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PILC welfare team goes on fact-finding mission
Kathleen Petras
On Wednesday May 28, a group of 26 Pattaya International Ladies Club (PILC)
ladies, along with one unabashed teenage boy, went on a tour organized by
the PILC Welfare Team. We were concentrating on the Pattaya area on this
occasion and so started at the Mercy Centre, near Sukhumvit McDonalds, then
proceeded on to the Fountain of Life Women’s Centre in Naklua and then
across town to the Tamar Centre, which has recently relocated to a shop
front on Pattaya 3rd Road not far from South Pattaya Road.
 Diane
Doell from the Mercy Center greets PILC members during their tour organized
by the PILC Welfare Team.
I was in my usual transport for the outing, the red Chevrolet pick up, which
surely is not far behind Ingrid’s bright blue Fortuner in terms of
recognisability (is that a word Fran?), which is just as well because I
promptly headed off from Foodland, with my convoy of following cars, in the
wrong direction. I had Dot, Dallas and her lovely Mum with me but we didn’t
go too far wrong, as Ingrid rang me along the way to ask if I was at
McDonald’s yet. It seemed a strange question to me as I was going to Naklua
but she quickly set me right and as it turned out, one right turn and we
were back on track!
After adding Elizabeth’s car to the convoy at McDonalds (sorry about that
u-turn into oncoming traffic Karen and passengers), we caught up with the
other ladies at the Mercy Centre and went to meet up with Diane Doell.
Diane is one lady with the gift of the gab, which I am sure is a great
advantage to the Mercy Centre and all the good work they do. After becoming
acquainted with many facts about the Mercy organization we had a tour of the
house (of 25 children) and the ‘factory’ which is the administration,
storage, teaching and recreational area. Fred Doell was also there and was
delighted to see us all. Oh, and Diane gave us all some water which was
really appreciated. By the way the Mercy Centre is looking for a volunteer
to teach English as a Second Language and Basic Computing for their children
if anyone knows someone?
After that the tour group headed to Naklua to visit the Fountain of Life
Women’s Centre and this time Ingrid had to get Fiona to ring me for
directions, which just goes to show I can’t be completely hopeless!
After arriving we met the Head Sister Supaporn and were pleased to see
Sister Joan from the FOL Children’s Centre there as well. Sister Supaporn
firstly took us to see the actual fountain of running water at the front of
the building, above which is written the centre’s motto: ‘Master give me
living water so that I shall never be thirsty’. This is a motto shared by
the FOL Children’s Centre as well as it is also run by the Good Sheppard
sisters.
Then we moved through the lower floor of the building in which we saw
hairdressing and massage classes in action. Quite a number of the ladies
looked very tempted by the foot massage treatments being offered there.
Massage is available to the general public for only 50 baht - highly
recommended by Ingrid!
After somehow ending up back outside, we went upstairs to see classes of
Typing, Computing and Language. Then we went up more stairs to the main
auditorium where we learned about how the Women’s Centre runs. Oh, almost
forgot; we received some delicious Thai sweets along with tea, coffee and
water! By the way, Sister Supaporn is looking for volunteers to teach
English if anyone has some time!
After getting down all those stairs we were ready to head on to our final
destination - the Tamar Centre, which by the way has even more stairs! Who
needs the gym girls when you have Welfare Tours to attend?
Eve from the Tamar Centre was there to meet us and to give us the run down
and Khaek was also there with the cheesecake samples, well, we had been
working hard.
Anyway Eve showed us their Bakery and Kitchen which is out the back of the
coffee shop. Then upstairs to the card making room, then up more stairs to
the conference room, then up more stairs to the uncompleted offices. Eve did
offer to take us up one further level which is more office space apparently
and as yet unconditioned. We deemed it unnecessary! So we headed back down
to the conference room to eat our cake (at last).
If you get the chance to visit the coffee shop it has a great selection of
cakes that are usually difficult to find in Pattaya. I will add in the list
of cakes available but remember to ring and order 24hrs in advance if you
want a whole cake.
On the way out we peeked in at the hairdressing salon which has a range of
usual hair treatments available at cheap prices. The Coffee Shop and the
Hairdressing Salon are at street level and easily accessible. After that
before heading back to Foodland we picked up our usual order of 14 trays of
banana cake (for the Garunyawet party the next day); it smelled delicious as
usual.
And so ended another successful Welfare Tour!
PILC, RLC’s garage sale
once again a success
Ingrid Cunliffe
PILC Welfare Chair
On Friday, May 30, a few of the Pattaya International Ladies and the Rayong
International Ladies met at Tiew’s home at Plutaluang in Bang Chang to set
things up for this year’s garage sale.
