Pen Pals Needed

The Blessing Hands students at Zhanghuang Middle school wrote me this charming letter together. I hope some of you will be willing to write these girls, and help them learn English. I would like to match youth groups, classes, and scout troops with schools in China. Write me for more information.

Dear Betty,
How do you do? Thank you very much for helping us in our life and study. We are Lin Xue, Lin Jiafeng, Wang Lu, and Su Lianfeng. We are studying in Zhanghuang Middle School, Pubei, Qinzhou, Guangxi, China. Miss Liu gave us a talk about Blessinghands on National Day, October 1st. Then she gave us money, some school things, and a beautiful big bag. She said we must spend the money on our study. She encouraged us to study hard and go to college with this beautiful bag. We will remember her words forever and make our dreams come true. But our English is poor. We don't know how to improve our English? Can you help us? This is our English teacher Miss Xia Qiumei's e-mail address. We hope to hear from you soon. Thank you.
Best wishes!
Yours,
Lin Xue, Lin Jiafeng, Wang Lu, and Su Lianfeng

Anna Explains about Blessing Hands

Anna Liu wrote the following e-mail about the ingathering.

Everybody felt very happy and excited. I talk about you, talk about Blessing Hands Charity, and my life in America for an hour. I told them all people in your church are sisters and brothers. I like that. I told them I am their sister, and the other teachers who donate the old clothes are their relatives, too. So they were very glad to share all the clothes donated by the teachers. How happy I was. Betty, you don't know when I told them you would come yourself on the 11th of February how excited they were!

Successful Ingathering

Anna Liu just sent these pictures of the ingathering day in Qinzhou for Blessing Hands students. 120 students from 26 rural middle schools around Qinzhou and 60 students from Qinzhou Number One Middle School (which has 6,000 student enrolled) came together with their teachers to receive their Blessing Hands tuitions for this semester.

It was a big day when the students got to have their pictures taken for our records, write thank you letters, and receive new school bags and school supplies. Some schools have ten Blessing Hands students and others have more or less depending on the need of the area and size of the school.

Anna was able to get volunteers to help her with the hard work for the day. She talked to them with a presentation about Blessing Hands for an hour and a half and encouraged them to be a Blessing Hand to others as well. She impressed on them that they were not just getting tuition but love as well.

The tuition for these students varies but averages about $75 or a little more per semester. If you want to be a blessing and support one of these students for a semester, you can send a check to Founding Family Foundation at 1004 Rodney Dr., Nashville, TN 37205-1018. Checks should be made out to Founding Family Charitable Foundation since they are matching contributions dollar for dollar until December 31, 2006. After that date contributions should come to Blessing Hands, 106 Timber Lane, Morehead, KY. We want you to take advantage of the matching offer from Founding Families Foundation before it ceases.

We can also match you up with a particular student if you would liketo write to them or know your special student. They are all between the ages of 15 to 18. They have been selected by their schools based on need and educational promise, and all come from families below the poverty line and most are from single parent family homes. The government of China does not pay tuition for children over 15, so many of these students could not go to school without help.

Ingathering Plans in Qinzhou

I talked to Anna Liu, the Blessing Hands administrator in Qinzhuo, tonight with a cut rate Chinese phone card. She is going through 600 applications to find the 180 high school students that can be funded for the fall semester in Qinzhou County. She has 26 rural schools and her own home school (Qinzhou No 1 Middle School) who are submitting applications. She is setting 10 students per school on the average, except for Pubei Town that was flooded from the typhoon. She says some families lost everything there, and she gave that school 20 student grants.

The schools cannot believe their good blessings and the lack of paperwork required. Anna says that the government would take three months to give money out and require them to submit paperwork again and again. They will get the Blessing Hands grants on National day in about one week.

She has had people trying to come in the backdoor so to speak, trying to get their poor relative included. She just tells them to submit the paper work, and they will be considered with all the other applications. She tells them Blessing Hands does it the American way, in the front door.

She is getting ready for the fall ingathering now with the help of three teacher assistants who are helping her as volunteers. 180 high students will come to her campus to receive their tuition money and school supplies, have their photos taken, write thank you letters, and enjoy a social time. 26 teachers will come with them from the rural schools and some teachers from her high school as well will attend. She says it is going very well, and everyone is excited and happy about what is happening. It helps that they remember me in the schools, since I taught rural English teachers in a summer English camp there in 2004.

She will give some of the donated American books to the rural teachers for their schools. We need to send them some more English books. The reading level is about 6th grade or lower. Books can be sent for a dollar a pound (up to 60 pounds) in a M-bag at the U S Post Office. They take three months to get there, but are very welcomed. If someone wants to send books let me know, and I will give you the address and more information.

