September 2007  

Dear friends!  

I just returned from a seminar in Pattaya. Father Felix, a Puerto Rican Redemptorist from our big house in Rome, did a great job in presenting "Challenges and Leadership", the course given us. It was an eye opener for us monks in Thailand, since we are kind of out of the loop over here.

The 137 kids are all relatively well. Little Josie, who has cerebral palsy, just returned from the hospital. Miss Bee is still recovering from plastic surgery, and still looks pretty bad. She makes the nurse put a big bandage over her face, so kids can't see how extensive the surgery was. The doctor swears she will be a little beauty when the face heals. I wonder if all those extensive scars and stitch marks will disappear. The kids have the usual colds they pick up during the rainy season. Also, a bit of good news. Our latest acquisition, The Baby Hippo is looking less like a hippo, and more like a fat little baby. The Baby Buffalo is also losing her nickname and is being called "Bai Dtue." (Whatever that means!) Chatchai is alert and chipper after they stopped the ARV medicines, and gave him some blood.

We have the Nazareth House furnished, so we will be moving the teenage girls who have AIDS, to their new home. It has to stop raining first, and that will probably be another three weeks or more. We will also move the babies and rug rats from the House of Hope, and goose step the little monsters to Nazareth House, while we raze and rebuild the House of Hope into a two story building. I am sure they will not like the move, and are steeling myself for a lot of guff from the irate little toads.

We also have to add on to the dorm in Viengkhuk. We have a lot of adults (over 100 of them) that come to our Friday clinic. The clinic is a small building behind the church in Viengkhuk. The nuns in school are complaining that these people come just as school is opening and they don't like their presence, as some of them are very sick, and look bad. So, I will add on a big dorm room for the little girls, and use their present dorm (which used to be our AIDS adult center) as our clinic. We need to stay in Viengkhuk, because it has bus service on the main road and many of the AIDS sufferers come and go on busses.

I want to take this opportunity to thank my webmasters. Brother Ole is studying for the priesthood in our Redemptorist seminary in Davao ( Philippines), and Wolfgang Siebeck lives and works in Phukhet. Both are faithful, generous people who have the kids and their future at heart. We would be crippled, without their help and sacrifice.

Again, thank you very much for your kindness and interest in the children. The children offer their prayers every evening for those who help them and for those who are sick and weak, as they often are. God bless you.  

Gratefully,

Fr. Mike

back to top