To be an orphan on Father’s Day – even at best, it’s pretty tough.

Last week, on Father’s Day, which falls on our King’s birthday, our children expressed their love in song for their King; and the local Abbot and myself led our children in blessings and prayers. A friend, who understands – who lost his own son in a car crash – dropped by with loads of goodies for all our children. Cake and Ice Cream can wipe away lots of tears. Especially when it’s a surprise! There was much to enjoy and celebrate.

But our children can’t help feeling a little bit lost and even betrayed on a day dedicated to their absent fathers. They believe, perhaps more than the rest of us, in the sanctity and joy of a loving family. I bring this up because I want to explain by example the case of young Miss Dao. That's her in the photo below on the far right with her friends at Mercy.

Nong Dao, now age nine, joined our Mercy family when she was just a toddler. Her older brothers Dik and Duk joined us a year earlier, but her mom, who was dying of AIDS, wanted to hold on to Dao a little longer, see her take her first steps and hear her say “momma”: her first words. Mom died at home when Dao was five. Dao was there, holding her hand when she died. Her dad had left when mom got sick.

After her mom died, Dao would visit her grandma on most weekends, and often cried herself to sleep when she came back to Mercy Centre on Sunday evenings.

Last week grandma died. It’s not easy being a nine-year-old orphan girl. It’s even harder to be a young orphan without even a grandma. I attended the cremation with Dao, Dik and Duk, as I do whenever our children lose their loved ones. Miss Dao cried a lot, but one of our house moms overheard her whisper, “don’t worry Granny – I’ll be okay. I’m a big girl. “

People may think our children have no family or that they are totally uninvolved. The truth is, almost all our children have family somewhere. And because they live apart, there’s often a yearning to return to make things whole. Our children recognize that family time is precious.

We try where we can. We try to make them feel that every day at Mercy is Father’s Day and Mother’s Day and Children’s Day all rolled into one.

Our kids are indomitable, resilient, and full of hope.

There’s much news to share with you about Mercy. Here are just few notes of recent events:

New Mercy Kindergarten for Sea Gypsies.

We have been teaching kindergarten in Koh Lao, an island village of destitute ethnic Mokan, since 2008. We started by turning a large dilapidated shack on stilts into a classroom, but since the shack was technically on land, we had issues with the landlord. Also, the shack continuously flooded during high tide.

With support from the Jan & Oscar Foundation and Lloyd George Asia Foundation, plus cooperation from local government, we just completed the construction of a real kindergarten, again on stilts but far enough away from the shoreline that nobody can claim the land.

The new Jan & Oscar Kindergarten officially opened in November. Over 50 ethnic Mokan children attend daily. It’s a revolution in education. Not one of their parents ever learned to read or write. None.

Rebuilding whole neighborhoods after fires.

Two sweeping fires recently devastated whole neighborhoods in our slums – one in the Pai Sing To community; the other in Rom Klao. Hundreds of families were left homeless.

Thanks to an outpouring of support from our friends, we were able to care for all the fire victims, provide emergency funds and gifts, get the kids back to school with new books and uniforms, raze the dangerous structures still standing, remove the rubble; and build new homes. Friends of Mercy made a huge difference in their lives. Thank you!

Our street kid students learn advanced technology.

Street kids are fearless, even in a classroom: they’re not afraid to learn anything. If you don’t believe me, please come visit our Janusz Korczak School, a special, informal school for street children, migrant children, and poor children who have no other place to learn, play and make friends.

A volunteer teacher, Kru Pearl, has been teaching our Korczak kids how to build websites, create their own computer applications, and program computers. Here’s just one example: an introduction to our Korczak school made by the kids themselves:

http://www.powtoon.com/p/d8WcfEKDU3J/#.Unn7uiWGO7s.gmail

All of this programming seems impossibly difficult to me; but street kids, as I mentioned, aren’t afraid of anything.

Leadership training for the poorest children in the slums.

We took almost 150 neighborhood kids camping last month. These kids are poorer than most other slum kids, and we’ve been sponsoring their education ever since kindergarten. If we didn’t support them, they’d likely be helping their parents collect recyclable garbage on the streets or doing menial work far below the minimum wage.

At leadership camp, these kids learn about life beyond their shack in the slums.

They’re smart, alert, curious and caring.

Over 50 children we’ve been sponsoring since kindergarten are now enrolled in vocational colleges and universities. One former Mercy child, Miss Wanwisa, is now a doctoral candidate in neuroscience in Atlanta.

You don’t want to sell any poor kid short. Give them just a gentle nudge, and they can jump over any hurdle.

Finally, as Christmas draws nearer, the energy and excitement in our Mercy Centre surges upward. Please come visit. It’s a beautiful here, and you are always welcome. You are always a part of our Mercy family.