The Children’s Education

31 children from 12 families – that’s the number of children covered under our Education Sponsorship for Children programme for next year. With the exception of 1 family where the children still have a father, and 1 child who has lost both her parents, the rest are all children of single mothers. The 31 children are sponsored by 24 different individuals/groups of individuals. Which means a few sponsors are actually sponsoring more than 1 child.

When we first started this programme in 2008, we started off with 9 children being sponsored. Then in 2009 the number increased to 16, and this year the number rose to 21. With an additional 10 children needing sponsorship for next year, we have 31 for 2011, that is, if we don’t get any new clients needing sponsorship within the year. Thank goodness the response to my call for sponsors was superb… mainly either my alumni members or my blog readers or my facebook friends (some of them a combination of all 3).

Then there are those who are not under our sponsorship programme but are getting help from our Children Education Fund (CEF). Huh? What’s the difference between the Education Sponsorship for Children (ESC) programme and the CEF? Both are meant for children’s education, right?

Right. But the difference is, the ESC is meant for children from poorer families. Each individual child is personally sponsored by individuals from the public. The sponsorship covers anything to do with the children’s education including monthly pocket money, bus fares, tuition fees etc in addition to the usual back-to-school expenses.

The CEF on the other hand, is a special fund that we have, meant more for those who can afford the monthly expenses but face difficulties at the beginning of each schooling year when they need to come up with hundreds of Ringgits for the back-to-school expenses including uniforms, bags, stationeries, workbooks and the various fees they need to pay when school reopens.

We have at least 15 children who qualifies for the CEF.

Which means by next month we’ve got to buy school necessities for at least 46 children. For a few of them, the parents can at least buy first with whatever savings/borrowings they have, to be reimbursed later when they submit to us the receipts. But some of the guardians can’t afford to do that. If we ask them to buy first, chances are they won’t be buying anything. So yep, for these ones, we’d take the children out to shop for their schooling needs.

Since most of the children under sponsorship are those of my clients (not because I practice favouritism but because I always get assigned to the poor families… sigh!), I will be bringing 19 children out shopping.

So will I bring them shopping all on the same day to save time?

HECK NO! Even if they can come on their own to the hypermarket where I intend to take them, no way am I going to have 19 children choosing their uniforms, shoes, etc all at the same time! Maybe it’s not so bad for the older children, but for the younger ones? Eeeks!

I will bring them out, one family at a time. It will give me more space to use a more personal approach to each family and it will give me the opportunity to get to know each child better. After all, I will need to give individual reports to each individual sponsor, as such it’s best if I know each child personally, rather than just knowing the parents/guardians.

The hypermarket people will be seeing my face quite often next month… oh yeah… :-)

The sponsored children…

For the past week I’ve been using my facebook account to look for additional sponsors to cover the educational needs of some children of our PLHIVs. After visiting them at their homes to assess their situation, I finally managed to compile a list of additional children needing help.

Before the additional children whom I’ve just recently included in the list, we already had 21 children already sponsored. We now have an additional 12 names. Within the past week, I’ve managed to find sponsors for 8 of them. That leaves another 4 needing sponsorship, in addition to another child who was sponsored for this year, but needs a new sponsor for next year in view of the fact that the old sponsor is no longer contactable.

So far none of the children from the earlier list had been dropped out for whatever reasons. Yes, there were some slight disciplinary problems with one or two of the kids, but they seem to be doing better now. Sometimes the problem lies not with the children themselves, but the parents. It’s not easy for us to really monitor that the money is actually used for the educational needs of the children, but we’d still try our very best.

The 21 children that had been sponsored so far?

4 of Fuzi’s children are schooling, and all 4 sponsored by 3 different sponsors. Her 2 older girls are doing quite well in school, in fact, Wina, the eldest is one of the top students in her class. She’s sitting for her PMR this week. Her 2 boys are average students, but seem keen to go to school. Although Hafiz, Fuzi’s 3rd child, had at one time caused all sorts of problems due to his wrong choice of friends, nowadays he seldom goes out with his friends in the neighborhood.

Valli’s 2 sons are rather disciplined and doing quite well in school.

Shila’s daughter Laila, is also an average student, but had always been eager to go to school. Although Shila herself had given up on hospital appointments and ARV medication, thank goodness she hasn’t given up on her daughter’s education.

Then there’s Hana’s 2 girls. I have to be a bit careful with Hana as sometimes she tends to do that muka kesian of hers saying tak cukup duit, duit belum masuk etc. I always need to remind her that the sponsorship is only for her children’s educational needs and doesn’t cover other household needs. Her kids too, if it was up to them, would ask for this and that, but no, we cannot be too giving. We do want to help them for their future, not to pamper them.

Another sponsored child is Pushpa, HIV+ orphan who stays with the grandmother. Pushpa doesn’t seem to be doing too well in school, but we still need to stress to her on the importance of education.

Out of Wani’s 2 sons, the older one who has hearing problems, needs to go to a special school a bit far from their home and as such involves higher bus fares. But with the sponsorship programme, Wani doesn’t have too worry too much about it. Her younger son is doing OK in an ordinary school.

Lin, another client of mine, has 6 children; and although only the younger 2 are still schooling, the older 3 are still studying in higher learning institutions while the no. 4 who sat for his SPM in 2009, did not go for further studies. Instead right now he is doing odd jobs. None of the older children are able to help out Lin financially yet, so Lin’s 2 younger children, a boy and a girl, still need assistance for their schooling. The 2 are average students in school. I have not been able to get hold of the son’s sponsor though, and so I will need to source for a new sponsor for him.

Meng Lan’s only daughter is in form 4 this year. I don’t get much updates from this family since Meng Lan’s buddy doesn’t update me frequently, but the latest I heard was that the daughter is beginning to feel lazy to go for tuitions etc. I’m not really sure what the problem is all about. I’d better get the buddy to follow up.

Another family who has been involved in our sponsorship programme is Sofie’s. 2 of her 4 children had been sponsored since last year (I couldn’t get enough sponsors then). Alhamdulillah, during the past week, I managed to get sponsors for the other 2 as well. The boys need to be reminded often about the importance of education for the future, but Sofie’s youngest girl, has been very enthusiastic in school. In addition, she’s also a fast learner when it comes to reciting the holy Quran. Now the family has moved to a new place, she’s asking if there’s a sekolah agama rakyat nearby.

Another child who started receiving financial aid under this programme is from an orang asli family. I’ve never met Wan or her son personally, as they stay in a kampong not accessible by car. I will have to check with Wan’s buddy who usually meets up with her in the nearby town to get updates.

