Safe Child Thailand

A sit down with Peter Bradley

April 25, 2024

As the year came to an end, we sat down with one of the most important individuals in our organisation—Peter, our CEO. I sat down in front of my laptop, eager to get into the interview and ask all the questions I’d prepared; Peter is the sort of person you can listen to for hours, his seemingly never-ending arsenal of interesting stories like having drinks with Harry Styles or organising a birthday visit for Prince Edward. Having spent 30 years in the sector starting as youth and community development worker, he spent time helping the youth and engaging with communities. Having joined Safe Child Thailand 5 years ago, there has been a lot of change for the organisation as well as for him; stepping in at a time where the organisation as a whole was being restructured—its both a point of rejuvenation and immense fragility. He took a step back to evaluate what the children in institutional care needed and how Safe Child Thailand could help them. And over 4 years, the team have implemented a much needed shift, keeping in mind the context and that strategic change can never be overnight, within the organisation that can be seen the work that they do.

As a part of this, the Thai government are both hesitant yet committed to making a change. And recognising that these children are living in care and that system needs to be reformed is a definitely a start. For Peter, being in the sector is all about helping the youth. In the time spent working in this sphere he’s come across a fair few hurdles—in particular related to political obstacles, as we chatted he recalled the many political challenges. One example was Section 28, 35 years ago, the hurdle that stood in the way of children getting education about sexuality. These political obstacles have been ever-present throughout his career, including most recently Care Reform where local governments are not one hundred percent on board with bringing in change. Peter’s insight into funding issues, like for a majority of the sector, are still very much a hurdle—and only more information and research can bring more funding for a topic like care reform. Another hurdle we discussed, and I could relate to as being a new entrant into the realm of jobs, was setbacks and how resilience and having a strong support system—a safety net around yourself—was immensely important to get through those setbacks and realise that you’ll be fine. And when you are working, having the right motivation really matters; for Peter, the day you stop caring about the people, when there is no empathy left would be a worrying day for someone within the sector.

Having spent time on the ground in Thailand, I asked Peter what his most memorable experience was—and his answer was absolutely enthralling. He talked about a woman who came up to him in a village and held out her arms, giving him a big hug. She told him how she’d waited so long to see him again, as they’d met in a previous life. Peter talked about the importance of knowing other cultures, but he also talked about the uncanny feeling of knowing her too—and this was special. Peter also pointed out that impact is not always immediate. Recently, a person he worked with and diagnosed with schizophrenia 20 years ago, found Peter on LinkedIn and said that he saved her life by referring her to the right services and the help she needed, and is now a successful doctor. The positive work paid off in the right ways, and that one decision 20 years ago saved someone’s life, and gave them a much better quality of life.

As our interview came to a close, we spoke about the future of Safe Child Thailand—and he was just as passionate about Care Reform, the journey, and the work done in that sphere must continue. For him, constant self-reflection dictates his future as well. As a CEO, he must ask himself if he’s still the best person for a job at a point in time—and if not, then the willingness must be there to step away in order for the work to continue. As we talked a bit about my career ambitions, he jokingly said he had one more job in him and then he’d hand it over to my generation—this resonated with me deeply, as it reminded me of how he’d emphasised the importance of young people and how they are the future. For Peter, you’re part of a cycle—a cycle of work, a cycle of careers, and a cycle of life. The most important thing is to support children, to make sure they are in safe environments as they have a massive role to play in their own futures and others’ futures; Finally, Peter left me with a very poignant question—how can we talk about the future without talking about children?

Author’s bio:

As a masters student nearing the end of my degree, one of the most important and meaningful things I did during my year, was being a part of the English Conversation Mentor Programme. Now working as a Youth Ambassador, I am thrilled to continue my journey with Safe Child Thailand on this project that aims to reflect on the work we do, along with a focus on the ground reality and stories that shed light on the children and staff that are at the centre of this organisation.

‘Every step you take will contribute to a brighter future’ – A Statement from Ambassador Thani Thongphakdi in support of SCT’s Global Run

March 5, 2024

This week is Safe Child Thailand’s inaugural Global Run. Throughout the week, runners from around the world are running/walking in support of Safe Child Thailand’s work to provide a safe and nurturing environment for children across Thailand. Runners are aiming to collectively run the length of Thailand – 1,024 miles!

