Julie Yang - A rising star in the East

Malhotra family shows their kindness to blind kids

ISR students donate funds to Fountain of Life Center

Build Bridges - Overcome Borders

Julie Yang - A rising star in the East

Mike Franklin

There is relatively little coverage for junior golf in the media, but occasionally there is an opportunity to cover a success story that should not be missed. This is certainly true in the case of young Korean, Julie Yang.

Julie took up golf at the age of six as a result of encouragement from her Father and conveniently living on the Rayong Green Valley golf course, Rayong. An easy step to daily involvement with golf and the opportunity for a level of application that would bring much success in a very short space of time.

Julie won the Sarawak Junior World Masters Golf Championship at Damai Golf & Country Club, Malaysia, in April this year, to bring her titles tally to an amazing twenty-three in a mere seventeen months period.

Julie won her first junior tournament, the UBC Junior World Golf Tour, in December 2002 at the age of seven in class E, age 5 -8 yrs. She will be nine years old in July 2004 and will move up to class D, age 9 - 10 yrs where the competition will be tougher but with the benefit of eighteen months successful tournament experience behind her.

In January 2003 she won the T-Zoom Junior Open, followed by the Rose Garden Junior Championship in March followed by three more successes in April, the Thailand Junior World Championship 2003, the Kiarti Thanee Junior Open and the UBC Junior World Golf Tour Division A Masters. She enjoyed four more tournament wins in June, including the Eastern Star Junior Championship and the T-Zoom Junior Open.

At just 8 years old, Julie’s swing already looks refined.

Julie celebrated her eighth birthday in July by winning the UBC Junior World Golf Tour and went on to claim five more titles in the period August to October, including the Golf Time Tour 2003, the Bangpoo Junior Open and the Rose Garden Junior Championship again. November added the Watermill Junior Open and in December 2003 and February 2004 she won the Muangake Wangnoi Junior Open twice. Two more wins in March with the International Sports Federation Junior Open and a Pattaya Country Club tournament. Finally in April this year, to bring her titles tally to an amazing twenty-three in a mere seventeen months period, Julie won her age class in the Thailand International Golf Championship 2004 and the Sarawak Junior World Masters Golf Championship at Damai Golf & Country Club, Malaysia.

That is some record, so how does she do it? Certainly an intense love of golf, a vocational approach to the game and lots of hard work. Clearly this is largely possible due to great support from her parents, but not only that, as Julie’s success and application to competitive golf has earned sponsorship at this early age from two companies, Volvic and T-Zoom.

Nevertheless, school and a good education are important too, so conveniently she attends St. Andrews International School on her doorstep at Rayong Green Valley. Five days a week, when she finishes school at 2.30 p.m., she jumps into her mother’s car and drives to Sriracha for her daily lesson and practice session with Thai Golf Professional, Khun Somphon.

Julie has clearly put a very good game together, so I was interested to know what she felt were her strengths and weaknesses and what clubs she normally carried in the bag. Julie is just 133 cm tall and uses a T-Zoom 11 deg. driver that she says is ‘neck height’, so that makes it about 42-43 inches long. Her irons are all Taylor-Made except for a T-Zoom wedge, fairway woods are T-Zoom and the putter is a Ping.

Julie states the strong part of her game is with the short irons, and fairway woods four and seven. Her average driving distance is 180 yards, to 200 yards maximum at this stage. If she has a weakness at all, she says it is with the putter and is working hard on that.

She cites the Eastern Star Junior Championship in June 2003 and the Sarawak Junior World Masters 2004 as her two most important wins, and is looking forward to her next major event this June in the USA, playing the Pepsi Little People Championship at the Indian Country Club, Illinois.

Julie, pleasantly self-assured, is a pleasure to talk to, so I asked her to name her favorite courses. St. Andrews 2000, Rayong got her vote in the Eastern Seaboard Region; then surprisingly staying local it was Bangpra as her other favorite course in Thailand. Outside of Thailand it was the Damai Golf & Country Club, Kuching, Sarawak in Malaysia.

Asked which man and lady tour professionals she respected most, with little hesitation it was Ernie Els and, not surprisingly, Seri Pak.

Julie’s other hobbies are swimming for exercise and muscle building, and drawing for relaxation. She seemed quite clear about her intended career path. School, then university with maybe a golf scholarship to somewhere like Stamford University, and all the hard work required to eventually become a tour professional.

At nearly nine years of age there is a long path ahead for Julie Yang and, it would seem, she has not put a foot wrong so far. We will follow her progress with interest, and wish her luck in the Pepsi Little People Championship this June in Illinois.

Malhotra family shows their kindness to blind kids

Suchada Tupchai

The Malhotra family presents goodies to the students at the Redemptorist School for the Blind.