Another family getting sponsored this year is Aini’s family. Her 3 children are all in secondary school. The eldest, a girl, is in form four this year and had opted for a vocational school after a poor showing in last year’s PMR. But she proved that she made the right choice when she started showing excellence, even getting awards from the school. Aini’s 2nd son is doing okay in school, while the youngest son, seems to be more interested in co-curricular activities.

Those are the 21 children sponsored this year. With 12 additional children for next year, there should be 33 children sponsored by the next schooling year. As it is, I’ve got sponsors for 8 of them already, so I now need to look for 5 more sponsors – 4 for the balance from the new list, and 1 for Lin’s son, whose old sponsor is no longer contactable.

The important thing is, no matter what the circumstances are, these children must not be deprived of basic education at the very least. Of course, we always tell them that the sponsorship will be revoked if they are caught using the sponsorship for things other than their educational needs. And in this respect, I have to admit, I am a bit strict with the children and their guardians. Besides, it’s not my money I’m handling, it’s the sponsors’ money entrusted to us to be used for the children’s educational needs!

Sponsorship assessment: Done! Volunteer: Found!

With another unfamiliar territory to go to, I decided that for the sponsorship assessment visit to Ramli’s house, we’d better make a move in the morning.

So we (the vice-chairman, a trainee volunteer and myself) promised to meet up at the NGO center at 9 am. I got there a few minutes before 9 am and was happy to find that the other 2 were already there. I like punctual people!

Off we went, heading towards the highway, exiting Kuala Kangsar and on towards the K.Kangsar-Gerik highway. Unlike the old road which was rather narrow and winding, this new road (well, not THAT new lah, but considering that the last time I headed that way was quite some time back, it was new to me at least!) was a breeze. It didn’t really take that long to get to our destination. However, the new bridge near Lenggong was designed in such a way that we weren’t able to see the lake below. Otherwise the scenery would have been better.

As we got into the junction leading to Ramli’s kampong, we stopped by the roadside and I decided to call Ramli’s daughter, Amy. Their kampong is not listed in my GPS and so I wanted to get proper directions from her. The day before, I called the house to get the directions but Amy wasn’t around and her elder brother wasn’t too cooperative. All he said was, “Ada signboard tu ikut aje.”

Well, Amy didn’t give me directions either. She told me to wait at the junction and she’d ask her husband to meet us there. Based on that I figured it wouldn’t be easy to find on our own.

It took her husband more than 10 minutes to get to the junction where we were. Quite a young chap – must be in his early 20’s, just like Amy. Well, his father-in-law (Ramli) is also young – he’s only in his mid-40’s.

Anyway, true enough, I think if we had tried on our own to find the house, we would have needed more time since their address didn’t have any street name, just no. xxx and the name of the kampong. And there were so many lorongs, we wouldn’t be sure which lorong to turn into.

Ramli has a house which looks quite comfortable to live in. For someone working on his own, he must have earned quite well. Well enough that he  could afford to have 4 wives! As mentioned in my earlier posting here, Ramli was probably infected by his 3rd wife, who eventually died of TB.

Ramli has eight children – 4 children (now adults) from his first wife, and 4 children, still schooling, from his second wife. Now that he is bedridden and his (still living) wives have all left him, Ramli no longer earns any income. No problems about the children from the first wife – they’re all adults and can take care of themselves. Our concern now is the children from the 2nd wife – the wife not only dumped him… she dumped 3 of the kids with him, and only took along the eldest child with her. With no income and he himself needing care, there’s no way he can take care of his children.

I didn’t see Ramli when I went into the house, only Amy and her young half-brothers were there to greet us. I asked where Ramli was, and all Amy said was, “Ayah meragam pagi ni.”

Meragam? Well, ever since her was bedridden, Ramli hadn’t been himself. He talks rubbish, he tears off the adult diapers on him, and he dirties himself and his mattress with his own sh*t.

Worse, the daughter taking care of him is pregnant and is due to give birth anytime. Imagine how tiring it is for her to take care of her father in such condition. To add to that, she’s also taking care of her younger siblings when she herself is financially dependent on her young husband. With a baby coming into their lives soon, things will get more difficult.

With Ramli not even capable of taking care of himself, when arranging for financial help for the children, we definitely couldn’t put Ramli’s name as guardian. My colleagues agreed that Amy would be the right person. But she had not photostated her own IC and neither had she opened a bank account; so we told her to do so once she has settled down after giving birth to her own baby.

While I was getting all the details of Amy’s siblings, a few lady neighbours came over. They frequent the house quite often to see how the children are doing. I had to be extra careful not to mention anything about Ramli’s HIV status. We just told them that we’re from a welfare organisation in Ipoh.

One of the ladies then asked, “Tak ada ke rumah boleh ambik orang sakit macam dia ni? Kesian tengok budak-budak ni ada mak bapak pun tak ambik peduli.” Amy herself had not even mentioned anything about sending her father to a welfare or shelter home, but it seems the neighbours themselves couldn’t bear seeing Amy being burdened by her own father.

We only stayed there for about half an hour or so. After getting whatever details and telling Amy of whatever other documents she’d have to prepare after she has given birth, we made a move. It didn’t feel too comfortable to stay there longer with the neighbours around.

It was still quite early, and so we decided to go to Taiping to meet up with a Taiping doctor who had earlier expressed her interest to become a volunteer. So I called her up to tell her we were just about to make a move and that we’d meet up with her in Taiping town.

And so yes, we met up with the lady doctor who ended up paying for our lunch!

Oops, hope I didn’t scare people from volunteering with our NGO. The doctor volunteered to pay for our lunch, ok? We don’t usually make it a practice to make a potential volunteer pay for our meals… hehehe…

Sponsorship assessment: 2 done, 1 to go!

Having weddings to attend next week, I decided I need to finish off the sponsorship assessment visits this week. Done with one on Thursday, and saving the one furthest to be done on Sunday, today I went to visit Rajan’s family, who stays in Ipoh.

Rajan’s buddy had promised to pick me up at the NGO center and drive me to Rajan’s home, so by 2.45 pm I was already at the center. By the time my colleague came, it had already started to rain but it wasn’t too bad. After transferring some groceries meant for the family from my car to my colleague’s car, off we headed to Rajan’s place. The rain got heavier and heavier. So heavy that my colleague who was driving had to be extra careful while driving. We had already promised Rajan we’d come today, so might as well just go ahead with our plan.

It was still raining heavily when we got to the low cost flats, so we decided to leave the groceries in the car first. The family stays on the third floor, no lifts, and so we had to use the staircase. Rajan wasn’t home, but 3 bright and cheerful girls opened the door for us. 2 of the girls are Rajan’s children, while the other one is his niece.

The flat looks quite comfortable. Or maybe it looked rather big because they didn’t have much furniture. Some of my colleagues however did contribute some old stuff including clothes, pillows, and a cupboard.

