To make a difference in some lives! In Thailand thousands of children are abandoned, given away and even sold into the sex trade by families that are unable or unwilling to give them the life they should have. That is a loving, safe home where they can recieve an education to break them out of the vicious cycle of illiteracy and poverty that is sure to happen. Many of our children have come to the home for a better life, some given to us by a family member or the village that they were left with. In many Thai second marriages the children from the first marriage aren’t welcomed to the family so many suffer abuse at the hands of other family members. Many of our children have stories of abuse or neglect that are typical of many children living in the poorer villages in the country. But they all have a few things in common: poverty, little education, large families and sometimes young parents (14-16 years old). We see these problems any time we travel thru the country and plan on making a difference with our children. We know that in spite of our best efforts we still can’t control what our children do but we can give them the choices that can lead to a better life for them and others.
Terry and I (Dave) were first introduced to the El Shaddai 2 family in Thailand (2002) while we were on holidays visiting family and touring the country. It was a couple of days before we were to leave for Canada that we met the children but we were immediately taken by their smiles. Then we got an up close and personal tour of the existing facility by the children and noticed all the things that they needed. Honestly there were so many that we were overwhelmed. Sewage bubbling up in the sinks during rainy season, toilets elevated 5 feet in the air on platforms outside in a shed so that they would flush, torn and decaying flooring, lack of clothing etc the list goes on. We left there with many questions about what would be the best way to help. (Lord knows we spent many hours both on our trip back and once home trying to come up with a plan). The plan we came up with was to return in 3 years to help out with our own money to do whatever we could to help make the home better. Whatever that might be we honestly didn’t know. In the meantime the Tsunami hit in 2004 and while it was all fresh in people’s minds our Pastor (Andrew Picklyk of Bible Truth church in Kamloops) found out about our plan to go help out in Thailand and asked us to lead a team over to help build a new building for the El Shaddai family. A call went out for volunteers interested in joining us and the fundraising began. Our team of ten with help from many others raised $25,000 towards building costs and off we went (everyone at their own expense) to SriRacha Thailand where we spent the better part of three weeks pouring concrete and labouring alongside Thai workers building our present home. We were quite excited about this as we were not just building a new home but participating in a viable plan to provide funding for the home in the long term. We were building a 5 story building, (four floors of rental rooms, bottom floor the home) that when paid for would provide an income for the Children’s home longterm.
Our new building
Before we even got back to Canada we knew that we being called to help the home on a greater scale, little did we know how much. After arranging for leave’s of absences from our jobs we sold our home and most of our worldly possessions in order to go to Thailand for 2 years. Our jobs originally were to help oversee building construction and provide help to the El 2 family and parents anyway we could. As things progressed we found ourselves busy with the family and noticed that the parents were doing it as a job not as parents. And the children had been through a few sets due to different circumstances but were missing out on the stability and relations that come from a loving home and parents. So in Feb 2007 we officially took over El 2 when the others let us know that they no longer wanted to be the parents. That gave us a family of 13 children and we all squished into temporary housing while we waited for our building to be finished.
Daily family transportation for 13 children, soon to be 20 plus 2 adults.
In October 2007 we were settled into the daily routines in the new home and decided we should add a baby or two to the family (like 13 wasn’t enough) so off we went to the northern jungles. To make a long story short we returned with 7 more children ranging from 4 to 10 years of age to give us a nice round 20 children total. Phew, crazy or what??? We’d been offered 15 children in the one village.
The illiteracy of the people was that many of the people signed the papers with their thumb print. (we didn’t just go scoop babies as we joke to friends) It was all done legally through the ministry and government offices. But you sure see the ral living conditions of the people in these villages, kids picking up leftover cobs of corn after the chickens abandon it to chew on, thatched huts and in general poor hygiene conditions for everyone.
More to come at a later date of trials and tribulations of raising 20 children in a foreign country. Many thanks and blessings to all of our El Shaddai 2 family supporters.
first arrived in northern village in the rain
Thailand Daddy