Tragic Fire in Klong Toey Slums

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thaiworthy

Tragic Fire in Klong Toey Slums

Post by thaiworthy »

I am not Catholic, nor even religious, but I did a kids' magic show 3+ years ago for Mercy Center located in the slums of Klong Toey. The area is known as the Bangkok Slaughterhouse. I received an email this morning about a tragic fire that destroyed two city blocks there.

Tuesday, 31 January 2017 02:53
Last Friday night our beloved slum beside the slaughter house burned down. Nobody lite a match, it doesn’t happen that way. However, Seventy year old wooden shacks – seventy year old wiring – over-loaded circuits. Lights left on in an abandoned shack. It was horrible. An area the size of two city blocks completely devastated. Nothing was left standing.

But our kids – now fire victims - are okay. All of them. No one hurt. No one had to go to the hospital emergency room. Some scratches, burns and bruises, but nothing worse. There won’t be any scars, except the fear, the horror and lasting night mares of the children.

It was near midnight. The electricity went out, and the only light was from the flames. This fire ‘hurt’ me, Fr. Joe, more than most. This slum is my home; where I grew up as a young slaughter house priest.

Those over 45 years ago, we all started with nothing, really. Our first make-shift chapel under a bridge next to a railroad track, then in a wooden, tin roof slum house, finally the second floor above an illegal school. In those days, our slaughter house kids were too poor and too much laughed at because they lived literally above and beside the pig holding pens in the slaughter house. No school wanted them, and those who did, our kids dropped out in weeks because all the other kids bullied them, scorned them. So we began our own kindergarten in a non-used pig pen, - anything to ‘get started.’

Yes, that was years ago, but these memories flashed through my mind, as I stood there, watching the flames. And the original community, with and wooden shack homes haven’t changed that much.

Those kids, now adults, educated, send their own kids, even grandkids to our kindergarten, escaped with their lives and little more.

Forty five shacks/ homes, and seventy three families – over twenty children.

The house I ‘grew up in’ in the slums as a young priest – trashed…. The 2nd floor completely burned out, roof caved in, windows all broken.

Slum Fire is ugly. Not nice to anyone– doesn’t care: just burns and burns, till there is nothing left. And the wind –fickle: blows the fire this way and that. No favourites. Doesn’t really care how much you plead nor beg. After 3 hours, the wind switched back on itself, and the burning didn’t spread any further. But the damage was done; forty six wooden shacks and seventy six families.

I was there, a few steps away, in safety, holding a couple of six years old by the hand – to dry their tears. A boy was holding a charred statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary which he and his sister had run back into the flames of their burning shack to rescue. No mum to stop them as she is in prison.

I kept telling the kids: Don’t worry; we can build a new house, and in the morning, buy you some new school clothes so you can go back to school on Monday. And then they started to console me, as I ‘choked up a bit.’ They said … Don’t worry, fr. Joe, we will take care of you.

And as you know we NEVER close our schools. Our slaughter house kindergarten of course has moved out from that un-used pig pen of years ago to another part of the slum - small child walking distance, but safe from the fire area. Two of the fire victim families with no place to stay, came and ‘set up camp.’ A couple days in the school.

Now, they are with relatives near-by.

Finally

Together, in partnership, with district office, local police, army and hospitals and the temple and the schools our community will bounce back, that’s what we do here in the slum. The slum might look weak and fragile from the outside, houses made of rotten wood and families poorly dressed. But we are stronger that some might think – we have (unfortunately) many years of experience with fires and accidents and tragedies – HOWEVER we always come back and we will this time too.

Prayers,

Fr Joe

http://www.mercycentre.org

Mercy Centre is a shelter for street kids, five orphanages, a hospice, a home for mothers and children with HIV/AIDS, a 400-pupil kindergarten, a community meeting place, and a serene haven in the slums with small gardens and playgrounds. Originally built on a former Buddhist Temple site on port authority property, Mercy Centre has stood in some shape or form for nearly 40 years. In 2000, it was rebuilt through a generous gift to accommodate our expanding services to orphans, street children, and children with HIV/AIDS.
readerc54

Re: Tragic Fire in Klong Toey Slums

Post by readerc54 »

Fr. Joe went to a place few wanted or dared to go in 1974. And he stayed. You were fortunate to see the place up close. Thanks for posting the letter.
thaiworthy

Re: Tragic Fire in Klong Toey Slums

Post by thaiworthy »

Update from email received this morning.

Dear everyone,

No one really has had permission to live there. Not even from the beginning. Nearly 70 years ago, it wasn’t that important. What was important was coolie labour in the Klong Toey Port and butchers in the slaughter house. Let them live as they may: Helter-skelter. So they built clap-trap wooden shacks. Pirated municipal water and electricity. And last week, all these years later, those wooden shacks caught fire.

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But those shacks are home. Babies born there, old folks have died there. Children grew up in, lived above and around the pig, cattle holding pens. Poor but beloved. Sacred.

Twelve days ago today, it burned to the ground. Nothing left. Two city blocks wide & long: 51 old wood shacks & 76 families. Our homes. Yes, as squatters: no legal right to the land, except we have butchered pork and cattle for the city – 3,500 a night, and carried produce on our backs, up and down ship gang-planks now for 60 plus years. We fought for municipal water at normal prices and finally ‘won the battle of meters’ (to have our own meter) but still have one big water meter to share Bangkok city water.

We won’t leave; where would we go – This is home. And we are re-building as fast as we can. We have cleared most of the burnt scrap. We have sifted through the burnt to find our sacred statues. WE are doing most of the clearing burnt scrap and re-building ourselves. We aren’t the best carpenters, but the work has to be done.

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With strings of different colors and a single piece of paper with your name on it – that’s how to mark the spot where your shack once stood – slum style. And every neighbor respects that, understands what these basic symbols imply.

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Some have been extra lucky and got a tent – a tent on top of burned wood and unsafe ground – gives you protection and you claim your turf.

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We are using your money for that. Plus school uniforms for 41 school children, plus pots and pans, plus houses for a couple of our teachers who lost everything, plus shacks for elderly ladies with no source of income and certainly no money to re-build. And on and on. Time is of the essence and we won’t rest before everyone is back in the community. Plus the rains are coming – the rainy monsoon season. The ‘new houses’ might not look like much high class, but they are solid and liveable.

And everyone is participating, everyone is involved. The women take care of the donation box (so every coin is counted) another group prepare the food. The men take turns at guard duty at night, so that no stranger comes to wander around. The teachers come each morning to collect the children for school. It’s awesome.

Thank you - Prayers as always fr. joe.


http://www.mercycentre.org
readerc54

Re: Tragic Fire in Klong Toey Slums

Post by readerc54 »

Thanks for update. Mercy Centre can be counte on to use donated funds wisely and within the community.

Japan's English edition of NHK news aired an interesting segment Wednesday about the Klong Toey slums. A local developer has installed two unique soccer "fields" within Klong Toey. Their innovative design makes the field conform to the available space. A manufactured surface appropriate for playground activities is then installed. The concept has been cited by Time magazine.

Towards the end of the video a reporter notes that the local government plans to redevelop the slum, and this has many residents on edge. Although they've been promised alternative accommodations, many fear that they'll simply be displaced as high-rise condos go up. Klong Toey slums occupy a space near a major subway stop (Klong Toey) and the Chao Phraya River.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/ ... cerfields/
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