Buddhist Lent with Surachai Seebubpa
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My Story is not at all important, but I believe that my wife's story is and is a typical story for Thai people.
Tewi, my amazing wife is full of energy, motivation and is driven by a passion to achieve what she sets out to do. Her mother was a local teacher in the south of Thailand on the Andaman coast line near Phuket.
Encouraging and teaching her daughter, she sent Tewi away to Bangkok at 18 to do her degree because there were no universities in Thailand except in Bangkok, to help her with her studies. Tewis Mum (an amazing lady) took a second job at night to help with the costs of receiving a degree as all education in Thailand is fee paying.
After my wife passed her B.A she then found a job in Bangkok and did what all Thai Families do, she sent almost 50% of her income home to her mother, just leaving herself enough to live on. The money that was sent back to her mother was then used to help pay for Tewi's step-sisters to get an education as well.
Five years later Tewi decided that she wanted to go back and take her Masters Degree and once again her mother took a second job to help her daughter achive her dream. Once again , Tewi got a better paying job and sent even more money home to her mother.
In September a few years ago, being a school teacher herself, it was a very proud moment for Tewi's mother when she signed up to take a PhD Degree in Educational Leadership.
On December 26th that year, my wife like the rest of the world awoke to the horror TV pictures showing the devestation of the Tsunami. To our horror my wife's mother was killed and her body never recovered. Tewi made a promise to her mother that when she qualified as a Doctor she would use her skills to educate the children in the south of this huge country, as her mother once did.
I, on the other hand, am just a simple working class man, a construction engineer who was touched by the plight of so many and decided I would like to help my wife achieve her dream,
We have bought 4 acres of land were we are building a school for the orphans of this effected area on the andaman coast line, a part of the country that seems to have been forgotten about, as much of the rebuilding and aid went to the holiday island of Phuket.
The school is being designed by Dr. Soontorn, a famous green (enviromental) architect from Thailand. Today we have just received our licence for the foundation we have setup called F.A.C.E which is an acronym for Foundation for Arts, Culture and Education. Our website address is
http://www.global-face.org, which currently is still under development and we would encourage you to visit our website if you would like to contribute in anyway to to help with these wonderful project.
The Thai Education Department did a study for us and informed us that apart from Phuket, our school will be the only English program institution for 100km radius along the coastline. We asked the education department for the area to choose for our school and they asked us to look at Krabi so we decided to buy the land there.
I hope that in the coming months and years that visitors to this site will help in some way to achieve our goals and to help the very poor children in a positive and fruitful way.
http://www.global-face.org
Every one of the children above are orphans. They live, eat, work and study at a government school one hour north of Bangkok.
The school provides everything for the children from their education, their clothes, food, accomodation and leisure.
This school needs help and the children need help.
Before school the children tend to the fields where they grow there own vegetables. The younger children tend to a large pond which provides the school with fresh fish. After school the elder children work in local cafes, shops, ect... for 20 baht (around 50 cents USD) per NIGHT, this is the equivalent of £0.30 or $0.58 cents, this I hope brings home to you what a struggle these children have to go through.
At http://www.global-face.org/sac/ you have the opportunity to make a difference in the quality of life these children have.
The School director informs us that each child needs, per month, a grand total of $30.00 USD, this for all the childs needs. At the moment we have 6 children on a pixel board were you can publicise your website or even your myspace site and support a child in need. If you would like to help a child then you can go to http://www.global-face.org/sac/ . Currently, my wife Tewi and I personally are supporting 5 children from this particular school.
Please make yourself a member, confirm your email and buy your pixels (only $0.10 per 10 x 10 pixel block) and advertise your site while helping a child. You can decide how large or small your picture will be on the pixel board, this is a monthly sponsorship and you will be emailed 5 days before your sponsorship runs out and decide if you would like to support them for an additional month. To give you an idea h20ho's banner cost $3 per month and thank you h20ho, appreciated!
F.A.C.E THANKS YOU FOR YOUR HELP AND GOD BLESS YOU!
Our recent visit to Surat Thani on our way to Krabi to apply for the school licence was all i can say was very envigorating p)We were invited by the cheif monk for the province of Surat Thani to visit a very special cave. Upon our arrival the Monk donated to our Foundation several hundred ammulets from his temple , he also blessed them personnaly and gave us permission to sell them to raise money for our foundation. At the same time he also blessed almost 1000 ammulets some as old as 35 years that poor people have donated to our cause and the monk gave our foundation his approval to sell the old Ammulets.
The monk then gave myself and Tewi my wife a guided tour of this very old site, The cave it's self is 2000 years old and the staircase rises 200 meters with buddha's all the way to the top, there are carvings of Buddha carved on the walls of the cave i was overwelmed by the history of the cave.
The monk then showed us the new access road he as constucted but as not finished to the entrance of this historic cave, and the construction of a new temple,
All construction work as now had to be halted through a lack of funds, The monk as asked for our help in selling the temples ammulets so that he can complete work at this historic site, So the directors of the foundation have decided that this is a cause that we would like to support so any ammulet we sell we will give the temple 50% of the money raised on what the Monk donated to our Foundation and any ammulets sold thereafter will go to the temple alone.
So from time to time we will be selling these ammulets, if you are intrested in the Ammulets you can email us at [email protected] and register your interest we will send photos of the ammulets for you to inspect.
Please help in this worthwhile cause and thanks for reading my profile
