Clare Holman's Trivia Night

Raising some much needed funds to help Clare stay in Cambodia and continue her work with “Chres Village Orphanage” and “Stepping Out Cambodia.”

When :  7pm Saturday 18^th August 2012.

Where : Wellington Soldiers Memorial Club

Cost: $ 15 per person. (Tables of 8 – 10)

Guests are asked to bring a plate of nibblies to share with their table.

 To book a table, please contact Kate on 0427 466217.

Visitors from April-July 2012

 

Geoff and Diane Holman

Geoff with his three sponsor sons Chet, Visal and Pises.

Corrin Kelly with her sponsor children, Phola and Sokchea.

Debra and Jack Morgan, and Stacey, Amelia and Victoria Bruggy

Pictured with Corrin Kelly, Geoff and Diane Holman,

 and Victoria and Amelia Bruggy.

Amelia and Jack teaching Phos

and Sombo how to play Monopoly.

Amelia, Victoria and Jack

with some of the girls at the orphanage.

Ross, Sue and Sam Hobson

Pictured with the Chairman of the orphanage and Bun Lu.

Gary and Joy Giddings

Pictured at a Cambodian wedding with the Chairman 

of the orphanage's family.

Jeff, Nadine, Emily and Amy Tinsley

Pictured with their sponsor daughters, Sokha and Toeum.

Asher Milgate and Emma Grindley

Emma teaching some children a dance routine.

Australian visit

For those of you who haven't heard yet, I will be bringing three of the orphans (Phola, So and Saray) to Australia in August for three weeks. We will be spending most of the time in Wellington, also visiting Sydney, Canberra and Nowra. Thank you to their amazing sponsors for making the boys dreams come true! The boys are so excited and counting down the days but are not so keen on experiencing the cold weather!
We will be at the Trivia Night (Saturday 18th Aug) in Wellington and will organise a get-together in Nowra (Monday 20th Aug) and Sydney (Saturday 11th Aug) to try to catch up with everyone.
We are now waiting to hear if the boys Australian Visa's have been accepted

Building a new house for fire victims

The boys have been busy over the last few months building a new house for a young family (Phos' sister) after their house was destroyed by fire in February.
Thank you to the generous people who donated money towards building the house, it is now finally finished!!
The boys spent most of their school holidays and weekends helping build the house. I am very proud of the time and effort they put into helping this family.
I am trying to teach the boys to help others, which they are keen to do anyways.

The family have written a letter to the people who donated money to build their lovely new house, which they love. (Translated from Khmer into English by Phos)

Dear kind friends,

When I saw our house on fire, I was very shocked and devastated that we had lost everything. I was sad that we lost our family house and all our property. I didn’t know how I was going to fix our problem, I was trying to think how can I get money quickly. I felt very helpless and worried all the time about my wife and sons. There was no way I could help them myself and this made me very scared.

In my life I have never felt like this before, I felt I lost everything. I can’t describe the feeling I felt. We lost everything from the small things to important things like farming equipment, important papers and money. We had nothing.

I didn’t know how I was going to earn money and to feed my family. I am not an educated man.

I would like to say thank you very much. I want to thank you more and more all the time. You are all generous people to help my family have a new house and make everything a house, and new machine. Now I know our life will be ok because of you all.

Thank you to Teacher Clare very much for finding people to help my family. You make us have everything good now. In my life I don’t know how to repay you and your friends. I can only say thank you to you all and hope you understand how much I thank you. Thank you for looking after my family when they were sick.

Finally, I wish all our generous ‘friends’ good luck and everything good for you because you are so kind to my family. You don’t know us but helped us, I am very surprised when I heard we will get a new house. I love our house, all my family do.

From Seng Soeuy and Phy Meas

June 2012

Hi Everyone,

Sorry we have all been very busy the last few months and haven't had time to update the blog. I am hoping now to keep it up to date for you all.

The boys are all going well and settled into their busy schedules. They have their moments like most teenagers but that is to be expected.

The boys were lucky enough to have Teacher Sue volunteer with us for one month to teach the boys English each night. The boys learned a lot and enjoyed Sue's classes. Now I have taken over teaching the boys English three nights a week. I included life skills in their lessons as well.

                                                 Thank you Teacher Sue!

The boys have now started learning Japanese at the house. I have employed a teacher for 5 days a week. All the members of Stepping Out join the class, even Tokla.

Phola's Birthday- we all went out for dinner to celebrate Phola's birthday. He was very surprised when we brought out his cake and all the restaurant sang Happy Birthday to him.

Fui

We have a member at Stepping Out- Fui Fui (name given by my father and sister- not me!). This is the boys first pet they have ever had. Saray has taken over looking after Fui and feeding him. The boys enjoy playing with him and taking him for walks. He is very spoilt and gets into EVERYTHING! But we still love him.

