Do you have to let it Linga?

With Cory only having a few weeks left in the country we decided to see Siam Reap together for one last time. We've both seen the main circuit of the most impressive and famous Angkorian temples a good few times so this time decided to explore a little further afield. We took a tuk tuk, Vuthang's brother Vutha, and travelled north of Siam Reap to Banteay Srei and Kbal Spean. It was great to drive away from the tourist masses visiting the old favourites and tuk tuk through gorgeous Cambodian countryside, passing a few minor temples hidden in the trees as well as rice farmers getting on with their work. Amazing to think all this 'normal' life was going on around and amongst these magnificently ancient ruins.

Banteay Srei (translates to mean citadel of women or citadel of beauty) was made of reddish sandstone and the timing of our visit in the morning meant that the lighting had it at its most beautiful. The stone looks almost pink and its a relatively small site compared to most of the temples making it really easy to get around. It really was beautiful. It has been great visiting the temples but I think I've appreciated it more because I've had the advantage of being able to visit over 2 years and not had to pack it all into 2 weeks or less like most tourists.



Kbal Spean (translates to Bridge Head) was another treat off the beaten track. It's an Angkorian era site also north of Siam Reap which consists of 1000 linga and yuni carvings in the stone riverbed, amongst other Hindu motifs. It was a good 45 minute trek up a hill, through dense jungle but was well worth the climb. Amazingly atmospheric.

The Breakfast Club

Life has become exceedingly quiet in Phnom Srok due to rice planting and transplanting season kicking off, schools slowing down in preparation for the long holidays and Grade 9 and Grade 12 exams which take the attention of my DOE colleagues. Not one to sit around doing nothing for too long, I have managed to muster up some things to do in this quiet period.

A little while a go all the education volunteers got together in Phnom Penh with some Khmer colleagues from the 6 provinces VSO works in to conduct the Annual Partnership Review meeting. Each province got the chance to present how they had worked with the VSO volunteer to meet the objectives of the programme. It was a long, hot day but a really interesting and fruitful one too. It was inspiring to see how much VSO had had an input into improving education in the country, working in collaboration with many other organisations and supporting Districts and Provinces in development. Elise and I shared our bus journey with Mr Sophan and Mr KemSovan who had undoubtedly been busy with a few whiskey bottles the night before! It was great for them to share their progress with representatives from all over the country and also really useful for them to see what else had been going on that they could learn from.

While in Phnom Penh I met with Charlene, a VSO volunteer in Kampot, to work on another edition of the Neak Smak Jet (translates to mean 'volunteer') magazine. We took over as editors of the infamous mag about a year ago and have managed to see 3 great editions go to print! I have loved having this secondary project to focus some energy on in Phnom Penh over the year. It's given me a great excuse to get out of Banteay Meanchey, led to some excellent late night conversations with Charlene and satisfied my creative cravings no end! We have turned around the mag (or so people have told us!), ditching some old parts, creating some new ones and generally given the volunteer community a spot of entertainment every few months to adorn their coffee table - or at least provide something to stick under the wobbly table leg! Charlene is definitely more of a language technician than me, spotting inconsistencies, grammar and spelling errors, while I have thoroughly enjoyed editing the photos, changing layouts and fonts and making sure our newspaper was the most eye-catching and amusing it could be. We've relied on other volunteers providing articles and photos about anything they want to write about really, from corruption to cheese triangles and we've been overwhelmed by people's response to put pen to paper! The most popular regular feature became a 'Dear Anna..." page whereby volunteers could anonymously write in their problems for the editors to answer! You wouldn't believe volunteers could have so many problems!

At the APR meeting in Phnom Penh we were treated to watch a 20 minute DVD that VSO Cambodia has put together of the progress made in the 6 target provinces its been working in over the last 4 years. The DVD gave a fantastic overview of work that has been done and developments in community involvement in schools, improved leadership and management skills of school directors, and so on. With schools in Phnom Srok closing and with not much going on I decided to invite my work colleagues to one of the Breakfast restaurants in the village to watch the DVD over Koi Teol (noodle soup) and coffee. It was a hit! My colleagues from the DOE all turned up to the restaurant where the landlord had reserved tables near the TV (on which some American wrestling programme is normally watched, powered by a generator) and we all tucked into breakfast together. We repeated the treat with school directors on the following day and it seemed to be successful. It was great to see school directors getting out their notebooks to record the things they were watching about schools miles away in different provinces.

