Growing up in Mumbai, Dr Ayesha Husaini, director of Manzil special needs centre, planned to study finance in college but she switched to psychology after a young woman with Down syndrome wandered into her accounting class and her classmates recoiled in fear.
Baffled at their reaction, Ayesha helped the woman find her way back to her own class.
"I turned around to say bye to her and there was a look in her eyes that I can never forget," she says.
Ayesha, 42, has dedicated her life to people with special needs, with a focus on including them in mainstream society. She founded Manzil in 2004, when "inclusion" wasn't the buzzword in the UAE it is now.
The Sharjah centre has 40 students and 24 staff members. As students grow up, Manzil offers vocational training and helps them to find work.
"There's no point in going on the rest of your life taking care of people," Ayesha says. "You have to help them take care of themselves.
"The old adage about giving a fish to somebody versus teaching somebody to fish, that's always stuck with me."
Eleven Manzil graduates are working in mainstream jobs such as data entry and gardening.
"In fact, two of them are supporting their families," Ayesha says.
One graduate, who works in a bank, told her that with steady income from her and her brother, her family was ready to let their father retire.
"I felt so happy," Ayesha says. "Had it not been [for] her salary, the brother alone could have never managed that."
