All welcome at Big Mum's house

REFUGE: Narith Horm with Australian Cambodia Foundation founder Geraldine Cox. (Pic: Luke Hemer)

16 Nov 2011
City Messenger (Australia)

GERALDINE Cox recalls the day a young Cambodian boy arrived on her doorstep seeking refuge.

“He came to us at 13 with no English and he was living alone and sleeping with cows,” Ms Cox says.

“He then went to Blackfriars (Priory School) and was given Cordon Bleu training.

“He said to me yesterday `Before I came to Sunrise, I slept with the cows and now I’m working at the Intercontinental ... how good is that?.”

That boy is Narith Horm, now 21, who has been living in Adelaide for four years and working at the Intercontinental Adelaide for four months.

Standing ovation for talented kids

Srey Lin from Sunrise Children's Village performing the coconut dance in Sydney during their fundraising tour last week. (Photo by: TRACEY SHELTON)

Monday, 12 October 2009
Tracey Shelton
The Phnom Penh Post

The thing I enjoyed most was seeing their adorable faces peeking out from behind the curtains, full of glee....

(SYDNEY) - THERE was hardly a dry eye in the room at the Sydney Opera House last week after children from the Sunshine Children’s Village in Takeo presented their moving performances.

The 29 ecstatic but exhausted children arrived back home Tuesday after a week in Australia, where they performed Khmer dance, music and song at the iconic opera house.

Their ticket sales alone raised $75,000 for the Sunrise foundation, while donation boxes and merchandise sales took the figure to more than $100,000 for the night.

President of Sunrise Children’s Villages Geraldine Cox said she had been worried it was only motherly love for the children that had made her believe they had talent.

“It wasn’t until the curtain went up and I heard applause after applause after applause that I realised they really are incredibly talented children,” Cox said.

She said the trip was funded by 14 corporate sponsors, covering all expenses including airfares, accommodation and day trips for the children. Passports and airport fees were waived by Prime Minister Hun Sen, and the Australian Department of Immigration waived all visa-related fees for the children and staff supervisors.

Cox said the children showed Sydney Australians the “dignity and beauty of Khmer dance”.

“The love that just flowed over them at the concert hall was like a wave. You could feel it – and the children just loved every minute of being on stage,” she said.

The event was hosted by well-known Australian celebrity Ray Martin, and support performances included country singers Kasey Chambers and Beccy Cole, musician Jane Rutter, and singer David Campbell.

“The thing I enjoyed most was seeing their adorable faces peeking out from behind the curtains, full of glee – bursting with excitement,” said one member of the audience, Samantha Florence, 32.

The audience rose in a standing ovation as 13-year-old Chorn Chanvisal belted out the last few words of his powerful rendition of the song “Why”. Looking on from backstage, Chambers and Cole remarked: “With lungs like his, there might be some stiff competition coming up in the Australian music industry.”

But although Chanvisal said the performance was very exciting and happy, when asked if he would like to be a rock star he replied, “No, I’d rather be an accountant. If I become a pop star, someone might kill me.”

Outside of the performance the children with enjoyed a pirate ship cruise around the harbour, a wet but enjoyable trip to the zoo, and a day at Palm Beach.

Despite the excitement of the Opera House, for 12-year-old Thai Sreyleak the highlight of the trip was eating a hamburger and swimming at Palm Beach – despite the temperature hovering around a low 17 degrees.

Cox said in addition to the pride she felt during their stage performance, she was also quite pleased with their behaviour. “Not one event passed without people coming up and remarking on how well-behaved the children were,” she said. “They did Cambodia proud.”
_________________
Tracey Shelton has volunteered at Sunrise Children’s Villages since 1998 and assisted in supervising the Sydney tour. She is also the photographer behind a picture book about the children, titled We Can Be..., that was released at the Opera House.