Talking Crap Again

Following the feelings of success experienced by Deirdre and myself last month, we decided to repeat the Sanitation Project at another Cluster of Primary schools in Phnom Srok District. This cluster was Srah Chik, one I'm a lot more familiar with in general due to the close proximity of the schools to my office and the fact that the model school (Chey Oudom) is a part of this cluster. It was Srah Chik Primary School, in fact, which was the school to give birth to the idea of the Sanitation Project in the first place (see Talking Crap entry). We chose a different cluster to start the project off with as initially not every school in Srah Chik cluster had toilet buildings so it was great to finally spread the project to this cluster.

We followed our agenda from last time, holding a meeting with community members and school staff on one day which was followed by a Student Council Workshop the next (with a few modifications). As before, the participants were really engaged and enthusiastic, although there seemed to be an even more positive vibe about this group of people. As hoped, Vuthang (my assistant/translator) led the whole thing in Khmer and did so fantastically well. I have really seen this man grow in confidence and ability in the last year. His English isn't wonderful all the time but the way he communicates in his own mother tongue is really clear, expressive and fab! In Khmer culture he is relatively low down the pecking order as a young single man but he held his own during this project, facilitating discussions of problems and solutions between school directors and well respected elders from the community. It meant I was fairly redundant but that, I guess, is the whole point. It feels great to be doing less and less in terms of leading meetings at this point in my placement. Vuthang, together with my colleagues are more than able to lead the way!

The Student Council Workshop was a lot of fun and this time the teachers were much more proactive in leading the children in learning about good hygiene practices. Again, who knows what the eventual outcome of this project will be. If nothing else, we managed to get 4 schools together, sharing meetings, knowledge and learning and we showed how the Student Councils can be used in a collaborative way and as leaders for the rest of the students in their schools. The teachers were great and really took the lead this time.

The activities included learning words to a goofy song about how to use the toilet properly, ordering a set of pictures, acting out how to use the toilet (caused great hilarity!), matching questions and answers and exploring the Germ handshake. Most of the activities were from a supplementary book from the Ministry of Education themselves so thankfully all the hard work was done for us! We tried to make the project as simple and cost effective as possible, in order to motivate but at the same time being realistic for schools to afford themselves. These are the gift packs we provided; a sanitation starter kit! costing less than $2 in total as well as a pack containing the activities we used on the day and some drawing materials for the poster competition! All pretty basic but its stuff that schools are really lacking in.

I've added more to the previous Talking Crap entry too...

I'm not sure what happened to June!

I just blinked and before I knew it May had become July! What happened to June! This has happened a few times but I've usually managed to squeeze a blog entry or two into each month. Part of my problem is the fact that the modern technology I have had at my fingertips is collapsing around me!

• Laptop (had a virus I was ignoring and has finally bitten the bullet and turned itself off. In effect it is now ignoring me and any attempts I go to to turn it back on again. I'll be taking it to be fixed in Phnom Penh next week and praying that some of the photographs of my last 2 years in Cambodia still remain on it)


• VSO computer at my office (just died! and as the current education project is coming to an end there is little or no hope of it ever being resurrected in my life time here)


• iPod (a very sore subject! My cleaning lady managed to wash it in soapy water as she didn't realise it was inhabiting the inside pocket of a bag I had specifically asked her NOT TO WASH! So all music loaded by my dear UK friends as a gift before I left has been lost. On the plus side, I think it can be reset and filled with music again - fingers crossed!)


• Phone (OK, so it is approximately 7 years old, has had a new battery and cover but my faithful Nokia really is on its last legs. It dies at random times, even though the battery is not empty, and the sideways button has given up the ghost making it really difficult to correct texts messages or choose anything from the menu that isn't accessible using the up and down button! frustrating!)


• All memory sticks are riddled with viruses!

Having nothing to watch DVDs on and no music to listen to has increased my book reading this week in particular and has also led to some very early nights!

But I don't want your pity! Oh no! I rather think that everything I own around me knows its nearly time to stop working in Cambodia and to return home to England. 4 months to go...

Talking Crap!

