A Royal Award

Christine Overeem, the founder of Baan Phak Phing, came to the Netherlands in August on furlough. She left Harderwijk, the Netherlands 30 years ago to move to Thailand but the connection to Harderwijk has always remained. A few days after her arrival she had an appointment with someone in Harderwijk. Before she could get to the agreed location the other person called and asked her to meet at the city hall. A group of about 50 of her friends, family, and people connected with Baan Phak Phing were there to surprise her. The Mayor was there to receive her after which he proceeded to give her a Royal Award in the King’s name for the work that she started in Thailand and the 30 years of service to help the vulnerable girls who live at Baan Phak Phing. When Christine was asked about how she felt, she said, “I am happy to have received the award but that is not what this is and has been about. It has always been about the work that we get to do in Thailand.”

More Posts

Special meal

The ‘mothers’ told us we would not be going straight home after school this afternoon, because we’d go out for dinner. “Really?” we all asked at once. “But why?” was the next question. Someone wants to throw us a party, so that’s why we’re going. Of course, we all wanted to know where we would

Read More »

Visiting grandma

Every year the ‘mothers’ take us on a family visit, that is as long as it is safe for us at home. For most of us it is wonderful to see parents, brothers and sisters and sometimes even grandparents again. But sometimes it is difficult, because not everybody has a good relationship with their family.

Read More »

Victory

Early April seven of our girls traveled to Bangkok to compete in a very important self-defense contest, Jiu-Jitsu. Each of them had been training hard to get to this point and now the time was finally there. The journey itself was great fun, because from the gym several young people came along as well as

Read More »