2025 April
Batbayar
At the end of November, Batbayar fell through the ice in Choibalsan. I informed you about this heartbreaking event. Now that the ice has melted, his body has finally been found. He was buried on Friday, April 11.
Collaboration
Each province, for us that’s Dornod. has a centre for children and families. The people at that centre provide support with parenting and intervene when there are problems. The latter is perhaps best compared to what’s called Youth Care in the Netherlands. One of their tasks is to ensure that the funds made available by the national government for proper nutrition are used appropriately. Last year, for example, we received 77,000,000 Tugriks, over € 21,000. This contribution comes with conditions regarding the quality of the food. There must be, for instance, enough fruit, which is expensive and rare in Mongolia. As a result, the cost of food has increased drastically from 41 million Tugriks in 2023 to 83 million in 2024. But these costs are now almost entirely covered by the government’s contribution. We are extremely happy that there is finally a substantial contribution coming from the country itself, something we’ve advocated for over many years. In January, we signed another contract ensuring the same contribution for 2025.
In the photo, you can see the new director of the Children’s Centre a wonderfully enthusiastic woman who is determined to collaborate more closely with Anna Home, including support with psychological issues. We met her in January and are confident that real progress will be made.
Another form of collaboration is with the schools that our children attend. The teachers from the most important school for us visited Anna Home to see how our children live. Boldsaikhan and the “mothers” explained what daily life is like. The teachers shared how the children are doing in their classes.
Our own teachers, the “mothers,” took part in a two-day training course on child development and child protection.
We received donated clothing from various organizations. It’s great to see that Anna Home is recognized and appreciated. We bought a lot of new clothes ourselves too.
Taekwondo
Boldsaikhan is a highly skilled Taekwondo practitioner. I first met him 19 years ago at the Taekwondo school he still runs today. He teaches all children in the city who are interested, including children from Anna Home and he does an excellent job, as shown by the many medals we’ve won.
Ganchimeg, Azlargal, Purewdorj and Chinguun won prizes at a tournament in Ulaanbaatar.
Ganzorig, who is now studying in UB, will be representing Mongolia in a tournament in Beijing. He has the honour of representing his country in both Taekwondo and kickboxing.
Annual Reports
The most boring part of this newsletter: the annual reports from the Mongolian and Dutch foundations are ready. The Mongolian report has been stamped by the accountant and signed by the board members. You can find it here. The Dutch foundation’s report, approved by the board, is available here.
Maarten