Sarnelli House

STORIES

Cebo Ride 2015

Another very successful Cebo Ride is over for 2015. Many thanks to the fantastic mother and daughter team Jodie and Cana Straub who organized the whole event for the second year running. Sixteen dedicated and fit cyclists rode the 50 mile course for Sarnelli House. 

Special thanks to Jon Bartow of FDL Cyclery and Mike Schneider of Badger Tire who donated T-shirts, jerseys, a SAG driver and vehicle. 

The CeboRide for 2015 made over $US100,000.00 that has gone directly to Sarnelli House to meet the needs of the 150 children living there.

It is dedicated and creative people like Jodie and Cana and before her Maggie Shea and Marian Sheridan who have kept the children of Sarnelli House well cared for over the years by organizing the CeboRide. We all at Sarnelli House – children and staff are truly grateful for their commitment and are humbled by the  generosity shown by all involved in the Cebo Ride. 

There WILL be a CEBOride next year. Keep a look out on http://ceboride.webs.com/ …

STORIES

Future careers

The university and senior high school year has already started for some students this month. Twenty seven students from Sarnelli House and the Outreach Program are being supported to attend senior school this year. It is the largest number yet and the work to get them enrolled, accepted , seek out accommodation and furnish it with fans, cupboards and cooking goods, buy uniforms, pay bills, fill in countless forms and settle them in is never ending. Br Keng and Fr Ole do a great job as does Mrs Dtim in the office coordinating all the payments and cash flow. 

Ten students are enrolling for the first time this year and their chosen studies vary from public health, economics, and fisheries to mechanics and marketing. Some are studying as far away as Bangkok and Chiang Mai while others are in the Northeastern region in Khon Kaen, Udon Thani and Nongkhai.  More than 50% are girls who are going on to further study and from this group of 27, twelve of them are living with HIV, while 6 of them are from the Outreach Program and the remaining twenty one are graduates from Sarnelli House.

 Last month was a challenge gathering them all together for photos and final form filling. Not all of them could make it so they will come later in the month to collect money and present forms and receipts. The ones who came thanked Fr Shea for all he has done to nurture them to this jumping off point in their lives and he gave them words of encouragement and blessing. 

The year ahead will be hard for many of them as they forge new friendships and learn new things, are put under the stress of meeting deadlines and are away from friends and their Sarnelli family. Some will have to decide if they will disclose their diagnosis to friends.  Some will not finish their studies as the lure of the world outside Sarnelli House will be too much for them to settle down and dedicate their time to study and others will do very well and be able to mix their social and study life. The achievements and mistakes these young adults will make are all part of reaching adulthood. Giving them opportunities for personal and professional growth and supporting them through this time is now a huge part of Sarnelli House’s role as their guardian and family.  

A big thank you to all our donors and sponsors who are so necessary in assisting us give these and upcoming children educational opportunities. A  very special thanks goes to the Carl Greer Foundation, Bakers Cheese and Gary Grendys all from the USA for their support to launch these 27 kids out into the real world for the next year. 

Kate Introna
July 2015…

STORIES

Self sufficiency

After much planning, hard work, some failures and some successes, Jomp’s Farm is starting to bear fruit.  The pigs are breeding well and this month there are three more sows pregnant, thanks to the big papa pig who is well fed and cared for. With the farm staff and the boys who live in the Gary and Janet Smith House, a pig a week is slaughtered for food for all the children’s houses. Not a trotter or an organ is wasted and the meat is stored in freezers to feed the children. Chickens on the farm are also being used for meat and a batch of them are slaughtered every two weeks. In the school holidays the younger boys from Sarnelli House learnt how to pluck the feathers from the chickens and to help prepare them for eating.  Duck eggs are being collected regularly and these boost the protein intake of the children. 

In the bakery, Sister Dominic’s project is continuing. With a team of four interested teenage girls from Nazareth House and one house mother they are focusing on improving their skills in making cakes, muffins and cookies. These are commissioned for the birthdays of visiting guests, for afternoon snacks on the weekends as well as supplying sweets for the big parties in the Mary and Joseph Hall or at local church festivities. 

