OUR FRIEND THE TERMITE?

With a little help from an army of termites, IDEA Philippine’s decision to replace the thatched meeting building beside the Dao Diamond Hotel was made easy.  It was either tear it down or let if fall down on its own.  It was getting dangerous to hold events there.

It is funny how these “have to” situations can turn out to actually be a step forward.  Drawing from the resources of the sale of IDEA Philippine’s property, and working on a pretty small budget, we began putting up a new meeting hall.  Because of a recent city ordinance, we could not use thatch or “light” materials.  This meant we needed to come up with a radically new design.

Because of the hit of Spanish styling of the main hotel building, the decision was made to come up with another Spanish type styling that would resemble the adobe structures from Santa Fe New Mexico.  After almost a year of work, Dao Diamond Hotel’s new Santa Fe Hall is now fully functional and open for business.

Building this structure has offered employment to more than 20 deaf men and women, first in the construction and now in the operation.  The hotel is now able to offer a space for seminars, receptions, and parties for groups.  It also has folding sound proof walls that can be opened and connect with the smaller meeting room and also has an over-flow patio garden allowing for a total group capacity of as many as 500 persons.  It has become a popular place to hold Christmas parties this December.  This new function hall holds great promise for the growth of IDEA’s livelihood business at Dao Diamond.

Do not forget, this is still all about the kids.  As Dao Diamond Hotel and IDEA’s other employment/income generating projects improve, so does IDEA’s opportunities and capacity to reach out to more and more impoverished and neglected deaf children.