This is how the past 2 months have felt.

First of all let’s get the not so happy stuff out of the way and I will tell you I will be short with this part. Many people came here and many more contacted me, all about helping out at the Wat. I was told that I could have them help (which is something that has not been able to happen for a while) and some did but then I got the word in very few words that this was no longer OK. I just wish it was always a yes since the kids love having help and more volunteers. If you have more questions about this please read my last blog post. But the long and short of that is, I am a volunteer and I do what I can do at the Wat and I have rocked the boat before but I need to stop that for a while. So if you do want to help the best way is to make a donation so I can use that for getting the kids into University when they graduate from the Wat.

Also been dealing with a new visa process and by this time I usually have it but I am still waiting, 6 months of waiting so far but there is a light at the end of the long tunnel. I am told I should know by the end of September or October????? I am hoping this is true since I need to get home to work and make some money so that I can continue volunteering as well I need to fundraise so I can get Som Yot and Belle into college. I am planning to do a fundraiser in LA, Philly and Jersey. Som Yot and Belle are both Shan from Shan State, if you get a chance to google this, please do so much to learn about these people (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shan_State). Belle now has a legal ID card to live here in Thailand so she can goto school. As for Som Yot the first step is to get him a Legal ID card and after that we can get him into university. I was just told it will cost nearly $4000 to do this process but earlier I was told it would only be about $1000. Needless to say we are “shopping” around to see what we can do. So far I have raised $500 from some very nice people stopping by here and hitting that sweet lil paypal button, thank you all so much.

Am I going off or are you all still with me?

So the beautiful and very kind Lana Shea Genna and her husband Joe Mattia came for a visit and the plan was to teach yoga to the kids, I was told just the girls could join for this activity. Unfortunately this plan had to change a bit. Poor Joe got dengue fever so he was not well enough to go but Lana just hooped on the back of my bike and taught an amazing class to 30 of the girls and they loved it so much. Oh and Joe is doing great now, pretty sick for a few weeks though. Thank you so much for your time, the girls are still talking about it.

Jesse Hall came from California and brought 3 electric guitars to donate to the kids. He brought them on a Friday afternoon and gave them a 1 hour lesson too. Now this activity was just for the boys. The guitars are now in one of the teachers offices and when they want to use them they must sign them out and bring them back. The worry was that the kids would not share as well as play them when ever they wanted and at 2 Am when most are trying to sleep, well you get the picture.

Around the same time that I heard from Jesse about the guitars I heard from another Jesse, Jesse Ash and his lovely girlfriend Faith Karg. Faith had lived here for a year a few years ago and was back for a visit, Jesse was to join her for the end part of her trip. She found this lil blog, Stu and the Kids and she went to visit the Wat, on her own and had a chance to hang out and play for a few hours. We finally got to meet when Jesse arrived and he brought a HUGE bag of clothes and 15 thumb drives to donate. That’s not all……. They had friends make donations on here too, amazing, truly amazing. I am so grateful, thank you so much.

Whitney Spathelf and Jenny Lenardson were here 2 months ago from LA and they brought a HUGE bag of clothes, school supplies, thumb drives and baseball hats for the kids too. It has been so great to give all of these nice gifts out to the kids. Some of which I keep for prizes for games during class time. You should see when I let them pick something, they love it!

What else, what else, I am sure I am forgetting something????????

Oh yeah, I met with a wonderful lady from the Karen Hill Tribe that runs the Elephant Nature Park here in Chiang Mai. I wanted to speak with her about volunteers and opportunities for when people contact me and I am not able to bring them to the Wat. Again, sometimes I can but this is for when I can’t. She told me about her Elephant Park here in Chiang Mai, the one in Cambodia, her dog park and the cat park she is building. So if you like animals and wanna help, contact me or the folks from the Elephant Nature Park at http://www.saveelephant.org. She also is involved with building schools and education programs in remote Hill Tribe villages, now this is what I like to help with. Some of her volunteering projects are free but some you have to pay a bit for but I think it is mainly for room, food, gas, stuff like that. I am not 100% on all of this so if interested it is best to check out her website.

For the past 3 months I have been volunteering at another school, teaching a really fun Friday English Camp, I guess we will call it a camp??? A friend of mine is a teacher at the Siripi Technical School and the kids had Fridays off so she asked if I could do this. My friend Lynn Anderson helped out and did a few classes too. The kids are so great and this was an extra course for them, they did not have to go but the ones that did loved it and so did I. Most classes had 20 kids, I hope to have the opportunity to work with them again. Last week after class we took them to a hotel to eat at the international buffet, stuffed, totally stuffed, lol.

Quick update on the Stu and the Kids, kids, Tanagone, Surisit and Thammasak…..Doing well, grades are good and happy. Surisit and Thammasak have 1 more semester after this one and then it if off to the working world for them. Thammasak is working on his final project and for that he is making an electric fence. Surisit is making a needle making machine, I will post pictures if they ever email them to me, lol. They have also been traveling a bit playing and competing in a game similar to Chess, “Ko” with their school, they both made it to the finals so we will see if they take the gold. Tanagone has been coaching Badminton at his university, he loves it. His grades this year are so good but it is a lot of work, this term he has 3 different English courses, good luck buddy. Tanagone still has 2 more years to go after this semester. All of the money for all expenses are already in the bank for all of this so all of the new donations will go for helping out Som Yot and Belle. I have 2 other kids that I want to help also but first we need to see if we can raise that money and if not they plan to take a year off and work to save some money or try to take out a school loan which could be quite difficult……….. So there you have it, you are up to date. As always, peace and gratitude, -Stu.