Luke Teyler travels to the far East for charity

How many CVHS students have been to Thailand and Cambodia?  How many went in the middle of the school year? How many have gone in order to do charity work?  The answer is probably not that many students have done that, but one CVHS student, junior Luke Teyler has done all three of those things.

Teyler went to Thailand and Cambodia from Nov. 21 to Dec. 4 with 400 pounds of medicine and clothes purchased from fundraising to help out the people living in the Eastern Asian countries.  With his father, grandfather, and two other helpers, Teyler braved the hot, humid weather and poverty of Eastern Asia. He passed out the supplies to children and people who had almost nothing.

During the first week, he went to Thailand and stayed in a church while getting to know some of the Thailand people. Then, he flew to Cambodia during his second week and assisted in a Cambodian orphanage.

“Cambodia was way poorer than Thailand.  They had rice pools and market place farms. Once you got out of the city, there were lots of poor kids,” said Teyler.

When he visited outside of the cities, he witnessed the poverty of the natives, who are extremely poor, and mostly naked. On his second-to-last day, Teyler participated in a feeding program, where once a week, the program goes to the villages and feeds about 400 people.  This meal is the biggest meal the people receive all week and it consists mainly of rice.

Despite the language barrier, Teyler was able to connect with some of the natives in Thailand and Cambodia.  His translator, John, and he both played the drums and Teyler became friends with a four-year-old orphan in Cambodia named Spanky.

“From this trip, I realized how blessed I am, we all are, to live in America and how easy it is to go share that blessing to others,” said Teyler.