The design and making of costume jewelry continues at Our Lady of Refuge Home for Girls at Vienghuk, as well crocheting bags and small souvenirs to sell overseas and locally to guests. 

The mushroom houses located near three of the children’s houses are proving to be a huge success. The children take responsibility for watering them daily and picking the ripe mushrooms when they have grown. Even with the appetites of the growing children at Sarnelli House, there is a surplus of mushrooms, and the girls at Vienghuk bag them up and walk door to door to sell them in the village. The money they make goes back to buy more mushroom spores for growing.    

The fish ponds are teeming with fish and before the rainy season in June the ponds are fished out and drained to be restocked again when they are full with rain water.  
Keeping cows is also producing results, starting with 4 cows and 1 bull, and thanks to generous donors buying us more cows, we now have seventeen. The young bulls that are born are eventually sold for $US 1000 / bull, and that money is put back into the farm. In the, dry hot months the boys have to go far and wide to find and cut fresh green grass for the cows to eat.  

Collecting cow, pig and chicken manure, turning it over and adding organic material to it weekly has it ready for the pellet making machine after about 3 months. This job is done by the older boys every week and when the organic pellets are made and packed into bags they are ready to be plowed into the rice paddies to improve the soil before planting rice every year.  

As well as the teenage boys who help on the farm in the holidays and on Saturdays in the school term, there are three families employed to live on the two farm sites. They manage the livestock, making organic fertiliser and the rice planting and harvesting.  Jomp’s Farm is a testament to Fr Shea’s farming background and to the hard work of all the staff and the boys. Working towards self sufficiency is helping to reduce costs, teaching the young adults new learning new skills and  improving the children’s health by having them eat fresh organic food.   

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STORIES

Holidays water theme

As temperatures soar up to 40C in the Northeast of Thailand in time for Thai New Year or Songkran – also known as the water festival among tourists, water becomes a major theme in the lives of the Sarnelli House children. School holidays have begun and many children have now been picked up by relatives, caught the bus or been dropped off to their homes to celebrate the coming Songkran which falls on the 12 -15th April. It is a time when families are reunited so the big cities almost shut down while their workers head home to their villages. At Sarnelli House it is a time to seek relief from the heat and to be thankful for the volunteers’ generosity in sponsoring day trips to the Water Park in Udon, visits to Tesco Lotus in Nongkhai for ice cream, KFC and shopping or visits to the Aquarium or Crocodile show in Nongkhai.

Last week 95 children, 10 staff and eight volunteers descended on the water park at Udon Thani, a 45 minute drive from Nongkhai in two cattle trucks. For three hours the kids had an amazing time – splashing each other, noisily careening down water slides, and generally keeping cool in the pools, only breaking for lunch. No one was lost or drowned and all the swimming caps that had to be hired were accounted for and returned. A big thank you to Jim Snell for sponsoring the event! 

The pool behind House of Hope gets a big workout this time of the year.  Thanks to Vrienden van Sarnelli from The Netherlands – the pool’s filter and the shower room have been repaired,  and a new  water supply for the pool established and it is running like a dream. Thanks also to Fr Chuck from the USA for sending  over the foam noodles for the kids to play with in the pool and various donors who have bought goggles and swim wear for the kids. Such is the lure of the pool that some mornings  at 8am some of the little boys from Sarnelli House are dressed in their swim wear, clutching their towels all prepared mentally and physically be picked up at  2pm for their allocated hour of swimming!  

Continuing on with the theme of water a visit to the Aquarium and the crocodile show followed by lunch on the Mekhong River for the House of Hope kids proved to be a great outing – thanks again to Ben and Angelique from Vrienden van Sarnelli. The Aquarium tour took precisely 15 minutes to complete as the little kids saw open space, tunnels and sloping  concrete floors and just wanted to run giving a cursory glance to the things swimming in the tanks on either side of them. The crocodile show kept their attention for a bit longer, a few were too scared to watch, and others were too fascinated by the toilets to watch. Lunch on a floating barge on the Mekhong River was a great way to end to the day – eating grilled fish, papaya salad and sticky rice. 

