Blog 4

Wednesday 6th was a much needed day of rest.  In the evening a few of us got together to watch the sunset over the Mekong.  We stayed for drinks and dinner and took the opportunity to get to know each other a bit more but not a late night as early start the next day.

Thursday, December 7th 2023, saw us all up and ready to head to Savannakhet with the sunrise.  Upon arrival at Savannakhet airport, we met up with Sidney Phommarath and Sean Kaye (taking pictures - video) where we boarded buses and headed to the village of Phoxaykhoun for the inauguration of the secondary school. The journey was much easier than the previous one and we reached our destination in a couple of hours.  Upon arrival the celebration began with some traditional dancing performed by the school children.  The speeches followed and then with the presentation to the school of supplies for the classroom, sports equipment, and some medicinal products.  A special thank you to Lynda Boutah who purchased clothes for all the students. Also Ben Chang and Boris Petkov bought and gave books to build a library. We are so grateful. Then SKL members were presented with certificates of appreciation and finally the ribbon was cut.

The traditional blessing ceremony took place with SKL volunteers and donors being blessed and wished good fortune by the local elders.  We then joined with the local villagers and dignitaries for lunch of chicken, fish soup, fish larb and fresh vegetables followed by us all joining in with the traditional dancing.  A very long and eventful day and we headed back to Savannakhet tired and happy.  But the day was not over as we all stopped off to eat at a local well respected floating restaurant, Savan Lao Deam, where a typical Laotian dinner was picked out for us to share.  Delicious!

Friday saw some beginning their journey home.  Those of us who had a later flight went for breakfast at cafe sugar where we were recognized and shown appreciation by some local people who had seen us on the tv news!

A big thank you to our donors and volunteers and especially to Ken, Francois and the SKL team who did a tremendous amount of work behind the scenes to make sure everything went according to plan.  Of course, many people made this happen and we can all be proud of our contributions to the well being of rural Laotian children.