Wangjiayu Orphanage School of Yingshan County

Early this week, we did not visit any village for our project since we were writing our reports on the three income generation projects we have visited last week. In addition, due to less team member now (only two member instead of three), we were also busy in preparing training/workshop material for next week. During this week, our interpreter is sick therefore I became an unofficial interpreter to facilitate Kevin and SC. Only one staff in SC can speak English fluently (the interpreter), the other two can speak only Chinese. I have been practicing my Chinese with them for the past two weeks, as such, I have been persuaded by SC and Kevin to become their unofficial interpreter.

With my new title, unofficial interpreter, on 11 July 2007, SC and PwC visited Wangjiayu Orphanage School. This is a dormitory school and/or house for disabled and abandoned children. This orphanage school is taking care of 214 children. More than 50% of them are disabled. The school has several class for disabled students. The school is only for elementary school. For junior level, the children have to go to regular school but will still stay in the dormitory.

SC has built several building for the School and also provides assistance on a regular basis. All the students live in the school. During our visit, we discusses on the situation of the school. The headmaster explained on the school situation including lack of salaries for the teacher and social workers, computer, and other basic needs since the government only provides a limited fund on monthly basis. The number of students and orphaned students are increasing drastically. Even, for the past two days they have received two new disabled abandoned children. The purpose of the orphanage school is to provide skills to the children so that in the future they can work and reintegration into society.


Notes on the pictures:
(1) Kevin, me and the twin
(2) Situation in a class room
(3) Kevin, Heyao, Wangjiayu (the headmaster) and me
(4) I gave candy to a child
(5) An abandoned baby is being taken care of
(6) Children is washing their own clothes
(7) The social worker, the child and me
(8) All the children and the teachers said goodbye to us by standing in the side of the access road
(9) The same as above

Balihe Resort

Besides as a leadership program, Ulysses is also a program for recognizing culture diversity. As such, during the program we need to do cultural things. For this week end I planned to go to Song Shan and Shaolin Temple in Henan Province. You probabaly have known about Shaolin Temple which is very famous for its martial arts. Shaolin Temple is the place of origin of all the great Chinese martial arts.

We need to take train or bus to either Luoyang or Zhengzhou to to to Shaolin Temple. Unfortunately, we could not get the train ticket. We did not plan to take a bus since in China, it was raining cats and dogs for the past couple days therefore it was not safe to take a bus to go to other Province. As such, Xi Feng, Program Assistant SC and I went to Balihe - 50 km East to Fuyang. Kevin did not go since he was not feeling very well.

Balihe is a recreation place nearest to Fuyang. Many tourists from other China city such as Shanghai, Hefei or Jiangjing come to this place. The spot to see in this place can be classified into 4: Bird zoo, European miniature, China miniature and Zoo. Balihe is surrounding by a huge lake (see the pictures).

Zhuanji Townships and Guozhuang Village Income Generation Projects

On 5 July 2007, we went to Zhuanji Township of Jieshou County where SC is helping renovate the sanitation system for a primary school in the village to improve the hygienic status for the school. We went to Zhuanji Township to assess the income generation activities of a local NGO which has been established with the assistance of SC. SC has provided a certain amount of money for seed funds, and poor families can borrow the money to buy seeds or to fund other income generation activities. We discuss the challenges faced by the villages on the last round of projects.

On 6 July 2007, we visited Guozhuang Village of Linquan County. Cologne University through SC has provided a certain amount of funds for living and/or education allowances for children orphaned or made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS, household based income generation/nutrition activities, including poultry, goats, pigs, calves raising and village enterprise of plaster products. The management includes community leaders and PLWHA which was formed through community participatory meetings. The money is provided to the beneficiaries as a donation and there is no need to return it to a core fund.

In Guozhuang Village we visited the Children Activities Center built by SC and the plaster manufacturing factory. We discuss the challenges faced by the plaster manufacturing factories and any other ways to improve the performance.

The special characteristic of Guozhuang Village is that all families in the village has the same family name "Guo". In Indonesia known as Kuok, Kwok, Kwee or Kwik.

Notes on the pictures:
(1) and (2) pictures taken in Zhuanji Townships

(3) Plastering products

(4) Children in the village and me.
(5) Plaster manufacturing factory

(6) PwC, SC, Women Federation and all children in the Children Activity Center

(7) Kevin, He Yao, me and the children.

(8) Villages in the Children Activities Center.

The Hospitality of Save the Children Team

Probably there are many of you wonder where we live during our project in Fuyang. We live in Buckingham Palace. Not Buckingham Palace where all the UK Royal Family lives. We wish to live there. Unfortunately we live only in Buckingham Palace Hotel. The hotel has a fitness center but please do not compare it with Fit by Beats. The hotel also has a bilyard center and again it cannot be compared with the Score. The hotel has a bowling alley but it is not comparable with EX or Senayan Bowling Alley. Last but not the least, the hotel has karaoke facility, and it can be compared with Inul Karaoke.

