GIVING CHILDREN A CHANCE

This article originally appeared in Reader’s Digest magazine.
THE CHILDREN IN this ramshackle, garbage-strewn Phnom Penh squatter village shout with joy as soon as they spot him. “Papa Scott! Papa Scott” they scream as they run up to six-foot, red-haired Scott Neeson and grab his outstretched hands, tug at his pants leg or try to jump up into his arms.
Other children and adults shout loud hellos when they see Neeson. Many bow their heads and put their hands together in the traditional Cambodian greeting. Just minutes af- ter entering the dank, dark, densely packed squatter village of Steung Meanchey, Neeson, 55, looks like a modern-day Pied Piper, surrounded
by a swarm of children, most of whom are bare-footed and dressed in dirty, tattered clothing.
The ground is covered with rotting food, discarded plastic bags, broken bottles and more. The air is humid, clammy and heavy with the smell of rotting refuse.
These dilapidated shacks, cobbled together out of bits of wood, tin and canvas, house thousands of Cambodia’s poorest people. Many of them scratch out a living recycling garbage from the city’s dump. Others are mi- grants from the countryside and have had no luck finding jobs in the capital city. Many, such as the three men who squat stone-faced nearby, are alcoholics or drug addicts.
Neeson does this walk, which he wryly describes as “my constitutional,” nearly every evening. It is his way of keeping tabs on the families and relatives of many of the more than 2000 children that his ten-year- old charity, The Cambodian Children’s Fund (CCF), aids, supports, schools, feeds and houses. Residents regularly approach him and ask for help. A new mother needs food for her family. Another asks for help getting rice. A father tells him his child is very sick and Neeson promises to set up a visit to the hospital.
Neeson knows the Steung Meanchey squatter village well. He first saw it 11 years ago. At that time the Australian-born Neeson was a high-flying Hollywood executive, vice-president of marketing at Sony Pictures, with all the trappings of Tinseltown success million dollar salary, yacht, luxury car, expensive home and famous friends.
“Yet something was missing,” he says, pausing in front of a wooden shack where a wizened, gray-haired toothless woman smiles broadly at him. “I wasn’t really happy or fulfilled.” He took a break from Holly- wood and set off on a six-month long motorcycle trip across Asia. His first—and last—stop was Cambodia. What he saw there changed his life. “I’d never seen poverty like this be- fore. I’d never even imagined it,” says Neeson as he recalls his first visit to the nearby (now closed) Steung Meanchey garbage dump.
He watched hundreds of Cambodians crisscrossing the mountainous toxic dump, scavenging for anything they could sell to recyclers. Most shocking of all were the children, filthy and dressed in ragged clothes, many barefoot and covered with sores. None were smiling. Neeson watched in horror as scavengers, including tiny children, chased after the steady stream of garbage trucks that arrived at the dump, fighting for position as the massive vehicles emptied their loads nearby. “It was a scene out of hell,” says Nee- son.
He vowed to help the children and their families. He returned to Hollywood and sent money through a Cambodian friend to support several families and send their children to school. But he couldn’t get the memory of the children at the dump out of his mind. “I had to do more.”
Within a year he had quit his job, sold everything he owned and re- turned to Phnom Penh. He used his savings to set up the Cambodian Children’s Fund to help educate, house and feed some 45 children. By the end of the year he had 100 chil- dren. A year later there were 200. To- day CCF helps more than 2000 chil- dren, has a staff of almost 500, oper- ates eight buildings and runs a wide range of programs.
Neeson and CCF do not adopt children, they simply agree with their parents to feed, house and supple- ment the children’s public school ed- ucation, with classes like English lan- guage and computer skills. CCF also offers vocational training for students and parents alike. A daycare center, a shelter for abused and at-risk chil- dren, a nursery, a medical clinic, a maternity program and a community outreach program round out the charity’s offerings.
Neeson raises CCF’s annual bud- get of just over $5 million by tireless fundraising. Movie moguls like Via- com’s and CBS Corporation’s Sum- ner Redstone, who has donated over $4 million, leading film director and producer Roland Emmerich and ac- tress Heather Graham generously support CCF. After reading about Neeson’s work in Reader’s Digest, an Australian philanthropist donated nearly a million dollars. People worldwide have sent in donations.
Neeson has to travel to raise funds but he is happiest when he is in Phnom Penh, watching the transfor- mations that CCF makes in children’s
lives. He knows all the children CCF helps. After finishing our walk through the Steung Meanchey squat- ter village he introduces me to Ang Srey Mom, who Neeson first met in 2009. She is one of CCF’s many suc- cess stories.
The bright eyed, bubbly 21-year- old tells me she had dropped out of school in the third grade when Nee- son found her at the dump and of- fered her a place at CCF. Today she speaks fluent English and teaches it to CCF students. She recently gradu- ated from a vocational school and has held her own fashion show at a garment factory in Bangladesh. She is on track to become a fashion de- signer. “Scott has changed my life,” she tells me. “He gave me my dream.”
Last year CCF’s first high school graduates all went on to higher edu- cation; a rare feat in Cambodia. These “future leaders” make Neeson beam with pride. “My ultimate dream is to watch these kids prosper and give something back to their families, community and country.” Thanks to a former “Hollywood hot- shot” who saw a problem and vowed to help, they are on their way.

BY ROBERT KIENER