On a monthly basis I travel to the Khao Lak / Baan Nam Khem area to check on our students and projects. I have been remiss in updating this web page, but be assured that your funds are being used in the most personally direct ways possible.

All of our students are now out of the camps and living in permanent housing. Some of it better planned and built that others, but all are with their extended families and safe and in school. We continue with their monthly allowances. Our aim is to see them through their entire schooling if possible. Any who would like to attend university, we will try and find the means for them to attend, to prepare them for a promising life.

private funded housing near Khao Lak agency funded neighborhood near Baan Nam Khem

Our small business plans are going well. It is very heartening to see the pride with which these companies are being run. All are now making a profit, some more than others, and are creating employment for more people in the community. Khun Sayan, pick up owner, has extended his business to fish wholesaling. With the return of tourism to the Khao Lak area, Khun Sayan has made contracts with some of the newly reopened hotels and restaurants. He buys fresh seafood from the fishermen in Baan Nam Khem and delivers it every morning to his clients. He has plans to add a stall at a new market being set up near the new housing areas and employ some of his family members. We have recently financed a motorcycle for Khun Opas to use as a motorcycle taxi, and help support his already large extended family and his newborn son!

Khun Sayan with his nieces and nephew and mother new member of the family

The three houses that our fund paid to have built for the Mogon Sea Gypsy community have been completed; in fact they have finished building homes for all of their tribal members. The building of the Community Center has yet to be started. The plans have recently been approve by the Committee of Elders, and we await the New Year to start the construction. The rains seem to have finally stopped, and the mud is bearable, and life is getting back to a sort of normalcy. Happy faces on the mothers as they move into their new homes with fans and refrigerators, and the men going back to sea in new boats, or employed in construction of the growing number of new buildings. Even the Mogons, who have settled inland, away from their traditional island homes, are setting a new course in their lives.

Mogon house is almost ready to move in ew member of the Mogon community men gather for a meal and community meeting

The city of Khao Lak is rebuilding. The deluxe hotels; Meridian Khao Lak and Sarojan are open for business. Other boutique hotels and guest houses have reopened and are hoping to be busy during the holiday season. The reopening of the hotels and restaurants in Khao Lak has provided employment for some, and a sense of progress to the whole area.

The Phuket beach hotels are back in business, and there is little sign of the Tsunami on the streets of Patong. It is not as full as in previous years, but there are many visitors enjoying their vacation.

Tony Lodge in Khao Lak new road and shops setting up in Khao Lak

room in 5* Meridian Khao Lak lots of construction jobs for previous fishermen

Looking forward to the anniversary of the Tsunami that forever changed the lives of the people in this region, there is lots of hope and progress for a bright future. Thank you for keeping all the wonderful survivors of this tragic event in your thoughts. Kathy