Apart from supporting the annual education funds for up to 40 children living in the slums area with school fees, uniforms and materials, etc., this year HHNFT additionally helped the leader of the Theprasit slum community with a great donation. During the day, when the parents of these children go to work mostly on the construction side, some children go to study at the day care centers and the very young ones stay at shelter of the leader of the Theprasit slum community. She takes care of them and they have the chance to play together until their parents return from work in the evening. After this shelter burned down by a fire, the children had no place to stay during the day and gathered near the road.  With the support from HHNFT a new shelter is now under construction and the children will not need to play along the road.

This weekend a group of international students stayed in Pattaya visiting many charity projects such as Father Ray Foundation, CPDC and Pattaya Orphanage.

On Saturday morning they set out for the CPDC to spend time with the children.  After a competition of a game of tug of war, the children had the change to choose between different kinds of ball sports whether they wanted to play volleyball, basketball or soccer. The students also gave time to teach the children some easy Origami paper handicrafts.

Before the group left for the next project they distributed sweets, toys and donated rice and sanitary products as well.

After spending time with our children at the CPDC on Saturday the students of the TCIS came to visit the orphanage. The children there had the pleasure to be taken out for lunch to MC Donald’s. Once more the students succeeded in making our children smile.

We want to thank this young people for being interested in our projects, for sharing their time with our children and for the generous donations towards our projects.

Susanne previously visited the orphanage on its 36^th anniversary. On this occasion she had the opportunity to tour the orphanage and see where HelpAlliance donations have been spent and where the benefits have been achieved, for example, the motivation room, which is very much enjoyed by all the children in their free time. Susanne will also undoubtedly remember her visit to the baby room and a special little girl with particular fondness. We hope it won’t be long before her next visit to the orphanage.

From the orphanage, the visit continued the short distance to CPDC when Ewald Dietrich, President of HHN, informed Susanne and all present about the future aims and objectives for the Centre. It was Susanne’s first visit to the Centre and she was clearly impressed with the facilities at the compound particularly the educational center and of course the pig and chicken farms, which the children are very much involved with.

We were very happy to show off to Suzanne the two accommodation houses at the Centre which were sponsored by Lufthansa’s HelpAlliance and we hope she will agree that the donations provided by HelpAlliance have been used wisely and put to the best possible use for the benefit of the CPDC. To mark this special occasion and to provide a souvenir for Susanne and her foundation team a picture was taken in front of our ‘Wall of Sponsors’ with Ewald Dietrich.

Thank you for your visit Susanne and thank you to your team at Lufthansa HelpAlliance for their generous help and donations towards the work we do at the Pattaya Orphanage and our home for the Street Kids at CPDC. We truly appreciate the goodness the kindness and support from distant support organizations like yourselve.

The day began with a traditional ceremony introduced by a parade of outstanding members of the staff and children wearing the Songkran traditional dresses. Some of the children also performed a typical dance suitable for the occasion. The element of water assumes an important role during the Songkran celebration and it is tradition that the younger generation pours water over the hands and shoulders of the older member of the family and friends in order to pay them respect. At the orphanage the older members included the teachers and senior members of the management and staff. In return, those distributed string bracelets symbolizing good luck for the New Year. Unavoidably, the traditional and gentle pouring of water developed into a wild water battle. Its only intention is to drench each other as much as possible. Of course during the hottest month of the year this is a great pleasure for every child. What is even more fun for them is to tease and wet their teachers-preferable without being seen-which they are only permitted on this occasion.  With this water splashing the PO was part of the city wide party when they moved to the front entrance on Sukhumvit.  Water was thrown on passersby who in return tried to drench the kids with the water guns and buckets they were armed with. To regain energy and enjoy, plenty of food and drinks were provided for everybody during the whole day. On this hot and wet day Songkran proved being a great pleasure for everyone, especially all the children, once again.

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The idea to celebrate Easter this way at the CPDC stem from Elfi Seitz, well known editor of Pattaya Blatt and long-time supporter of the Human Health Network Foundation Thailand (HHNFT). Elfi took a leading part in organizing the event including painting the eggs with nice pictures, which, of course, is the tradition for all good egg-hunts.

The eggs were placed together with some chocolate, sweets and small toys in a basket and, while the children were not allowed to look, then hidden around the Centre in hide-holes which – having the little kids in mind – would not be difficult to find but funny to look for and a surprise when being found.

The background of the traditional hunt for eggs at Easter was explained to the children before the signal was given to start the treasure hunt. The excitement and squeals of the young kids as they ran in all directions to find one of the Easter baskets was great also for all those who looked on and not less of the obvious joy of the children. After very child had found a basket of goodies for itself a raffle was held for everyone to participate;  the main price: a big Easter bunny.

Throughout the whole program a buffet of delicious international food was offered and enjoyed by everyone attending. The fun, the excitement, the food and of course the Easter baskets gave all the children ‘big and small’ an exciting and memorable Easter Sunday at the CPDC.

We want to extend our gratitude to all those who helped preparing and organizing this wonderful day and also to those who took part and made it a very special and happy day for the children.

