I think it is time for some background for people that are new to this blog.
This journey started back in 2007 when I lefty Australia to travel through south east Asia for 6 months. During that time I spent 6 weeks in Laos and under took a range of exciting activities that helped me fall in love with this beautiful country. The most special experience was taking six days and heading into a remote village to really get a sense of village life. I was taken into the family household of the guide I was with and ate, slept and worked alongside them for the six days. It was a truly unique experience and one which will shape the rest of my life.
My parents always told me that education is key to improving your life and so I was struck by the effect that having such limited access to educational resources would have on the opportunities the children of the area would have in the future. With broken blackboards an absence of books and teaching resources these kids will be
doing it tough in the modern knowledge economy.
So I started with a small gesture of buying two blackboards for one of the villages and it all grew from there. After a successful music fundraiser in 2009 and a more successful trivia night in 2010, I have returned to Laos with around $4000 to spend on supplying resources that the teachers need. And that is why I am here.
My team involves a good friend of mine Thee who guided me the first time and he enlists the help of friends and family to manage the logistical operations. We met again today and talked of our plans over the next two weeks.
In that discussion it became apparent that there is much that is changing.In the last two years one of the villages (Houay Kasak) has been merged with another village, Ban Kok. In addition and a little concerning is that there is now a road that provides access to all the villages in the area that was built by Vietnamese construction crews. Why this came about is because the Chinese are building two dams along the Nam Kahn river which the Nam Fen feeds into and roads have been built to allow construction crews in. From there it was only a reasonably short extension to
build a road to the five villages of the Nam Fen river. What the impact of this will be is yet to be determined but life is definitely changing and these villages are becoming less isolated. This creates opportunities and costs that need to be managed.
The other point of interest is that the government is taking a greater interest in what we are doing and want to put additional controls in place, including itemised tracking of what material goes in. A side effect that is emerging of providing money to these villages is that the education office, wanting to use its limited budget effectively, wants to shift money away from the villages I am working with and provide it to other villages. this is a little concerning and I need to be careful that the villages along the Nam Fen don't end up with a net loss.
So these are the stories of note and challenges as we move into the next phase. Keen to hear your comments and ideas on how to move forward.
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