 Ready
and set to go, now just waiting for the gates to open.
Olive, Brooke, Janis, Tosha, Paula, Karen, Lyn, Rachael and myself together with
Tiew’s husband and staff, including the girls from her “Our Home” project, where
the girls make those famous quilts, did battle with the loads and loads of goods
that had been donated over the last few months for the sale.
After a few hours the goods that had been collected from members of the clubs
were displayed to our liking and we all headed home for a good rest before the
onslaught of the sale the next day.
Saturday morning arrived far too quickly.
A few extra goods were placed on the tables and we waited in anticipation like
last year for the eager customers. They started coming in at a slow trickle,
unlike last year when the gate was crowded with waiting customers till the gate
opened! Despite this we had a major rush and the buying began.
Tiew in her kindness supplied the working ladies with a lovely lunch to keep us
going through the heat of the day as the customers kept coming.
I noted that this year only 2 customers wanted to haggle over the already low
prices, the others happy with the goods and clothes that they had filled their
bags with, which by the way were donated by Paul from AGS Four Winds moving
company. Thanks Paul!
The day ended with the remaining goods being sold for 100 baht a bag for the
clothing and the kids were delighted to be able to fill a bag with toys for
free.
The remaining goods and clothing will be transported to Burma by AGS Four Winds
together with goods collected via various organizations to help in the situation
from the cyclone.
We are proud to be able to help these people in such tragic situations.
I am pleased to say that we raised 54,729 baht on the day, which is amazing.
Half of this will go towards the running costs at “Our Home” for the girls and
Tiew and the remaining will go to PILC charities.
I would like to personally thank Tiew, her husband and staff for all the hard
work and organization they put in to this great day.
If you are ever in the Bang Chang area please go and see the girls and Tiew at
“Our Home” to view the amazing sewing of the quilts and perhaps put an order in
for your own. They also sell very fresh produce in the front at Plutaluang.
Also thanks to the ladies: Kathleen, Tosha, Janis, Brooke, Meg, Cecilia, Karen,
Olive, Fiona, Paula, Inga and Lyn, your help was very much appreciated.
Thanks also to the many members who donated goods and clothing over the last few
months.
I look forward to another monster garage sale next year so start collecting your
goods now!
Dogza us says gang that arranged support for Sattahip strays
Pups get a good cleaning before
veterinarians
perform sterilizations and vaccinations on them.
Patcharapol Panrak
Members of the Dog Lovers Club held a rally to raise funds for Sattahip strays
on June 1, donating food and working with veterinarians to perform
sterilizations and vaccinations.
The members, who have their own website gangdogza.com and who are best known as
the Dogza Gang, number about 600 in total and were celebrating the first
anniversary of the club.
Led by their president Pratchaya Sayachak, a 42-year-old resident of Bangkok,
the club members arranged for teams of veterinarians from Chulalongkorn
University and Pattaya City to visit the Plutaluang Home for Stray Dogs, in
Plutaluang, Sattahip. About 1,000 strays were fed, bathed, vaccinated and
sterilized.
Pratchaya said that the website was set up so that dog lovers from throughout
Thailand could correspond with each other and come up with solutions to the
problem of stray dogs, a cause of concern throughout much of the country.
The rally was organized for the dogs at Plutaluang to mark the club’s first
anniversary, with the Ping Company and A&S Co Ltd supplying food for the dogs
and the Baring Company donating shampoo for them.
Ms Nan Choisunirachorn from the Chulalongkorn Veterinary Faculty said that she
is a member of the Dogza Gang website, and when the decision was made to visit
Plutaluang she had asked her colleagues to form a team of four people and
administer vaccinations and sterilizations.
Members donated money to buy medicine and cooperated with other clubs to find a
method to support stray dogs, dogs that have been injured by vehicles, and sick
dogs throughout the country.
PILC welfare team, Kate’s Project, busy in Mabprachan Lake area
Rachael Hoag
The PILC welfare team, along with Kate’s Project, has been busy working
in the Mabprachan Lake area. There are many families in need of help, and we
have only just begun, but as each case is different, it is very much a work in
progress. Some people need help with basic life necessities such as food and
clothing, and others need help with finding suitable living arrangements or
work.
 Grandma
Nid, busy at work on her next hand made piece.
One woman we have been in close contact with is Grandma Nid. She is living with,
raising and supporting her 2 grandsons by herself and is in dire need of finding
a way to raise some money. They live in a very modest shack where the floor is
falling in; yet even have a pet rooster. She spends her days cleaning her home,
working in her garden to grow their food, and looming material, mats, and
baskets.
