Things happening in my hood

So much has gone on the past few month (more than me just having a good time rockin out in Thailand) and I apologize for lacking in the sharing department.  I'm breakin this one down by some of the things I've recently done and some of the things I hope to do over the next 1.5 years I have left here in the Land of Smiles :)

One of the amazing families I've met here - took me in as their own.  This was at a beautiful Wat they took me to.

In a previous blog I've mentioned that my Balat (supervisor) has taken me to visit some of the disabled people in our community.  We were both strongly moved by a little girl, Noong Kim, who has an underdeveloped brain and cannot speak or move much - she can hear though.  She was very cute and after about 3 of our visits, she would smile when we spoke to her.  Our office and the community donated many things to this family, as they are much less fortunate than most other families.  This is the case with most families of disabled people.  Due to this realization of the needs of those with disabilities, we are creating a disability group in our community and plan to provide them with opportunities for extra income.

Noong Kim.  That is her grandma and some of the SAO staff in the background at one of the visits when we delivered some goodies for Kim.

In the Peace Corps worldwide, there are 4 special committees that focus on the following: HIV/AIDS, youth development, ICT and gender and development (GAD).  I am a member of the GAD member and we are hoping to provide a train the trainer conference in 2012 for PCV's and their Thai counterparts.  We hope to provide others with the tools and the skills to teach youth in their community about sexual health, gender roles, sexual identity and peer pressure.  I am responsible for the gender roles component and will implement my activities addressing this complex topic at the secondary school, before the end of the year. 

To go along with this topic, I recently met the Persons Living with HIV/AIDS (PHA) group of my district (where I live is a sub-district of this district).  I just hung out with them all day and got to know them a bit.  They shared their stories of how they became infected, how long they've known of their positive status and how the villagers segregate themselves as they are afraid of them.  These brave people do go to many of the secondary schools in the district and share their story, but there is still much stigma associated with HIV and more people, outside of students in the school, need to be educated.  The group also got to know me a bit more and asked why I am so interested in working with them.  It was hard for me to express my true feelings with them due to my amateur language skills, but I just kept clutching at my heart as I told them that it makes me so sad to hear their story and I want to teach others so they can be treated just as any other person.  They told me they were afraid I would hate and despise them because they were HIV.  We all shed a few tears and by the end of the afternoon, despite my language, I think they know I'm on their side.  They were amazing and I hope to work with them in the future as well.  For now, I will continue to attend their monthly support group meeting.



Just chatting it up



If you ever make it to rural Thailand, brace yourself for the worst teeth you've ever seen.  Yes, they are worse than the English. Mainly because Thai's love sweets and other foods that just turn into sugar (i.e. rice 3 times/day) and never brush their teeth.  If the kids have teeth, they are usually brown and rotting out of their mouths anyway, so you can imagine how ecstatic I was when I found out that my community has been in the midst of a dental healthcare campaign at the schools to teach the kids how to brush their teeth and also give them toothbrushes. They've dabbled in teaching parents and elders but I don't think it's been too successful.  Anyway, I was lucky enough to observe the dental nurse teach the kindegarten class at one of the schools.  

I was even more shocked when they told me to slap on some gloves, squeezed some fluoride gel on my finger and told me to clean the little guys teeth!  I was scared I would mess up but it was a lot of fun!  The kids were so good.

There's actually quite a bit more in the works, but will wait to tell those tales until after the fact.  Till then, choke dii ka (Good luck)!