Children gather for lunch at Sama Mountain Orphanage. Pic: Thein Lin

ABOUT 200 children have gathered in the dining area of an orphanage at Sama Mountain in Lewe township, Mandalay Division. They seem happy and free from care as they scoop steamed rice, gourd soup and fried fish paste onto their plates.

Their young, thanakha-covered faces run with sweat from a combination of the heat of the food and the warmth of the day.

“They have clocks in their stomachs,” Sayadaw U Nya Neinda, 58, the head monk at the orphanage, says with a smile as he watches the children eat. “As soon at it is 11am they get hungry and arrive to eat as a group.”

He says the children, ranging in age from one to 20 years, all live at the orphanage and arrived there for many different reasons – some did not have any parents, some only one parent and some parents who were too poor to raise their children.

“We accept any child into our orphanage. No parent wants to live apart from their flesh-and-blood children but if they are too poor to bring up their children, they can send them to us,” Sayadaw U Nya Neinda says.

He adds that all children who live at the facility receive a formal education at the primary-level monastic school in the orphanage compound.

“We push every child to go to school and to work hard at their lessons because only education can help them improve their lives,” he says.

“Our efforts have borne fruit because 10 of our children earned university degrees. Seven of them have become monastic school teachers and three now work in firms,” he says. “We are very happy to see them with stable lives but we do not ask to get anything back from them.”

The Sama Mountain Orphanage was founded in 1990 with just four residents. Back then, handling the children and their living costs was much easier, says Sayadaw U Nya Neinda. “Even 10 years ago we grew our own rice and vegetables. The children’s school was very small and did not have as many teachers as now.”

He says the orphanage has also attracted its share of children with bad character and behavior.

“We use different ways to control the children. Mending their character is more difficult than collecting food for the whole centre. So we are very careful not to hurt their minds when we push them to improve their character because they always have inferiority complex about their weaknesses,” he says.

Sayadaw U Nya Neinda says he has come to see himself as fulfilling the role of both parents for each of the children, adding that he has devoted his whole life to taking care of orphans.

He says his biggest disappointments occur when children do not try their hardest in their pursuit of education.

“Children around the world are pushing hard to educate themselves. Here, most children spend their time farming. So we give them as much support as we can to get an education,” he says. “This year we have four students in 10th grade. We are giving them all the help they need to do well in the matriculation exam because if they get high marks they can study at the best universities.”

However, Sayadaw U Nya Neinda says the orphanage’s monastic school is only equipped to educate students from kindergarten through seventh grade. For grades eight through 10 they must attend a basic education high school in Tharwuthti, which is quite far from the orphanage.

“We are trying to raise K94 million to expand our primary school to include secondary school. We've already received K2.6 million from a Singaporean missionary,” he says. “Whether we can expand the school depends on whether we raise enough money.”

Anyone who wishes to contribute money for the school expansion can contact Sayadaw U Nya Neinda at the Sama Mountain Orphanage.