Sacrava Cartoon: Geraldine Cox, an Angel from Down Under

Cartoon by Sacrava (on the web at http://sacrava.blogspot.com)

Hands-on Aussie Geraldine Cox cares for hundreds of Cambodian orphans

Geraldine Cox and her Cambodian orphan children (Photo: Carry for Kids)

October 25, 2008
Cheryl Critchely
Herald Sun (Australia)

GERALDINE Cox reckons she'd be arrested if she ran her orphanages in Australia.

Ms Cox, 63, who runs Sunrise Children's Villages in Cambodia, loves hugging and kissing the kids.

"With all the political correctness . . . I'd be in prison in a week," she laughs. "I'm kissing, touching, fondling, napping with . . . the kids all the time.

"My kids need to be touched, they need to be caressed and I think it's a great sadness the way the world is going now that you can't be loving towards children."

Unable to have biological children, Ms Cox, who was born in Adelaide, gave up a life of diplomatic and corporate hedonism in the mid-1990s to establish her homes.

The feisty redhead, now called Mum by hundreds of children, is back in Australia for her annual fundraising pilgrimage.

She needs $80,000 a month to run two orphanages, so she headlines functions such as Melbourne's Business Chicks fundraising breakfast.

A third orphanage is being built thanks to $500,000 from Australian company Computershare, which also donated a bus. Another $600,000 is needed for the new home, which will house 200 orphans.

On this trip Ms Cox has the added worry of the global finance crisis.

"We hold our money here in Australia and it's sent up in US dollars," she says. "I've got to raise about twice as much . . . to meet the falling dollar."

Ms Cox prides herself on the fact that Sunrise, which has no government funding, spends just 10 cents in the dollar on administration.

A $40 monthly sponsorship covers a child's food. Each child needs six $40 sponsors to cover food, clothing, education, medical care, English, computer lessons and maintenance.

Many of Ms Cox's charges now have good jobs and some have won tertiary scholarships in Australia.

Other cases she sees and hears about are horrific.

"I get kids that come to me through abandonment, neglect, physical and sexual abuse, cruelty; they've been trafficked into prostitution and slave labour," she says. "And two of my girls have been victims of acid burn attacks.

"In one case the mother was having an affair and the wife found out and she poured battery acid all over the mother and her sleeping daughter."

Geraldine Cox will speak at a Business Chicks Breakfast on Thursday, October 30, from 7-9am at Peninsula, Shed 14 Central Pier, 161 Harbour Esplanade, Docklands. Tickets: Guests $81, Members $70, Table of 10: $700.

Ocean Grove woman in Cambodian orphanage blockade

August 6th, 2008
Danny Lannen
Geelong Advertiser (Australia)

ARMED youths menaced humanitarian and former Ocean Grove resident Geraldine Cox before mounting a blockade at an Australia Cambodia Foundation orphanage.

Foundation representatives said Ms Cox was forced into hiding with staff after they were run out of the Sunrise Angkor orphanage by a renegade gang of about 15 which later blockaded the site.

Military police and government officials were called in to break the blockade.

Foundation project co-ordinator Brenton Whittaker said Ms Cox had shown outstanding bravery in a dangerous situation.

Youths armed with iron bars, bricks and tools had taken control after one of their gang members was asked to leave the orphanage.

Mr Whittaker said the group had attempted to rob the orphanage headquarters and he had been forced to flee.

Ms Cox told him she would come to help him.

"I said don't come up here, it's crazy," Mr Whittaker said.

"She said no 'I'm coming up to support you' because she's fearless that woman.

"She came up and we knew that the children had no food because I couldn't get in because it was blockaded and too dangerous."

The foundation has run the former government orphanage since 2004.

Mr Whittaker said the youths could not be blamed for the dramas.

"They're a product of their environment, people forget the Khmer Rouge only left in 1998, that's not that long ago," he said.

Ms Cox first travelled to Cambodia in 1970 with the Department of Foreign Affairs and has lived in the country since 1996 working with disadvantaged children.