Charity Activity
Khao Lak School Project
WAT SAWAM AROM RAWAI SCHOOL 18 JUNE 2010
On 18 June Blandine & Claude went to Wat Sawam Arom Rawai School to get an update of the children Skal Phuket is helping since 2006. We met with school director Khun Chaiyot and children teacher.
In this School, Skal Phuket is now helping 8 children who are mainly orphans or coming from poor family as well as sea gypsy.
We were happy to see that the kids are doing well and enjoy the school.
We have told them that as always, this year we will organize the children day and it will be on 21 August 2010. We will let them know of the program but you could see from their smile that they are really looking forward to this day!!
Blandine & Claude
18 June 2010
KHAO LAK AND RAWAI SCHOOL PROJECT 25 JULY 2009 / CHILDREN’S DAY
Our now very popular children day was organized on 25 July 2009. From all school in Khao Lak and Rawai, we had a total of 25 children and teacher.
We started the day with the eco-trail at the Evason in Rawai, where the children learn how to preserve the environment and how to recycle, it was very interesting and all kids enjoyed the tour and asked many questions.
After that it was time to visit the aquarium, where it is always fun to see those colorful fish. We had some refreshment there and went to have a lunch in town. Thank you to Christophe and Exotissimo to provide free buses for the whole day and that include pick-up and send back the children to Khao Lak.
After a delicious lunch, we drove to Patong Junkceylon to have some ice cream generously donated by Giani and Pluto Ice Cream. Then the highlight of the day came with the movie “Ice Age 3”. Fantastic movie even VP Claude and Secretary Jorge had a lot of fun watching it!!
It was almost 6pm and time for the children to go back home. It was a great day for the children but also for us, and we are all looking forward to the next one!!
Claude, Jorge, Simon
25 July 2009
KHAO LAK AND RAWAI SCHOOL PROJECT 03rd MARCH 2007 / CHILDREN’S DAY
The Skal Phuket decided to organize a Children's day for the three schools in Khao Lak and one in Rawai, which Skal Phuket is now also sponsoring. A total of 12 children (6 from Khao Lak and 6 from Rawai) joined the children day together with their respective teachers.
On the 03rd of March in the morning we all met at the Phuket Zoo for the first visit of the day. The children had a lot of fun watching the elephant show and the monkey show and you could see real happiness in their eyes. It was also a good visit for us (Hajo & Claude) as we were visiting the Zoo for the first time, although we thought the Zoo could do with some maintenance and cleaning. Anyway, the kids enjoyed themselves and this was the most important.
At about 12.30, we all felt hungry and went to have a nice lunch at a seafood restaurant next to the Phuket Zoo. Lot's of food were display, but after 2 hours all plates were empty and all tummies full! With Hajo, we thought, ummm now it's time for a nap… but this was not on the children agenda! They knew, we still have more things to do in the afternoon and the nap was postponed to some other time!
Back in the mini bus (graciously offer by AsianTrails and Hoteltravel.com, thank you Beat & Fredy!) and drive down to Phuket Aquarium, but before that we stop at the Mangrove reforestation project where Evason Phuket has replanted thousands of mangrove trees.
This was our educational stop and indeed very interesting as the Evason team (Thank you for spending the whole day with us!) explain to the children how important the mangrove is to the coastal zone by preventing coastal erosion and providing habitats for wildlife.
We then drive down to the Aquarium for the last stop of the day.
The visit of the Aquarium was great, especially since the renovation. We finish with some ice cream and give all kids the educational books and toys that we bought for them,
Over all it was a great day for all of us and the kids had a lot of fun and they simply asked; "When is the next one?"
Back row from left: Hajo Von Keller (President SKAL), Nathalie (Evason Management Trainee), Claude Sauter (Vice President SKAL), Khun Nop (Evason Sport & Activity Manager) together with the children and teachers.
Dear Skal Members,
Jaspal and I have met the teachers in charge of the nine children that we are supporting in the three schools. We have also met and
spoken to various caretakers / parents of the children and to eight of the nine children themselves.
We have received copies of the bank books which show the credits of Skal Phuket and the debits which have to be made in the presence of both the teacher and their parentorcaretaker of each child. All debits are within the money we have donated. School fees have been paid and the children were all pretty well groomed with clean and new looking uniforms.
The performance of the children in the schools is satisfactory, except for two of them. We have discussed this with their parent / caretaker and with the teacher and we will compare the results during our next visit.
As you can see from the pictures, the schools have received a lot of support in terms of infrastructure, hardware and learning material. It seems obvious though that the children who have lost both of their parents and who now live with 2nd degree family members, still have notdigested the tragedy. Physiological assistance is not given by professionals.
In a first step, we have and will continue to identify people who can offer some kind of moral support and we are trying to source volunteers who can offer
professional psychological support. This is something not very common in Thailand and if you look the children at all these schools in the eyes, you realize that
hundreds, if not thousands are not very joyful.
Please do feel free to contact the undersigned for any further information.
Claude Baltes
December 2006
Skal International Phuket would like to thank Skal International and all other donors for their generous financial support by sponsoring our post Tsunami charity project.
During the Asian Congress held in Phuket in May 2005, Mr. Matanyah Hecht and other members of the Skal International Committee took the opportunity to visit Kao Lak and Takua Pa to get a personal impression and overview on the devastation in the worst affected area hit by the Tsunami.
Skal International Phuket has received well over 1 Mio. Baht in donation for its Tsunami relief fund. After carefully studying several opportunities and possibilities it was decided to spend around Baht 500,000 by supporting a total of nine children in three schools around Takua Pa and Ban Man Kem.
Our financial support of the children is meant to be for their education and the cost involved thereof. The children will receive Baht 500 per month for school
fees, etc. in quarterly installments made through our treasurer, Khun Suwit Auttayatamavitaya.
The access to the money is jointly controlled by us and
the teachers at the respective schools in order to eliminate any wrong doings.
Four of our members here at Skal International Phuket have kindly agreed to oversee the schooling project over the coming years and we would like to thank Khun Methee Tanmanatragul, Jaspal Singh, Claude Baltes and Claude Sauter for their engagement.
They will report twice per year on the progress of the project and visit the children and their teachers at the end of each school term to ensure that our money is well spent.
Several members of our committee visited Takua Pa in October 2005 to introduce ourselves to the children, their parents and teachers and inform them of our intent to support them.
The children are between 4 and 14 years old and Skal International will support them until they finish high school. Should one or several of them wish to join a university, more funds will be made available.
We are currently still looking for a second project where we can donate another Baht 600,000 approximately and will announce in this section of our website, once the money has been donated.
Please visit our website regularly for more updates on our charity projects.
Urs Aebi
Vice-President
October 2005
