
Creating a new face for Yulce would take 11 more surgeries and a lot of therapy over
the course of a year. Bring! ing her back home at the end of it would be one of the
most powerful experiences of Cady's life.
HOMECOMING
The entourage for the trip back to Indonesia and Yulce's village was something. Yulce,
her mother, the IFC team, the filmmakers and others were preparing at a small inn
nearby when Yulce's grandmothers showed up. After they saw her, they couldn't stop
holding her face, hugging her and crying.
The grandmothers dressed Yulce, her mother and then Cady and another escort head
to toe in colorful traditional clothes, which, to Cady's dismay, meant wearing a skirt.
As they drove toward Yulce's home, they were met on the outskirts by her entire
village. With people everywhere, they couldn't drive any farther. They got out and
walked down the middle of the road, through a corridor of well-wishers. Everywhere
children were singing, drummers were drumming, people were dancing.
Making their way slowly through the crowd, they t! urned a corner and caught a
glimpse of Yulce's house. But first, there was protocol. A boy dressed as a traditional
warrior danced toward them with a machete, accompanied by girls dancing elegantly
alongside.
"We were to follow him as he welcomed us to the village, then led us to her home."
Soon, they could see Yulce's father waiting in front of their house. As they
approached, Cady took Yulce's hand and placed it in his.
With tears flowing down his face, her father hugged her, held her back so he could
look at her, hugged her again, held her back, looked at her some more. He put his
hand against her face. "My girl is back," he said.
The dancing, the speeches, the feasting -- followed by more dancing -- went on for
hours.
"Oh, it was something ," Cady said. "We danced for five hours."
Reporter Debra McKinney can be reached at dmckinney@adn.com.
Copyright © 2006 The Anchorage Daily News (www.adn.com)
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