Our approach to the project with Save the Children ("SC") is a collaboration project. We assist them in improving the way their managing their projects. SC team consists of He Yao (the Project Manager), Chen Xi and Shi Xi Feng.

On 4 July 2007, PwC Team has been invited for a dinner by the SC Fuyang Project Manager. PwC Team and SC Team cooked together. I should be honest this time that Kevin was the one who cooked for PwC team, not me. Kevin and I both agreed that the food we had for dinner was much better than food served in the restaurant where we have lunch/dinner so far.
Notes on the pictures:
(1) Buckingham Palace Hotel
(2) He Yao and Chen Xi from market to buy vegetables and meat for dinner
(3) Xi Feng and He Yao on action - cooking the dishes
(4) Chen Xi was preparing the fruit salad
(5) Foods for the dinner

Fuyang, A Brief Story

I have posted blog describing our Save the Children China Project at Fuyang. However, I have not posted any blog on Fuyang itself. As such, this blog will be a little bit story about Fuyang.

Fuyang (Chinese: 阜阳; Pinyin: Fuyáng) is a prefecture-level city in northwestern Anhui province. It borders Bozhou to the northeast, Huainan to the southeast, Lu'an to the south, and the province of Henan on all other sides.



The prefecture-level city of Fuyang administers 8 county-level divisions, including 3 districts, 1 county-level city and 4 counties:
- Yingzhou District (颍州区)
- Yingdong District (颍东区)
- Yingquan District (颍泉区)
- Jieshou City (界首市)
- Tiahe County (太和县)
- Linquan County (临泉县)
- Funan County (阜南县)
- Yingshang County (颍上县)

(source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuyang,_Anhui (access on 27 June 2007))

Fuyang Prefecture in Northern Anhui Province, bordering Henan, has a population of around 9 million people; an estimated 2 million have migrated out.

The situation in Fuyang is similar with other Indonesia middle size city such as Bogor, Tangerang, etc but the population in the city is the same size as the most populated city in Indonesia. There are several parks in Fuyang. In one of the park, on weekend, there is a dance festival. In addition, there is a lake so-called Si Hu. The city also has supermarkets and a square. Many government officials live in flats.

Notes on the pictures:

(1) Park in Fuyang with Pagoda

(2) Si Hu Lake with Pagoda

(3) Park in Fuyang

(4) Dance festival in the park

(5) Chinese traditional music performance in the park

(6) Fuyang Square

(7) The biggest supermarket in Fuyang

(8) Traffic situation in front of the supermarket

(9) Another Fuyang park
(10) Fuyang City Hall

(11) One flat in Fuyang

Xilaojia Village - Income Generation Pilot Model

On Monday 2 July 2007 we were going to Xilaojia village in Funan. It took 1.5 hour drive from Fuyang to Funan. Further, we had to walk for half a hour from the main street to the village because our rented car was not able to go through the access road to the village.

All people live in the village are very poor. They live from livestock raising and agriculture. They purchased the livestock after obtaining microcredit from community managed fund. The fund is contributed by Save the Children ("SC").

We visited the village for the purpose of assessing and discussing the income generation pilot project in this village. The project may be replicated to other poor places in China by SC if it works as intended. We also discussed with the villagers the difficulties and challenges they faced for more effective implementation of the income generation project. Our aim for this project is to provide our assessment on the current model and to provide alternative sustainable models.

Due to her sickness, my teammate, Mihaela, a Romanian partner, has gone back to Beijing and presumed on to Romania. As such, for the Save the Children China Project, the team consists of only two members, Kevin and myself.

Notes on pictures taken at the village:
1) Trees plant on side of the access road to the village
2) Discussions held with the head of village and villagers on the income generation project

3) Kevin, myself and children in the village
4) Community activity center built by SC
5) Condition on the part of the village

6) SC team and me

7) Access road and two villagers

The Great Wall and the Forbidden City

During Foundation Program, I climbed the Great Wall (public section) during a free time with all other participants. I could tell you that this was not an easy climb. The steps were so steep. In addition, I had also climbed the Great Wall- private section from the Commune through a path in a small forest when I arrived at the Commune on Sunday 17 June 2007.


Before we rode down to Fuyang by train. With another team member, Kevin, I went to the Forbidden City for 1 hour. Definitely, we were not able to visit all the places in the Forbidden City within an hour. At least it may take one whole day to visit all the places in the Forbidden City.

Several photos below are taken at the Great Wall and Forbidden City.