Ryan and Melissa Crossett Deliver Relief to Rural Thailand
Online, July 23, 2013 (Newswire.com) - Several months ago, Ryan and Melissa Crossett became aware of the needs of a small village in northern Thailand. As winter season approached, the village, consisting of about forty families, was in need of warm clothing and blankets to last them through the season. Without these items, these families would be very ill-prepared to face the cold temperatures in the mountains of northern Thailand in the months to come.
Like most countries, Thailand also has its population of rural people that live at a very humble level of economic viability, and who have no way to manage when a crop fails or serious sickness strikes. When many of us would just turn to our own personal savings account, the poorer people just have to "make do" with whatever they have at hand. It was not a surprise for the Crossetts, who engage in humanitarian relief projects, to find out about this particular need for warm clothing and blankets. In fact, they're always on the look out for project possibilities; especially the type of project that is requested by the local community, and has the proper characteristics to insure sustainability and genuine improvement for the recipient community.
As soon as she heard about this situation, Melissa Crossett helped spread the word to friends and neighbors in Bangkok who were interested in helping. Friends dropped of bags of nice, warm clothing and some even put out collection boxes so that others could easily donate. Still others gave money to contribute to the relief effort.
After a few weeks of collecting items, Ryan Crossett helped gather it together, sort it for easy transport and distribution, and then loaded it up into trucks. When it was all organized, they had three pickup trucks full of donated items. He was impressed with the large amount of donations they had received. Ryan said, "it's so great to see the enthusiasm and generosity shown by our friends and neighbors to help this village."
Ryan Crossett, along with some friends, were able to deliver the blankets and warm clothing to the village themselves. From Bangkok, they drove for about ten hours to reach the village. They also used the donated money to buy forty sacks of rice to give to the village, as they had learned that rice was another need of the people. After arriving at the village, they spent the afternoon handing out the clothing, blankets and rice to the people. The residents gratefully and eagerly received the gifts and some of the children were even wearing their new clothes by the end of the day.
Ryan and Melissa Crossett found the relief effort a very rewarding experience and they have plans to find other ways to keep helping. You can read more about them and their work doing community development in Asia at ryanmelissa.com.