6 of them stay at the flat – Rajan, his elderly parents, his 2 daughters and his niece. Rajan wasn’t home as he was at the hospital visiting his father who was hospitalised after a bad fall at home recently. So we just spoke to Rajan’s mother and the 3 chirpy girls – Rajan’s daughters aged 11 and 9, while his niece is 7 I think.

Rajan’s girls lost their mother 6 years ago, while their young cousin, although not an orphan, lives like one. Her mother left the family while her father, according to Rajan’s mother, is a bad hat. So the girl had been taken care by her grandparents.

Rajan himself is not in a position to work due to his condition. The 6 survive on monthly welfare aid of RM200 for Rajan’s 2 girls (bantuan kanak-kanak) and another RM155 for Rajan’s dad (bantuan warga tua). That’s their source of income to pay for their rental (of RM120), utilities and food. Rajan’s sister, who stays elsewhere, does help from time to time, but not much.

Luckily for the girls, their school has exempted them from fees, and in fact they got free workbooks as well from the school. Oh how I wish all schools have more teachers who take the effort to help the students… unlike some of the children from other families I know, whose teachers kept pressuring them to pay up all the various fees.

We had already approved our CEF for them earlier, so my colleagues had already brought them out shopping 2 weeks ago and got them new uniforms, shoes, school bags and stationeries.

Their grandfather usually send the girls to school on his motorbike but that will be difficult when school reopens. You see, in addition to the bad fall causing him to be hospitalised, today we were told that his motorbike had also gone missing in his absence. So how are the girls going to school when it reopens next week?

We told the girl to arrange for a school van – we can cover the fares using our CEF. The girls also need and want tuition, but tuition fee is not covered by our CEF (our CEF only covers for basic schooling needs). So hopefully we can get sponsors to cover the girls under the Education Sponsorship for Children programme. At least not only are their basic needs covered, they will also be covered for tuition and monthly pocket money.

Hopefully I can get sponsors for them soon.

OK, 2 assessments done, 1 to go. And I’m going tomorrow to settle the last assessment visit, insyaAllah.

Sponsorship assessment: 1 done, 2 to go!

I finally managed to get a fellow volunteer who was able to join me for a sponsorship assessment visit on a weekday instead of a weekend. Of course, I had to ask one with flexi working hours, like myself.

So today, at 2 pm, the 2 of us headed off to north of Perak to visit Aza. As always, whenever heading to unfamiliar territory, I’d do my homework first. Last time I used to google for the place. Now that I have a GPS, I’d check on my GPS first. But the name of the kampong where I was heading today wasn’t on my GPS, and not even on google. The next course of action was to call Aza yesterday, asking for landmarks and directions. I then set my GPS to the landmark nearest to her kampong, and from then on, to look out for the other landmarks that she gave.

Halfway at the NSE, the error message appeared on my GPS. Hmmm… must be due to the updated map which I downloaded just 2 days ago. I decided to stop at the next R&R to restart the GPS. Just as I slowed down at the R&R, suddenly I heard a screeching sound. Alamak, panic seround. Please, please not the car! The sound stopped when the car stopped. After restarting the GPS (which worked well after that), I continued the journey… this time no more screeching sound. BUT I noticed the air from the aircond was getting less and less cooler. Ah, the screeching sound must have come from the aircond. The aircond had never given me problems before; but I did send the car for aircond servicing just last month! Aiya, like this baik tak payah service! But in a way I was relieved it was just the aircond – it would have been a problem if the car broke down at the highway!

As the journey continued, it got warmer. But the weather wasn’t too bad, so the “free sauna” was tolerable. :-)

Anyway, after reaching the landmark I set on my GPS, I could no longer depend on the GPS for further instructions, so I had to look around for the other landmarks and instructions given by Aza earlier. I must commend Aza – her instructions were quite clear and accurate. After getting into the lorong she told us to get into, I understood why it was not in the GPS. It’s not even called jalan or lorong, it’s called parit xxx (sorry, cannot lah mention real address here kan?) And it’s quite narrow, with padi fields on both sides.

Just to be sure I was on the right track, when we passed by a makcik on a bicycle who stopped by the roadside (erm, I mean ‘parit’side) I asked her where “parit xxx” was, and my, my, her instructions were good too! Yes, we were on the right path, but most of the time, based on my own experience, the instructions I’d usually get under such circumstances would be, “Jalan teruuuus jer…” This makcik’s instructions however were complete with, “sampai hujung tu, ikut titi, lepas titi ada surau..” Waaah, caya lah makcik! If I didn’t stop to ask her, I probably wouldn’t be too confident continuing taking the same route. You see, I had to drive quite far in just to reach the titi (small bridge) the makcik mentioned.

After the titi and upon reaching the surau, I called Aza for further instructions. You see, it wasn’t easy to see the house numbers in the kampong. Some are visible while some aren’t. And Aza told us to drive further until we reach a primary school. Yes, there’s a primary school in the middle of all those padi fields! No secondary school though.

A few hundred meters after the school, I stopped where I thought the house would logically be based on the house number given, and called Aza asking her to come out of her house. And whaddaya know, I had actually stopped right in front of her house! We’ve never met before but it wasn’t difficult for Aza to figure out 2 strangers looking like rusa masuk kampong. Oh ok, in our case it was Kenari masuk kampong (I was driving a Kenari meh…). Yayy!! We made it without making any wrong turnings whatsoever! Woo hoo!

Anyway, Aza is in her early 40’s. Her husband died about 9 years ago. Aza herself was diagnosed HIV+ when she was pregnant with her youngest child, who is now 10 (and free from the virus). Her husband had refused to go for check-ups until he was too weak. He died just 2 weeks after he went for blood tests.

So Aza was diagnosed HIV+ quite some time ago. But her case was never referred to us because we don’t have volunteers doing support services at Taiping Hospital where Aza goes for her appointments. Her case was referred to us this time by the doctor (the same specialist handles HIV cases in Ipoh and Taiping) because she felt Aza needed the help.

Aza’s 4 children are all schooling – 14, 13, 12 and 10. She stopped working last year after she started taking medication which caused her to feel drowsy and sleepy. Now she is much better and should be able to work again (provided she’s able to find one) BUT her mother, whom she’s staying with, is unwell and needs looking after. So for the moment, Aza is totally dependent on welfare aid of RM400/month and Baitulmal aid of RM150/month. The good thing is that she doesn’t have to pay house rental. But with the amount that she gets it’s not easy to support 6 people (including herself) staying in the household. What more during the beginning of each schooling year.

We can definitely cover the yearly schooling expenses with our Children Education Fund. Whether or not her children will be covered by our sponsorship, that will depend on whether I can get any sponsors!

