Big happenings at the CHA

Back in March, we received the sad news from Kim Tha, the director of the Cambodian Handicraft Association that Sok Chea, one of the young disabled women they supported, had suddenly become ill at work, and after being taken to hospital she was diagnosed as having typhoid fever. She sadly passed away later that day due to a heart attack. It came to light afterwards that she had a congenital heart condition that Kim Tha was unaware of.

Kim Tha asked us for funds to help with funeral costs amounting to US$2600, but sadly we had to decline as such costs just don't fall within the remit of the CFF. Similarly, a previous request to fund a marketing trip to India also had to be declined. However, we decided to make a donation of US$1700 (about £1000) to help with increased running costs during the difficult times CHA found themselves in.

Then in early July Kim Tha again contacted me to ask for assistance - this time more urgently required:

"We appeal to you for help because the current landlord of our house, where we have run our projects for 3 years, sold his house and the new landlord who bought this house asked us to find other place to move our programme out at the end of July 2014. He needs the house, where we have processed the projects for the disabled, for his own aim. We have been very worried about this transfer because we have had no funds to resolve this, so we really require your kind help and urgent funds as well as your useful advice. We found a new site for our programme and will move to it at the end of July, but it needs fixing and adding some more parts of the new house and renovation – as mentioned in the detailed estimate attached. We need funds for moving our programme to another house and the rent cost for a few months after being moved so that we can have strong position to lift up to help ourselves continue it as usual.  Your help with this will ensure our group can pursue the efforts and patience to learn more skills in our programme, and CHA will maintain its excellent standard of work with the disabled. Your priceless cooperation and funds in this matter is greatly appreciated and the impact you are having on the lives of the trainees at CHA is substantial – for this we are truly thankful. On behalf of the CHA programme, I would personally like to extend my gratitude to you"

The move was estimated to cost CHA around US$12,000 as they had quite a lot of work to do on the new site to make it habitable. We initially wanted to offer Kim Tha US$2400, equivalent to three months' rent on the new premises, but after consulting him he confirmed this would simply not be enough.

The CFF Trustees and I were very concerned that CHA could cease to exist if we did not help as much as we possibly could, so we asked what level of support would keep them going, and Kim Tha told us that US$5,000 would help them survive. As we had enough money in the account we decided that we should make this donation.

Kim Tha has been sending lots of photos of the work they are carrying out and I think this one gives some idea of the scale of the work required. The zinc roof is new, and the floor was just earth, but has now been concreted.

If you would like to see more of the transformation then these YouTube videos posted by Kim Tha will give you more of an idea of how much work has been done - with your money of course.

The house before renovation:  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmTusaRTj_c


The house after renovation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KIC1Vzatpk

So it seems we have secured the future of the CHA in the short term. They have a 3 year lease on the new premises, which isn't very long at all, and of course having spent as much as they have on these new premises it would be a real waste if they had to move again after these 3 years.

I am intending to visit Cambodia at the end of the year and will speak to Kim Tha about how we can try and secure their longer-term future, perhaps by looking to buy the land or by asking for a longer lease. We don't have enough money to do that at the moment, but perhaps with some targeted fund-raising we could do something.

I will leave the last word to Kim Tha, as I feel this says it better than I could:

"Thanks to your generous assistance, we have renovated new premises of CHA program. Your kindness of your funds makes our program move on successfully and we are very glad that your kind help also makes our disabled group continue to live on and try all our best to struggle our daily life better and better. We all have never forgotten your precious funds and help for our whole life.
On behalf of CHA members, I myself would like to thank you very much for the donation, and express our sincere and thankfulness to you and your donors, and wish you and your donors have happiness, good luck, good health and success in your noble business and beautiful life. We all remember your name in our hearts and we do not know how much to say " Thank You " as  the same as your kindness and generosity to support us while we are facing to the worrying time and difficult life to move our program to another place"