IT is a sunny morning and the single-story bungalow house with its spacious grassy compound seemed to be filled with squealing, happy children. Dressed in clean, colourful shirts, shorts and dresses, some of these pre-schoolers were playing ball in the garden while others were diligently saying their alphabets out loud inside the house.

In the kitchen, the older children are just as busy if not as noisy. Here, with the patient guidance of their volunteer teachers, they slowly revise their primary school work. This place is after all, their escape from the poverty many of children will go back to in the evenings.

Welcome to the Assunta Children's Society (ACS), a day-centre for poor, abandoned and underprivileged children. Tucked in a quiet section of Oldtown, Petaling Jaya, this place offers children of poor families and single-parents a safe, quiet environment to study, do their homework and prepare for school.

"Many of these children stay in squatter areas where there are no kindergartens for the young ones and those who are schooling have no desk or place to study," explained Sister Angela Wong, the young, soft-spoken nun who has run this place for the past five years.

"Others have single-mothers who cannot afford a maid and have no one to take care of their children when they go to work so they bring their kids here."

Funded totally by charity and donations, the ACS traces its roots all the way back to 1963 when nuns from the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary (FMM) set up a mobile clinic for the poor in Old Town.

One day, a mother with ten children was admitted and while the mother was hospitalised, the sisters worked on fostering out the children into different families. The Assunta Clinic, as it was known, eventually became Assunta Hospital, while the efforts to foster out poor and abandoned children continued and eventually ACS was formed.

"We are not an orphanage or children's home so the children are not left here," said Sister Angela. "At the end of the day, the children go home to their families or foster families. For single-mothers, this way helps them have the responsibility of looking after their children."

About 40 children, ages five to 18, come to the centre at the moment, which is opened from 9am to 2pm on weekdays and from 2 to 5pm on Sundays. For the young ones who have no transport to come, the centre van goes out in the morning to fetch them.

Three or four volunteers come each morning to coach the children in Mathematics, English and Malay and after a home cooked lunch, the children dress for school and are packed off according to their bus schedules.

Sundays are for the secondary school students who go for morning classes during the weekdays. 

Volunteers like working adults and university students will then come to give tuition or just help the students out with their homework.

One would think that administrating and coordinating such activities would take up all of Sister Angela's time and energy but she reveals that these are the least demanding of her tasks. 

Many of these children have no birth certificates and hence cannot get accepted by schools - and this is where Sister Angela has been fighting a losing battle.

"I spend a lot of my time in the birth certificate and identification card department," she sighs wearily. "The government officials refuse to give me the documents because they say that I must first trace the mother and father but these children have been abandoned for years, it is very hard to find the missing parents."

Some officials have even told her to check all the hospitals around, an almost ridiculous task considering that Sister Angela has taken many of these children begging off the streets, while some are almost teenagers now.

She tells of Justin, a six-year-old at the centre, who was left with a babysitter by his mother when he was three. She never came back and for the past three years, Sister Angela has tried to obtain identification for him.

"The authorities have told me to make reports at the police station and welfare department, all of which I did but to no avail. They will not issue a birth certificate for him until I trace the mother. I have tried but don't know how to find her," she says while pointing out Justin. The active-looking six year-old grins at me and Sister Angela laughs.

"There is now a couple who wants to adopt him and next year he is old enough to go to school, I hope we can sort out his documents by then."

Sadly, Justin is only one of the many children who end up having no identification papers due to abandonment or inefficient registration. Shanti, a 16 year-old who is mute, has a birth certificate without her father's name on it and so far Sister Angela has only managed to obtain a green identification card for her (instead of the usual blue), one that needs to be continually renewed.

"I really don't know why, it's quite confusing," admits Sister Angela. "Sometimes I wish we had someone to turn to for advice or legal help!"

Without proper identification however, these children cannot enroll in school, making it even harder for them to be accepted into society. They may even end up back on the streets, something Sister Angela and the society's volunteers want to ensure does not happen.

So while Sister Angela continues her daily journeys to the welfare and registration department, the volunteers at the centre continue to work with the children and ensure that they are clean and well-taken care of.

The only full-time hired "staff" here is Selvamary Selvaraj, 21, who knows only too well the plight the children here go through. Hailing from Kampung Medan, Mary, as she is called, has also felt the kindness of the FMM sisters.

"We were poor and my mother had to take care of all six of us. When I was seven, the sisters helped me get my birth certificate, put me in school, bought us food and helped pay my school fees," she revealed.
She is now doing a diploma in pre-school education and is in charge of teaching the pre-schoolers at the centre. She shyly admits that teaching children is not easy and would like to study business in the future but for now, she is happy.

"I think I will be working in a factory now if the sisters didn't help me. I am very grateful to them."

By noon, the children put away their books and pencils and get ready for school while some already sit quietly to lunch. The food is also provided by volunteers who cook for the children and Sister Angela feels thankful for all the support the public have given so far.

"We have about fifteen committed volunteers at the moment, some of them are ex-teachers. We welcome more, of course, as well as any donations for the children. If there are any case referrals, we will also look into it," she says.

It is soon 2pm and time for the centre to close. Sister Angela soon heads off either to the welfare department or to look into another case report of a child in need. And the centre is finally quiet - until the next morning.

If you would like to volunteer your services or make a donation, please contact Sister Angela at 03-77837105 or e-mail acsoie@tm.net.my. Any workable advice on the legal side are especially welcomed.

The writer can be contacted at bev@waumail.com .