Written by: Hanne Fellers
Kelly King the 2014 Fashion Hope ambassador and the Founder of Passport 2 Freedom, Hanne Fellers partnered on a trip to highlight some front-line organizations in Thailand.
We visited Zoe Children’s Home in Chiang Mai (www.gozoe.org) Zoe is a faith based organization, they are known for their excellence in how they treat their children, their protection policies and their success rates in all aspects of Human Trafficking work. They do Prevention, Intervention (direct rescues) and aftercare. Zoe has developed a close relationship with state officials and local police, in partnership they work to fight child trafficking in Thailand.
The organization is also very close to founder, Hanne Fellers heart. Zoe is the main organization the proceeds from the sales of the Dance 4 Freedom pants goes towards. During our visit we were able to work on what we ended up calling the “crack project”. Co-founder, Carol Hart had a awesome vision that we were able to see come alive. When the Zoe building was built and the foundation settled, some cracks appeared. They covered them up with cement, but Carol had a great plan for them. The children at Zoe have been through a lot as victims of trafficking or double orphans.
The vision of the “crack project” : The cracks symbolizes the cracks in our lives, it’s easy to want to cover up our faults. When we give our cracks, broken hearts, our faults, our imperfections to God, He can turn them into something beautiful.” Kelly and Hanne got down and dirty. Kelly was using powertools like a champion, we hammered and worked hard to mosaic tile the cracks. And wow, they really turned out amazing. It was great to get to work hard and see the vision alive.
Kelly taught some jewelry wire-wrapping classes at ZOE with the 14-18 year old girls. It was great for the girls to get to learn a skill that potentially can become a work opportunity for them in the future. The girls made themselves multiple earrings, and also a necklace. It was wonderful to see them match beads and colors together, creating unique and beautiful designs. We were so blessed during our time at ZOE. Thank-you for having us, a special thank-you to Jessica, Jenny & Satit and Carol & Mike!
Photos are from the ZOE website because of their media protection policies (Zoe Media may show orphaned or at-risk children, but never trafficked children. To see more photos from ZOE visit www.gozoe.org)
Next we visited Destiny Rescue (www.destinyrescue.org) Destiny Rescue also does prevention, intervention and aftercare. What we got to experience and learn the most about was their aftercare and vocational training programs. They have some really great opportunities for the children to learn a large variety of skills to help them start over. Kelly and Hanne were so blessed to be served by their beautiful girls in the vocational program at their restaurant and coffee shop and to top it off we got a hair-cut, hair-dyed and styling done by the talented girls. Destiny Rescue produces, bags, scarfs and jewelry all made by trafficking survivors. We encourage you to go check out their shop and get some christmas gifts with meaning. Thank-you to everyone at Destiny Rescue, thank-you to Tina and Kate for hosting us. Stay tuned for video from our visit at Destiny coming soon..
Last, but not least we visited “Association for the Promotion of the Status of Women” center (http://www.apsw-thailand.org/Intro.htm) Here we got to visit with the youngest children there. They were so precious and loved the attention. The emergency home takes care of victims of violence and abandonment.
They run vocational programs, clinics and teach about social responsibility. Krissy the owner of (www.ferrocosmetics.com), had sent us off to Thailand with some makeup. We had such a fun day getting to bless the women with some make-up, but most importantly getting to spend some time with them, teaching them that make-up is fun and great, but that true beauty comes from within. Thank-you, Håvard, Pat and Anette for hosting us. We will have a video of our time at APSW soon…
Thank-you to Phunchanit for filming and helping us along the way.