OK, so one house visit done. 2 more to go… and the plan is, the one in Ipoh this Saturday, and the other one (almost reaching the East-West highway) on Sunday.

But tomorrow I’d better go to where I got my car aircond serviced last month – the guy better fix my aircond as I don’t intend to go through another free sauna…

House visits, house visits… bila mau pergi?!

Last week alone a few cases were referred to me to be considered for our sponsorship program, or at least for our Children Education Fund.

There’s Rajan, a single father (of 2 schooling kids) who’s too weak to work.

There’s Ramli, who is now bedridden and whose wives have left him to take care of 4 schooling children.

Then there’s a new case referred to me by the doctor herself. This lady goes for appointment at the Taiping hospital and we Buddies have yet to send any volunteers for support service at that hospital. So for the moment, if there are any cases which the doctor feels need financial help, she’d refer the case to us for our further action.

House visits for sponsorship assessment purposes require at least 2 Buddies to be present for the assessment. So, I don’t only have to find a suitable time when I can go, I’d also have to find a time when I can pull another volunteer to tag along.

That shouldn’t be too much of a problem in Rajan’s case, because he’s staying in Ipoh.

Ramli however, stays in a town about 1 1/2 hours drive from Ipoh. That is not inclusive of the time I’d need to find the particular kampong where Ramli’s family is staying. I’m not too familiar with the place, so I’d better get at least one male volunteer to come along. Besides, the client, a male, is bedridden, and so it’s probably best for a male volunteer to talk to him.

The third case referred by the doctor is Aza, a single mom of 4 kids, staying in a town north of Taiping. Again, unfamiliar territory and not in my GPS. But I did google to look for the town… and although I couldn’t find the specific road from my google search, I guess I can always use the AMTS system when I reach the town. Huh? AMTS? That’s Ada Mulut Tanya System…

Question now is… BILA MAU PERGI WEI??!

The children

As I was preparing my report on our Sponsorship/Children Education Fund (CEF), I had to go through the files to get the statistics – how many children and how much spent throughout the year.

16 children from 9 families were covered under our Sponsorship program, while another 23 children from 12 families were covered by our CEF. That means we managed to help out with the educational needs of 39 children from 18 different families (a few families overlap – some children covered under Sponsorship and another one or two covered by our CEF). All the while I thought we covered just about 30 children or so – I never realised we’ve reached almost 40!

Out of the 18 families, I’m either the main buddy or co-buddy to 13 of them, although I have met all 18 families, and have visited 14 of their homes – in 10 different towns. And of the 39 children, I’ve personally met 37 of them!

Our CEF actually started much earlier, when Buddies was still under the wings of FHA (Family Health Association, back then known as Family Planning Association). I hadn’t even joined Buddies yet. However, since budget was rather limited, the financial assistance too, was limited as well.

So we started off the Sponsorship Program in 2008, getting individual sponsors to sponsor the needs of individual children, ie 1 sponsor to 1 child. The response was overwhelming!

And during the second half of 2009, we managed to get quite a huge sum from donors, and now we have more money to spend under our CEF as well. Alhamdulillah. So spend on the children we will – but only on their educational needs. We have always believed in the rights of the children to basic education at least – no matter what kind of circumstances their parents are in. It frustrates me every time I hear about children not going to school due to poverty. They will end up inheriting their family’s poverty.

But it can be tough trying to influence some of them, especially if they have already stopped schooling. Somehow they only see the short term – they’d rather work now so they can help their family. Whereas if they think long term, they should be able to help their family better if they get better education!

Mrs K’s son, Shah for example, opted to work even though I advised him to go to Giat Mara for just a 6 months course to enhance his skills and to enable him to get a better job. Devi’s son, who stopped schooling at form one, also chose not to accept our offer to help him get back to school. He’s now doing odd jobs to help his family. In both cases, the parents themselves did not encourage the children to continue studying. I guess they felt they needed their children more to earn income for the family.

Sofie too, almost asked her son, who was then in form 3, to work part-time. Only when I begged her not too, promising I’d try to get financial help for the family, did she agree to let him concentrate on his studies. Now the boy is under sponsorship, and Sofie’s family is also getting some other financial help, so she is no longer thinking of getting the boy to work yet.

I do hope these children will fully utilise the educational help they are getting. I hope they will take the opportunity to do well in their studies, and hopefully after SPM they will also further their studies in higher learning institutions.

I already see hope in Lin’s, Sofie’s, Rosnah’s and Pushpa’s children. Their mothers are not only HIV positive – they are also thinking positive!

Of sponsorship fund and standing instructions

I am almost done with the back-to-school expenses of the children under our Education Sponsorship Program and the Children Education Fund for those without sponsors. Just a wee bit more to go to ensure that all their fees, workbooks, exercise books, uniforms, stationeries etc are all settled.

There may be a few more children from families assigned to other buddies who have not submitted their claims to me. I will have to wait for the respective buddies to do the necessary.

I have also sent the yearly reports on the sponsored children to their respective sponsors. Ahhh… got to send the reports early lah… otherwise how to ask for this year’s sponsorship amount, right? ;-)

----------------------------------------------------

My NGO is already considering taking in a part-time staff to help out at our centre. And we’re also thinking that this part-timer may be able to help reduce our own workload. Well, for me personally, the one job that is taking up quite a bit of my time is the Sponsorship Program. I was hoping maybe somebody could help ensure that the necessary amount is disbursed to the various recipients’ bank account on time very month. But the person we are now considering for the part-time job is only coming in after office hours. So asking her to go to the bank is out of the question.

What I’ve been doing for the past year was to remit the sponsorship amount online via my personal bank account and submit the claims to my NGO at the end of each month. I need not go to the various banks to bank in the money, but still, in the midst of my day to day work, the remittances were not fixed on a certain date. And sometimes I had problems accessing the website, and so the remittances may be later than usual.

Now that my NGO has opened up a separate bank account specifically for sponsorship purposes, I thought, to make life easier for me, I’d opt for standing instructions to the bank to remit a certain fixed amount each month to the respective bank accounts of our recipients. But when I referred to the bank, the officer said they cannot do it for us because ours is an NGO where the signatories may change, and the recipients’ bank accounts are with other banks, not their bank.

Huh? I can easily do standing instructions via my personal bank account to ANY bank accounts in Malaysia. And my NGO can’t because we may change signatories? Hello? Unless and until the NGO gives instruction otherwise, the earlier instruction should be valid, shouldn’t it? The signatories wouldn’t be signing the SI based on their personal capacities, they would be legally representing the NGO!

Is every bank’s policy the same I wonder?

Aargh! Talk about making life easier! I don’t like the idea of using my personal bank account for the standing instructions. Maybe I should give them sitting instructions!!!