Most prominently is the assignment of a new director: Ms. Aphitta Reungdej (Khun Kaew), 34, overtook the task of leading our Center in February. She received a Master Degree of Arts in Applied Linguistics for English Language Teaching (International Program) at King Mongkut’ s University, Thonburi, and prior to this had majored in Liberal Arts. All at HHNFT/CPDC are happy having such a competent and experienced person as a new member in our team. With her vast experiences working with children and in spite of the very short time she is with us, she has already proved her skills and is popular with everybody at the CPDC.

Simultaneously, Mr. Kanchanat Meemanut (Khun Aeh), 37, has been recruited as a Manager of Children’s Welfare. He graduated with Bachelor and Master Degree at Thammasat University, Faculty of Social Administration.  It is great to see how he is immediately getting into his job and to see how the children already love him.  Furthermore, two new tutors have been hired as well to take care of children’s daily aspects. Last but not least, the Drop-In-Center got a new coordinator and the outreach team was boosted.

The children are very happy and we are all confident to develop the Child Protection and Development Center into the right direction.

In the early morning the kids of CPDC took part in the opening ceremony with their tutors and without doubt they were the focus of everyone’s attention. Khun Toy (Radchada Chomjinda) from the Human Help Network Foundation Thailand represented CPDC and gave a short speech describing the work of HHNFT and its link with CPDC dedicated to the rescue of children from the streets of Pattaya.

While the opening ceremony was going on all the necessary safety precautions were provided including the operation of life guard jet-skis patrolling accompanying the children on their way. The starting shot was given at 9.30 am for the ‘fun swim’. All twenty children of the CPDC did their best and swam with tremendous enthusiasm. Without exception, not only did they all complete the course but the boy “Non” and the girl “Bow” excelled and made the second and third place. Everyone was very proud of them and what is even more important, the children were proud of themselves. As the kids came out of the water they were congratulated by members of the Rotary Club and given a towel and a refreshing drink. In addition, the Rotary Club Pattaya-Jomtien awarded them with a medal for their remarkable effort and a T-shirt to remember a very funny day.

The proceeds of the Charity Swim will go to a number of Foundations working to benefit children including The Father Ray Foundation, Banglamung Boy’s Home, Baan Jing Jai,  CPDC and others. We want to thank Khun Philipp of the Rotary Club Pattaya-Jomtien for inviting our children to this great event and express our sincere gratitude to the club for its constant support. It was a very special day for all the children who had lots of fun and who will keep this day with proud and happiness in their memories.

At lunchtime the team set out to build up a booth in front of the Alcazar theatre. Several foundations and supporters of the event presented themselves and sold their goods. The HHNFT staff together with 4 helpful children of the CPDC disposed handicrafts produced by the children of the CPDC. Among these were jewelry, bags, as well as scarves and hats against the sun. No question, all the items were green according to the tradition of St. Patrick’s Day. The team also took the chance to spread the information about our work as many customers wanted to know what the gains are spend for – of course it is to the benefit of the children at the Child Protection and Development Centre.

We would like to thank everybody who supported us that day by showing interest in our work or buying the handicrafts of our children.

Normally Songkran, the Thai New Year, is celebrated in April, however, in the CPDC it took place already now in order to thank our constant benefactors; They made an essential contribution to the development of the center and thus helped us to get along with the daily routine. What is more, they sponsor one girl living in the center and rejoiced her with nice presents. In addition, they surprised Khun Toy, director of HHNFT, with another present thus thanking her for her continuous effort to the benefit of the children.

At 10 am nine Buddhist monks began the festivity with the traditional ceremony to bless the New Year, the center and all attending. At this occasion the two new houses of the CPDC (see news) were solemnly blessed as well. After the traditional recitations the visitors were sprinkled with water and following the monks received a meal. Especially for the foreign visitors this rite was capturing and interesting. In order to pay respect and to thank their benefactors the children committed an important part of the festivity themselves by pouring water over the hands and shoulders of the special and guests.

Before and after this ceremony children of the CPDC performed Thai dance wearing beautiful Thai-style costumes. Indeed, everybody participating at the ‘Pre-Songkran’ received pertinent dressings and therefore the celebrating congregation made for a great picture. A particularly nice view was arising when the children invited the visitors to participate in dancing which everybody enjoyed.
After the monks had finished their meal everybody else had the chance to help themselves and relish the delicious food.

Thus a great event ended and everybody was happy having participated in an unusual but great Songkran-festival. We want to express our special thanks to our generous benefactors from Denmark for gracing us with their presence.

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After their visit at the orphanage the students headed to the CPDC, where they where warmly welcomed by the CPDC staff. Over there they had the chance to refresh themselves with a cup of water before the guided tour around the compound started. The group was very impressed especially by the education centre and the mushroom farm. Then the time for question had come as students and teachers were very interested in our ideas and aims.

However the best part of the visit was the moment the children came back from school. The group of the Hong Kong International School enjoyed playing different kind of ballgames with our children, such as basketball, football and monkey in the middle.

Unfortunately time went by very fast at the students had to leave our centre to go back to the Redemptorist’s Centre, where they are staying.

In the name of the staff of CPDC and HHNFT we want to thank these young people for joining our daily life for a while, for showing great interest and of course for playing with our children as well as making them enjoy their life.