It is not easy to find our Yenakart Mercy Preschool on any Bangkok map, tucked away, as it is, in an obscure slum community beneath an overpass on the way to Papadaeng. But somehow a bicycle tour company – Recreational Bangkok Biking – stumbled upon our Yenakart school several years ago, and they have been supporting us ever since. Today they lead a group of Madam Ambassadors from Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Mexico, the Netherlands, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa on a visit to our Yenakart school. Our teachers received a generous donation, and our school children danced, sang, and, of course, as they always do, hula-hooped with unbridled joy for their guests. Also, as captured below, the kids enjoyed a few games of paddy cakes.

On the morning of January 8, 2011, the Archbishop of Bangkok Frances Xavier Kriengsak Kovitvanich lead a group representing ten local Catholic Churches in a charity walk in Lumpini Park to support our Mercy Centre. Over 1,000 adults and children joined in the walk, including our own Mercy children and their House Moms and Dads. After everyone crossed the finish line, our children demonstrated their skills in Taekwondo, music and dance to the assembled crowd.

Please watch this high-spirited holiday message from our Mercy children.

This past Monday, December 13^th, HRH Princess Srirasmi, the Royal Patroness of the Human Development Foundation, celebrated her birthday with the children of Mercy Centre.

Galong was in his mid-20s, living on the street, and working as a “doorman” at a bar near the Pratunam market when we found him fifteen years ago. Born with a kind of Downs’ Syndrome, he could speak only a few words, and unfortunately they weren’t the ones he needed to explain where he came from or how he came to live by himself in the most crowded neighborhood in Bangkok.

Our Rimklongwatsaphan Kindergarten, one of eight preschools we operate in Klong Toey, is a modest wood-frame schoolhouse located right next to a canal, about 200 meters from the Slaughterhouse. It may not look like much, but in the past twenty years, over 1,000 slum children have graduated from this head-start Mercy Preschool in preparation for government primary schools. These are children who might never have gone to school or learned to read and write their names. On its 20^th anniversary, we held a grand celebration.