Jasmeet, Wanna Malhotra and Asali present foodstuffs for the children

Rungratree helps serve lunch to the children.

The birthday boy Tarjit Singh Malhotra ‘Bill’ (centre) with Asali (left) and sister Jasmeet (right) at his birthday party for the blind children.

The Malhotras, one of Pattaya’s most prominent families, have again shown their magnanimity by providing lunch for the children at the Redemptorist School for the Blind in Pattaya.

The Malhotra family, led by Tarajit Singh Malhotra (younger brother of Pratheep “Peter” Malhotra of the Pattaya Mail) on May 2 made merit and provided lunch for the blind kids.

Tarajit said, “We just want to give a pleasant time to these underprivileged children so we bring some necessary things like sweets, toys and milk to them.”

At the close of the meal, the children sang “Khobkhun mak kha” (Thank you so much) to show their gratitude to the family.

About 40 children, mostly attending summer camp and staying at the school’s dormitory, had lunch together under the close care of teachers. At the close of the meal, the children sang “Khob khun Nakna” (Thank you so much) to show their gratitude to the family.

The Redemptorist School for the Blind has 180 students, an increase in numbers over last year. As a result, the school’s facilities have become insufficient and the school is planning to extend its buildings and dormitory to accommodate the children.

The projects are being supported by several local charity organizations.

ISR students donate funds to Fountain of Life Center

ISR students hand over a cheque to Sister Kalayani Tuanrassamee at the Fountain of Life Center.

Regent’s School students chat with their younger counterparts at the Fountain of Life Center.

International School of the Regents students and teachers recently visited the Fountain of Life Center on Pattaya Third Road to donate funds for its development projects.

Representatives from the school’s Student Guild handed over 26,540 baht to Sister Kalayani Tuanrassamee, who accepted the donation on behalf of the center. The funds were raised through numerous activities carried out by the students for the underprivileged as part of their community awareness campaign.

Sister Kalayani said the funds will go towards a new development project for children aged 8-14 to learn how to cook.

“The skills learned in the course, beginning later this month and finishing in October, will teach the participants the benefits of food preparation and hygiene that will stay with them for the rest of their lives and hopefully help them when they are eventually old enough to work,” she said.

Volunteer teachers and mentor will run the course at the FOL center.

The children attending the Fountain of Life center come from low-income families.

ISR students pause for a group photo with their new found friends.

Build Bridges - Overcome Borders

Rotary Club of Taksin-Pattaya invites children and parents to attend International Children’s Party

The Rotary Club of Taksin-Pattaya invites you to an international children’s party to be held on Saturday, May 15 from 2-6 p.m.

About 200 children will participate.

Orphaned children from several institutions of the Pattaya region and students of various international schools will be guests of the Taksin-Pattaya Rotary Club in the Bavaria Beer Garden on Pattaya Beach Road, just 100 meters south of Soi 6/1.

A magician and balloon artist will perform in the afternoon and games will be organized for children between the ages of 5 and 12.

A free children’s buffet as well as the entertainment program will be donated by the Bavaria beer garden.

The event will also be supported by voluntary helpers of the “Herrenclub”, a German-speaking gentlemen’s club.

The party will be held under the slogan: “Build Bridges - Overcome Borders”.

President Dieter Pr้court explains the slogan, “Borders within society are often the cause of social conflicts and unfairness - language barriers as well as social ditches or just being unaware of the life situation of other humans.

“Children are most easily able to overcome such borders. Therefore it is important to build bridges between children of different languages and different social backgrounds.”

The party is therefore not being organized as a closed affair. All parents with children are welcome to join the fun and celebrate with the orphaned children.

The purpose of the event is to promote their integration. On the one hand, a consciousness is to be awakened with the invited children for the life situation of their contemporaries who must grow up without parents.

According to the vision of the Taksin-Pattaya Rotary Club, this can best be carried out by giving the children the opportunity to meet one anther and have fun together.

On the other hand, the orphaned children should also be given the feeling that they too are a part of our society.

The Rotary Club president adds, “It is a central task of Rotary not only to be materially charitable, but also to work within society towards social reconciliation and equal chances.

“In this sense, such an event can give an impetus. We hope that contacts between the orphans and the families of the other children develop. If we promote and support such contacts and relationships, we can make a contribution to the aim that the orphaned children have a chance to grow into our society as equal members.

“The orphaned children in Thailand are not only in need of material help. There is also a need for attention and affection.

“Surely it is important to support orphans materially as Rotary does again and again. It is just as important, however, to offer a way from the isolation in which they grow up.

“Thus we not only help the children, but also serve the society in which we live.”