The Miracle of Giving
by David Louridas
Teach in Thailand
Tatiana and I visited a temple in Lopburi called Wat Phra Bat Nampu, which houses final stage AIDS patients. There, we were deeply moved and heard that they have a "partner" organization called "Dramaraksa II", which was created to house children who were born with HIV or acquired it after, or have lost their family to AIDS/been abandoned. There are some children who do not have HIV, but all have been orphaned. We then made contact with that orphanage and organized a visit. Our first visit was on the weekend of Christmas, and it went very well. While we were there, we were very touched by the children and saw all of the resources that they were lacking. We saw other organizations come to give donations, but they gave only small, second-hand things that most people would be embarrassed to say that they donated if asked about it. (i.e., board games missing the board and pieces, electronics that were broken or with no batteries, clothes for adults, etc.----no joke) We then on our way home decided that there are many things that would be great to give these children, so we started thinking of how to raise funds.
I went back to my school and started talking to my boss, the head of the English Program at Anuban Saraburi School. I came up with the idea of a Walk-a-Thon to raise the funds, along with getting additional donations before the actual event. I presented the idea of a Walk-a-thon fundraiser for the orphanage to her. She was on board, although she had never heard of a fundraiser like this before. After multiple explanations of what a Walk-a-Thon was, I wrote up a proposal, she presented the idea to the director, and we were on our way to creating it. I started by creating a letter detailing the event written in English. Then one of the teachers translated it into Thai. The letter detailed the event and asked for donations before the actual event. We sent it out to the students, and even before the event began, we raised around 50,000 baht JUST FROM STUDENT DONATIONS. We were absolutely shocked with the generosity of our students. Also, during this time, I created a facebook page, and along with the help of Katherine Gutschenritter and Rory Bevins we spread the word through America and beyond. We organized a MoneyGram transaction through my mother and Kat and Rory organized a PayPal account that we could put the donations into to be collected later.
Then, on February 25th, it was time for the Walk-a-Thon. There were about 150 students that came out to participate in the event, and I was very impressed. They walked/ran for an hour straight, each with their own number for the event. Many teachers/staff/parents showed up and gave more donations. It did not go completely as planned, I must say, but it went very well. After adding the donations we received from the Walk-a-Thon, we got a total of another 10,000 baht in one day. We then gathered all of the donations from abroad, which added to a total of about $2,800 (84,000 baht). This gave us a grand total of a little under 150,000 baht. It was then time to begin the planning for what to do with the money. We already had a general idea of what we wanted to buy, but the actual logistics of it were the problem.
Then, the miracle happened. We were randomly talking at a restaurant after the Walk-a-Thon with friends, and one of our Thai friends out of the blue offered us the rental of a large flatbed truck for free to transport things. Then, another one of our Thai friends offered to help us with the purchases/transports during the week. In the course of a week, we organized the truck arrival time, ordered massive orders through Pizza Company and KFC, and bought/organized the buying of all of the materials that we need. The following is a list of the MAJORITY of the things we were able to afford through the generosity of everyone:
31 bicycles
20 scooters
67 pairs of sandals (1 for each child!)
50+ children's books for their library
Washing machine
Karaoke machine with large speakers, and a TV to go with it
2 Playstation 2s, 4 controllers, 2 memory cards, 5 games
2 concrete volleyball posts with volleyball net
5 volleyballs and a container for them
5 soccer balls with 2 soccer nets
Jumbo play kitchen for the girls, with cookware and "food"
Mini-pool (blow-up pool)
2 ping-pong tables (with extra paddles and ping-pong balls)
Markers, crayons, pencils, erasers, etc.
Cooking oil for the kitchen
Over 15 DVDs
2 badminton sets, with extra birdies
150 pieces of chicken from KFC, along with french fries for 100 people
14 pizzas from Pizza Company (Thai "Pizza Hut")
When we arrived at the orphanage to drop off the donations we bought, we were met by the director of the English Program at my school and
several other Thai teachers who came to support us. We then prepared the presentation of all of our gifts, and presented them to the students. We ate a meal full of pizza and chicken, along with soda, and then made sure that everyone was fitted with a new pair of sandals. Then came the fun part: playing with all of the toys!! With the help of everyone, we set things up, installed new appliances, built things that needed to be built, and then joined in the celebration. It was wonderful to see children that appreciate so little finally have many things to do and experience. One of the downfalls that I saw with the other groups (besides the glaring one about the shoddy donations) was that they delivered these donations, took pictures, and left. I didn't want this to be like that. So, 10 of us spent the night, as Tatiana, Rory, Katherine, and I had done in the past. This way, we were able to spend time with the kids and be there to show them how to work some things.
I was just absolutely moved and touched by how much support we got for this event. It was a great experience, and I hope its success can be shared with others so that there are more events like it.