Is she poor, or is she not?

I wasn’t really feeling too well on Sunday – the throat was beginning to feel a bit hoarse, and the head was beginning to feel a bit groggy. I had already made arrangements to do some house visits for sponsorship assessments and canceling them would mean a few other people would have to change their plan too. So I just took a dose of aspirin and got myself a nap just before noon.

I did feel a bit better after that, although I was coughing a bit, but at least the head didn’t feel as groggy. So after lunch, off I went, first to my NGO center, to get some groceries to be brought along for the house visits, and to fetch a colleague who had promised to wait for me there. Then we went to the home of another colleague who stays nearby before we headed off to Lin’s house.

Lin was expecting us obviously. Her front door is usually closed whenever I visit her but yesterday the door was open. Only Lin and her 12 year old daughter were home. Her 14 year old son was off at his grandma’s house while the other son currently waiting for his SPM results was off with his friends elsewhere.

It has been slightly over 2 months since Lin got the court order for her ex-husband to pay her alimony of RM300 per month. So far, she has been getting the money for December and January; albeit a bit late (he promised by 25th but usually pays at the very end of the month). Lin has been scouting around for work but so far to no avail. It’s tough getting a job nowadays. It’s good enough if you don’t lose a job you already have. So, Lin has been helping out at her brother’s nasi lemak stall and every afternoon before she goes home her brother would pay her RM10 for helping out. Maybe a few times she’d get RM15 if the business is slightly better on any day. No pay of course if she has to go elsewhere and can’t help out at the stall.

The bicycles given to them last month have been put to good use. Yes, her 2 children have been using the bicycles to go to school. At least it shows they do appreciate the help they’ve been getting – unlike some people who tend to make it look as though it is our duty to help them. Yeah, yeah, there have been cases where first they ask for bicycles, then they get bicycles, and they say it’s not practical for the kids to cycle to school, so they ask for bus fares etc. Of course, it’s not as bad as Hana who once included in her list of “things needed” – motosikal RM2,000. Duh!

Anyway, there were no doubts whatsoever amongst the sponsorship committee involved in the visit that Lin’s children deserved financial aid for their educational needs. And seeing how the older siblings have performed (the 3 older ones are furthering their studies in higher learning institutions), I feel good about the 2 younger ones also doing well.

After Lin’s, we headed off to visit Meng Lan. My colleague who is Meng Lan’s buddy had never been to Meng Lan’s house before although they have met outside. So, she had to call Meng Lan to get directions to her house.

Now, one glance at Meng Lan’s house, you’d wonder why she’s asking for financial help for her daughter’s schooling. Meng Lan is a single mom and the daughter, a single child. They stay in a comfortable looking double storey terrace house and there is a car at home (a Kancil). On the outset, I wouldn’t classify them as “poor”.

The house was actually bought by her late husband. At that time, they were staying at Meng Lan’s in-law’s house in a nearby town, and so the double storey terrace house was rented out. When Meng Lan’s husband passed away about 11 years ago, Meng Lan and her daughter moved to this house. There were still some installments to be paid for the house, and her late husband didn’t have any EPF (he was self employed) to cover for the balance of payments. So Meng Lan had been working from home (she sews shoes for a particular shoe factory and gets paid based on how many shoes she sews). When she doesn’t earn enough, her sister would help with the payments. But business has not been well of late, and so Meng Lan got less and less shoes to sew. As a matter of fact, for the past 2 months, she has not been earning anything, that even to eat, her sister who lives nearby helps her out.

Her daughter will be sitting for her PMR this year and needs tuition. Her school doesn’t seem to provide tuition for their students. Private tuition is rather expensive.

We know of organizations who’d help the hard-core poor, but with the house and the car Meng Lan cannot be considered as hard-core poor. Of course people don’t know about the leaks at her house which she can’t afford to repair. She said she had applied for Welfare help but so far none of the officers have visited. Frankly speaking, if they did, they’d probably not approve her application. I remember they almost stopped Fuzi’s financial aid when they found out Fuzi had a hand phone (I gave her a used phone that my friend was not using anymore). Chances are the officers will just ask Meng Lan to sell her house and car if she needs money. Yes, then what?

Meng Lan is in a difficult position. Selling the house and the car may only solve her short term problems. Then what? Those are the only properties that she has. For long term, it’d be better for her to keep the house and the car. Besides, with the current economic situation, I doubt she'd get a good price for the house even if she does intend to sell it.

So how? Is she poor? Or is she not?

For today, I haven’t been able to think properly – even at the office earlier today the head was getting groggy again. I got home in the afternoon, had lunch and thereafter a dose of medication, and after zuhr prayer, off I went zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz….

Of sponsorship assessments and gaining trust

Usually on Thursday afternoons I'd be at my NGO center to check if there are any admin matters that need to be looked into. Only when I have to be elsewhere do I give it a miss; even then if I know there are matters needing my attention, I'd drop in another day.

You see, we don't have any full time or even part time staff at the center. That's why when there are letters or faxes, sometimes we only get to read them rather late. Worse, if the letters or faxes are last minute notices of meetings or workshops or the likes, by the time we get to read them, the deadline for confirmation or registration is already over. That's why I prefer correspondences via email. This I can check almost anywhere - at home, at the office, or even when I'm outstation.

Yesterday was Thursday - so yep, I was at my center again. There wasn't much needing my attention - most of the matters outstanding needed the attention of the treasurer.

So I decided to arrange for the house visits for sponsorship assessment purposes. We need to visit the homes of 2 of our clients to assess if their application for our Education Sponsorship for Children is justified. We'll be visiting Lin and Meng Lan. There has to be at least 2 committee members other than the buddy joining the visit. And since I'm Lin's buddy, I've got to bring along with me 2 other committee members although I'm heading the committee myself.

I told Meng Lan's buddy to call her informing her of our intended visit to make sure she'll be home on Sunday, the day we intend to visit. We don't want to end up visiting an empty home if we don't notify them. I myself called Lin. Initially I thought of visiting in the morning but Lin asked if it was possible to change it to the afternoon as she usually helps out at her brother's food stall in the mornings. She'd still make herself available if I couldn't change the time but that would mean less earnings for her, even though the amount is just a measly amount, the small amount matters. I promised to check first and get back to her later.

When I called my colleagues, apparently one of them will only be available after 2.30 pm, so I might as well arrange for the visit to be in the afternoon. I immediately sent a text message to Lin telling her that we'd be visiting her about 3 pm. When she noticed I was using the word "kami" instead of "saya", she replied, "Ramai ke datang? Apa halnya? Lawatan ke? Saya ni segan sikit dengan orang tak biasa. Tapi takpelah, datang la."

