First stop of the day is Agape school. Agape's headmaster is the extraordinary David, a convinced Christian who gave up his good job in Bangkok to look after children on the border. Now he has nearly 200, of whom he and his wife have adopted 20 to help them stay in Thailand. David believes that his children need to start every day by singing together for half an hour or so. They come from very challenging backgrounds - the smuggling community on the riverbed, intensive farming and sweatshops. Especially now, with the influx of new migrants thanks to the fighting on the Burma side, migrant communities and families are under pressure. The singing helps the children settle back into their day job, which is being children, learning through instructuion and learning through play. They have already learned a lot through experience. The singing time is joyful.
I can't believe that I managed to leave the Burma Children's Medical Fund without pictures of the organsisers of this tiny but remarkable humanitarian initiative. Kanchana and Kate really are the business. Children who arrive at Mae Tao Clinic, and who are assessed as needing surgery which is beyond the scope either of the clinic or of Mae Tao Hospital, are referred to BCMF who arrange their transfer to Chiang Mai hospital, and pay for their treatment. Typical cases include children with heart problems which have gone undiagnosed and untreated in Burma, occasional gunshot or mine injuries, tumours. Each case has to be carefully documented. Every Thursday a truck leaves Mae Sot with around 9 patients aboard - plus carers who will live in the 'safe house' in Chiang Mai for as long as their child is in hospital, which may be anything from a few days to a few months. Everyone on the bus is in Thailand with 'migrant worker' status, and Chiang Mai is outside the border zone. So the Army and the Police are notified of each one, who they are, why they are on the bus, when they may be expected to return to Mae Sot. With the generous co-operation of the Thai authorities, the truck will travel unhindered to Chiang Mai, treatment will be given, the patient will return. This lifesaving operation is managed by just two people, Kanchana and Kate, who work very long hours for no pay to make sick children's lives a little easier. The paperwork is meticulous - it has to be. The care for the children is paramount - that's why they do it! But money is very short, especially for paying some quite notable hospital bills. Please help!
On to STTC which we saw last year. It was something of a flagship of agricultural projects, and I had high hopes that STTC, which is a post Grade -10 programme, would be able to provide support and experienced help to schools wanting to raise fish, chickens and mushrooms. This isn't going to happen the way we hoped. The chickens and the fishtanks have gone. They were on someone else's land, and he wanted it back. Ho, hum. The mushroom shed is empty. There are only 20 students in the school, so there was a saleable surplus of mushrooms. Money from the surplus was not used to restock the shed, which it should have been. There is no explanation for this immediately available. The school is, however, pursuing a different path with some success, cutting and welding steel bars to form sturdy school furniture. This has commercial and educational possibilities. It is hard not to be a bit crabby about the way the mushroom shed has been set aside, and it is not a topic which will be allowed to drop. But the success of the small scale manufacturing operation should attract praise. It works.
Sky Blue School is built beside a huge rubbish dump outside Mae Sot. It is hugely better than the old site, which was dominated by a vast mountain of rubbish which threatened to engulf it at any moment, and eventually did. The new school is safe, for the moment, from encroachment. But it is not a healthy place for a school.
That said, the staff seem happy and motivated, the children are confident, outgoing and - if their English is a reliable indicator - learning well. Above you can see their mushroom shed, which was a TCT project. The mushrooms have been very successful here, and lunches supported by 'Big Give'donors will start next week. Thanks again, 'Big Give' supporters - you would be proud of what your money is achieving.
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