Went and visited the main school in town and went to Lakana's class. They ended up pulling her out of class for my visit ("Umm... are you sure she doesn't need to stay in class??") so we could go and visit her family home. When we were walking down the hall at the school I suddenly realised that she was almost as tall as me! "How old are you now Lakana???" ... she's 17! In my mind she never grew older than when I started sponsoring her when she was about 12! Last time we visited was in the dry season.. being the wet season her stilted house was surrounded by water and we had to cross some very rickety planks of wood to go inside. We sat around and chatted for a while.. simple and lovely. Lakana still wants to be a doctor or nurse.. but they don't know if they'll be able to afford to send her to University (although she still has 3 years left at highschool). Sustainable Cambodia offers scholarship for either tuition or living expenses but the family has to pay the other. Their estimate was that to study medicine it would cost about $3000/year in tuition and that living expenses would be $100/month. Her older sister that I'd met last time had recently moved to Phnom Penh to find a job in a department store.. but unfortunately they weren't sure whether the salary would cover her living expenses away from home! Must be so scary.
The next day Richard and I and a bunch of the SC guys went on an all day expedition to the Bakan area. It was AMAZING! Rural rural Cambodia! The dirt roads were god awful! I was on the back of a moto with Mr Chenda who I'd met last visit. At times the 'pot holes' were the size of small swimming pools and we fell off twice in the slippery slippery muddy slosh! Brilliant fun. We visited a rural school funded by the Australian branch of SC, a rotary club in Western Australia. We had to wade through shin deep water to get inside and the room was partially under water. We had to collect data of the childrens' age, weight and height for the nutrition supplement program. SCA provides food supplements of porridge in the morning as well as vitamins for the children. I think almost all the children in Cambodia must be lacking nutrition or food because they all look years younger than they are. Most 9 year olds look no older than 6 etc etc. The kids were all very entertaining and we taught them the high-5.
Next we visited a newly formed community further out. Apparently they all had escaped financial problems with the bank by just moving out bush... sounds a bit dubious. They had pooled their money together to buy land for a school to be built ($1000 US for a hectare!!) and they were going to start construction in the next two weeks once it dries up a bit. The whole community congregated at one house to see us... we were the very first white people they'd seen. Quite a few women came up and touched my arm and face, seemingly very concerned I had mud on my white skin! A group of children just stared at us (at a safe distance).. I don't think they really knew what to make of us!
The next village we visited, we had to drive through another terrible terrible road. At one point there was a flowing stream 1.5m wide that we had to try and carry/pull the motorbikes across. I'm really surprised the engines didn't flood. At this point I'd like to add that when I say 'motorbikes' they weren't dirt bikes or anything... they were scooters! Eventually the road was too bad and we had to slosh through knee deep water for a kilometre to get to the village to do more data collection. The children there were fascinated by us as well. At first they were a timid but after a while I had a group of girls sitting next to me and hesitantly touching my skin. A couple of them even put their hands around my calf and made faces that said 'WOAH' at the circumference of it! We taught them the high-5 as well and eventually had all of them joined in. By the end of it I had two girls hugging me around the hips like baby koalas, not wanting to let go! Sweet little things. They're all just so beautiful.The countryside was absolutely amazing too. All so very flat bar one mountain range in the distance. Red dirt, bright green rice fields, clear blue sky... the colours just seemed too vibrant! It was just sooooo beautiful I can't even begin to do it justice!
I was taken to visit another school in the Kandieng district. I'd never really thought much of Pursat town.. not a very good looking place, but Kandieng is Beautiful! Last time I hadn't gone further than the main market.. but down the road further next to the river it gets so lush and tropical. Banana trees, sugar palms, and simple stilted timber houses. It was actually really gorgeous. The school was right next to a large open rice field and the view out the window was just so picturesque. I visited 3 classes of varying age. I taught the youngest class how to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star at their request (one of the other volunteers had taught them Baa Baa Black Sheep and they asked if I had a song to teach them too!), which was very entertaining. The other classes just practiced their English by introducing themselves and asking me questions.
This morning we rode out to Krakor and took a boat onto the Tonle Sap to see a floating village. It was really nice. All the houses were painted in various shades of blue and turquoise with other brightly coloured details. The Tonle Sap in the wet season is just such an amazing vast mass of water.. it's all you can see as far as the horizon! It was my first time on the Tonle Sap and I really enjoyed the visit.
Caught the bus to Battambang this afternoon and I'm heading to Thailand early tomorrow morning! I'm going to have to find an impromptu bus route the long way around Bangkok to get to Chiang Mai to avoid getting stuck in the flooding. If all goes according to plan I should meet Steve in Chiang Mai in the wee hours of the morning! So excited but also somewhat apprehensive that my 'wing it' bus plans might not work out... Nah it'll be fine!!
Wish me luck!! x
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