After interviewing Scott Neeson on my show The Pauly Cast, I became inspired to get involved with the humble goal of changing Just One Life.

Now, with the generous support of my closest friends, our small group has taken on the Sacred Stewardship of this fine young man. His name is Sky… how perfect!

Sky will now become a part of the Cambodian Children’s Fund’s fantastic program. Here is the Fund’s charity rate.

I spoke with him through an interpreter last night and he simply could not stop smiling. Sky is super excited to receive an education, learn English, and grow.

Just One Life… we have touched this young soul, and in this he has touched us…

I will periodically be sharing our journey here and on my Pauly Cast with the hope that you too will be inspired to make a difference in someone’s life.  Whether down the street or across the planet, simply do something.

We can change the world, with one act of love.

God Bless.

Here is his bio:

Dear Paul,

It’s me, Sky, again, as I promised to send you my life story before and after especially when I am with CCF.

You know I was happy to see you on Skype and got a chance to speak some English with you. I am surely to try hard with my study so that I can speak and listen to your English even more. At the same time, I am excited to exchange my story with you and the group of your friends who support this sponsorship. I am blessed to know you. I really thank you and your friends for your kind heart and generosity.

Oh… Please say hello to your family for me as well. Here, my family and I are very good.  And now, I would like to tell you in detail about my family background and my life story. My sponsor relations officer will help me to bring my words to you because my English is still limited. Also, she will be the one who translates our emails with each other. I will try to write to you on my own as much as I can sometimes so that I can learn from you and you can learn some Khmer from me tooJ.

Phnom Penh is the city where I was born. I will turn 16 soon as I was born on February, 23 in 2000. I have 4 siblings including my older sister, a younger sister, a younger brother and me. I am the second child in my family. There are 5 members in my family including my parents, my younger brother, my younger sister and me.

My older sister is living with her own family now. For us, we are currently living together in the house built by CCF. My family is very happy to have our own house.

Here are some of the photos of my house and my family members.

Talking about my family past, my father was from Kandal province while my mother came from Takeo province. My mother is an orphan who shared the roof with her aunt when she tried to find the job in Phnom Penh and was once a garment factory worker. My parents got to know each other in this city then got marriage. At that time, my parents were bread sellers. I really pitied them because they had to push the cart to everywhere in order to sell the bread along the streets.

They worked so hard to support our family and send me to school. However, our living condition was not so good because we needed to pay for the rental room, electricity and water bills especially during my mother’s pregnancy we really found it hard since my father was the only breadwinner.

Sometimes, my parents didn’t have enough money to support both our living expenses and my study. Adding a little bit more about my father, he had to be home late at midnight after selling the bread alone and our family felt pity him even more since we know that he cannot see clearly at night as one of his eyes is poor (night-blindness symptom) but I was young and could not help him at allL.

With his hard working he could support me to study only general education but I didn’t have opportunity to study any extra classes such as English language as the others. Actually, I wanted to study extra classes and English more though I just hope we have enough food to eat everyday at that time.

Everything changed when my family and I became part of CCF. You know, my family got to know CCF through our neighbors. It is because their children studied at CCF and I really wanted to learn English just like them. Later on, my mother brought me to interview at CCF.

Fortunately, I was accepted into the CCF education program. I am glad to be one of the CCF students. My father is now a cricket seller outside of Phnom Penh city in a place called Kandal, and my mother also goes with him when my little sister’s health is fine.

Thanks to CCF with this business support because my father didn’t have enough money to buy a motorbike to run this and CCF provided him with a business loan. He also comes back home in the evening around 6pm or 7pm from where he sells, which is about 36 Kms away. You know Paul, when I have some free time I also ride my bike to visit where my parents sell which I would spend about 1hr 30mns from here.

For my study, I am currently in a grade 10 at public school. I go to school by CCF bus every day.  Moreover, I have a chance to study Math, Chemistry and Physics, Khmer language and English at CCF school. I also study computer every Friday at CCF school. At school, I like studying chemistry and math. They are my favorite subjects. In the future, I would like to be a businessman who comes up with some kinds of the whole sale products. I know it’s the long time to reach but I will try to study hard and be patient just like you told me on Skype.

After joining CCF, my family situation became better than before. My life is full of joy and happiness. CCF supports my family in terms of providing the study materials, school uniform, and the rice. Also, I just received a bike from CCF a few months ago. I ride it to CCF school sometimes when my younger brother doesn’t ride it to his public school. This is the photo of my bike.

Once again, I would like to thank for your kindness. I am glad to know you as my sponsor. I’m happy to share with you about my study and my daily activities. I hope you share yours with me as well.

By the way, I like reading books and attending the CCF activities such as Tom Shoes distribution, Happy Homes and other events that I am available to participate. I am also one of the Junior Leadership students which this program helps me to learn more about my community and other ways to help people. I learn a lot more about leadership and get new experience from CCF staff, successful CCF students that shared knowledge with us… and so on. Besides, I help my mom to do household chores such as cleaning the house and washing the dishes. It sounds I have so busy schedule with my daily activities and weekend but I still enjoy doing and overcome those challenges.

Anyway, would you mind sharing me your home office photos? I really want to see how the radio broadcast set up after you telling me that you work from home.

Okay, I think it is all from me now. I hope you will get to know me well after reading this email. And now, I would like to send you some photos of mine. I hope you enjoy seeing them.

I am looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Best wishes,

Sky,