One program is in Mae La camp, and it is so cold there during winter. Children from that program didn’t have enough blankets before. When we delivered the blankets to them, they all were so happy. Likewise, one of the other programs doesn’t have thick walls in one of the dormitories. So during winter, it is very windy and children who sleep in that building can’t sleep well. The head teacher said,

“When children got the blankets from R2G, they all were happy and they said that they got thick and warm blankets, so they can sleep and study well now. They use them not only for sleeping but also for studying.”

When we delivered tooth brushes to one program, they said they don’t have toothbrushes, and they brush their teeth with charcoal. They also don’t know how to use toothbrushes. So, we demonstrated to them how to use a toothbrush. One of the students said,

“This is the first time that I have had a toothbrush, and I don’t know how to use it. I always use charcoal to brush my teeth.”

He also said that he lives near the landfill and some of his family use charcoal to brush their teeth, while others don’t brush their teeth at all. So, providing toothbrushes and education how to use a toothbrush is so important for children who have never used one in their lives.

R2G would like to thank ELC for sending the blankets and toothbrushes for the children who we work with. It was so useful for the children who didn’t have enough blankets and who have never used toothbrushes in their lives. Our children now have clean teeth and healthy, warm and happy lives in the classrooms. Thanks ELC!

In the morning, a truck pulled up at the office and unloaded about 200 blankets, 4000 toothbrushes and several boxes of assorted goods (towels, children’s clothes, baby’s items, toys). We got to sweating unloading them all from the truck and stacking them inside the office, but I couldn’t help but laughing out loud several times during the process. It was like Santa had arrived with his sleigh only it wasn’t Santa, it was the kids who attend the Early Learning Centre - a group of schools for children in Bangkok.  Before leaving for the holidays, students there brought in blankets for less privileged children and their combined efforts resulted in Santa’s sleigh arriving in Mae Sot yesterday.

In all the giving, I particularly noticed three boxes marked from Jack and Grace. These two children provided three boxes full of goods for children and it looks like they raided their house to do so. They cleaned out their closet, provided toys, both new and used, and filled three boxes full of presents for children they had never met before.

The day of giving wasn’t even finished yet. In the afternoon we stopped by the post office and came home with three very large boxes from Sister Maria Goretti Catholic Primary School in the UK.  The boxes were full of gifts brought in by students there and sent off by mail to us here on the border. The boxes had fun things inside like toys and games, but also practical and very needed school supplies, such as pencils and notepaper. Both gifts will be well received by children here.

They say that there is no gift like giving – but what I know is true is that very little lights up my heart like seeing other people give, especially when they give from their hearts. To see so many children giving to other children at a time when a lot of kids are excited about getting gifts is such a beautiful thing. And to know that this Christmas a lot of children who receive very little at all for most of the year will be opening some presents – it all made for a very beautiful day.

The Room to Grow team will be heading out to several boarding houses in the next few days, to share the holiday celebrations and to distribute the wonderful gifts that we have received from our friends in Thailand and the UK. We hope you all have a wonderful holiday season, lit up by the joy of giving and recieving and full of laughter, love and smiles.

Happy Holidays from Room to Grow!

“Nobel, please help me, how do you say ‘a little’ in Burmese?” was my frantic question as I tried to stop a little boy pouring a whole bag of glitter onto his animal mask.

Just two weeks after being offered the job of Programme Co-ordinator for Room to Grow, I found myself here in Mae Sot, surrounded by a group of primary school aged children from SAW Safe House laughing and smiling and chattering away at me in Burmese as they decorated their masks with glitter, sequins and feathers sent by a UK sponsor. The children were so happy doing the craft activity and showing off their creations (so much more artistic than our own example!) and asked us if we could make masks again tomorrow.

The most enjoyable part of my training so far has certainly been visiting Room to Grow’s partners here in Mae Sot – singing, dancing and drawing with the kids, having lunch and chatting with the teachers and caregivers and seeing what a difference R2G programmes are having on the ground. Things like school dinners, nursery snacks or play sessions are often taken for granted by us in the West – but not for these children. And these are children who need this more than most.

One of the saddest moments this week was hearing the stories of some of the children supported by R2G. Children who’ve cared for their dying parents, only to be left orphaned, children who’ve experienced abuse, suffering and loss more than anyone should have to, and all before the age of 10.

Yet I’ve also seen and heard about so many positive things that are happening – children laughing and playing, wanting to hold my hands and dance with me, teachers proudly showing off their mushroom huts and telling me about the food and supplies they’ve been able to buy for the children with their profits. Room to Grow is doing a lot of great work here, and I’m excited about being part of it!