 

 

Road Safety

While my parents were visiting, they bought each of the boys a motorbike helmet. I am trying to teach the boys more on road safety and the importance of wearing a helmet (not just so the Police don't charge you money!) The boys were also given the option of getting a bicycle helmet.

I am proud of the boys wearing their helmets all the time, now I don't have to yell at them as much to remind them to wear their helmets.

Thank you Mum and Dad for our helmets!!

Fire Safety

Thank you to Wellington Rotary Club for their donations of fire alarms and fire blankets. Our house is now equipped with the correct fire safety equipment. 

Thank you also to Mum and Dad for providing the house with fire extinguishers. We are also hoping to get fire safety training for the boys at the house as well as the children at the orphanage.

A Family Who Needs Your Help

As you may already be aware, there was a house fire at the home of one of the orphan's sister's house yesterday. The family's home was burnt to the ground and as a result they lost everything they owned. This included all their money as Khmer people do not use banks, their personal belongings and the farming equipment that they use in order to earn money. This will have devastating consequences for the family. As there is no welfare system in Cambodia, it will mean that they will have to rely on the generosity of neighbours, friends and family, most of whom do not have much themselves.

Unfortunately, house fires are common in Cambodia, especially in rural areas and are commonly caused by lightening strikes during storms. The fires are not easily extinguished and there are no fire fighting trucks or equipment available. Traditional Khmer homes are built on stilts with a wooden frame. The walls and often the roof are made from homemade palm matting. So as you can imagine, once a fire starts there is usually nothing anyone can do to stop it.

An example of a traditional Khmer house

So this family with two young children are now left to live in a small tent-like shelter. They have the overwhelming challenge of not just replacing their home but also to address their more immediate concern of buying basic necessities such as bedding, cooking utensils, toiletries, just to name a few.

Can you imagine trying to live in such a basic shelter with nothing at all to your name? Or the uncertainly of how you are going to survive this and find a way to feed and support your children?

 So what can we do to help?

We would like to raise some money in order to firstly get this family food and the necessities they need to get through this difficult time. Secondly, to build a new home for the family. Altogether we are probably looking at around AUS$1500.

 The boys at the Stepping Out Cambodia Half-way House have set themselves the challenge to help the family rebuild their home once we have the funds to do so.

If you, your family or friends can help in any way, please contact the Stepping Out Cambodia Support Program or myself (nshanahan79@yahoo.com.au). Please keep in mind that the family has nothing at all so any small donation will help.

We can all make such a difference to the lives of this family.

Nikki

Introducing myself

Hi Everyone,
My name is Nikki and I'm Clare's sister. I will be helping Clare out by keeping the Stepping Out Cambodia Blog up to date and letting you know what Clare and the boys have been up to.
Hope you enjoy watching the Stepping Out Cambodia Programme expand and watching the boys confidence grow as they experience new and exciting things.

The boys

Our vegetable garden is growing!

The boys are very proud to show you how much their vegetable garden has grown. They all take it in turns to look after the gardens.

Wish List

Thank you to everyone who donated towards our Wish List, there are still some items we still need. Please contact me if you are interested.

February 2012

Well, it has been another busy month for us at Stepping Out. We had to say goodbye to Robyn, who has been an amazing support to the boys and I. We miss her so much already. Now I have taken over teaching the boys English at night. We also have two extra boys who join us for English class, they are from poor families and haven't got the money to study English. I am enjoying teaching the boys and SreyMom. Next week they will start learning French two nights a week.
The boys had their half-yearly exams which they studied very hard for and are now nervously waiting for their results.
We have an extra boy in the house now, Channy, has returned to the house and has settled in well. Channy is not part of the program but lives in the house. He is in Year 12 and works in the afternoon. It is a pleasure to have him back.

'Our Wish List'

OUR WISH LIST

ITEM	COST per item	AMOUNT	TOTAL
Desks	$15	10	$150
Chairs	$6	10	$60
School fees	$20	7	$140 per month
Bottled water	$1	10	$10 per month
Bicycle repairs	$10	-	$10 per month
Medical costs	$30	-	$30 per month
School Equipment-text books.	$10	7	$70 per month
Toiletries	$5	7	$35 per month
Sport fees	$7	7	$49 per month
Bed Sheets	$12	8	$96
Shelves	$5	7	$35
Cupboard	$50	2	$100
Underwear	$2	14	$28
Sports shoes	$25	7	$175
School Shoes	$10	7	$70
Bike locks	$2	7	$14
Screens on windows	$200	-	$200
Garden pots	$10	4	$40
Fruit trees	$100	-	$100
Smoke alarms	$8	8	$64
Gardening tools	$50	-	$50

If you are interested in donating towards any of these items please contact Clare for bank details clarehol_87@yahoo.com.au or through FaceBook.
Thank you

Rollerblading

The boys have enjoyed rollerblading every Sunday afternoon. They are slowly getting better, not as many falls as before. It is very entertaining but scary to watch them sometimes. I am proud that they have tried something new and enjoy socialising with other people.