Give Children A Choice February 2007 Trip To Laos and Cambodia
I came across Give Children A Choice’s Weblog, most of us might have read about them from reading www.voanews.com, Give Children A Choice to Build Ten Preschools in Laos This Year, …“Our goal was 3 preschools for the years 2004, 2005 and 2006,” said Mr. Dori Shimoda, founder and president of Give Children A Choice “but we completed three for each of those years.”
Give Children A Choice has set a target to build a total of 10 preschools this year. Mr. Shimoda said so far five have already been built, and he expected five more to be finished before the end of the school year. Read rest of article here.
Their recent trip to Laos and Cambodia article was amazing; this is from part of their blog posting,
Give Children A Choice Preschools - Laos
Two new preschools in Souane Luang and Long Or have been completed since the last Give Children A Choice trip in August 2006, thanks to contributions from Steve and Maureen Rathgaber (NYCE), John Pinto (NYCE) and Lori Gilbert, Mike and Denise McCarthy (both of NYCE) and many other Give Children A Choice supporters. Give Children A Choice works closely with the Luang Prabang Education department to identify villages in need of a preschool.
Give Children A Choice Health Fairs - Laos
Following two pilot health fairs in August 2006, Give Children A Choice held two free health fairs in Mouang Khai and Long Or during this visit. An additional medical checkup session was held at the Aine Savanh preschool. Four physicians from New York City’s St. Barnabas Hospital traveled to Laos to donate their services. They believe, as Give Children A Choice does, that healthy children make better students.
… Over the five days of the health fairs, over 200 children were inoculated and 300 medical checkups were performed. Read more.
[...] I did a post on Give Children A Choice February 2007 Trip To Laos and Cambodia, I have had mixed feelings. I’m very happy to see that there’re people out there that are kind [...]
[...] I did a post on Give Children A Choice February 2007 Trip To Laos and Cambodia, I have had mixed feelings. I’m very happy to see that there’re people out there that are kind [...]
The “Fame” and “Success” we have enjoyed recently has been short and bittersweet. It is through many years of hard work, dedication, and patience, that Give Children a Choice has been able to not only overcome it’s obstacles, but to achieve it’s goal to build over 10 schools by the end of this year. “Jumping on the Bandwagon ” to gain fame is a statement made in cold indifference to the helpless situation of the children of Laos. Our Goals have always been to focus on building schools and by doing so, we are also building futures for the children of Laos…. the children of your ancestral lands.
We have been quietly working with the Lao Education dept to achieve these goals of 15 schools in 5 years before is is considered popular. Believe me, it has not be a glamourous life. In fact, mostly everything gets lost in the translation and we have to find a balance to be able to start from square one to 10 all over again. Since travelling at least 2 times a year to Laos for the past 4 years, I can actually say that it gives new meaning to “jet setting” We lug no less than 8 huge boxes stuffed with clothing, school supplies, crayons, coloring books and hundreds of stuffed animals( no child should be without one) for every trip 30,000 miles away by ourselves. We are a team of 5 dedicated people who have regular jobs, families and lives just like everyone else.
We work on GCAC after we come home from a hard day’s work. So everything has been achieved through hard work and dedication to helping these young children get a headstart in life. Dori Shimoda, the founder if anyone has ever had the pleasure to meet him will tell you that he is pure of heart and passionate to help Laos. A child at heart, he relates to them in a special way that so refreshing. In Laos, he is known by the locals by “Son of Lao”. It is said that if he builds a school in a village, he will come and pay homage to the village leaders time and time again….with a balloon in hand for each child. Debbie, our executive Director is equally passionate for the children she helps both stateside and abroad. Her background is in volunteerism and she keeps us on track from trip schedules to ensuring that all donated funds are correctly allocated to build schools and to help the children. Me, I organize all the healthfairs, encourage medical staff from here to come and volunteer and have the experience of a lifetime.
To date, we done 7 healthfairs since last year. We work with the Health dept and the village to implement a vaccination program for all the women and children. It is a shame when a parent has to bury their child who died unecessarily becuase they had no money to seek medical attention of buy medicine for himor her. In every village I have heard of at least one or more cases of sick children whose parents just “lay them down to die” because of these reasons. We came upon such a case earlier this year. A woman from a far neighboring village heard about us and traveled 5 hours by foot up and over 4 mountains to reach us for medical attention for her young son. she carried him all the way. If we were not there, he would have surely died from infection in both his feet. It costs about $5.00 to save his live including medicine. Our coordinators, Thongchanh and Goi work day and night to expedite all of our plans , working with both the Education dept and Health dept to achieve our goals.
We are a small grassroots organization whose mission and focus is to lead the children of Laos out of poverty and illiteracy and improve the living conditions for the betterment of all. We all work hard to network with new and existing donors who find great value in our services in that 100% of all donations go to the children and all of their scholastic needs. Ours schools are finished and ready to open for class within a 3 month period. So if I had to define fame and success, YES! We already have it in the hearts and minds of the wonderful Lao people we have all come to love and care about. They know our track record speaks for itself. But this has been an experience and adventure of a lifetime that is ongoing, is everchanging and ever evolving. I encourage all Lao Americans to become successful in all of their endeavors, but don’t forget to give back to your forgotten brothers and sisters in Lao. They need your help. BTW… this was written by an American who genuinely cares…
Sincerely,Barbara Lee Shimoda RNVice President/Director Healthcare ProgramsGive Children A Choice Inc. http://www.givechildrenachoice.org