Kampuchea House is blessed and extremely fortunate to have Pauline Van Driel as a supporter.  Pauline, who lives in Milan (Italy), has raised many thousands of dollars for us despite the fact that she has never been to our orphanage.  Whilst visiting the temples in Siem Reap during a family holiday around 18 months ago, she saw a group of children all dressed in the their KH T shirts and noticed how happy and healthy they looked and how the caring the adults (our staff and house mothers) looking after them appeared.  She took a few photos of the kids (as many other tourists do) and when she returned to Italy Googled Kampuchea House and found our web site. She then contacted us and said she would like to assist by raising money in Italy.  We doubt that either Pauline or us could have imagined just how successful she would be at fundraising.  We are enormously indebted to her for the hard work she has put into raising funds for KH.  We are hoping she will be able to visit KH during 2010 and know she will receive a huge welcome from the children and staff.

Below is the report written by Pauline on her latest fundraising efforts.

I am happy to announce you that we gathered about 5000 US$ for this Christmas period. It has been hard working, starting in October making the decorations. Every piece takes its time, so to have a certain number I started early this year.  Katalin Hegedus, my Hungarian friend, and I started selling some items in the beginning of December. She invited me at the Christmas Market of the English school in Milan. Then, half December, I had a drink at my place where we sold quite a lot and had fun at the same time, drinking and eating.

And last but not least, on the 13th of December, we held a workshop with 45 children. That was great fun, I teached them how to make a Christmas decoration with material from nature. They enjoyed themselves really a lot painting a small vase and putting everything together. Many children didn't want to leave anymore at the end of the workshop or asked if they could come again the day after. It was great to see what beautiful things they made and how the liked it. It was a real success thanks also to Laura Forni and her husband from Vivainatura who made it possible with the right space, giving their time and giving us all funds gathered during the day.

Katalin is really a great supporter and help. She will have a big party in January for her 40th birthday in Hungary and asked all the people to give her money for KH instead of presents. We hope people will be generous! And Laura, where we had the workshop with the children, was very kind to invite us to have a workshop at her place. She helped buying material, spent a lot of time on it and we organised a real nice day for the children together. Even several parents asked us to have such a workshop for adults, so we will organise that in springtime.

(Due to technical difficulties uploading photos from Pauline's fundraising functions they will be published in the February Newsletter).