Sick Lotte wants to 'just be Lotte again' among other children with cancer

“What kind of cancer do you have?” “I had leukemia.” It sounds like an everyday question and an equally normal answer. And that is exactly the intention of the summer camp in the documentary Summer Dreams : just to be a child like everyone else.

The short VPRO documentary Zomerdromen can be seen on TV tomorrow night. Metro already saw it for the television program Blik op de Buis . Viewers follow children with cancer who can forget the misery of everyday life for a while during a camp in the summer of 2024. The program is part of VPRO Jeugd, responsible for 'not everyday food, but different cake' for thirty years. The latter has succeeded again.

The question asked at the beginning of this Blik op de Buis comes from Lotte. The girl is 11 years old and was told in 2023 that she had a tumor in her lower abdomen ("it was cut away"). Lotte's haircut is now short, but she was completely bald for a while. Even her eyebrows had disappeared. The Princess Máxima Center became her second home, but for now it is the summer camp.

According to the hospital, Lotte is "doing great", so she is allowed to go to the summer camp. She finds it a bit exciting, but when she arrives she has a smile from ear to ear. Lotte is especially looking forward to the end, the colorful evening. Life is no longer dominated by cancer, hospital, radiation and chemotherapy. She wants and can be 'just Lotte' here and, apart from a moment of tears during a necessary treatment, enjoy herself without a care in the world. And that with children who have been through the same thing.

This camp can be about cancer, and often is, but it doesn't have to be. Swimming in an inflated donut is much more fun, after all. But still: "Did you let your hair fall out?", asks a girl. The answer: "Yes, there were clumps all over my pillow."

Summer dreams about children with cancer was made by Kim Faber. She graduated in 2014 from the Utrecht School of the Arts with the documentary I let you go . It was about the right of psychiatric patients to self-determination, eleven years later still a subject in the telefilm En we vliegen door de dagen . In her work, Kim Faber focuses on small stories of one or more individuals who symbolize a larger subject or problem. Like Lotte in this case, as the face of children with cancer.

Zomerdromen is a must-see. It is beautiful, but because you know what all those children with their happy faces are or were missing, it is also very sad at the same time. The fact that you as a viewer know almost nothing about Lotte and that summer camp is not a problem in this case. And that final variety evening? That was just fine for Lotte.

You can watch Zomerdromen tomorrow (Sunday 22 June) at 7.20 pm on VPRO on NPO 3. You can also find the documentary on NPO Start .

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