An attorney for the past 36 years, Kay recently retired as Senior Vice President and Principal at the Edward Jones financial services firm.

Prior to Edward Jones, Kay was Vice President and Assistant General Counsel for Sabre, Inc., a former subsidiary of American Airlines, where she worked prior to the Sabre spin-off. Additionally, she was in-house counsel at Dollar Rent a Car and Thrifty Car Rental. She began her career in private practice in Tulsa, Okla., and is licensed to practice law in Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.

Kay has practiced in many areas of the law. Her expertise is commercial transactions, in which she specialized in technology transactions, and domestic and international mergers and acquisitions.

Kay earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism at the University of Oklahoma and her law degree at Tulsa University College of Law.

Passionate about justice and equality, Kay was a committee member of the National Association of Minority and Women Owned Law Firms and was responsible for the inclusion and diversity initiative in the legal division at Edward Jones. She has served on the St. Louis area Salvation Army Board since 2011 and currently holds the position as Chairperson of the Executive Board and the Advisory Board.

Born in Shanghai and educated in Tokyo, David graduated from Occidental College and worked in the Asian divisions of Deutsche Bank and Chemical Bank. He is Managing Director of CCL Holdings (USA) Ltd. and Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Vintage Communities, Inc., and makes his home in Irvine, California.

David and his family financed the construction of a building that houses the CBHEP program and Microbiology Lab at Angkor Hospital for Children.

Alex is a senior software developer with over 20 years of experience in programming, system administration and project management. After graduating with a degree in computer science and mathematics and a master’s degree in computer science, Alex gained exposure to various roles and technical expertise in different industries, including his current position as a Production Support Engineer at the New York City Department of Buildings.

Born in Laos, Alex immigrated to the United States at the age of 17. He and his wife, Nieves, and their two daughters actively support Friends. They have traveled around the Northeast to visit Lao-American communities and to discuss the benefits of having a better health care system through Lao Friends Hospital for Children in Luang Prabang.

C.P.A.

Born in Cambodia, Nerou earned a BSBA from Georgetown University, an MBA from Ball State University, and his CPA Certificate from Pace University. He established NCheng LLP in New York City in 1989, which has grown to a 110-person accounting and consulting firm. Nerou is an active board member of Friends of Khmer Culture, another NGO doing work in Cambodia.

Nerou established Friends of Friends, Cambodian-American support groups, in New York/ New Jersey, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C. and New England.

FOUNDER & HONORARY PRESIDENT

After studying at Nihon University, Kenro moved to New York where he established his photography studio in 1974. He continues to photograph still life and sacred sites around the world. He founded Friends Without A Border to build the Angkor Hospital for Children, which opened its doors in 1999. He has inspired countless people by his example of using the arts to achieve humanitarian goals.As founder and honorary president, Kenro maintains his active leadership by making trips to Laos and Cambodia several times a year. He also serves on the Board of Friends Japan and AHC Inc.

Steve is a New York-based British photographer who has shot award-winning commercial campaigns for many of the world’s leading brands. His love of travel led to a decade of travel-photography for Corbis and Getty. Steve is also one of England’s leading rock-music photographers. His images of the Rolling Stones, Bob Marley, Neil Young, and many other iconic musicians are the subject of his multimedia art. Steve’s work has been exhibited extensively in the U.S.

In 2007, Steve and his wife started The Shemesh Joester Foundation with the goal of supporting children’s causes.

Philippe was born and raised in Bordeaux, France. Inspired by an 18-month trip around North America and Central America, Philip decided to relocate to this side of the Atlantic in 1982. Over the following decades, Philippe opened 20 restaurants in several states, and has been involved in real estate development and media ventures. His most recent enterprise is an all-American sourced and produced premium bottled water brand, American Summits.

In 1998, while launching a restaurant in Tokyo, a side trip to Siem Reap, Cambodia, led Philippe to the discovery of the Angkor Hospital for Children. This progressively led to his involvement with Friends Without A Border. As a French-American, Philippe feels a deep bond with humanitarian efforts in Indochina.

