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A Working Visit, Rotary Club Forbes

Thanks to members of the Rotary Club Forbes, Australia for organizing a working visit to Sarnelli House in the school holidays in October. Five Australians arrived and set about washing and repainting two of the homework rooms at Sarnelli House and Our Lady of Refuge Home for Girls. The Sarnelli House classroom hasn’t had a repaint since the beautiful animal murals were originally painted on the walls by two much loved volunteers Natacha and Hans about 10 years ago.    Now the walls are shiny white and ready for the last term of school. The school room atVienghuk had its windows repaired and the inside and outside repainted and looks great. While the painting was going on a dental clinic was being held  in the Outreach clinic room by experienced dentist Paul Kotala. He assessed 99 children and extracted 25 decayed and rotten teeth and plans to come again in March to complete the dental work by cleaning and filling the children’s teeth as necessary.  The children were mostly well behaved if a little apprehensive but were happily surprised at how little pain they felt during the extraction procedure. 

The weird game of Cricket was introduced to the Sarnelli House boys by Ross and they took to it, while Graham tested the soil on Jomp’s farm and the current farming practices used and advised on ways to improve the soil to ensure the yield of the rice crop is maximized.   

Rotary Forbes are hoping to support a project on 12 rai of farm land in the future. The  soil is good for growing vegetables and fruit trees. However it is without decent road access and will need  a small house built for the farm boys, a well for water and the plan is to try and use solar panels to provide cheaper  and greener electricity for the farm. 

Many thanks to all involved – Jeff, Peter, Ross, Graham and Paul it was great to have you here.