She must have forgotten that I told her earlier when she applied for the Sponsorship for her children, that WE would need to visit her at home to be considered for this programme.

I suppose from day one at the HIV Clinic when Lin was referred to us, she was initially reluctant to have a buddy because she didn't feel comfortable with "strangers" especially when these strangers know about her HIV status. I wasn't on clinic duty then but my colleagues who were on duty, gave her my number in case one day she needed someone to talk to. They figured I'd be the person Lin would be most comfortable with. In cases like this, we'd have to respect their decision and so we wouldn't make any follow up calls, unless and until they themselves seek our help.

Well, it took Lin more than a year to make that call. By then she was already divorced, and she was all stressed up with all sorts of problems that finally she called me to simply let things out of her bottled up system. Although Lin isn't usually comfortable with strangers, when we met the first time, we hit it off immediately despite being total strangers prior to that. Now that she's comfortable with me, she doesn't feel comfortable about having others tagging along with me. I guess she just doesn't feel too secure having unfamiliar faces around. But she did say "tapi takpelah, datang la" at the end of her message, so that means she has given the go ahead. After all, if she really trusts me, she'd have to believe that the friends coming along with me can be trusted too.

I know my PLHIV clients well enough to know who's comfortable with me alone and who wouldn't mind other visitors as long as they are from Buddies. I always respect their privacy. When I have to bring along others with me, I always get their permission first. In Lin's case, if she refuses then she'd have to forget about having her children being considered for sponsorship.

Maria is another one of my clients who, like Lin, is only comfortable with me, and me alone. But Maria for the moment only needs emotional and not financial support, so she is not involved in the sponsorship assessment visits. People like Zainab, Fuzi, Yah, Shila, Jah, Anita and Wani don't have any problems if I bring along other buddies when visiting them.

I guess people like Lin and Maria find it difficult to trust people. When they finally trust one person, that's good enough for them. Should anything happen to that one person, it will be difficult for others to take over.

Various updates

Ahhh…bliss! Life is finally not so hectic for me now.

At the office, deadlines for the filing of annual reports and financial statements for our business clients with June year end, ended yesterday with a few betul-betul last minute cases. When I say betul-betul last minute, it includes injury time.

Huh? Submission of annual returns also got injury time ka? Well, actually those with June financial year-end, must have their AGM by end of December, and all the documents need to be filed by end of January. And there is this 7 days grace period given before a late-lodgement fee is charged. My officemates and I call the 7 days grace period “injury time”.

As for my NGO reports, I’ve already submitted all my reports to the assistant secretary to be compiled together with reports from the other coordinators.

So yep, I’ve got a little more breathing space now. But that only means it is time to resume the things I’ve been postponing to do – like the house visits to the homes of those who applied for the Education Sponsorship Programme for assessment purposes. I hope to do so next weekend.

Speaking of sponsorship, I’ve also already submitted my reports to the individual sponsors for last year’s sponsored children. There were 9 sponsored children for last year. 3 were Fuzi’s children – the eldest is doing considerably well in her studies, the second one is just so-so while the third has some disciplinary problems (if you remember one of my earlier postings, he was the “hisap k*m*l**n” boy).

Shila’s daughter Laila is another average case. As for Pushpa, the HIV+ child who took UPSR last year, her results slip showed a string of B’s, C’s and D’s.

In contrast, Valli’s 2 boys are doing quite well in school. Her younger son, who, like Pushpa, also took his UPSR last year, scored 5A’s. Ah, I always love it when children from financially challenged families do well in their studies.

As for Hana’s children, I must say I am quite impressed. Hana herself is rather “slow” and “blur” most of the time. But her eldest daughter managed second position in class (so the amount paid for her tuition definitely didn’t go to waste). Her younger daughter, who was 5th in class the year before, only managed 22nd position last year. The drop, I’m sure has nothing to do with their financial constraints, but more because of the “teasing” she has been facing in school ever since her father (or step-father, I’m not sure because the girl doesn’t have a binti if based on her birth cert) died. I have yet to find out the real reason behind the teasing – it is so difficult to get information from Hana while the little girl herself didn’t want to say why she was teased. I can only suspect that it is either one or both of the following reasons:

- Her school-mates found out that the father died of AIDS. And maybe that her mother too may have been infected.
- Her birth cert indicating “Maklumat bapa: Tidak diketahui.”

I do hope the girl will get over it soon and that her friends in school will get bored of teasing her. I did try to suggest that she change to another school but the mother just said, “Tak payahlah.” Ah well, if the teasing was due to the second reason, she may still face the same problem if she changes to another school.

On another note, tonight I will be attending a wedding reception at a hotel. The parents of the bride are both volunteers of Buddies. Yesterday I was SMS-ing my fellow volunteers asking if anyone would like to chip in to buy a wedding present.

One of the volunteers asked what kind of presents we should buy – the bride and groom come from well-to-do families, he said. Somebody suggested maybe we should just buy something useless but nice to look at. :) I told him it doesn’t matter… it’s the thought that counts.

Anyway, based on the responses, I got a rough idea of the budget, so this morning off I went to buy a present. And since my colleague brought it up, I was kinda in a dilemma if I should go for something practical or something useless but nice to look at. If I go for practicality, then what should I be looking for? Electrical goods? It may not end up being too practical if the newlyweds end up with say 2 rice-cookers, or 5 dinner sets, or 3 gas stoves. Oh, you get the drift.

So I ended up buying something the couple can use even if they get 6 of the same thing. Something that needs to be changed and washed from time to time. No-lah, not underwears - they'd need more than 6 of those I'm sure. Muahaha!

I bought them a queen comforter set. OK or not?

More Sponsors Needed

Hi folks! School reopens today, and it seems for whatever reason, most of the schools of the children under our Education Sponsorship for Children programme are only giving out the report cards when school reopens. As such, I will have to wait until I can gather all the info on the sponsored children before I can send out the reports on the children to the respective sponsors, and ask for this year's sponsorship money. I would prefer to send out the reports of the children before asking for this year's sponsorship so that the sponsors will at least know the developments of the child they are sponsoring. Which is really making life rather difficult for me, because I have to get the reports ready and at the same trying to settle the sponsored children's back-to-school needs before I can ask for the money! Lecehlah, if the various schools could give out the report cards before the last school holidays, I could have prepared the reports earlier and won't be so kelam-kabut when school reopens.

Now this sponsorship programme is becoming like a full time job for me... so much so that even though as the chairperson I am also in charge of my NGO's volunteer care, I am doing a LOUSY job at the latter because this sponsorship thingy is already taking up so much of my time. But I guess I will have to prioritize things... volunteer care is no doubt important to make sure all the volunteers are doing okay and are well motivated, but since the sponsorship involves handling other people's money entrusted in us for the education of needy children, I definitely have to give that top priority.

