2015 September

Three new girls

Delgermaa, 32 years old, has three children. They now live under the stairs in an apartment building, all four of them. There are in some buildings very small rooms, without any facilities such as water and toilet. Some time ago she worked for a herder and she wants to do that again, but she wants to take only her youngest child. She brought the other two daughters to Anna Home, so that care will be taken of them and so that they can go to school, which they did not very often up till now. The oldest is Bayrtsetseg, 15 years. The other daughter is Uuriintuya, 7 years.

Six years ago a house burned down. Sumyasuren’s mother lost her life in it. she was a baby then, now she is 7 years old. A friend of mothers and his wife adopted her and moved with her to Ulaanbaatar. The adoption mother is very ill now and cannot take care of her. So they brought her to her grandmother. But that is not a good solution. Grandmother lives somewhere in the countryside, but not in her own home. She does not have one. And now they brought Sumyasuren to Anna Home, where she was lovingly received and where she already made friends.

All three of them now go to school. This brings the number of children in the house on 26, 1 too many in fact, but inevitable. Besides them there are 4 boys living in the transition home.

Summercamp

Boldsaikhan writes enthusiastically about camp:

This year the children did not want to travel far to camp and so we went to Dolgoon Herlen, around 30 km from Choibalsan. We slept in gers and we made a lot of fun. They swam in the river Herlen, they fished, they floated in a small boat and they did a lot of sport, such as football and basketball.

Besides the three “mothers” and myself also Lizzie and Byambadavaa went along. Lizzie is a American Peace Corps volunteer who does a lot for the children, loves to play with them and teach them things. Byambadavaa is the boy who now started the third year of his law studies.

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We made little trips in the surroundings and we talked with local people about their land and nature. They told us that there are wolves, but we are not afraid of them. Some gave us milk, meat and also airag (horse milk and very much a Mongolian tradition). We once went to a high mountain with many rocks and many birds. There we met a nomadic family. The children could ride their horses and at the end they even gave us a sheep!

For some new children this was the first time in their life they went on holiday and that was very special for them.

We divided the children in three groups with names like the Crazy Guys and Anna City. So we could compete together.

The weather was very cooperative. It started to rain just after we arrived back home. The time went very fast and we are very grateful to the Dutch donors who make this possible!

Cameraman

One of the boys, Gansukh, who lives in Anna Home since many years, wants to become cameraman. He will start a three months training in Ulaanbaatar next month. Since some time we have a study fund for the children and we will pay this from that fund. He will live with his old Anna-Home-mate Byambadavaa, the student.

Baby

Bolortuya, one of the girls who left Anna Home not so long ago has a baby. I could not resist to show you the photo.

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Enlargement of the house

Thanks to a big donation we can enlarge Anna Home! Not to house more children, but to give the actual 25 children some more room. They sleep now in three bedrooms, an average of 8 children per room. We will build two more rooms, with the result that 5 children will share a room. That means some more privacy and some more space for their belongings. Also maybe they will make homework in the room.

The last enlargement dates from 2009. In that time Hassan, a Dutch building expert assisted. He was in Anna Home for a few weeks during the actual work. And he will do that again! In spring it will all happen. That makes it possible to make a little opening party in summer, 10 years after Boldsaikhan started to take care of the children. Hassan will go to Choibalsan by the end of October to prepare everything. After that we will make, together  with the architect Gert-Jan, a final design. It looks like there will be a floor on top of Anna Home, because this is the best way to heat the house with only one fire. One of the children started already to make his own design.

Journey in July 2016

We plan to go to Choibalsan in July with a group of 10 to 15 people. The provisional plan consists of three days in Anna Home with the celebratory opening of the new rooms. Then three days of celebrating Naadam in Choibalsan, which is the national Mongolian celebration with horse races, wrestling and archery. In that city never a tourist comes and that means the celebration is very authentic. Naadam is most probably from July 11 to 13. After that everybody who wants can make his own programme, for example a tour through Mongolia, sleeping in gers, go back home in the Trans Siberia Express, make a tour in China or anything else. There are a few places left. If anybody would like to join us in this very special journey, please send me an e-mail. Mongolia is not the usual holiday country, it is beautiful by its enormous vastness and emptiness. There are few people and many animals.

Maarten