Breaking the poverty cycle

As a young boy, my brother and I were orphaned and found ourselves under the care of Hope for Cambodian Children Foundation. It is a place that gave me everything; such as warm shelter, a safe environment, food and especially a chance to get an education. All of these are challenges for orphans and children from very poor families.  I feel I was such a lucky child to be cared for by Hope; they were my family. 

After receiving a good education, I was given the opportunity to attend Phare Artistic Academy and on graduating started an internship and have now been working as a Graphic Designer in Phnom Penh for three years. 

I am very proud of what I have achieved and also acknowledge it would have been almost impossible without the support of HOPE.  I am grateful to everyone who was involved in assisting with my journey to where I am today.  Thank you! 

With a relationship of more than 10 years with HOPE; I have seen first hand the transition from the original Residential Center into a Community-Based Care Organisation. HOPE provides many programs across the sectors of Education, Health and Welfare departments. The staff commitment and dedication provides high standards of service to the poorest and most vulnerable children and their families. We are very fortunate to have their support in our Community.

I was first introduced to the Hope Foundation through board member Craig Armstrong. When I inquired to learn more about Hope after my firm BT, I was working for at the time, send used laptops to Cambodia to be used in a computer training facility set up at the centre. Two things struck me during this conversation; Craig's commitment and passion to the work being done by Hope and overall breadth of the program and how it was seeking to address the underlying problem facing the kids and not just the symptoms such as homelessness and malnutrition. I have six children of my own and have done my best to provide everything they require. I was due some down time from work, BT then provided staff 3 days

of leave per year to be used for community based project and services, so I decided to put these days to good use and direct my thoughts to how I could best contribute. Craig, in his characteristic charmingly direct way when I asked said, "money". It was then I set about planning how I was going to raise and contribute funds for Hope so they could further run and expand their many great programs. Perhaps more importantly though, I wanted to build a sustainable fund raising vehicle that would bring back supporters and sponsors each year and that Hope could look to as one of their major funding streams also. The Hope Indochina Ride Organisation 'HIRO' was born.