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The Outreach Program May 2013

The Outreach Program has been helping a small family survive for almost 2 years now. This family consists of a great grandmother Khun Yai, her husband a man from Laos, Khun Por and their great grandson Dor. He is 5 years old and he rarely smiles and is always solemn. Khun Yai is blind and Khun Por is not able to legally work in Thailand as he is from Laos, and although elderly he is willing to set his hand to anything to keep his family alive. Dor’s mother left the young family when Dor was a baby and Dor’s father is in jail. The family squatted on some land adjacent to rice land and were living in poverty and squalor when they were first referred to the  Outreach Program by Khun Da who works at Charlene House, and who heard of them through someone in her home village. The Outreach Program supplied the family with a monthly delivery of rice, eggs, tinned fish, fish sauce and cooking oil,  chickens to care for and vegetable seeds to plant as well as a stipend to live on. With the help of the Outreach Program Dor was taken to the doctor’s to check on his health and to update his vaccinations, and then enrolled in Kindergarten. A very generous Irish donor donated a 2nd hand motorbike so Khun Por could drive Dor to school each day, after his previous one was stolen under the nose of poor K

hun Yai who couldn’t see what was happening.

Last year the family was relocated to another village, as the owner of the land wanted to expand his rice paddies. They were sent to live in a smaller shack that was dirty and falling down, with no running water. In April this year the family were relocated again and for the final time to the village of Don Wai, by the Outreach Program. Sarnelli House had a small empty house that needed repairs amidst a mango orchard. With the motivation and generosity of Tommy Kelly from Ireland, the little house was restored to a livable condition. He worked with 2 boys from the Jan and Oscar House and together they repaired the roof, cleaned and painted the walls and floor, connected running water via a pump and connected up the electricity as well. The outside of the house was tidied up and the rubbish taken away, even the old lady living next door who is also supported by Sarnelli House was delighted when Tommy installed a ceiling fan  in her little house.  The result is a clean and safe home for the family. Khun Por wants to grow vegetables and raise chickens again and there is enough land available to do both and the Outreach Program will provide him with a start up of baby chickens and vegetable seeds and fertilizer. Dor will now attend school at Rosario school with the other children of Sarnelli House but he will continue to live with his family and be supported by the Outreach Program. He was taken to NongKhai to buy school uniforms last week and was amazed at the sights he saw – he had never been to Nongkhai before.  Thanks to the generosity of donors like Tommy this family’s life has been restored and they are able to live in dignity and to be self sufficient.