Ties to Thailand help raise funds, awareness

As an ambassador’s daughter, Maile Lindley attended high school in Thailand, and when the devastating Pacific tsunami hit the Khao Lak region on Dec. 26, 2004, Lindley sprang into action.

Arriving in Khao Lak four days later, she called on a group of alumni contacts she had made during her years in Thailand. Together, Lindley and the International School Bangkok Network Foundation amassed donations and offered assistance to the people — mainly orphaned and homeless children — of the Ban Bangsak School community, where the most severe damage had occurred.

The school functioned mainly as a day school for about 128 children before the tsunami hit, and the giant waves decimated the buildings, leaving only a flagpole in its wake.

Through the efforts of the foundation and the King of Thailand’s Rajaprajanugroh Foundation, soldiers from the Thai army were able to provide the labor and rebuild the school on higher — and hopefully safer — ground.

The new 35th Rajaprajanugroh School Phang Nga ) now operates as a boarding school for about 1,000 students.

Those students may truly be orphans — having lost both their parents — or as Lindley explained, while only one parent may have died, the remaining parent, unable to cope with their individual loss, simply “wanders off” and abandons their children.

Lindley returns to Thailand every year and is haunted by one little boy she saw on her last visit there in January, who “just wanders around alone with a vacant look on his face.”

These are Third World children, Lindley said, and they have virtually been forgotten.

“They are still troubled by the shock of the disaster,” Lindley said, “and nobody advocates for them.”

With a fundraiser planned Saturday at the Oasis Senior Center in Corona del Mar, Lindley hopes to raise awareness for what she calls “these disenfranchised children.”

Lindley wants people to come out and enjoy the Thai food being donated by local restaurants, the entertainment provided by Thai dancers, the Thai foot massages and especially the presence of celebrity PBS chef Tommy Tang.

Her goal in hosting this event is to ensure that the children won’t be forgotten.

Lindley and her husband, Brian, will be returning to Thailand in July, and will be there for four months.

All of the proceeds raised Saturday will go directly to the school foundation to support the school and its new English as a Second Language project.

IF YOU GO:

WHAT: Taste Of Thailand fundraiser to benefit tsunami victims

WHEN: 5:30 to 8 p.m. Saturday

WHERE: Oasis Senior Center, 800 Marguerite Ave., Corona del Mar

COST: $50

INFO: Maile Lindley (949) 673-4632