Abo-u-ja Kids' Ark!
Linda, Supachai and I were picked up early Saturday morning to start our travel up to northwest of Thailand to visit the Kids' Ark Foundation daycare center located in the tribal village of the Langhu People. Kids' Ark is a non-profit organization that DIAKRIT has been supporting for the last 12 years, and we were really excited to go and visit the kids.
Upon arrival, we were greeted by a group of children who were all busy with their assignments from their tutors -anything from making paintings to mathematics for the older children. When the kids noticed that I am interested in learning Thai, they were very eager to teach me the Thai alphabet. As I am in the process of learning the language, they inspired me to study harder -got to keep up with these clever kids!
After class, it was time for lunch -served by Supachai and me, closely monitored by paparazzi Linda. Some of the kids could not finish their plates, but made sure to not let anything go to waste. The children gathered up the leftovers from their plates in a bucket to be able to feed the livestock kept by the tribe.
After lunch, we brought out a big bag of sweets, bought with kind donations from our colleagues at DIAKRIT. Even though they couldn’t join this time, everyone has been very involved in our visit to Kids' Ark. The sweets were highly appreciated among the kids, and high on a sugar rush it was time for some games where the loser had to splash its face with baby powder. Who do you think was one of the losers?!
All the kids tried out our VR glasses and explained to us in Thai everything they saw. One boy said that he was still seeing penguins after he had taken off his glasses!
Soon after the class was over the kids went back to their houses. We had a guided trip around the village where we got to see more of the Langhu peoples’ way of living and their religion. Many of the women are learning to weave in collaboration with a Swedish design house selling their products. This is a very good way of learning new skills & being able to be self-sufficient. We learned that some symbols are very important to the Langhu people like cotton meaning clean heart, stone equals strong health, soil means long life and bamboo means that staying together makes you stronger.
This was a fantastic experience for me, and I am ever grateful I was lucky to win the lucky draw trip together with Linda & Supachai.
I am proud that I could go as a representative for DIAKRIT, and that I got to see with my own eyes, that we are contributing to breaking the cycle of poverty in this region.
/Ivar