Last month, I had the privilege of meeting two former World Vision sponsored children from Thailand and The Philippines, who were in town to offer their voices and share their lives with the Malaysian public. And because of my job scope, I had the honor of sitting through their interviews with the media. With that, I try my best now to share with you their stories. Simple yet powerful stories, of how lives were transformed. Stories of hopes that became realities. Stories that made a person pay attention to listen, not because one has to but because one is attracted to.
Once in a while, we meet people who inspire us, who made us believe in the goodness of humanity again. Such were the sweet encounters with Mrs Ornanong Panyawang Awakul, from Thailand and Mr Richard Supat, from The Philippines. One was a former Ms Thailand 1992, who is now a well known actress, TV host and a celebrity in her home country. The other, holds a degree in Mass Communications and an MBA, spearheading the Human Resources Department of a location-based services in his home country. Neither of them ever thought that their lives would take such a turn.
Richard Supat today
Both were born into a poor family, struggling to survive on daily basis. Richard’s parents were working in a peanut butter factory, depending on daily wages. Richard, who grew up in the ’shanti’ (slums) area of Metro Manila known as the ’sin city’, got emotional when speaking to The Star journalist, reminded that sometimes he only had rice with salt. Life took a gradual turn after he got selected into World Vision’s Child Sponsorship programme, teaching him values beyond classroom education - learning to be thankful and to be a good steward of what has been given. I believe lessons like these are the ones that shape a person’s world views. Richard eludes a quiet yet friendly persona and his humility amazed me when we met. When he sang “You Raised Me Up” at our This Is My World Vision Campaign launch, each word came alive from a soul who truly understood the lyrics. I must say, some of the audience present were at the verge of tears.
Richard (top) in his younger days and his sponsors (from USA and later, Germany)
In his interview with BFM 89.9 BFM 89.9, Richard said “Never in my entire life, I would imagine that someone I don’t know would help me. So that is a big responsibility and that has taught me to love other people who you do not know and just be there for them.” This is the beauty of the World Vision Child Sponsorship programme, it not just about a programme or the donation of RM50 per month but more than that, it is a journey together - the sponsor and the sponsored child.
Mrs Ornanong today
Mrs Ornanong, was always pleasant and one of the most down to earth celebrity I’ve met. She was always polite, even when speaking through an interpreter and there was a certain radiance about her smile. This was a child who came from a family of 7 siblings and her father was a construction worker by day and a tricylce taxi peddler by night, relying on daily wages. Her mother was a factory worker and sold fruits in the market. Growing up, she taught she would turn out to be a fruit vendor like her mom.
Mrs Ornanong then
World Vision came to the school she was studying one day and identified the poorest families, offering if they would like to be a part of its Child Sponsorship programme. The rest, as they say, is history for her. She kept her grades at school and eventually learned the traditional Thai dance, which contributed to her winning the title of Ms Thailand in 1992. She made public her background of poverty and that she was a sponsored child to the media upon winning the crown, believing that one should not be ashamed but instead, be grateful of how much her life has been changed because of the generosity of others. Today, she sponsors 6 children with her husband, saying that she can relate to them because she was once in their shoes. This is her way of encouraging the sponsored children that they must not give up on their dreams.
“World Vision is like a boat, it collects people on-board along the way and bring them to their destination”, she said through her translator to New Tide magazine journalist. Will you join us in this journey? Thank You, Mrs Ornanong and Richard, for being such amazing living testimonies.
I am writing this entry, not because its part of my job as a staff but because I truly believe in the work World Vision does. I hope you too, can believe in us to Build A Better World For Children. You can be that person for someone else too.
Sponsored child Leonel Novas, 17, was thrilled to discover he can play a role in World Vision’s relief efforts following the Haiti Quake.
Leonel lives in the Dominican Republic, near the border with Haiti, and is the child of a Haitian mother and Dominican father.
Immediately following the quake, thousands of injured took rides on crowded public transport to Jimini—a Dominican border town—to seek treatment in hospitals there.
The hospitals opened their doors to the wounded but doctors, who arrived from all over the world in response to the emergency, could not speak the Creole language of their patients and families.
Leonel accepted an invitation to a join a team of three World Vision translators to meet the communications needs.
Leonel says when he arrived at the Good Samaritan hospital, about 300 patients had turned up to a hospital designed to accommodate 60. Those seeking treatment, often with horrific injuries, lay in the hallways and were later placed in large tents in the hospital grounds.
He says doctors and patients were trying to communicate by hand signals which simply added to the chaos and confusion.