Vanhlee was born and raised in a small Laotian village, where good quality health care and education is not easy to access. She has always been interested in the health and education sectors. She earned a master’s degree in public health from the University of Glasgow under a Chevening Scholarship and a master’s in international development from Ohio University through a Fulbright Scholarship. Vanhlee is currently the Director of Franks Family Foundation, a London-based philanthropy focused on improving health and education in Southeast Asia. Prior to joining the Franks Family Foundation, she worked as Programme Secretariat Manager at Scaling Up Nutrition-Civil Society Alliance (SUN CSA). She has worked with many organizations throughout Southeast Asia, including Plan International, Population Services International, French Red Cross and Oxfam. Vanhlee became a FWAB board member in 2019.

A graduate of Dartmouth College, Amos Tuck School of Business and NYU Law School, Michael was an investment banker and served as President of Parfums Stern. In 1990 he founded The Big Wood Foundation. He currently serves on the Board of Friends Without A Border, Team Rubicon and Excellence in Community Schools.Description goes here

CHAIR

Steve recently retired from his positions as the chief legal officer and corporate secretary for the Bessemer Trust companies and Bessemer Securities LLC. Prior to joining Bessemer in 1996, Steve was a partner in the law firm of Chadbourne & Parke in New York City. While at Chadbourne, he lived and worked in the United Arab Emirates in the early 1980s, and his practice extended to corporate and financing transactions across multiple industries. Steve received an undergraduate degree from Stanford University and a law degree from Yale Law School.

Steve and his wife Laura frequently traveled to Southeast Asia and visited Angkor Hospital for Children in 2005 during a visit to Siem Reap.  He has been a contributor to FWAB for many years and joined the Board in 2016. He became chair of the board in September 2019.

Amy grew up in St. Louis and studied at Northwestern University, where she received a dual degree in art history and economics.  She currently works for Citi as a director in the Not-for-Profit Health Care Group, which provides strategic advice and capital markets services for a range of not-for-profit health systems, hospitals and health plan providers throughout the United States.  As the daughter of an E.R. physician and the sister of a pediatric surgeon, Amy has a deep appreciation for the medical field and a longstanding desire to assist health care providers in their missions to care for those in need.

Amy journeyed to Cambodia and Laos during her honeymoon and was profoundly struck by the generosity and hospitality of the people in both countries. The desire to help the communities in Cambodia and Laos led to her joining the board of Friends Without A Border in 2016.  Amy and her husband John currently reside in Napa County, CA and are looking forward to assisting in growing the FWAB network on the West Coast.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

After obtaining marketing and communications degrees from Babson College, Nicole began her career in advertising in New York City, working at Wells, Rich, Greene and Saachi & Saachi for seven years. After moving to Los Angeles and getting married, she decided to follow her heart again and founded a nonprofit organization, On Your Feet, which supported homeless families and singles throughout LA County with move-in or eviction prevention funds. While she served as Executive Director for 18 years, the organization grew from 1 to 20 employees with the budget over $1.5 million at its height. Most recently, she moved back to NY and was Development Director of Nazareth Housing, which provides a full service program for the homeless.When Nicole visited Lao Friends Hospital for Children as a volunteer consultant for their development programs, she commented “After five minutes at LFHC, I knew I found a new calling.” As a mother of four children, children’s health issues and rights have played a major role in her life. She has been Executive Director of Friends Without A Border since March of 2017.

DIRECTOR OF ADMINISTRATION

After moving from Japan and graduating from the International Center of Photography in New York, Akiko started working as a photography assistant for photographer Kenro Izu in the early 1990s. In 1995, when Kenro decided to found a nonprofit organization to build a pediatric hospital in Cambodia, she offered her administrative and clerical skills and gradually shifted her time from the photography field to NGO work, as Friends continued to grow and gradually expand. Akiko is a founding board member.