Monday, November 26, 2007

Ashley Mills '05 is in Thailand and needs your help!

Got this email and am passing it along. She gives the link where you can donate below, or you can click here. A story worth reading--and, I hope, worth giving, too.

Sawadeeka!

If anyone still wants to donate (it's tax-deductible!) to my Thai Youth Theater Project it definitely is not too late. We can use ANY and ALL donations.

Just to remind you guys, the festival is completely free for all the kids from all over Thailand who want to come- we provide all of the housing, their meals, even the t-shirts that they get when they come. We want to make sure that no child is turned away due to lack of money. The festival itself is a 2 day event full of everything to do with theater- workshops in stage-fighting, stage makeup, costumes- the works. Then, at the end, all of the kids get to perform their plays, all in English, on the national Thai theater stage. It's an event of a lifetime for some kids who are so poor that they only own one pair of shoes. We have one group who, despite the fact that their Peace Corps volunteer left 6 years ago, continues to come year after year and performs Shakespeare (seriously- I saw them perform the Tempest. It was intense). That group now travels all over the country and performs for different groups. We have some groups who choose to perform about issues such as HIV/AIDS. Right now we have 480 kids signed up and I think we are going to have to cap it pretty soon because of the capacity of our accommodations.

We think that this is a great project- not only for building English skills, but also for team building and for giving kids confidence that they might have never gained otherwise. Plus, the memories are priceless. You could make a 'Mastercard' commercial out of this. Really, the festival isn't possible unless the grant goes through, so
we're crossing our fingers.

So, if you can donate anything at all, that would be great. If you can't, that's fine. Your support during these two years has meant the world to me.

Thanks again!

https://www.peacecorps.gov/resources/donors/contribute/projdetail.cfm?projdesc=493-154&