“I am able to make sure the doctors get the right message from the patients,” he says.
Leonel says that he is also able to reassure family members of the wounded by relaying to them doctors’ assessments and treatment plans.
At the same time, he finds the work emotionally challenging.
“I remember a little girl who had to have both her feet amputated. She cried and cried throughout the night,” he says.
Leonel says he can identify with many of the suffering because he has also been a victim of a natural disaster. In 2004, his home was destroyed when flooding swept through Jimini, killing several members of his family and dozens of his fellow sponsored children. He found temporary shelter in the home of a local pastor, and World Vision provided his family with food and clothing in the immediate aftermath.
“I feel deeply touched by their pain,” he says of the quake victims. “I feel I need to help, just as I was helped back in 2004,” he says.
He believes God also prepared him for his role. Having lived all his life in the Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic, his Creole language skills had suffered. However, recently he had been practising the language with a friend.
Leonel says in addition to helping him during the flooding disaster of 2004, World Vision has been instrumental in helping him progress at school, providing access to computers and school supplies. He is now in the 11th grade and hopes to go on to study languages and computer science.
Child Sponsorship allows children to break free from the cycle of poverty and empowers them to help others in need. You can make a difference too by sponsoring a child today.
The simplest thing you can do is to email this Youtube video and the website link http://www.worldvision.com.my/goh to all your friends on Facebook or maybe your office co-workers and get them to know about Gifts of Hope!
“A shocking sight!” was how Richard Stearns, President of World Vision US, described the scenes that greeted him at La Paix and L’Espoir hospitals when he arrived there with trucks bearing World Vision medical supplies to struggling city hospitals.
“I really felt we could have been in a war zone. There were patients in the courtyards in the hallways, and the waiting rooms. Obviously hurting people with bloody bandages and makeshift slings and casts,” he said.
However, the people he spoke to said that conditions were much improved from the previous week.“The dead have mostly been moved out and the ones remaining in the hospitals and clinics are mostly treatable cases,” he observed
At L’Espoir hospital, Stearns joined a human chain moving supplies from a truck to the hospital store room.Among the supplies delivered were dressings, antibiotics, tetanus shots, and materials for the treatment of broken bones.
But as the clock reached the hour when the quake had struck exactly one week earlier, hospital staff, and volunteers from around the world, ceased work, dropped to their knees and began to pray, sing, and give thanks for the support the hospital had received.
Stearns said it was a powerful moment.“I was just amazed at the faith of the people who were gathered there,” he said. “In the midst of this God could be glorified. In the midst of their pain they sang Great is thy Faithfulness and Amazing Grace in French. It was a very touching moment.”
Stearns added :“They still need more medical personnel, medications, and equipment, but they are certainly in better shape than they were a few days ago.A promising start had been made in building the capacity of hospitals and clinics to cope with the massive influx of injured patients.”
World Vision expects it will need to raise at least $20 million to help Haiti rebuild
Distribution of emergency supplies from warehouses in Haiti have begun - including water bottles, blankets, clothing, and first aid supplies
WV is also helping to provide emergency health services to the injured – distributed supplies to 7 hospitals on Wed and 2 more today (Thurs in Haiti)
Shipping supplies from Denver warehouse overnight, scheduled to arrive Afternoon flight out of Denver will carry 18 metric tons of basic supplies to quake zone at 6.30am (local time) in PaP
Shipment includes 18 metric tons of life-saving supplies including
· tarpaulins for temporary shelter
· blankets
· collapsible water containers
· hygiene kits, which include a month’s supply of toilet paper, sanitary pads, toothbrushes, toothpaste, combs, body soap and laundry soap for a family of five
· cooking sets, which include aluminum pots and pans, bowls, utensils
$100,000 has already been released from the partnership Emergency Preparedness & Response Fund (EPRF)
International response team will be flying in from around the globe to assist
World Vision will first focus on providing basic needs, especially helping children.
Relief goods are prepositioned in various locations across the country and have been mobilised for the response
WV has a container in PAP that arrived in July (prepositioning for hurricane season) with enough emergency items to serve 1540 families. Contains: 1500 kitchen sets, 1540 hygiene kits, 3500 collapsible water containers, 16,000 aqua tabs to purify water (note: have not yet confirmed the container is accessible)
For the updated report and international spokesperson available, please click here to read more
Malaysians who wish to donate towards Haiti Earthquake can download an Emergency Relief Donation form from www.worldvision.com.my or call World Vision Malaysia at Tel: 03-7880-6414.Cheques should be made payable to “World Vision Malaysia Berhad” with the words “Haiti Earthquake” written at the back of the cheque.
