Grounding

The Dton Naam’s team chose GROUNDING as our theme for this term (Jan- April) and it's been so relevant again and again in our daily lives. 

JAN & FEB highlights: RECOVERY PROGRAM: We started 2025 with processing, debriefing, elevating and planning... We set curriculum and goals for the next six months for our team, students, even specifics for each program (outreach, recovery, job training, and aftercare). A few friends from "Pong" in Australia came to visit, and it's always so good to connect. They've raised funds for us annually for over a decade, and these funds go directly to our caseworkers' monthly salaries and helping them keep doing what they do best.  OUTREACH PROGRAM: Our team went out more than 12 different nights, following up and building relationships with sex workers in three different red light areas. We also had an important meeting with the US Embassy as they are gathering information for the annual TIP report.  We also hosted our 2nd own Medical clinic partnering with the Health Development Association of Thailand

Our team values and often collaborates with other ngos in the city. We often help with Nightlight's medical clinic (where trans can get free health checks) and we joined Rahab’s valentine outreach. Rahab passed out roses to the female bar workers. We baked and passed out our own heart shaped cookies to the trans and male bar workers we know. 

JOB TRAINING: Our cafe is slowly moving forward again, hosted a worship night, a few other specialized events. And, we are actively posting jobs and interviewing for more cafe staff too.

Celeste focused the majority of her time teaching two main students ("Dusit" & "Ekaphong") barista and baking skills. They had some of the basics already from last year's classes, so both grew quickly in skill and confidence. They even helped bake and prep the Valentine cookies for the bar workers. Ekaphong is focusing more on barista skills and his latte art is improving daily. Dusit is focusing more on pastries, loves baking and is so careful with details. They both smile so big when they've made and served excellent products.

Currently, most of the sales in the job training cafe come from baking orders and special event rentals. But, with these sharp students and two trainers, we re-opened to the public a few days a week. We did this slowly to train and work out kinks (and help students' confidence), but also hope to increase to full time hours this summer, once we get an experienced chef.  Early Feb, four of our team attended the ICAP conference in Hua Hin and all of us made some beautiful new connections. Gik and Geng loved connecting with several other teams, including Thai, Cambodian and Filipino workers within great orgs in SE Asia. ** Student names are always changed to keep them safe.