| Source: The Global Playground News dated 11 March. | | | | the families that SSF is helping. One family consisted |
| Last January, Global Playground had the opportunity | | | | of a single mother and her daughter who were living |
| to visit the Sao Sary Foundation ("SSF"), located an | | | | in a dilapidated structure, but because the home had |
| hour's drive outside of Cambodia's capitol city of | | | | no walls the daughter was in constant danger of |
| Phnom Penh. SSF was founded in 2006 to "help | | | | abduction and trafficking given her beauty. SSF is |
| improve the living standard of the poorest of the | | | | rebuilding the home. In other cases, SSF teaches |
| poor and vulnerable families . . . and to develop | | | | families how to run a business and provides them |
| support for the education of orphans and other | | | | with startup capital to do so. For example, SSF |
| vulnerable children." The ultimate goal of SSF is to | | | | taught one mother whom Global Playground visited |
| ensure that vulnerable children are kept safe from all | | | | how to raise fish and grow rice and morning glories (a |
| forms of violence, exploitation, and abuse, especially | | | | marketable vegetable in Cambodia) so that she could |
| child trafficking. This was also the lifelong goal of the | | | | keep her family out of poverty and her daughters |
| foundation's namesake, Sao Sary, deputy chief of | | | | safe. |
| Takeo province in Kus commune, who was gunned | | | | |
| down after intervening in a robbery. | | | | Global Playground visited SSF to better understand |
| SSF runs a house where students live so they can | | | | the import of bolstering education in Cambodia. Board |
| attend school, develop skills, and generally be in a | | | | member Doug Smith stated, "Part of the reason |
| safer environment than they might otherwise be in | | | | Global Playground is operating in Cambodia is because |
| their own homes. Children at SSF are considered | | | | there is child trafficking and education is a means to |
| those particularly susceptible to being trafficked, such | | | | alleviate it." Although SSF's goal is not education alone, |
| as those who have been trafficked before, who live | | | | Global Playground does see education as the ultimate |
| well below the poverty line, or who come from | | | | preventative measure. "If kids are in school and |
| single-parent households or families with physical | | | | gaining education to allow them to enter jobs |
| disabilities and low earning potential. In addition, the | | | | successfully and earn decent income, then trafficking |
| beauty of a child and lack of access to education also | | | | is not as serious of a risk," said board member Doug |
| make a child a likely target for trafficking. | | | | Bunch. |
| To contribute to their keep and to support SSF, the | | | | During its visit, Global Playground purchased the entire |
| girls who live at SSF spend hours on end making | | | | inventory of the girls' nylon flowers and will sell them |
| hundreds of elaborate flowers fashioned out of metal | | | | at Global Playground's March 27 event in Washington, |
| rods and colorful nylon, which are then sold at | | | | DC at the Carnegie Endowment for International |
| market for use in weddings or other ceremonies. But | | | | Peace. |
| not all of the organization's work is at the home | | | | -Jennifer Rinker |
| itself--much of what the organization does extends | | | | To read the profile of one of the families SSF is |
| into the community. Global Playground saw SSF's | | | | helping and to view pictures from Global Playground's |
| outreach efforts firsthand when it toured the | | | | visit with the family click here. |
| Cambodian countryside and visited with several of | | | | |