Anyway, we are looking for more sponsors this year as we have more children needing education sponsorship. We already have 3 children already approved for sponsorship, and there may be more coming. Of the 3, one is HIV infected. The sponsorship amount by the way is RM1,200/year for primary school and RM1,800/year for secondary school - payable either yearly or half yearly. The 3 newly approved children are all in primary school. The money will be used to pay for the child's basic schooling needs (including uniforms, shoes, stationeries, exercise books and workbooks), co-curricular activities (fees, uniforms etc), monthly pocket money, bus fares (if necessary), tuition (if necessary) and whatever other necessities as long as it is for the education of the children.

So, if any one of you readers are interested, or if you know of anyone who may be interested, you may contact us for further info.

Those who'd like to contribute but do not dare commit themselves to sponsor the children individually, you may still contribute one-off (any amount accepted, however small) to our Children Education Fund (CEF), which is a separate fund used to cover for the back-to-school expenses of the children who are not individually sponsored but still need help at the beginning of each schooling year.

You may either email Buddies or you may email me personally - I read them both!

Thanks folks!

A busy weekend...

I had wanted to visit baby K again over the weekend but there were oh so many things to do. Other than sending my car for servicing on Saturday morning, later at 3 pm we had our gotong-royong to tidy up our NGO center. Yes, we do have our cleaner coming in every Saturday to clean up the place but all she does is to clean the place… not tidy up the mess we created in our store room.

So we figured it was time to clear up the place – tidy up the things we need and throw away the things that we don’t. Otherwise even the useful things we won’t be able to use because by the time we need to use them, we won’t be able to find them!

7 volunteers turned up and one of the volunteers brought along his wife to help out (very clever, when it came to hard work, he brought his wife!!).

Before - everything simply chucked one thing on top of another...

The main thing causing the piling up of things in the store room was actually our Buddy Bears – its production has been greater than demand. With the bears in plastic bags and chucked into the store room, all the things that were placed in the store room earlier were simply lost from our sight! So we took things out from the room, placed the bears in boxes and marked the number of bears on each box.

During - an even bigger mess created...

Then we had to rearrange everything back into the room. Buddy Bears at one corner… Family Day things at one corner… groceries for our poor clients at one corner… at least we won’t get “drowned” in the mess when we try to look for things next time.

After - the bears already in boxes and stacked up at one corner

I couldn’t visit baby K on Sunday either as I had to go to KL for some personal matters. But Mrs. K did call me on Sunday evening, telling me that her little girl would probably be discharged on Monday and that the doctors had arranged for her IJN appointment in August. I know she’s worried about the traveling costs. I will have to think of something to help her out. Even if they still have their EPF money, they still need help.

Fuzi too called me. I had told her earlier to inform me if any of her children need to pay anything extra for their schooling needs as they are under sponsorship. So yes, her eldest daughter Wina was chosen as a prefect and needed to pay for her prefect’s uniform. In addition she also had to pay an additional fee of RM20 asked by her class teacher. Whatever the fee was for I don’t know, I will have to see the receipt first. Talk about free education….

And oh, Fuzi also mentioned that the children’s bus fares have increased from RM30 to RM40 a month. Which reminds me, with the price of petrol/diesel up; surely the other children too may have to pay extra for their bus fares. I’d better ask around, sometimes they are too shy to tell us if we don’t ask. I just came back from KL myself (my first trip to KL since petrol price shot up) and somehow my petrol tank seemed to have expanded….

And I’ve got quite a number of trips to KL in the next few weeks and maybe months... alamaaak…

The Sponsored Children

I was a bit kelam-kabut when the Education Sponsorship for Children first started. Unlike the Children Education Fund where I could lump up all payments under one account, for Education Sponsorship, I need to make sure there’s a separate account prepared for each particular child/sponsor so that by the end of the year we can send an individual report to each individual sponsor.

I guess that was why when the chairmanship of the NGO was handed over to me, and I handed over the treasurer’s job to a new treasurer, the committee members insisted that I still take care of the Education Sponsorship as it is still in its early stages. (In other words, they don’t want me to pass the headache to them!! Very clever lah these people!)

Well, I have finally managed to draw up a proper system/format for the sponsorship accounts, so now I can easily tell the fund balances for each individual sponsor, and the total sponsorship balances just by a click of the mouse. But I’d better remember to do a backup… all the info are now in my thumb drive, if I lose that, adoii… nangis!!!

Anyway, for the moment we now have 9 sponsored children – and 7 of the sponsors are readers of this blog. Another colleague of mine also managed to find a few other people interested to sponsor a child, and we are now in the process of assessing more children to be sponsored. By next year there will be a few more children under my charge who will be of school-going age, so I may need more sponsors next year.

Who are the 9 children sponsored so far?

3 of them are Fuzi’s children who can now go to school by bus instead of cycling along the lonely road every day. Fuzi can now use the monthly welfare aid for her household needs without having to worry about her children’s educational needs.

2 more children are Hana’s. Her elder daughter now need not worry about her monthly tuition fee as it is covered by the sponsorship money. But we are still unable to get a school bus/van for the younger daughter despite having the funds because so far none of the bus/van drivers approached wants to go to their area! So the little girl still has to walk to school every day. I am not too worried about the distance as she is used to it, but I am more worried about her safety, especially when her mother is at work and the girl walks alone to school. Just thinking about it gives me the creeps!!

Another 2 covered by sponsorship are Valli’s 2 boys. A whole load of burden is off Valli’s shoulders now that she doesn't have to worry about her sons’ bus fares and pocket money.

Shila’s daughter Laila is another child sponsored. Shila has told me that whatever amount of pocket money not used up by Laila in school will be kept in the girl’s savings account so she can use it for her future needs, when the sponsorship period is over (sponsorship is until she finishes school – it does not cover further education).

The 9th child sponsored is Pushpa the orphan. Her grandmother does not have any fixed monthly income… while her uncle has his own children to support. With the child’s schooling needs covered, her grandmother and uncle need not worry about her educational needs anymore.

To all the sponsors, if you’re reading this, YOU have made a whole lot of difference in the lives of these children.

On behalf of all the children and their families…

THANK YOU!!

House visits: Sponsorship assessment

When my NGO’s sponsorship committee set up the procedures for the application and approval for our Sponsorship for Education program, one of the requirements is that at least 2 members of the sponsorship committee must conduct a house visit to the homes of the children recommended for sponsorship to assess their situation. This is to ensure that the recommended families really deserve the sponsorship.

Well, we simply couldn’t find the time to do the house visits earlier, and as such we couldn’t finalize the list in time before school reopened recently. But not to worry, we used up our Children Education Fund to cover for their initial needs. Well, we have almost used up our Children Education Fund; hopefully the sponsorship money can start coming in soon to enable us to reimburse the funds.

