Three boys in need of help.

This is a family desperately in need of help.  There are 7 in the household, including the three boys, and everyone who can, works.  Father and grandparents work as casual labourers in the construction industry and Mum works part-time preparing food for a vendor, as needed.  They rent the land and erected the house themselves.  It's quite roomy in that they've made three partitioned bed spaces and a small living area with a T.V. set and there is a small toilet/bathroom area, and a partially covered outside cooking area.  Clothes are on racks down one side of the interior of the house or on hangers around the place and they have a refrigerator, electricity and a tank to provide water.  The floor is concrete covered in part by pieces of lino. Mum keeps it as tidy as she can.

As you can see from the photographs it's hardly a palace.  They've used corrugated sheets, wooden crates, stiff board and advertising materials as walls and roofing.  There are holes everywhere in the original roof which have been silicone sealed to prevent the rain coming in, but there are areas where rain comes in through the gaps between the top of the "walls" and the roof.  Windows are pushed out pieces of wood held in place by supports. There are no insect screens.  You can see in one part of the roof they channel the incoming rain into the toilet/shower area.  All around the outside is piled high with trash that's been collected to be sorted and sold.  To get to it you are well off the main road, and I hate to think what it must be like today after the storm we had last night.   It's a humbling experience looking into other people's lives and realizing how hard life can be for them.  It certainly puts my woes in perspective!

When the original assessment was made, they had a debt of 10,000 B on which they paid 6000B per month - interest only. Last week there was a violent storm and half of the roof blew off, so they borrowed another 10,000 B to get it fixed.  We don't yet have the details of how this will impact the monthly budget, but the Social Worker will look into it.  They are also making repayments on 2 motorcycles.

When we looked at the file initially the income was approximately 24,000 B and the basic expenditure 20,417 B.  Mum opened a storage container (an old paint tub) and showed us a handful of very poor rice - all she had to feed the family.  I wanted to cry.  How can they ever get out from under? We sent over 10 Kgs rice and some fish sauce, tinned fish and cooking oil this morning.

The boys need kitting out for school, so Suky will speak to Nok and we will arrange for them to be taken over to Naklua to get what they need.

http://www.slumkids.org/

                                               100 Years From Today
It will not matter how big your bank account was, the sort of house you lived in, or the kind of car you drove. But the world may be a little better because your help touched the life of one child.