New Year, New Life, New Beginnings

Dear Friends,

We wish you all a happy, healthy and meaningful new year. The new year is both a time for new beginnings and a time for reflection. Here we are celebrating past achievements and supporting new opportunities for children, youth and families. We were pleased to have a celebratory dinner for some of the young people who recently graduated from their yearlong hospitality training program. They now all have good jobs and are heading into a new and exciting phase of their lives. It was wonderful to see how their situations have changed since joining K.I.D.S. Smart Kids program 7 years ago and as one young man put it "if it were not for you and K.I.D.S. we would not be us" there were tears of appreciation, happiness, and gratitude...which they asked us to pass on.

We are so grateful to Hak Sok, who manages the program and also takes kids to live with his family in the city so they can attend their training programs. We now have three more young people in training school and living with Hak and his wonderful family.

In the same week we spent time in the countryside meeting and interviewing new students and their families. As we went to visit each of their basic dwellings and chat we were filled with both sadness and hope. These families are extremely poor. Giving up the labour of one child, to further their education, is a noble sacrifice; as they could work in the brick factories and increase the family income, however their desire to better their children's lives outweighs their basic needs. Thanks to you we were able to add eleven more families to the program.

We know that through K.I.D.S. support this program we will be able to assist the families to make life easier by providing them with bathrooms, better living conditions, bikes and solar lighting systems over the next few years. We have witnessed the changes families go through when given support and it is truly uplifting.

The new classrooms are well underway and everyone is very excited to soon open more spaces for children to learn. The building team is so happy to have the work and this project contributes to the village economy.

For many children and families here, thanks to your support and generosity, there is much to be celebrated and look forward to.

One of the graduate students sent this song to thank everyone for their support. (here is the link)

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDEmA2GizZA (Open in YouTube)

Until next time,
Adrianne and Rick