Raya
THE AID WORK
PHASE 4:
In the morning of 22.2.2005 when leaving for our 4th trip to Khao Lak we had money:Finnish people bank transfers: | 402.898 Thb (8.394 euro) |
Money leftover from Phase 3: | 173.147 Thb (3.607 euro) |
TOTAL FUNDS: | 576.045 Thb (12.001 euro) |
Our team was Garry Halpin and Anna Vermas. We wanted to visit the Ban Nam Khem School to meet up with the parents. Garry had called the school earlier and they hadn’t been able to get hold of the parents. We also wanted to visit some of villages that Nigel had last week told us about to talk with the people who didn’t get any help from the camps.
TIME 11:00
NAM KHEM VILLAGE: We did a quick ride through the village to see the situation and saw that the army was helping the people to build houses.
NAM KHEM SCHOOL: 390 pupils (last week 320), 27 dead, 7 orphans (last week 5), 6 without a father, 17 without a mother (last week 11).
Last week we talked to the Vice Principle of the school, this week the Director, so we presume that this week’s figures are accurate.
Yesterday money had been given out to all of the pupils so we decided to help the children who had lost one or two parents. We talked to the Director of the school and he provided us with the lists of children who had lost either one parent or both of them in the tsunami, altogether 30. There were also 20 orphans attending the school before the tsunami. Some of the tsunami orphans had received monetary help from some people from Switzerland, Germany and Canada for an education fund, not actual cash to the children. We gave each of the troubled children 5.000 Thb. We also talked with the teachers and they are also in a difficult situation. Nobody is helping them in any way even though they live in the village and their houses had been damaged or lost altogether. We gave the teachers 1.000 Thb each (24 teachers).
MONEY GIVEN OUT: 50 X 5.000 Thb 24 X 1.000 Thb = 274.000 Thb.
TIME 12:00
KHUK KLAK VILLAGE NRO 3: The woman we helped last week was our guide at the village and she came to walk with us to visit the people. With the villagers we were going to assess the situation first and then decide how to go from there. We met a man who had lost his whole family and was left with two empty houses, tsunami had swept through them. He told us that at the time the tsunami hit, his parents were on the beach selling souvenirs to the tourists. We thought about an amount to give and decided to give him 3.000 Thb. One older woman had lost her daughter who was taking care of the family store, which was also badly damaged, and we decided to give her 3.000 Thb. At one alley we found fishermen fixing their fishing traps and gave each of them 1.000 Thb. Close by was a man rebuilding his house, he had received some building supplies from some Frenchman and we decided to help him by giving him 3.000 Thb. Next door, another man who had in injured himself and lost his wife in the tsunami was rebuilding his house, we gave him 3.000 Thb. On our way back to the car, we saw a man who used to be a driver for Raya Divers, now unemployed, we gave him 3.000 Thb.
MONEY GIVEN OUT: 5 X 3.000 Thb 7 X 1.000 Thb = 22.000 Thb.
TIME 14:00
BOAT DRIVERS THAPLAMU: We met with former boat captains and boat boys from Thaplamu harbour. Some of the Finnish people donating money to us had wishes that we would try to help these people since they are now unemployed and some of them lost familymembers at the tsunami as well. We gave each of them 3.000 Thb MONEY GIVEN OUT: 14 X 3.000 Thb = 42.000Thb.
TIME 16:30
Back to Phuket, Phase 4 complete
MONEY GIVEN OUT TOTAL: 338.000 Thb (7.042 euro).
CONCLUSION
The Nam Khem School and nearby camps have received help from us and other sources and therefore we will concentrate on helping the people in the small villages which are not receiving any help. The best thing is to walk around the villages and talk with the people and go from there.