The night bus usually takes 8 hours and arrives into town around 5 am. The direct buses were all full, as migrant workers and evacuees all left Bangkok. A ticket to TAK was purchased online; At Tak  I would be notified to change for a bus to Mae Sot. This would happen in the early morning hours. I remember from previous visits, that TAK is a large bus station, with stalls, and food vendors:  imagine my surprise then when at 5am I was woken and told that I had arrived and needed to get off the bus. We were in TUN, a very small town an hour and a half past TAK; ahh the joys of online shopping. Fortunately I was able to remain on the bus, and after taking it to LamPung (another hour north), I was able to return to TAK and then grab the bus to Mae Sot.

So it was that I arrived at noon, 14 hours after I left Bangkok, just in time to begin preparations for the 3rd annual “Forgotten Birthday” party.

Sandra Jones has been on the R2G Board of Directors since its inception, but recently left her home in Kelowna to join the field team in Mae Sot. She will take up the position of Executive Director on January 1st 2012.

The current Executive Director , Jennifer Jones, will be stepping down from her position and leaving Mae Sot at the end of January. She will remain on the Board of Directors and continue to be involved with the organization.

After a long and difficult selection process, which involved reviewing over 200 candidates, Room to Grow hired Joanna Flint as our new Program Coordinator.

This is how she describes herself:

A little over seven years ago, during my first university vacation, I spent several weeks volunteering at an orphanage in Bulgaria. Spending time playing with the kids, learning their stories and showing them some love and affection brought home to me how much some children have to go through so young, how strong they can be and how little it can take to help them realise their dreams.

Seven years later, after graduating, completing my Masters in International Education and Development and working on the ground in Bulgaria, I have moved on, and intend to use the skills and experience I have gained to be the next Programme Co-ordinator for Room to Grow.

There’s a lot to learn about the situation of migrant children, boarding houses and orphanages on the Thai-Burma border, but it’s an exciting new page in my life! So many children across the world have been orphaned, abandoned or separated from their parents, and I firmly believe that they deserve time to play and just be children, as well as the opportunity of a quality education that will help them to fulfil their potential and realise their dreams. I hope that in a small way, my time here in Mae Sot will help make this happen.

 

With Joanna and Sandra on the Mae Sot team, it is looking like a strong year for Room to Grow in 2012. We all look forward to working together with the children, the boarding houses, and with future volunteers, new supporters and everyone who has been with us encouraging and helping us do our work over the past years.

 Send a Smile Flyer 2011

The competition was launched in March by UN Women and Mastercard as a way of celebrating the 100th year of International Women’s Day and MasterCard’s 25th year in the region. The competition drew a total of 450 entries from teams which represented 50 different countries from Africa to Asia to Middle East, the Americas & Pacific Islands. The Uplift Initiative was chosen as part of ten finalists. As a finalist, the public had a chance to vote for the best video, and we reached out to absolutely everyone we know in order to get votes. The response we received was amazing. It was wonderful to hear so many messages of support from so many people and to know that even those who didn’t take the time to post about their voting on facebook or write emails, did go to the website and vote for our project.

The Uplift Initiative is a joint effort between Nobel and Jennifer at Room to Grow and Mark Cox at Khom Loy. Mark represented our group at the finals in Singapore. On the morning he arrived off the bus in Bangkok, he checked into hospital and was diagnosed with influenza. Undeterred, he boarded the plane for Singapore, participated in a busy few days of workshops, and delivered a five minute pitch in front of judges that landed us in second place.

We were then faced with a new challenge: having prepared a project on a $25,000 budget, what could we deliver on a reduced budget? We racked our brains, we threw around ideas, we stewed in creative juices. Our initial plan had been to buy land and build a Women’s Resource Center – a space space where we could be based in order to provide trainings four days a week to women. The first thing to go was the land and the building. But without a presence in the community and a place to work, we were presented with additional challenges.

Our new plan is really exciting for all of us. We are re-designing our financial literacy modules as well as our approach. In November, we will start working with a group of young leaders from Burma currently studying at World Education‘s Wide Horizons Program. These 23 young leaders will become our master trainers. They are currently engaged in community development work in a small community just outside Mae Sot, which will offer us the testing grounds for the modules and a chance to develop the training skills of the trainers. Then the trainers will take to the landfill. Organized into groups, they will compete against each other to see which group can deliver the most effective training in terms of realizing concrete results in the landfill such as increased savings and income.

The trainings will allow us to work with the community and identify exceptional women with great ideas for projects capable of generating income and changing their lives. We will continue to work with those women on targeted follow up trainings and with small grant assistance, making their dreams a reality. Whether it be a small scale loan to buy a sewing machine, or start up capital for seeds and watering cans, we will be looking for women and projects which will improve lives.