Her work ethic is enviable as she does not stop from morning until night. She is
instilling this same ethic in her grandsons as the eleven year old already has a
job at the corner 7-11. The six year old boy is attending school on scholarship
and is very sweet; we think he has a lot of potential!
 Janis
and Noi show off some of Grandma Nid’s handiwork.
She makes beautiful fabrics and hand looms everything from placemats and table
runners to full size tablecloths and linens. She also weaves beautiful baskets
and floor mats. The only problem is, with so much work to do around her house,
she has no way to sell these items. Ingrid and Noi (from Kate’s Project) came up
with a wonderful idea to help her. They have decided to take her items to the
local bazaars and sell them for her.
Ingrid took her things, along with cards from FOL, to the Rayong Ladies bazaar
and sold out of the baskets. She has also accepted orders for more, with custom
choices of colors. She will have the items for sale at the PILC bazaar in
October and may bring them to the lunches for perusal.
In total at the bazaar, Ingrid raised 8,000 baht and presented a check to
Grandma Nid the following week. With humble gratitude, she accepted the check
and asked if she could help out the other families involved in Kate’s Project.
What a wonderful woman!
Huge thanks go to Ingrid and her welfare team and to Noi for their selfless work
and helping this woman retain her dignity to feel that she can still provide for
her family. If you have any desire to help with this project or if you would
like to see the beautiful items for sale, please contact Ingrid Cunliffe <[email protected]>.
(L to R) Noi, Rachael, Ingrid,
Grandma Nid and Janis
at the handing over ceremony.
Jitra jumps for joy
Miss Terry Diner
It was a birthday party with a difference for Jitra (Meow) Wongjuan,
held with ‘sponsorship’ at Shenanigans in The Avenue. With Meow being a director
of AA Insurance Brokers, the sponsorship idea came out of an informal meeting
with some of the customers. Malcolm Scorer, Meow’s partner and another director,
floated the sponsorship concept as a joke, and was taken aback when the
customers agreed! And so the event just grew from there.
 As
a rousing chorus of happy birthday resonates in the background, Meow cuts her
birthday cake.
The venue was certainly packed and the food and drinks endlessly attacked by the
ravenous (and thirsty) horde, with lucky door prizes going out the door every 10
minutes, and the ‘grand prize’ for the most outrageous shirt going to the
Pattaya Mail’s Dr. Iain after a final run-off against Manhattan’s Dave
Bowers, both of whom demonstrated the worst possible taste in sartorial splendor
that could be imagined; however, it was the tie teamed with the red shoes and
Paisley pattern shirt that won the play-off.
 Birthday
girl Jitra (Meow) Wongjuan (2nd left) poses with the sartorially challenged Dr
Iain and his family.
The usual suspects were all there. Maurice and Renita Bromley seen quietly
drinking, as opposed the noisy gurgling demonstrated by Kevin (the crane man)
Fisher and Peter Smith (also of AA Insurance Brokers), Tom (the dog) Coughlan,
MC Peter Marsh (Blackstar Jewellery) and Yupin, Gerry Germanis (ESC), Paul
Wilkinson (Four Winds International Movers), and many more. Meow was also
inundated with kind messages and congratulations from those who were unable to
come, including the New Zealand Ambassador, Brook Barrington, and the gift table
was groaning by party’s end.
 Meow
received many birthday gifts on the night from party sponsors and well-wishers.
There were special thanks to all the sponsors, who were kind enough to take part
in the event, including Touchwood, AXA Insurance, Senator International, Door 2
Door, Pattaya Mail, Go Industry, PVC Windows Thailand, Pattaya.com, CSP
Construction, Jomtien Property, Thai Health Insurance, RELAX Journal, ThaiSri
Insurance, AA Insurance Brokers, Siam Development (The Vineyard), Blackstar
Jewellery, Shenanigans, Plan B, Bangkok AA Insurance & Services Broker,
Watermark Capital Management, James Young, Khun Pichit and one anonymous
sponsor, “see you Jimmy”.
It certainly was a night to remember, complete with headaches the next morning
to prove what a good time they all had.
Shenanigans put on a delicious
spread for the birthday party.
The party drew a large and
diversified crowd of well-wishers.
YWCA presents donations
to UNICEF for cyclone victims
The YWCA Bangkok-Pattaya Center,
along with Deputy Mayor Ronakit Ekasingh and Jintana Wechachot, head of Pattaya
City Projects and Planning visit the Saha Union Building in Bangkok to make a
donation to UNICEF, through former PM Anan Panyarachun (center) to help victims
of Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar.