Celebrating Songkran next week with three days of water throwing should be a great antidote to the heat as well … bring it on! …

STORIES

Graduation Day at Rosario School 2015

The graduation ceremony at Rosario School started early to escape the worst heat of the day. There were about 200 students graduating from Kindergarten and Grade 9 on the same day. With sixteen young adults and one boy  from Kindergarten attending, it was a big day for Sarnelli House. The ceremony started at 08.30 with some selected children demonstrating their singing and musical abilities. Speeches were made by the Sisters and visiting dignitaries. Eventually the certificates were formally presented, and more speeches were made and official class photos taken. All the Sarnelli children met up with Fr Mike and the staff afterwards outside the school and had individual photos taken and everyone headed home about 11am. The Sarnelli kids were treated to iced chocolates and cakes in Nongkhai and then their favourite meal – grilled chicken, sticky rice and hot and spicy papaya salad treated by Angelique and Ben from Vrienden van Sarnelli (The Netherlands).  Some of the young adults who graduated from Jan and Oscar House, Nazareth House and the Gary and Janet Smith House are going on to further study in Nongkhai and Khon Kaen, others are staying to work on Jomp’s  farm at Sarnelli or at St Patrick’s helping to take care for the young girls. It was a great joy to see these teenagers so proud and happy and finishing school, and to consider how far they had come since their arrival at Sarnelli House as abandoned, sick children, many who were close to death.…

STORIES

More Relocations

In October / November of 2014 after an influx of new children – (we had 22 new children received into the Sarnelli House family in 2014 and most came in the last few months of the year), the boys from Jan and Oscar House were moved out to the new house on Jomp’s Farm. This house was originally intended for boys who would not be able to work in the outside world and who had learning or behavioural problems. However with the growing need of accommodating more girls, a decision was made to use the house on the farm sooner rather than later. The Gary and Janet Smith House now houses 17 teenage boys in one big upstairs dormitory. There are bunk beds and old lockers in the room and it has sweeping views over flat, brown, dry rice paddies at the moment. In the wet season the views will be of green and verdant rice paddies. A few add ons need to be completed such as a study room for the boys and a drying area for clothes and a cemented area for the boys to play basket ball or takraw. A sky lab (or tuk tuk) has been purchased for transport to and from the farm, and three boys only have the responsibility of driving it – Deep, Leew and Dow. There are no shops close by and the boys were originally walking their way after school in the dark back to the farm. There are no street lights and the road is dirt and unpaved. Now the boys have repaired some old bicycles and are using them to get in and out of the farm. There is a lady who comes out to cook for them but they are falling behind in getting their school clothes in order, keeping their belongings tidy and getting to bed on time. Presently the house parent job is being divided up between Fr Ole and one of the house mothers from Sarnelli House Ms Noo, but a permanent placement needs to be made to give the boys some continuity and someone who they can rely on being there for them. Maybe a former prison warden would be more in keeping with their style than a housemother!​

After the boys departed, the Jan and Oscar House in Pi Si Tong is now home to 8 teenage girls. They are older, more responsible girls who do not need the same level of supervision as the smaller girls. Most of them study in Nongkhai so they have long days – getting home after 6pm most days. They have the big upstairs dormitory to themselves and after a few minor alterations were made to the bathrooms like putting a door on, they have settled in well to their new space.  …

STORIES

On Jomp’s farm

The rainy season is a very busy period on Jomp’s farm. Our staff and the kids have put in an enormous shift in order to get everything done and ready on time. A large part of this season involves waiting for rain, worrying about rain and praying for more rain. Without the rain, the rice can’t be planted and without enough, the rice won’t grow. Thankfully it has rained – albeit belatedly – and the rice is growing well and beginning to bend from the weight of the heavy kernels. It’s a beautiful sight, particularly late in the evening, as the setting sun lends a warm glow to the fields of rich green rice stalks. The ploughing and planting took place in late July and early August, with all available hands on deck. Almost every member of staff was out there, ankle deep in muddy water, bent over for hours on end, separating the rice stalks in their hands and planting them into the wet earth. For three weeks, the backs were bent as rows and rows were laid in almost military fashion. The teenagers helped at the weekends, bringing a gaiety and clamour to the fields. In between the work, they teased and gossiped, the silence of the hard work broken by chatter and peals of laughter. Nobody complained, everybody got on with it and by mid August, the fields were finally full. The clouds weren’t so full however and the patchy rain had everybody worried. It came, promising more and then nothing for days. Finally by the start of September, the heavens opened and the rain thundered down, filling the rice paddies and cooling the farmers’ nerves. The rice will be harvested by mid-November and we hope to have enough to at least feed all the children here at Sarnelli House. 

