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Trip to Burma

The Womens Group in their sewing room.

We had a really sucessful visit on our March trip to Burma. Here is a summary of what we did, and the projects we supported:

DAY 1 - Arrived late PM and settled in, met with Dr Allan and discussed some of the current projects.

DAY 2 - Met with the new Archbishop and the pastor of the village where we have built the school. The meetings are becoming more open and relaxed with each visit, which really enables us to build better relationships and communicate more clearly about the projects, which is really encouraging. This time the pastor ate lunch with us, which I think was a big leap from previous years! Also dropped in and visited the Grief and Trauma training class that was going, an initiative of SCW.

DAY 3 - Met a group of volunteer, retired doctors and nurses who are running a free medical clinic and providing health care training. One of the nurses was 86 years old and still going strong! Also visited one of the day care centres in Yangon...I have never seen such an enthusiastic group of under 2-5 year old singers! As usual, the most interesting thing for them was looking at their photos on the digital camera...

DAY 4 - Visited on of the re-settlement areas (pop. approx 200,000), to get a good sense of what these displaced communities are like to live in. On the way over in the ferry, we met a 7 year old boy who was working in the school holidays to save for his school fees for the next term. His day starts at 4am, selling cigarettes and tissues. He was quite the salesman. I paid 10 times the local price for tissues. Still, they only cost me 50c. The pottery factory in the community was seriously overstocked, and the workers spin the pottery wheel by hand, while the other makes the pots. 200 pieces of potter per day will make them approx $2usd for their work.

DAY 5 - 3 1/2 hour journey by car to visit the womens sewing group we have supported. Its great to meet face to face, and really helpful to understand the context and constraints which they live under. It also enabled us to help them take some new directions to increase their earning capacity. In addition to the sewing group, they are also caring for a number of young children from the border area, so it was important we look at increasing their capacity in some way so that they could care fully for those children.

DAY 6 - Began the trek home.

PROJECTS YOU SUPPORTED WITH YOUR DONATIONS:

1. VILLAGE SCHOOL - Approximately 20% of the primary age children aren't attending the school, mostly due to caring for younger siblings. We discussed the possibility of opening a day care centre in order to address this issue. Also, we are looking at establishing a long term income generating project and encourating community participation through a volunteer roster at the day care centre to assist the two staff members, as there could be up to 80 children! We also tripled the crop capacity that the school is currenlty growing, which naturally will assist their income. Community involvement is essential to this projects' success, so the leaders will be meeting shortly to discuss ways of involving the whole community. As we do not have permission yet to visit, we are hoping on the next trip to make it at least to the main road into the community, then perhaps some of the villagers can make the 1 hour trip in to meet with us there. Total commitment: $3000 USD

2. MCDC, Maternal and Child Day Care centre is a project of the volunteer clinic whichi is running in central Yagon. This is the official 'GRIND' project...all the funds that GRIND raised went to assisting in building repairs (the timber building is starting to rot, due to flooding in the monsoon season), diabetic testing equipment (Rice has a high GI, and many people are developing diabetes), medical training for rural villagers (this is focussed on 'at risk' women who without employment will likely make the move across the Thai border into prostitution), and also purchased 10 sewing machines for an income generating project that will train some of these women as well. $1650 USD

3. DELTA REGION HIGH SCHOOL - Any child in this area that wants and can afford further education has to leave home. So, we have started phase 1 of the building, which is the concrete flooring and timber infrastructure, with bamboo walling. Once this has been built, the walls will last approximately 3 years, at which time we can re-invest a further amount of funding to replace them with brick. $2000 USD

4. ORPHANAGE - Income generating activity for an orphanage that has 50 boarders (temporary) and 50 orphans (permanent). $1000 USD

5. ORPHANAGE - School enrollment fees, equipment and uniforms for one orphanage of 15 children in the Karen State. $450 USD

6. ORPHANAGE - Income generating activity for the above orphanage. $350 USD

7. WOMEN'S GROUP - Purchasing of 3 acres of land, crop supplies and 1 years staffing for bean (dry season) and rice (wet season) crop. $450 USD

8. LE LE MON - Le Le Mon is in a fairly dire personal situation, a single mum with chronic health problems, she had to sell her only income source (her sewing machine) in order to pay for food and medical bills. We purchased a new sewing machine and equipment for her. $100 USD

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL OF YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS...ISNT IT AMAZING HOW MUCH WE CAN ACHIEVE TOGETHER?!