Vimolrat Singnikorn
The YWCA Bangkok-Pattaya Center has donated more than 100,000 baht
through UNICEF to help support the victims of Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar.
Chairwoman Nittaya Patimasongkroh together with Deputy Mayor Ronakit Ekasingh
and Jintana Wechachot, head of Pattaya City Projects and Planning on June 3
visited the Saha Union Building in Bangkok, where they donated the funds through
Anan Panyarachun, former Thai prime minister and UNICEF ambassador in Thailand.
Donations from the public had been received in front of Chaimongkol Temple over
the nine-day period from May 17 to 25. A total of 151,567 baht was collected.
Anan said that the donations together with funds collected by other
organizations and presented to UNICEF would be distributed in support of the
cyclone victims, with particular emphasis on helping children.
Wedding bells ring for
Pattaya Mail graphic artist
Saksiri Uraiworn
Pattaya Mail computer graphics artist Amnat Kangkamchad celebrated his wedding
to Miss Satanan Duangpakdee on May 31, tying the knot with a ceremony at the Had
Srai conference room at the Pattaya Discovery Beach Hotel.
 The
happy newlyweds address their friends on this most auspicious day.
Kamolthep Malhotra, general manager of Pattaya Mail Publishing Co Ltd, Na That
Thitirotnawat, managing director of Pattaya Discovery Beach Hotel, and Bunruang
Kangkamchad, the groom’s uncle, presided over the reception.
Kamolthep and Somkiat Sangsawang, who is food and beverage manager at the
Pinnacle Jomtien Hotel gave a speech of congratulations, and friends filled the
room with bouquets of flowers.
The bride works in the personnel department of the Pattaya Discovery Beach Hotel
on Pattaya Beach Road Soi 6/1. Both Amnat and Satanan graduated from Sakhon
Nakhon University with bachelor degrees, and have known each other for nine
years.
PCEC traveling
to exotic places
Roger Fox shares a lighter moment
with Narin and daughter Bew, of Narin Travel, as they describe the services and
tours they can offer to PCEC members.
As usual, a full but varied programme was presented at the
Pattaya City Expats Club (PCEC) meeting on Sunday June 1 at Henry J. Bean’s
restaurant.
The morning got underway with the week’s MC Stuart Saunders welcoming back
guitar maestro Dalton O’Sullivan. Dalton provided soothing guitar music as a
background to the morning’s buffet breakfast.
 Back
by popular request, Dalton O’Sullivan plays some classical pieces for the
members.
Stuart then continued the meeting by announcing that Sunday July 6th was the
date of the PCEC’s Annual General Meeting. This will be an occasion for members
to hear a brief report from the Board of Governors and will also provide an
opportunity for members to make comments and share any ideas or concerns
regarding the running of the club. With the expiration of the terms of the
current board members there may be an election if there are more than six
nominations to serve on the board.
Stuart then introduced the main speakers of the morning, Mr Narin and Bew of the
long established Narin Travel.
Narin Travel are the organizers of a number of the PCEC’s trips and interviewed
by Roger Fox, it was an opportunity to gain an insight into the travel business.
Bew commented that 70% of Narin’s business consists of ticket sales, the
remaining 30% is hotel bookings and other services.
Roger asked the question why a travel service should be used when today there
are opportunities to make independent arrangements using, for example, the
internet. The reply was that when complex arrangements are made, such as the
recent PCEC trip to Cambodia, it is advisable that a single point of contact is
available in the event that something should go wrong. Fortunately the Cambodian
trip was trouble free but had this not have been the case, help would have been
readily available.
It was suggested that those PCEC members who wished to, should provide an email
address to where any special travel offers could be sent.
Dalton O’Sullivan then returned and impressed the members with his guitar
playing, a skill which he has learned over the past 30 years. Dalton is now
seeking a more formal concert venue and is able to perform Bach to Bossa Nova.
PCEC board member Michel de Goumois announced that the regular monthly club
dinner would take place at the Aquarius Restaurant in Jomtien Complex on
Wednesday June 4. An attractive menu had been arranged for 390 baht. He
suggested that the next dinner should take place at the PCEC’s regular venue,
Henry J. Beans and asked for any experiences of the available menus.
The regular open forum was then underway led by Bob L’Etoile assisted by the
ever present Sig Sigworth who injected his own comedic moments. As always it
provided an opportunity for questions about living in Thailand with an emphasis
on Pattaya to be asked. The Open Forum again proved to be the usual lively and
entertaining session. For more information regarding, not only PCEC Sunday
meetings but also the varied mid week activities, please see the Community
Happenings section of Pattaya Mail or, for more details, visit the Club’s
website at pattayacity expatsclub.com.
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