Last Sunday I received three bagful of clothes, sheets and accessories. It was interesting that Mr Gurdip commented while he helped me pull out the huge bags,"These people are rich!" The clothes came from mainly his daughter in her early twenties, his son and his wife. In three or four batches of recycling, I have yet to find one shirt or a pair of pants in his size.
While sorting through the college girl's clothes, I found four cocktail dresses. One is peach colored with a very distinct asymmetrical tail in the skirt hem. I am not very good at judging sizes, it is probably a size 1. It is made by Susanna. Elizabeth found the label on the internet and the merchandise is priced in pounds. Therefore it was probably British made. We talked Serena into trying it, she looked divine in the dress which seemed designed for her. First the rosy hue brought out her delicate complexion. Serena has sharp features and has a face as fair as Korean stars. The soft fabric lent an angelic feel to her slim body.
There were two little black dresses: one halter neck and the other a bare back with sparkly stones in front on the bodice. Serena fitted those dresses well even though she did not look as striking as in the peach colored one. The labels were Naf Naf and M-Hews, respectively. It was providential that Serena was invited to my place to meet Elizabeth's uni room mate Penny. I normally do not keep any clothes more than 48 hours in my tiny home. Serena later thanked me for my generosity.
The way I see it, I did nothing except telling everyone I recycle clothing. Once the clothes started coming, I just make sure I sort them within 2-3 days. Some would go to a Filipino maid friend of mine, she sends them home in big boxes by ship. Others may go to an Indonesian maid friend of mine in Silver City. I already started a small collection of ping-pong (table tennis) bats for the orphans in Maechan, Northern Thailand. My husband is organizing a visit in December 2013. For this particular batch, Mrs Gurdip specifically requested that I keep her daughter's pieces in our country. Elizabeth and I managed to talk Penny into taking another elegant black long dress. She thinks she will take it home and find someone to cut and sew the maxi into a knee length dress.
Both Serena and Penny are first year uni students. Each year they would need to borrow, buy or tailor make a dress for the faculty party. Therefore these dresses come very handy during their summer break.
This recycling venture started when I visited Northern Thailand. One December day I was in a hill top village at about 10 am. I, who am afraid of the chill had three layers on. My husband had on only a thick T-shirt. Little hill tribe children between 2 to 5 were running around naked and bare feet. Of course their noses were running. I asked if it was their custom to have the children unclothed. The answer brought laughter in the group, these children's mothers saw sunny weather and washed the children's only clothing. None of the children has a second piece of (spare) clothes. That is the ultimate poverty I saw in the rural area of a developing nation. After I returned, with friends and neighbors and contacts, I would tell them the need of clothing in poor communities, and ask them directly to contribute used clothing through me. Through the years, I managed to collect all kinds of clothes but it was difficult to bring them to Thailand. Each trip I made I managed to bring 10 to 12 kilo. It was not practical to send by post as the postage itself would have paid for similar new clothing from China. Hence I resorted to send via maids who would return to their home towns at least once in every two years.
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