With the kick-off of the week-long run this week, it’s an honour to share a special message from the Ambassador of Thailand to the United Kingdom in support of the Global Run and all participating runners:

”Dear Participants,

I wish to extend my heartfelt support to all those participating in Safe Child Thailand’s Global Run, a commendable virtual event that goes beyond borders to make a positive impact on our world. Your dedication to run 1,024 miles which is the length of Thailand to raise funds for vulnerable children in Thailand showcases the power of philanthropy in the current VUCA and BANI world in which we all live.

As you set your own running and fundraising goals, please remember that every step you take will contribute to a brighter future for those in need. Your efforts will help thousands of vulnerable children in Thailand to grow up in safe and nurturing environments with their loving families and communities, enabling them to reach their full potential and to mature into responsible adults. I salute each and every one of you for your dedication.

Thank you for being champions of change. Your passion and commitment will help create a better world for generations to come. I wish you all an incredible Global Run.”

Thani Thongphakdi

Ambassador of Thailand to the United Kingdom”

Meeting Moe Moe

December 7, 2023

For today’s blog we have something different, I interviewed one of our vital members on the ground and sat down with our programme coordinator and all-round wizard who is our key person in Thailand—Moe Moe. As I sat down waiting for my teams application to load, I felt excited—I’d had the pleasure of meeting Moe Moe at a Safe Child Thailand event a few months ago, and she was both bold and determined but also one of the kindest souls you’d meet. As our meeting started and we exchanged smiles and greetings, I was met with her familiar warmth and openness—always a refreshing quality. Our first topic of conversation was her impressive story, the powerful memory of which stays with me for when I first heard it a few weeks ago at a Safe Child Thailand event. Moe Moe had been a child who lived at a boarding home and lived with a foster family, After leaving the system, she returned to her biological family. Her purpose in going back was to apply for a passport, which she needed to pursue university education. She took her GED classes and studied abroad, in Bangladesh, for 5 years after which she began working with Safe Child Thailand. Her inspiration for her work comes from her own past but also of what she saw around her.

She has been with us for the last 7 years, and her responsibilities in the field have only grown. When I asked her how she would describe her job, she let out a soft chuckle and said that it wouldn’t be easy, since she does a bit of everything. A typical day in her life consists of working with the multitude of partners we have in Thailand, along with the founders and monitoring the funding—she follows through with checks on the student homes, as well as liaising with Katie (our Senior Partnerships and Development Officer) in order to coordinate with our London office. She described her days as being a camera for the team in London so they can grasp the ground reality better, and this has helped immensely in designing our programmes and direct implementation. She spoke with a great deal of passion about increasing visibility for the charity in the region, though we have existed in the region for 41 years she finds that visibility still remains an issue. As such, a crucial part of her job, she is often at events and conferences and involving other large players within the NGO and INGO world.

Whilst working in the field, she has encountered her fair share of challenges. In terms of her work, her favourite part of her job is that she gets to help young people—to give them guidance, opportunities, education and support but she does find that every problem cannot be responded to, as is the case with most organisational work. Another prevalent challenge she faces is being a Burmese woman—though she has spent, and continues to spend, a considerable amount of her life living in Thailand and speaking Thai to the best of her abilities. For her being a young woman in a culture where being, both, a woman and being young garners stigma and is taxing. She smiled slightly and with a sigh of disappointment spoke of the older generations that don’t take her seriously in the field due to her being a young woman and that is, yet another fight she fights and will fight. In addition to this, her being a woman in a position of power and influence is fairly intimidating to the plethora of men she works with who try to patronize her by calling her “daughter”, as is common in many Asian countries to use endearing terms for young girls but this has a deeper layer where these women and girls lack autonomy, and their voices are taken away. Moe Moe, with her well-earned confidence, makes sure that those around her are aware that she will not be quiet and take it, she demands respect for both her role in the organisation as well as her opinions and knowledge surrounding the work she does.