Holidays well and truly over, the first week back at work was jam packed with travelling back and forth, meetings and a really bad cold!

The focus of the week's work was a meeting at Tropieng Tmar cluster core school followed by a Student Council Activity day all relating to a sanitation project dreamed up by Deidre (a Peace Corps Volunteer) and I. The idea was born a good few months ago when a troupe of good-hearted, kind-spirited sophomore students from Minnesota, USA, showed up at a local school having provided the cash to build a beautiful toilet building. It was a fantastic gesture and well needed. Their visit also challenged me as it was clear they had no idea of the cultural norm in rural Cambodia and the equal need for education about god sanitation and hygiene practices. Despite Health and Hygiene being one of the 6 Dimensions of the Child Friendly Schools (CFS) Policy the norm as I have observed it in schools is that the toilet buildings are kept locked and the students and teachers defecate and urinate behind the school or in the fields. There seems to be little to no understanding of the potential to spread disease so the traditional habits of old remain even if there is a sanitary toilet to use. I was frustrated at his and my frustration led to a long string of events which culminated in the workshops this week.

Firstly, I spoke about the problem with Mark, my Australian friend who at the time was working with an NGO in Sisaphon. He led me to the monthly meeting in Phnom Penh 'Watsan' (Water Sanitation) which was an NGO forum led by the Department of Rural; Development. Here I presented my problem that schools in rural Cambodia have toilet buildings but lack the eduction to use them. I was showered with various NGO's business cards, initially very excited by the response I got and the opportunity to write a proposal to the Ministry in order to receive funding for a project. Then disappointment set me back a bit - none of the NGOs were actually interested and my problem couldn't match the proposal guidelines. However, after sounding off to fellow volunteers, I found that Deirdre was full of ideas and enthusiasm to do a low-cost sanitation project ourselves.

And voila... after meeting, brainstorming, planning and pondering, we achieved the following... On Thursday we met with school directors, teachers and community members from the 4 schools in Tropieng Tmar cluster. After discussing aims and objectives, the Health Director for the district also turned up and gave a short basic lecture about good hygiene practices, the school groups listed the problems they faced in using the toilet buildings at their schools, the groups were mixed to discuss possible solutions and then wrote action plans directed by Mr Sophan from the DOE. We taught a funny Khmer song about correct toilet use and finally taught a bunch or games and activities relating to the topic.

On Saturday the fun continued with 2 adults from each school leading the Student Council activity day, the whole point being for the adults to educate the students in order to pass on some knowledge and ownership of responsibility. It was hit or miss as we had no translator on the day but we seemed to pull it off! Everyone who was involved participated really positively, the atmosphere was light and fun (Deirdre and I were very good at humiliating ourselves by singing the toilet song with actions, which helped!) and the students were fantastic.

We set up a rotation system for each group to learn and play the games with the adults teaching and supervising. The morning was punctuated with singing the goofy song and the Health Director spoke about hygiene and demonstrated correct hand washing with soap which all the students got to practice. At the end of the morning we held a poster competition and tried to emphasise the importance of each student council spreading what they had experienced with others at their schools.

As we drove away at the end of the morning I tried to describe to Deirdre how I was feeling: a relaxed sense of relief, happiness, achievement, realised it was the feeling of success I was experiencing!! It's been a while! Who knows the long term effect of our efforts, perhaps none! Perhaps all that will be remembered of the day will be 2 barang girls making fools of themselves singing in Khmer. Hey ho! It was fun trying! It was great to have contact with the children, albeit in terribly broken, barely understandable Khmer. Despite some planned follow up visits, for all we know the toilet buildings at these schools may remain locked, just providing a wall to squat behind or piss against. For all we know the soap bars we gave out as gifts tot eh schools, together with toilet brushes and cleaning detergent will collect dust in someone's office or be sold on! Who knows! But for now I'm going to wallow in what a fantastic day it was and in that rare and fleeting feeling calld...er...oh yes, SUCCESS!!

Added note...

And so the feeling of success continued as Vuthang and I conducted some follow up visits to the schools who participated in the project some weeks afterwards to see how the Student Councils were doing at spreading the good news of hygienic practices!