The heavy rain filled the fish ponds too, but not before they were cleared out of weeds and other vegetation. The staff and kids waded in, chest high and ripped anything and everything out of the banks. Any fish found were fed to the kids. Dirty work but again, little to no complaining. Freshly cleared, the ponds were re-stocked with tiny fish. These will be allowed to grow to adult size and then caught and fed to the children. The farm boys were busy again with a more literal form of dirty work, collecting cow dung and missing it with rice husks and other organic waste to create our own home made fertiliser, which will be spread on freshly ploughed fields in our new vegetable and fruit gardens. We aim to develop fruitful gardens supplying garlic, chilli, onion, cabbage, beans, pumpkin and herbs to our kitchens. There will be banana trees as well as we strive to make ourselves more self-sufficient. It is also important for the children of Sarnelli House to appreciate the value of their food and the hard work that has gone into growing it. Some of them love helping out on Jomp’s Farm, and there are now seven Sarnelli boys working on the farm full time. School wasn’t the best place for some of them and others might struggle in regular Thai society and now they are guaranteed an income and the dignity of work, while learning the skills and traditions of Isaan farming.…

STORIES

In Memoriam Francis Wiwat Simmaluang (Teep)

Wiwat Simmalunag was born in the Nongkhai Province of Thailand on 09-03-1995. His parents died of AIDS soon after. When Teep was diagnosed of having the AIDS virus, villagers were alarmed, and physically abused the child. Teep was brought to Sarnelli at the age of 6, on January 1, 2001. These were the days before doctors and hospitals would give out anti-retrovirus drugs, and Teep had shingles 4 times. Each attack would leave him in terrible pain and weak. Then, he contacted TB and had to take some very strong medicine. Years later, when we were finally able to obtain anti-retroviral medicines, Teep’s learning abilities were badly damaged by drugs he had taken.

In the meantime, Teep was baptized in 2001, and took the name Francis. He was a fine young Catholic lad, and he received communion regularly and was confirmed.

Despite all the sickness and suffering, and the frustrations of learning, Teep grew up to be a big kid; a gentle giant. He was polite to his elders; kind and considerate to his friends and all the children at Sarnelli House. Teep loved farming. Once he finished junior high school, he gladly took up residence at the Gary & Janet Smith home in the fields of Don Wai. He was in his element, working with his hands on a farm. It is this farm work that ultimately killed him.

About a month ago, farm workers, Teep among them, were butchering a pig. It had been raining, and the floor of the abattoir was wet and muddy. The workers had a cauldron of boiling water ready. As they were pulling the dead pig to the butchering area, Teep lost his grip on the pig’s hoof, and his feet shot out from under him, sending him backwards into the boiling water. His hands could not immediately get purchase on the sides of the cauldron, and his friends pulled him out. Teep was rushed to the hospital, and then sent to the burn unit in the University Hospital in Khon Kaen. He was in deep pain, and had fluid in his lungs and showed initial signs of an impending heart attack. But, he seemed to slowly be improving. Ms. Em, his house mother was with him, with a few friends, and she promised him that she would not leave until they returned to Sarnelli House together. Em kept that promise, but not in the way she envisioned.

On the morning of October 18, we received the shocking news of Teep’s death; a quiet journey to eternity at about 4:30 AM. Teep returned to Sarnelli House that evening, and was waked with Masses every evening for three days. On October 21, we celebrated Teeps’ life at Mass, and then village men from two villages carried Tepp’s body to our crematorium, where his body was cremated. His ashes were collected to be buried in the little cemetery behind Sarnelli House.  The presence of so many villagers who knew Teep showed his popularity with simple ordinary folk, who really loved and respected him. The silent grief of the crowd attending the cremation, including Teep’s two aged grandmothers, attested to the love we all had for him.

Requiescat in pace.…