Take Care Kids

Dear friends, let's pick up where we left off the last time.....Tanakon, the very premature baby (born at 5 and a half months), keeps fighting strenuously for his life....today he weighs 1.1kg and was transferred to the public Hospital in Chonburi and is living in an incubator, obviously. We try to help his mother out and judging by her reaction, we're doing a pretty good job even though we are not doing all that much...all we can do for her child is hope....

but I lived so many intense emotions this last month....I'm going to try to gather my thoughts and convey them to you......many keep asking about our shelter, so here are the latest news about that....renovation work is under way, and the workers actually gave me a date indicating the end of their work, which should be November 15th. So I'm now running everywhere trying to buy all the things we need to furnish the house. I never furnished a shelter that would host mothers and their kids before, so you can imagine me running around like a maniac in all the little shops trying to get the best price for everything......every piece I buy helps me feel a little closer to the goal and then my mind wanders.... it travels to where we started, to you, all your faces, to all those people who have always believed in us.......and that gives me the strength to get back on my moped and go fight for a better price.....and while I run around like a maniac many people call me, they want to see our shelter, some of them are mothers in need, mothers who know Khun Gio from way back or who have heard of me through others, some are from other foundations who want to cooperate with us, and I receive messages from people who are living the harshest conditions due to the most serious flooding in recent thai history....and I keep on running....trying to reach everyone in need....and "poor" Noot supports me through all this and withstands all my crazy ideas and shifting moods.....whoever comes to visit will probably build her a monument for her patience.

In the meantime, I was contacted by the Social Services here in Pattaya and they invited me to go to a meeting regarding Child Trafficking and Violence on Minors in South East Asia, a subject which is very present where Take Care Kids operates. It was really interesting even though quite depressing and very important in itself. There weren't many NGO's there but I saw many teachers from all grades and schools. We will see now if cooperation really exists.

We are always working on the front lines of course, and while I was at the meeting I received a phone call....from Teng a 16 year old mother who had her first child 20 days ago, the baby's name is Faa (baby blue). The situation is quite clear, Teng is an orphan and her boyfriend (the father of the child) is in jail for drug trafficking and will stay there for another 2 and a half years...she lives in a metal "box" but she has to leave it as soon as possible because she doesn't have the money to pay for the "rent" which amounts to about 10 euro. In total Teng owns 1 euro, either we take care of her, or she ends up on the street. But our Shelter is not ready yet! So I call an emergency meeting and I ask Ernesto to help us (he's one of our volunteers and is married to Nong) and host this young mother and her child until our shelter is ready. He agrees and the next day Teng and Faa are in his house....I'd like to take the change to than Ernesto and his wife Nong for having done this and for giving hope to these two people who will come to our shelter as soon as it will be possible.

Little Faa is healthy...and each time I speak she opens her eyes to try and understand where this deep voice is coming from, whenever other speak she sleeps peacefully. So I think, wow we need one more cot now...and I hop on my moped to go get it. Thursday the 10th Frida will arrive, she's an Italian volunteer who wants to live this experience first hand. At the end of NOvember we will be at the Christmas Market in Bangkok Pattaya Hospital and we need to be ready for that. I really believe that next time I will be able to show you our first pictures with the mothers and their children in our Shelter...until then keep on helping us from Italy in every way we can.....we definitely need all the help we can get....

TCK