Our goal is not just to improve the lives of women, but by doing so, to also improve the lives of girls. Increased family income is likely to lead to more opportunities for girls to go to school, and we are also working closely with the school that serves the landfill community to monitor enrollment rates. With less need for children to generate income, we hope to encourage more children to attend school. However, we recognize that children who have been out of school for some time are sometimes unenthusiastic about returning to a disciplined and restrictive environment. We also know that enrollment and food programs are linked: that children stop going to school when the school stops providing food. So as part of the Uplift Initiative, all children at the landfill school will get fortified soy milk and fruit every morning. The snack will help improve nutrition and give children energy to start their day and learn well. Together with improved income in their families, it will also be tied to higher enrollment rates at the school which means more girls going to school, getting educated and getting a step up in life.

In addition, in April, after the Wide Horizons students finish their program, they will return to the community development organizations they represent, taking with them experience and training plans and the ability to teach others important financial literacy concepts.

We might not have a solid building to work from, but we are going to accomplish a lot. We are going to help change the way people manage and understand their own money in order to increase savings and income: among our trainers, among two communities of women, and among a variety of community development groups along the border. That’s a lot of people saving a money a few baht at a time, increasing their earnings a few baht at a time. And that is how we are going to change this part of the world, person by person, little by little, a few baht at a time.

Since June 2011, Room to Grow has been providing some funding to Sky Blue School in order for the school to be able to provide a nutritious snack to children in their nursery program. Currently, under this program, children in the nursery receive a box of soy milk and some fruit three times a week.

The program has two purposes. The first is to reduce malnutrition rates among children under the age of five. It is during this time that malnutrition can cause stunting which has an impact on children’s mental and intellectual development for the rest of their lives. The soy milk we provide is fortified with vitamins and minerals and served with fresh fruit.

Our second goal is to increase enrollment rates at the school. We have seen that enrollment rates are closely linked with food programs. When food programs are cut, children stop coming to school. We hope that the reverse is also true: that children will be enticed to school by food and that this will help build a culture of eduction from a young age. In addition, when nursery-age children come to school, their caretakers, often their older siblings, are also free to come to school.

Nobel interviewed one nursery student who said: “I can not eat snacks in my home. My mother doesn’t buy for me because she has no money. So, I go to school every week day because I can eat snacks at the school almost every day after napping in the afternoon. I can eat snacks, I can play with my friends and I also can study at school. Now, I can read a lot of poems, I can count one to twenty, I can read and write Burmese alphabets and English alphabets too.”

The program has had problems. At first we provided a food subsidy, allowing the school cook to select and chose the snacks for children. Unfortunately, what is often considered a snack for a child is generally not nutritious. The school purchased cookies and other sweet foods. For the past two months, we have switched to milk and fruit. The most common fruits served are bananas, corn and sweet potato, although bananas are a clear favorite among the children.

To date, it has been difficult to judge the success of the program. Floods and heavy rains have kept students at home during the past months and numbers in the nursery, and at all schools, have been fluctuating widely.

In December, we will begin construction of a new nursery building. It will be an adobe structure designed and decorated by local artists. The new, more inviting structure will allow children more space to sing and play and sleep. As well, starting in November, through the Uplift Initiative, we will be expanding the program to feed all the children milk and fruit for breakfast so that they get the best possible start to the day. We will get those children out of the dump during the day, and into the classroom!

Nobel was at the home this weekend and she spent some time with our sponsored children, doing some drawing activities and speaking to the children about what they drew. Many of them drew the home that they dream about having. They live with 53 other children in a house that could be a lot bigger and which doesn’t have any grass to play on, so its easy to see why they imagine green hills, sunny skies and beautiful playgrounds.

While one little boy dreams about having his own airplane (“One that is not too big,” he says, “but it can carry me.”), most of the children’s dream homes are so simple, it touches the heart. One little girl has a sister who is older and who has to work. She draws a big chicken and a little chicken who spend their day together loving each other and chasing butterflies.

And one little girl dreams about having a mother who is so busy taking care of two siblings, and a father who has a job as a construction worker. She dreams that she is the one who helps everyone by bringing in money selling roses. She could dream of anything, of any luxury or lifestyle, but that’s what she dreams of: a hard and busy life where she’s part of a family that lives and works together. Its so simple and small a dream, and still so far from her reality, that it makes me want to cry.

“My dream house is beside the stream. If I across that stream, I arrive to my rose garden. I also grow some roses in front of my dream house. I like to grow roses. Sometimes, in my dream, people come and buy some roses, so I sell them. When I got money, I pay it to my parents. My mother would tell me, “Oh! Daughter, you are very smart, we are very lucky that we have you.” I am the oldest daughter, so I would help my mother. I dream that my mother is taking care of my younger brothers and sisters. I dream that my father is working at the construction site. So, I would grow flowers and make money for my parents, in my dream.”

— (Name Unpublished, 12 years old)