It’s refreshing to see the community in action, especially when you live in the city where individualism takes first place. We stayed at one of the communities one of the nights, and after dinner, we had fellowship with the community. Obviously that place being the only place where there was electricity, it was where everyone gathered. And we had fun together. How different it is from us being at our homes, where every family is in their individual houses, and every family member is in their own room!
Meeting my sponsor child and her mom was really special. She’s a really sweet girl whose mom obviously loves her very much. Margareta is no longer just a name to me but a person with a face, with a history and a story. Perhaps that’s the value of joining World Vision’s child sponsorships programme versus just paying a donation to a community. Because in having a sponsor child, at least for me, i feel not only compassion and a desire to help my kid, but the whole community. Because I know that if the community my child lives in is in dire straits, then my child too can’t move very far in life. We know that most times poverty is not so much an individual problem, but a societal problem caused by failed social structures, systems and flawed leaders. I guess that’s why God calls us to seek justice for all, and to usher in His Kingdom. We all have roles to play and perhaps for some of us it’s doing the work, but for some of us, it would be providing the resources for others to do the bulk of the work.
Sue Lee and her sponsored child, Margareta
Being in Indonesia and talking to some of them villagers also helped me look at Indonesian workers in Malaysia in a different light. They are people with stories, with perhaps difficult backgrounds, and they have families whom they are trying to give a better living to. I guess it’s true that unless you step into a person’s shoes, you can never pretend to know what their life is like and the kinds of things they are dealing with.
I can learn to be more emphatic towards them.
I hope more people will consider sponsoring a child through World Vision. We live a blessed life and we too easily take things for granted - no water for 10 minutes…”WHAT?!” The daily amenities we have each day, should be and is cause for great thanksgiving.
The Singkawang Sponsor visit spanned over 5 days in December. We were in Pontianak/Singkawang visiting the many community projects handled by World Vision or Wahana Visi (as the Indonesians call the organisation).
A bulk of the projects curently focuses on providing clean water to the communities, by helping them to build water tanks. Amazingly the water is clean and fresh as it comes straight from the source up in the mountains. Before these tanks, many of the communities had to transport unclean water from a far away river, consuming much of their time. They had no toilets and no running water, and that in itself is a cause of many health problems such as diarrhea etc. There are many more communities without running water but the communities themselves are now seeking to help their neighbors obtain fresh water supply.
World Vision also helps to set up kindergartens (also know as PAUDs = Pendidikan Anak Usia Dini) at these little villages. Providing pre-school education for the rural children is important because without it the children really struggle when they enter primary school. Of course World Vision also works hard to encourage children to finish at least their primary school education as many drop out due to the usual reasons of “it’s more profitable to work than study” or because children have to take care of their siblings, or it’s too difficult to get to school (some children walk over an hour to get to school, no matter the weather). The situation is even bleaker for those wanting to finish secondary school as they have to pay monthly school fees which many of them can’t afford. Other things World Vision helps with, is teaching them how to save and invest in the local credit union (even little children!), as well as simple but important things like providing mosquito nets to families.
What’s cool with World Vision’s work there is that they work hand in hand with the community. So whatever good that comes out of the village is a credit to the people there as well since without them, nothing can be accomplished. They are the ones to build the water tank, to dig the trenches for the pipeline, to build the school etc. World Vision just provides the resources, the expertise and the support. So it’s cool to see World Vision working together with the people, empowering them to improve their standard of living for a better future. The World Vision field staff there are amazing people who are full of passion for the work and for the people they are serving. Theirs is not an easy job!
The children Malaysians sponsor benefit from all these World Vision projects, obviously, and our RM50/month perhaps goes further when collected together to be used for the community, rather than just as a handout for the children. And what amazed me about these communities is that in talking to the adults, you don’t get the sense that they pity themselves. They have a lot of dignity and even though they are less fortunate, they are generous people, and full of love and care for each other.
Cheers, Sue Lee
p/s do look out for Part II of Sue Lee’s story in Singkawang!
Here are the 6 celebrity child sponsors who will travel with us on this journey of ‘This is My World Vision’ to share their world vision to the Malaysian public.
World Vision offers those who can give, the opportunity to improve the lives of children in need by sharing resources, hope and experiences in overcoming poverty. Through the Child Sponsorship programme, those who are interested sign-up as child sponsors giving RM50 monthly and contributing to the community’s goal of improving life for the sponsored children.
These 6 ads will be aired on Astro from January - March, do remember to share these with your friends!
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