So today, 3 of us went to do the house visits for this purpose. I had yesterday already stuffed up my car with groceries for 4 different families to be brought along during this visit.

After picking up 2 fellow committee members at about 10 am, off we went heading south of Ipoh, to start off our visit. There’d be a few stops along the way, so we figured we might as well use the Federal road instead of the PLUS expressway.

First stop was Shila’s house. All 3 of us had been to Shila’s house so the visit wasn’t really necessary but other than being a formality, we thought we might as well just drop by since we were passing that way anyway. At the same time we could also deliver some groceries to the family. We called Shila just about 15 minutes before we reached her place to make sure she was in. Yes, she was in, and the moment her daughter Laila knew we were coming, she kelam-kabut had her bath…

Next stop was supposed to be Pushpa’s house. All three of us had never been to her house. By right, the buddy involved should accompany us for our house visits, but since Pushpa’s buddy was in KL, we just went ahead without her buddy. Pat, her buddy, had earlier given me directions verbally without giving me the actual address of the house. Frankly speaking, I too may not remember most of my clients addresses. Oh yes, I do know how to get to their homes, I just don’t remember their addresses…

Anyway, the problem with the visit to Pushpa’s house was that nobody answered the phone when we called. When Pat tried to call a few days earlier to inform Pushpa's guardians of our visit, there was no answer either. So, while we managed to find the housing area, we simply couldn’t find the house. Ask around? Well… yeah… that would be a good solution… but the problem was that Pushpa is an HIV positive orphan who stays with her grandmother and uncle – and believe it or not, we didn't know the uncle’s or grandmother’s name!! We tried to call Pat to get more info, but Pat didn’t answer her phone either.

So okay, never mind, since our phone calls went unanswered, probably nobody was home anyway. I will have to arrange for another visit when they are around, and this time, I’d better make sure Pushpa’s buddy is available to accompany us for the visit. At least now I know the housing area where Pushpa stays.

We moved on to our next stop – Hana’s house. I’ve been to Hana’s house once before, so I should know the way. Her house is not easy to find if just based on the address. I was lucky that during my earlier visit, Pat was around to show me the way, so this time, although not 100% confident; I managed to find her house without getting lost.

As we were climbing up the hill to get to Hana’s house, I heard her daughter shouting to her, “MAMAAA!!!” Hana was actually sleeping. It was about 11.30 am. Oh no, she’s not the type to wake up late. It was her sleeping time. You see, she so happen to be on night shift this week, so she has no choice but to sleep during the day time.

We didn’t stay long. After getting a few details from Hana and reimbursing her for the amount she had to fork out to pay for her children’s schooling needs, we headed on to our next destination – Valli’s house further south.

Valli is also under Pat, and again, none of us had been to her new place. And again, no proper addresses were given by Pat, just directions. But Valli had already been informed that we were coming and the low cost flats she stays in was quite easy to find. Nice place, I might add.

Although it was our first visit to the house, we had already met a few times earlier as Valli was one of our earlier clients and had been with us for some time already. Her boys had joined a few of our Family Day outings so we were already familiar to them.

The boys (14 and 12) had even wanted to prepare some drinks for us but we told them not to prepare anything. It was already lunch time by then and we were planning to have lunch outside right after that.

So after getting the boys’ details and reimbursing Valli for the amount she had already paid for their schooling needs, off we went for lunch. There’s one famous spot in that town people love to go to for lunch, so we thought of having lunch there. And yes, other than freshly cooked ikan bakar, there were lots of choices of lauk-pauk there.

There was one more house to go to, and although this house was the other way ie slightly north of Ipoh instead of south, we thought we might as well finish our visits one shot. So, yes, after lunch, we took the Plus Expressway and headed back to Ipoh before moving on to Fuzi’s house – the house I regularly go to on a monthly basis, so of course there was no problem at all finding her house. I am Fuzi’s buddy, so the visit was just to ensure that 2 other committee members had visited and assessed her family. Both my colleagues thought that amongst the families visited today, Fuzi’s family was the one most deserving help.

But we’re approving the sponsorship for all the families visited today anyway. While people like Hana and Valli have jobs, their income may just be enough for their household needs.

So yes, we went to 5 different places today but only managed to visit 4 families. We started our visit at 10 am, and by the time I got home, it was 3 pm.

Total mileage = 178kms

Quite a day I must say, and I am pretty amazed that despite having to be the “driver” for today, I am not at all exhausted.

At least now I feel a bit relieved that the house visits are done! (ok, except maybe to Pushpa’s house, but just one more to go… not too bad lah)

Sponsor a child, anyone?

It has been 8 months since I started this blog. I’ve done more than 100 postings (this one’s the 108th), the bulk of which were true stories about HIV infected people and their families whom I’ve been dealing with in my voluntary work.

If you have been following the stories, you would have noticed that many of the families under my charge are poor families, mostly single mothers who had to take over the responsibility as breadwinners for their families; and not earning enough to cover all their needs.

You may have read about:

• The children who were reluctant to go to school because they were pressured by their teachers to pay for the various fees.
• The children who were told to buy additional books which were not even listed in the list given earlier by the school. And then get scolded when they don’t buy the books without even the teacher asking why he/she didn’t buy the book.
• The children who were told to join uniformed co-curriculum activities in school but can’t afford to pay for the uniforms?
• The small children who had to walk to school, exposing themselves to dangers lurking around.
• The children who were pressured by their van/bus drivers to pay up the monthly van/bus fares.
• The children who had to actually miss school because they had no transport to go to school and would only go to school if there was anybody they could hitch a hike from.
• The children who needed tuition but whose parents can’t afford to pay for the tuition fees.
  

And God knows what other difficulties they face…

Education is a must for these children. It is a BASIC necessity for them. No matter what their parents had done, no matter what their background is, these children still deserve the chance to get at least basic education without getting unnecessary pressure… without exposing themselves to danger (by having to walk alone to school because parents can’t afford transport fares)…

If you can afford to help these children, will you?

My NGO has just finalized the guidelines for our Education Sponsorship for Children, where we hope to get individual sponsors for each individual child to sponsor their school needs until these children finish schooling. Amongst the expenses to be covered include the various fees that need to be paid to the school (there may be no more school fees and exam fees but I believe there are still lots of other fees – co-op, computer, co-curriculum etc), exercise books, workbooks, uniforms, shoes, bags, stationeries, van/bus fares or other means of transportation, tuition fees, pocket money and whatever other necessities.

Interested to sponsor a child? Or you have some queries on this?

Please email hivbuddiesipoh@yahoo.com .

More details will be given to those who indicate their interest to the above email address.