Grants and Stock Gifts

Since the Founding Family Foundation matching offer runs out on December 31, 2006, let me encourage you to donate now while it can still be matched. Founding Family Foundation has given us a good start, but they are turning to more individual adoption grants in 2007, and our grant with them may be reduced or even eliminated for 2007. If you intend to renew your subscription or pledge to help a child, now is the time.

Blessing Hands now has a stock account, which will allow us to accept stock donations. People who have stocks that have increased so much that their capital gains would raise their income taxes can give them to Blessing Hands instead and get a tax deduction. It is a wonderful way to give to the children and would help the donors as well. There is no need to cash out stocks and pay taxes on your profits and then give to charities when you could give the stock directly as a donation and get a handsome tax deduction. Being a public charity, Blessing Hands could use the sale price for the students and owe no taxes on the profits.

Volunteers Wanted

Blessing Hands has discovered volunteers. We set up atable at the Morehead State Volunteer Fair, and invited people to come by and see our display and sign up to help us with anything from a fund raising scavenger hunt to computer profiling of our Blessing Hands students who would like pen pals or sponsors. We are seeking organizations or individuals willing to help us with setting up our bookkeeping system, advertising, advocacy for our children, web site maintenance, fund raising, newsletters, pen pals, sending English books to schools, travel to China to have clinics or work days with Blessing Hands schools or children, matching sponsors and children, matching sister schools or classes, grant writing, computer records, and etc.

So many people have been a blessing already, especially our donors. Maybe some of you would be willing to help Blessing Hands contact churches, scout troops, community clubs, and other organization thatmight be interested in helping children. I have made a PowerPoint presentation that can be used by anyone to introduce Blessing Hands. The first time it was shown to a vacation Bible school in Pennsylvania resulted in $500 being given. I will gladly mail you a copy, and you can show it at your club, sorority, family reunion, scout troop, school, church, youth group, or synagogue. It encourages participation on small and large levels and involvement of everybody.

Nine Mile School Gets Fall Grants for Textbooks

One donor has adopted Nine Mile School to pay for their textbooks and school supplies. She only works part time since she has her mother to look after, but she has managed to bless these children abundantly. The pictures of the children receiving their gifts brought tears to my eyes. Mr. Huang, the principal, said the children started arriving as early as 7:00 a.m. for the 10:00 a.m. appointment. The teachers also came on their one day off to see the children get their gifts.

Anna Liu, who got to give out the gifts, gave a little speech to ask them to pass the kindness on to others and be a blessing to others just like they were blessed. She had such a good time that she is looking forward to going back in February to give out the next semester's grant. Our thanks also goes to Lu Hanbin who assisted Anna with transportation and shopping.

Anna hopes to give them winter sports jackets in February. I can tell from the pictures of the children that some of them are wearing very old torn jackets. I think we can find people willing to help give them jackets. We might even be able to buy them some other clothes. Maybe you would like to be that person. Just send a donation for this to Founding Family Foundation before December 31, 2006, and it will be matched. Be sure and make the check out to Founding Family Foundation. Their address is:

Founding Family Foundation
1004 Rodney Drive
Nashville, Tennessee 37205-1018 

28 Children at Nine Mile School Get New Shoes

Anna Liu, our Blessing Hands administrator in Southern Guangxi, was delighted to visit Nine Mile School recently to give the 28 Blessing Hands children there new shoes. The children had never had shoes that good before, and they said it was like Chinese New Year gifts. Anna got a good price of under $3 for the shoes. Each child also got socks, ten new pencils, erasers, pencil sharpers, textbooks and homework exercise books. All of this only cost $280.

When people ask why we are helping children in China instead of America, I always mention that US money can buy 8 times more in value in China. To these children $280 US =$2,240 buying power in their money. In US money Chinese famers only make about 200 to 500 dollars a year. Our charity dollar goes a lot farther in China, and the children really, really need the help.

Click on this link to see the movie of Anding Primary School going to our eye glass clinic

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7356210220983174287&pr=goog-sl is the address on the internet where you will find a movie of the Anding Primary School Blessing Hands children at our recent eye glass clinic.

Click on this movie of Anding Primary School

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2661150041128430494

I have placed two movies on line for your information. This one is our visit to Gaotian Anding Primary School. I used my little digital camera, so the size is small.

Eye Glass Dedication Ceremony in Yangshuo

While I was in Yangshuo China for an eye glass clinic many teachers also received glasses.These tachers in Yangshuo County received new eye glasses through the sponsorship of Morehead Sister Cities, Blessing Hands, Founding Family Charitable Foundation, and the Yangshuo's People's Hospital. Mayor Brad Collins of Morehead (in the beard on the back row) traveled with us to Yangshuo to present the glasses and arrange for other joint Sister Cities projects with Yangshuo in the future. Perhaps there will be other medical exchanges in the future. 