She recounted fondly a conference to which she was not invited, though all the major NGOs in the region were, so she did the most Moe Moe-esque thing and showed up anyway. We chatted more about the various people she had met throughout her career, and she recounted a conference in which Myanmar’s law regarding birth rights was being discussed—a law she disagreed with as it led to the exclusion of women from becoming president if they were married to a non-Burmese man, Moe Moe asked a poignant question regarding the unfairness of the law. One of the attendees, who was giving this talk on a policy forum, from a large INGO dismissed her point entirely by saying that it does not matter—portraying how much work was still to be done at the policy level, especially by those who work in these contexts without knowing anything about them. Naturally we moved onto discussing feminism as a concept within the country and the region. She pointed out that, like most of Asia, it was not a strong topic of discussion as compared to the West but there were seeds being sown, and that was still progress.

Moe Moe’s favourite part about her job is helping young people, being able to make a difference in there lives, to be there for them, to make them feel understood, to make them understand that there was someone there for them—that someone cared. I asked her how she coped with the emotional burden of her job, and she very conscientiously talked about the different hurdles that the migrant people from Myanmar faced like language barriers, nationality differences and having a sense of statelessness since the Thai government does not actually recognise them as being refugees. The way she copes with the emotional burden of her job is to understand that what she does is important and bigger than her, she moves past it by treating everyone she comes across with kindness, as she likened it to a book that she reads, with every individual being an author trying to get across a unique story to her. And she cherishes these stories. One such story she recounted was of a migrant family with a child who had a disability, due to this the family would set aside whatever meat they could afford for him, the entire family omitted eating meat due to their poor circumstances and hoped that this sacrifice would help the child to grow properly. With great emotion, she mentioned how this story had stuck with her for years and how it fuelled her greatly to do her job, to help as many people as she could.

As our conversation came to a close, we discussed some of the things she was looking forward to—the plethora of projects coming up in the region along with a closer working relationship with the London office along with our CEO Peter (who is a wonderful leader!), she joked about COVID-19 and remote working stating that this had always been the norm for her and now everyone had a taste of it. She concluded with the same warm smile with which we began, as she rushed off to her next meeting. And I was sat there looking over my notes, appreciative of this opportunity to interview someone as wonderful and authentic as Moe Moe had been.

Author’s bio:

Meeting Lwin

September 25, 2023

Continuing on from our last story about Ruby and Safe Child Thailand’s operations in the country. We have another story today, about Lwin who is another one of our students from the English Mentorship Programme*. I sat down with Caroline, our senior programme funding officer, preparing to meet Lwin, we began chatting away. It was a friendly and positive start to the day, and it was only going to get better.

Lwin had been an exemplary student during our sessions, his confidence and language skills both grew in spades over the course of a few months whilst we engaged in the English Conversation Mentorship Programme. He was eager and hard working, practicing the lesson plans after class and contributing to the revisions in subsequent sessions. After having got to know him during those sessions, I was keen and excited to reunite with him for this interview. Lwin joined using his phone as his face came into view and he greeted us with a large smile. We started off with exchanging greetings, and I explained the purpose of the interview to him and he was more than happy to partake. He was, as I remembered, a bundle of joy and so very positive along.

I began by asking him about his day, which had been busy, he’d been preparing for his GED* exams and had taken them that very day, he recounted with a smile. His expressions moved from being serious to a little anxious as he spoke about his tests next week at school that he had also been preparing for. He was feeling good about the day and about his exams, and had the largest grin whilst he spoke about his favourite subject—science. A much needed reprieve for him consisted of coming back home and spending time with his best friend who happened to be his roommate!

Lwin had an air of shyness yet of confidence, he possessed an element of self assuredness which was rare to see at his young age of eighteen. His hobbies included playing badminton, video games on his mobile phone as that is the primary device he has. He mentioned spending time on his own, naturally I pressed him for more details with caution and he revealed that he had a passion for writing, he wrote stories just for himself. As we moved on from this topic, I asked him about his aspirations and he paused—coming up with a very concise and sanguine answer. He wanted to join a science organisation anywhere in the world as a mechanical engineer, adding with wistful smile that he ultimately wants to move back home to Yangon.

As we came to the end of our conversation and discussed if there was something he was thankful for or wanted to share, Lwin recounted many other aspects that he was thankful for.