We met schools at their early morning flag raising ceremony and had the Student Councils tell the rest of the school what they had learnt at the Student Council Workshops. We then repeated some of the activities for the whole school to see and taught the song words. Vuthang was a star at encouraging and leading the students and the students themselves were really receptive. One school had already taught the song words to their fellow students And with actions!

Ratanakiri

Thanks to the King's birthday lasting 3 days and as additional public holiday in respect of Royal Ploughing Day (which marks the start of the rice planting season), no sooner had I returned to work than I had the delights of another week off! It is such a hard life here! Not being one to miss an opportunity to travel, I persuaded Cory to join me on a road trip to visit Ratanakiri, the 'Wild East' of Cambodia.

First stop was Siam Reap to say hello and goodbye to Lina and Fed. It was surreal to say the least, to meet up with them, great to catch up with each other and really rather special to reminisce on when I'd left London nearly 2 years ago. They had put me up on their sofa in Streatham for my last weeks in the country and had shared much of my excitement and worries int eh final preparation to leave the country, including my motobike training. In fact, it was on their computer in their flat with their cat on my lap (or trying to bite my toes, depending on what mood she was in!) that I had typed the the first entries of this very blog. It feels like a lifetime ago.

From Siam Reap we made the long journey south to Kampong Cham where I spent a month in language training at the very beginning of my placement. We then headed north-east to Kratie (pronounced Kra-cheh) where we stayed a few nights with some other volunteers. Kratie is a sleepy, pretty town with a lovely riverfront and many colonial buildings remaining from when the French inhabited the country having been spared a lot of bomb damage during the war years which destroyed a lot of other provincial towns. It was one of the first towns to be ‘liberated’ by the Khmer Rouge (actually it was the North Vietnamese, but the Khmer Rouge later took the credit) in the summer of 1970.

We spent a day sweating on bicycles to visit a gorgeous island in the middle of the Mekong as well as taking a boat trip to catch glimpses of the allusive and rare Irrawaddy dolphins. Apparently there are only between 60 and 70 animals left in these parts. An already endangered species, they are now termed a species in distress in Cambodia. They are intelligent creatures and apparently aware of their dwindling numbers and therefore have stopped breeding. We pondered whether to visit them at all as some reports suggest the tourist trade has become a factor in their demise but we were assured that if we went with a responsible boat who cut its engine rather than trying to get closer and closer to the shy creatures then we could do little harm. It was so very peaceful after the boat had cut its engine and we drifted for perhaps an hour as the dolphins swam around us, cautiously breaking the surface of the waters every now and then.

Onwards to Ratanakiri and we were made aware of the difference between this area and the parts of Cambodia we are more used to. The main road became a bumpy dirt road for a good few hours and we were surrounded by forest. Lazy, I know but here's what the Lonely Planet had to say... "Tourism is set to take off, but that is if the lowland politicians and generals don’t plunder the place first. Ratanakiri is the frontline in the battle for land, and the slash-and-burn minorities are losing out thanks to their tradition of collective ownership. The forest is disappearing at an alarming and accelerating rate, replaced by rubber plantations and cashew-nut farms. It is to be hoped someone wakes up and smells the coffee – there’s plenty of that as well – before it’s too late." So, a really beautiful place which will either take off and become another reason for Cambodian's to feel pride in their country... or it's natural beauty will be raped and sold off as with many other places in the country!

We were lucky to be able to stay in another volunteer's house in Banlung (provincial town of Ratanakiri) and we enjoyed the simple wooden Khmer style house and its gorgeous balcony for four days with a touch of envy it must be said. The resident volunteer gets to enjoy it all the time and watch the sunset over the hills and forests from the balcony every night. It was a tad different to Sisaphon and Phnom Srok! All in all, a very relaxing place where we ate a lot of avocados (Banlung market was inundated with them! - the first time I have seen them in Cambodia!) and hired a motobike to explore the countryside. We explored beautiful waterfalls, met some elephants and traditional ethnic villagers and visited the volcanic crater lake Boeng Yeak Lom a few times. The lake is magically beautiful, perfectly round with gorgeous clear water. We attempted a jog round the perimeter and managed about half way before walking became a more comfortable option, then enjoyed a swim in the cool waters.

Finally reaching the end of the holiday season and stopping off for a Phnom Penh party on the way home, we had managed to tour through the whole country in one week! I found myself looking forward to getting stuck back into Phnom Srok life again.