Some of you might have read the news on Cambodia's latest health epidemic.
For a period of time the disease was unknown; but they now know it to be Hoof and Mouth disease.
The disease is common here among livestock as well as a host of other problems, bird flue, blue ear, Anthrax and so on.
The scary thing was the not knowing what it was. Learning what to look for and keeping track of affected areas was all we could do. Most times when a disease hits and it is known we search the internet for answers. The last problem we've run into was with Blue Ear it was an immunodeficiency in pigs. The internet allowed us to do a lot of research over night and take action the next day. Also a big thanks to Grace Puttnam for helping us teach the kids how to give the pigs shots.
While we could not cure that disease we did learned we could help by keep the environment clean and free of other illnesses that was the main concern for the period the pigs were ill. We ended up helping a lot of people in the village with the information we had learned. While others were loosing a quarter to half their stock we lost one baby out of 120.
Anyway not knowing leaves little for you to research on.
This time and most of the time we were not affected by the random illnesses that roam Cambodia.
Generally peoples affected by such illnesses here tend to be where living conditions are worse. The problem also is that most of the country is living in poor and unhealthy conditions.
Poor hygiene, dirty drinking water, lack of bathroom facilities, poor quality foods or lack there of, poor housing and not having mosquitoes nets are major reasons that lead to the large amounts of illnesses that plague Cambodia. Our house hold here rarely are effected by these things because the living standards we keep. For example it seems like my niece next door gets dengue fever every year or so and in 6 years we've only had two kids get it out of the 54 children we've cared for.
So as things makes the new about conditions here you have little to worry about us being in danger.
How ever you should pray for the kids and the country and what they have to deal with. I published earlier the numbers on the sicknesses the children have had at the school. I have been telling guest lately the children they see, they are survivors. In Rakanakari where we vacationed this year the mortality rate was near 22% for children under 5 years of age. That is roughly 1 in 4 children.
So with this recent problem we were only affected because all schools country wide have been closed early.
We had a couple weeks left but over night it was finish up the year, collect everything and say good bye.
Kids were extremely happy.
What we are doing right now.
We have scheduled to build 3 temporary units at the church we rent. They will start construction in August.
We have two teachers starting their second year of school. One is the sister of our beloved teacher Chenda who has been and done so much for us. If Chendo is half the person Chenda is we will be blessed. The other lady is one of Reams cousin Nary.
We have 4 people scheduled to start college to become teachers.
Sdung our staff's sister
Khan a staff member who wishes to teach rather than remain a guardian at the orphanage.
Sokheng a part time helper with the kindergarten this year is going.
Seem our staff's brother I believe has asked to go
So we are continuing to build up for the future teaching staff.
We are also looking educating well over 200 children next year.
We will also need to furnish the new buildings once they're built.
I am also working on reworking our plans for the school that is less scary to people.
We'll be putting the plan into phases. Also I have had a building design idea that will make the school more interesting but also give us a free building or teacher room for the cost of 4 buildings.
When things actually come through, who knows but were excited about the future and what is happening.
We are increasing the tuition this year from $5 a month to $6.25 we expect to break even through out the year.
We are also picking up our paper work for our Junior High and High School licenses. We don't have the space and are not entirely ready for such a jump but we are getting ready for when the time comes.
Out of the 154 students we had this year we are advancing a little over 100 of them. About 50 of them will be held back because they came to us not knowing how to read or right. We have to hold back 1 of the 6th graders because he didn't know his alphabet. The teachers in the public school just keep passing and passing until the child just quits because they have know idea whats going on in class. It's just sad.
4 of the children that are not passing this year belong to teachers at the public school, if that isn't shocking.
The great thing is that all the children that could not read can now read but they are just behind.
We have had a good response from the parents that we even wanted to work with and help the children rather than just pushing them forward.
Cost; currently Ream and I will be paying for the new buildings and furnishings we are also supporting the teachers headed to college.
The new building we are told will be $5000. most likely a little more.
Desks will cost us about $1000
Cost to send one person to college has been $300 we have 6 going, $1800.
If you'd like to help we appreciate it. You may contact us or our church about how to do that.
Big steps for our community, real big.