According to him, he had a lot to be thankful for—starting with the English Mentorship programme along with meeting and getting to know all the volunteers. With a complex expression that was both sorrowful yet optimistic, he spoke about some of the challenges he’s faced including having been in institutional settings since he was young yet he was thankful to Safe Child Thailand for providing him with education and care since he was thirteen. His sadness was visible when he spoke about his struggles with staying optimistic all the time, and the loneliness that has come with living away from his family in a safe house which leads him to be more negative at times rather than positive— to remind himself of his roots and the life he reminisces about he reads books given to him by his grandfather.

We came to an end with Lwin talking about wanting to do well in exams, enjoy his free time and take a break from studying. As we laughed over his last point, I could relate as I was in the final week of my dissertation, he was keen to live his future, yet he wanted to pause just to enjoy life in the moment.

*Safe Child Thailand’s General Education Diploma (GED) programme

The GED allows migrant students from Myanmar to earn high school credentials.  The GED test is a group of four topic tests that, when passed, result in a diploma certification so the students have an American high school-level diploma. While private companies have offered GED programmes in Mae Sot for several years, they are highly competitive to enrol in and are not accessible for the majority of migrant students. By bringing GED programmes to schools and integrating them into their curricula, more students are now able to take the GED, giving them more options for their future.

*The English Mentorship Programme

This is a project developed by Safe Child Thailand to provide a learning foundation for children across Thailand. Working with UK-based university student volunteers, the programme aims to increase the participating student’s confidence when speaking English to enable them to access higher education opportunities. The UK-based student volunteers are paired with their mentees and meet with them once a week to engage in conversational English and mentorship. In addition to supporting the Thai students, the programme also aims to provide transferable skills to the UK student mentors and exposure to working in the international development sector. The programme is currently on pause.

Author’s bio:

Meeting Ruby

August 15, 2023

Safe Child Thailand’s work has been seminal and crucial in alleviating the stress and suffering of many women and children who live in various parts of Thailand, especially around the border between Thailand and Myanmar. One such story belongs to Ruby, who is 18 years old and lives in Mae Sot in a safe house for women and children. As I sat down with her over a computer screen, waiting for her teams app to load, I prepared myself for what I thought was going to be a rather delicate interview as these children come from incredibly impoverished and fragile backgrounds. Her familiar face lit up the screen, with a bright smile and cheery eyes—I hadn’t seen her since we worked together on the English mentorship programme, where she was undoubtedly one of the best students. She was sat in a pale yellow t-shirt, not quite sure what this interview was going to entail but she was happy to see me, as I was to see her.

We began eagerly—exchanging greetings, smiles and laughter. I had Katie (our senior partnerships and development officer) and Moe Moe (our programmes coordinator in Thailand) on the call with us for some guidance and translation since Ruby was born in Myanmar. As I asked her about herself, she gave me details as best as she could with an air of shyness—she is about 18 years old, her daily routine entails going to school and studying along with playing games with her friends arranged by her teachers. After school she likes to relax whilst watching a film or listening to music, specifically K-pop. Music is a topic she’s spoken about before, during our mentorship sessions, so I gently pressed her for more details where she revealed her favourite band (at the moment) to be Rose Quartz. We moved on to discussing what it was like living with her friends, she paused and gave a smile as she recalled her best friends, Hnin Ei kyaw and Khin Hnin Wai, with fondness. Though she lives in a safe house which can feel slightly isolated, there was nothing but optimism and gratefulness in her tone. My last question was rather open ended about her aspirations for the future—and she answered confidently that her favourite subject at school is economics and that’s what she wants to do when she’s older.

However, for my final question she paused and answered in Burmese as I saw different expressions fleet across her face; her answers were not only moving but relayed a sense of self awareness difficult for most, she was grateful to be able to see her friends and her teachers because she knows that she is in a difficult situation so she is grateful for safe space along with the access to education she wouldn’t have otherwise had. She was thankful for my time, for the conversation programme that took place every Monday and she was curious about the organisation and everyone else she hadn’t met yet. It was commendable for Ruby to be such a positive force, despite her difficult background and the different politics that go on in Thailand around the citizen status of Burmese refugees from Myanmar, especially children. As the interview came to an end, I was thankful for not only her time but also her openness and vulnerability as she answered these questions and I’m excited to see where she’ll end up and the great heights she’ll reach.

Author’s bio:

Safe Child Thailand

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