nycjoe

californiabeachboy, on 2011-04-22 00:53:56, said:

Hi,
I have been HELPING in Chiang Mai and Maehongson for years, I volunteer with toysforthailand.org, based out of San Diego, we do no WORK, just consult with the schoolmasters at the hill tribe schools along the border and supply the things they need to turn their schools into protein factories. Our latest project was to supply a water system in Om Goi village, we partnered with Mae jo university, faculty and students who installed the system. The key is not to do work that will take work from a Thai.
We pattern ourselves after the Heifer project, we give fish farms, barber shops (which make money for seeds and fish food) fish farms, gardening tools, soy milk making machines, tofu making machines, rice husking machines that while reducing the cost of milled rice also feed the breeding pigs and ducks we supply. The pigs offal, is put into tanks that produce methane to run the stove in the kitchen and is later used as fertilizer. Playgrounds entice the villagers to bring their children to the schools, rather than use them in the fields. We are never disappointed in seeing the fruits of our labor (fund raising). Last year we put on a festival in Maehongson which was hosted by the Mayor, all of the hill tribes were represented and they performed their dances and songs and mingled with the other children from different tribes nine tribes were represented, it was wonderful and I got a certificate for being the number one elf (not a work category) for toysforthailand.org, signed by the Mayor and School Administrator for the provence. We go twice a year to give to the the tools they need to the schoolmasters. I will be organizing fundraisers and trips to the schools upon my return to Thailand, ( I am currently in NYC ) on June 15th, if you want to get in touch with me, my number in Thailand is 0857142550 after June 15th, I will find something for you to do.
Our goal is to help the schools to become self sufficient and be able to leave a self sustaining system that they can administer that while improving the nutrition of the children and also teaches them animal husbandry and farming without the use of chemicals ie. marigolds with cabbages.
Sasha Bilar from San diego was born in Thailand and is the dynamo of our organization and communicates well with the powers that be. While Maria Miller counts the buttons and keeps the whole thing together.
Another group I work with is strongwillseed.org, which sells cards made by a few schools south of chiang mai, it is a Thai Charity, that brings out the creative juices of the kids while helping them to raise money for their schools nutritional program. We are sectarian and do nothing to change the cultures of the people that live there and we are all volunteer, I am retired from the New York Times.
I don't know of anyone who has been kicked out of Thailand for helping the Thai people to help themselves. Go to http:www.toysforthailand.org and check it out.

A fellow I know was arrested 3 weeks ago at another venue, for playing music without a permit. It seems there is a new big boss at CM immigration...............

The specter of fear will now be a new part of the persona of Thailand, I live in New York City in the summer and Chiang Mai in the winter, as you enter the subway stations, the police randomly check bags, there are public service announcements to be aware of suspicious bags and it becomes a way of life, the underlying paranoia. I went to help at the WTC when it fell, I have some red cross training and when I arrived at the corner of vesey and west streets at the foot of building number 1, a policeman told me that I was a civilian and to go to help at a hospital, I was on a bicycle and I pedaled 4 blocks away and heard the first building fall. I spent the remainder of the day at a hospital helping with security. We made a staging area for the ambulances to come in a park adjacent to the hospital, New York for that one day became as one. The hospital was deluged by young people who came to help or give blood, but few people arrived, as it was a stark reality of black or white, that you either made it out and were well or were caught and were dead.
These cowardly acts in Thailand come from the greed of not just the former owner/leader of Thailand Thaksin Shinawatra, but the feudal society that is perpetuated by the powers that be, until the needs of the neglected masses of poor people are addressed, there will not be harmony in the land. I read a letter in a magazine that expressed the thoughts of a farmer, who  worked another's land for enough rice to get by, while his beautiful daughter was in Bangkok doing what she had to do and of which he did not want to know, to send money to make the families life a bit more bearable. Thailand take care of your people, and address your corruption.

Ouch!

I went to Nong Nooch gardens In jomptien and they had returned the orangoutangs to the zoo. They had them as photo ops a few years ago but were made to stop the pracice, change is coming but slowly.