Yangshuo Middle School

The Blessing Hands/Sister Cities Delegation that went to Yangshuo August 1-14th got a lot done. We did a three day eyeglass clinic for the Blessing Hands children, visited schools, visited with government leaders, and toured Yangshuo.

Yangshuo Middle School was one of the most outstanding schools I have seen in Yangshuo County. Blessing Hands is presently giving tuition for the 23 students show here. Their campus is spacious, well maintained, and large.

I was delighted to share this trip with my daughter-in-law Cindy Cutts and her mother Jan Weeks. Jan is a third grade teacher and could understand the Yangshuo schools and teacher's needs and problems. Cindy was touched by the children that she met and wants to correspond with some of them. Cindy is pictured here on my right while Jan is on my left.

Thank You Gifts from the Students in Yangshuo

On this trip to Yangshuo I got to personally see a lot of the students at our eye clinic. They were eager to see us also and brought thank you cards and gifts. The gifts were creative, inexpensive, and home made.


One of the girls from the Teacher Training Middle School, Lu Xiu Yun, sewed a little colorful purse and put paper cranes inside with a personal note wishing luck and everything to go well. She is wearing the red shirt in the picture shown here.

Qin Min put folded cranes inside a glass jar with a little note. I was touched by the handmade cards they brought personally. The girl pictured here with me stayed up all night to make paper cranes to glue into the word "Thanks". Qin Ling Zhu, who had the operation in February, made a little basket from a plastic water bottle and filled it with folded paper shapes.

Lynn Chen Jianhua

While I was in Yangshuo recently, I got to see Lynn, our scholarship student from Guangxi Normal University. She needed new glasses, so I invited her to the eyeglass clinic we were having at the Yangshuo Hospital this August. We all had a great dinner at Kentucky Fried Chicken after the clinic was over for the day.

She comes from a large rural family and sets an example for her village concerning hard work and preserverance.

Starfish

When I was in Xi'an Nina Ottinger and I got to visit the fostor home of Amanda de Lange. Amanda is from South Africa and speaks Chinese.

She has been entrusted with 13 special needs babies and is doing a wonderful job. She gets them needed corrective surgeries and sees them through to adoption. She calls the ministry Starfish after the story of a man picking up starfish stranded on the beach and throwing them back into the ocean. Someone asked him why he bothered, and he said that at least those starfish would have life.

She has her own blog at http://www.chinesestarfish.blogspot.com. Several Chinese nannie help her along with volunteers from many countries. What a difference a life of compassion can make. I really think compassion is a gift and gives ability beyond our own to reach out to others.

The Blessing Hands Board recently voted to support this worthy ministry to handicapped children with a small grant each semester. You can also give money directly on her website.

Eyeglass Clinic

Blessing Hands was a partner with Sister Cities of Morehead in a eyeglass clinic serving Blessing Hands children and teachers from Yangshuo.




It was wonderful to see some of the students in person after having seen their pictures and read their thank you letters.

Carolyn Franzini and Tami Kaskulski were trained to use a refractor to exam the children. It made the exams go much faster.

The children came with their teachers on the local buses and stayed for a simple noodle or rice lunch. 350 teachers had their eyeglass clinic earlier in July.

Blessing Hands cooperated with the Yangshuo Hospital and Kendall Optometry Ministry, Inc. to conduct this clinic. The hospital contributed $4.50 for the price of each pair of glasses while Blessing Hands gave $7.50 per pair. With the hospital joining together with us, the teachers and students got better quality of glasses. Kendall Optometry Ministry supplied equipment and training to our clinic team.

Nina Ottinger Gave Physicals

Nina Ottinger from the Founding Family Charitable Foundation was able to use her nursing ability to give the Blessing Hands children physicals after their eye exam. The students were also invited to select a small gift like a beanie baby or baseball hat. Nina was a great addition to the group of eight people who went to Yangshuo as a Sister Cities Delegation.

Chinese Eye Doctor

The Chinese eye doctor at Yangshuo Hospital

Qin Ling Zhu Report

Unfortunately Qin Ling Zhu's tumor has grown back worse in six months since her operation. Sadly Dr. He, her doctor, sent word that her case could not treated in China and was beyond his skill.

Through a series of coincidences, while I was in China I was able to get her medical records to the Chinese Agape Foundation, a medical ministry that helps Chinese children receive medical care from American doctors who come to China. They also send children to America to get treatment. They are evaluating her case now to see if she can be helped in America.

Delta Airline allows donations of skymiles to help with the transportation of such children. If you want to donate spare skymiles, you can get more information at: http://www.china-mission.org.

Gaotian Anding Primary School

While we were in Yangshuo, we visited Gaotian Anding Primary School. It is a rural school with many needs and dedicated teachers. Blessing Hands has 6 students receiving textbook and school supplies there. The children had drawn us pictures to greet us.