Week of Work and Waterfalls
on Sarah G in Cambodia (Cambodia), 29/May/2009 08:05, 34 days ago
So, what do I do all week? If you have a moment read on and find out...Monday 25th MayThe road out of town was like glass this morning, it’s raining A LOT which equals much mud. There was a flood a couple of days ago, a bridge got washed out and a few cattle died. Losing a cow here is a bit like your house burning down at home, you lose a major asset - except I don’t know anyone who’s got cow insurance.Sitha and the mud!A 45 minute journey became an hour and a half but due to Sitha’s amazing motobiking abilities we only came close to falling once.Mouy school was the first stop and I was greeted by 5 boys and no teacher in one classroom and 9 pigs in the other. The boys were all about 16 but in year 5, so 6 school years behind, but hey who’s counting. We left and headed to school number 2, as there is not much you can do with a few pigs and no teachers...Not sure these guys will be learning much todayBei School had managed a teacher but only three students, we had a chat and it seems everyone is out planting crops. Food security is a real issue here, if things don’t get planted on time, crops fail and families starve. When there is farm work to be done, not much else matters. Up against starvation it’s difficult to suggest ways to improve school attendance. That aside the school director was impressed with his new teaching materials (which the teachers made and we laminated) and we went thought his development plan.We wanted to visit a new school today but after a bit of research we discovered it was 6km down an ox track. Given the mud conditions it really wasn’t the day for ox tracks...Third up was Pram school, the limping (he’d been bitten by a millipede!?) school director met us with a smile, there were teachers and students – result! The school director here is really young but really keen and I think he really understands what he needs to do to improve the school.Work starts at 7am so I had done all that before lunch. Two hour lunch breaks are great, Im not sure I will ever get used to grabbing a sandwich at my desk again. The market is currently a sloppy mud mess with rotting vegetables and other unimagables, but I am in charge of cooking at Tanya’s tomorrow and we are a few years off Tesco Metro, so walking books on and shopping list in hand I braved it.Afternoon was in the office writing labels so they can be translated for the first aid kits we are supplying to schools. We are trying to keep it simple i.e.“this is a plaster, apply it to small cuts” because people may have never used some things before.Evening was my first attempt as Tom Yam Soup– basically boil stock, kaffir lime leaves, chilli, garlic and lemongrass, add mushrooms, tofu and pak choy boil some more. Then lime juice and coriander. Done. It wasn’t bad for a first attempt.It’s now 20.06 this is the time of day when it can be quite a lot of effort to pass the time, I don’t have a TV so reading, writing this blog and bed by 10pm.Tuesday 26th MayToday was an office day to prepare for workshops, after a day in village I am glad to sit at my desk for a bit– met George (another VSO) to talk about making a film that we could use to train teachers. We want to see if we can film a really good lesson and a really bad one and see if the teachers can see the differences.I have two learning games workshops on Wed and Thurs, so I have to make sure I have lots of games to show the teachers. I will also give them possibily their FIRST EVER copy of the curriculum. Some would suggest a curriculum is kinda essential for teaching and in Cambodia they have a really good document, just most of the teachers have never seen it.Today’s lunch break feature a swim in the lake, there are not too many tourists around, so apart from 4 guys fishing in the sun I had an entire crater lake to myself - amazing. The lake is the best thing about Ban Lung and I try and go a couple of times a week, Im not quite a brave as Tanya who swims almost 2 kilometres across the middle. Its 57 meters deep so god knows what’s in there... well... a dragon according to local legend!Afternoon more office and met Kylie about home visits. I work for a NGO called CARE one day a week helping their Community Support Team, we have developed some home visits forms for children who have missed a lot of school. The team just finished the first lot of visits, I have finish the analysis of the results so needed to discuss next steps with Kylie, the field manager for CARE.Evening we had a‘girls of Ban Lung dinner’ at Tanya’s house, there are about 6 foreign girls living in Ban Lung, but 4 for dinner tonight. We found out this afternoon Alex has malaria so she wasn’t exactly up for a party (don’t worry mum Malaria is not generally regular occurrence).Malaria and Dengue are the illness we worry about and often debate which is the worst:Malaria– might be a chance you have it for life as it keeps coming back, but you can take medicine and it should clear up pretty quickly.Dengue– Makes you feel like you are going to die and there is no treatment, the worst is over in a week but you can feel rubbish for months afterwards; but once your better your ok.People who have had both say Dengue is worst, to be honest I really don’t want either.Kylie (Australia works for CARE), Tanya (an English tree surgeon that works in community forestry) and Kathleen (a Philippino working on disaster management) all made dinner. Tanya has an oven so we are still getting over excited about jacket potatoes! Kylie brought the gin....it was a really good evening!The Ban Lung Girls, looking glum as they all have to write reports tomorrow!Wednesday 27th MayI was very glad that we had so much stuff to carry we had to take Sitha’s four wheel drive this morning. Motorbikes are getting less and less fun the further and further into the wet season we get.It is great going to Nong school, the school director is young and enthusiastic and there are two great young teachers. We went through the curriculum and talked about ideas for teaching aids, so much of the teaching here is just reading from the text book and copying the teacher. We worked with the teachers (and roped in a few kids who were hanging about to help) to make teaching resources....Teachers making resourcesKids helping outOur last training at this school was about school mapping, basically you draw a map of the village and visit every house to see if the children living there are going to school and if not why not. The director showed me his completed map, he has found 200 children in the local area not going to school... that’s alot even for here. I have brought the forms to the office to analyse the data, after that we will meet with the community representatives and local education people to work out what to do.School staff and their school mapAfternoon I was back in the office again for a meeting about our‘Annual Partnership Review’ which is working out with the Provincial Office of Education what worked what didn’t and what we are going to do next year. The actual meeting is in the capital but we have loads of preparation to do.Another quite evening, there was a huge storm - you know when it is going to be big when stuff starts blowing off the balcony before there is any sign of thunder and lightning, it rained heaps but the thunder wasn’t too bad, sometimes it is so loud it wakes we up in shock in the middle of the night and I think the sky is going to fall in.Thursday 28th MayIt is my assistants Sitha’s last day today, which I am pretty gutted about as it is difficult to get used to working with a translator but he wants to work more on his tourist business. Also my flatmate told me yesterday he wants to move out so I have to find a new place to live which is going to be a bit stressful.We ran the same workshop as yesterday but today with 14 teachers from 6 different schools. So morning talking through the curriculum, thinking about teaching aids and demonstrating the learning games.We had a communal lunch with the teachers, Sitha helped the school directors wife do the cooking and the male teachers cracked open the rice wine, a regular occurrence in the village.Helping with the cooking in the school directors kitchenLunch and rice wineI was a bit worried the drunkenness was going to hinder the afternoon’s performance but the teachers all worked really hard and produced loads of teaching materials.Making teaching materialsIn the evening the VSO team met for a drink for Sitha’s last day, I think he is also a bit sad he is leaving. Sitha brought his wife Ping and his two daughters. As all the kids shout ‘hello’ at any white people Sitha’s older daughter is convinced my name is ‘hello’ she says think like ‘mummy, I saw hello today’Sitha's wife Ping and her youngest daugherFriday 28th MayFriday was another office day, the school we went to yesterday are building a library but haven’t got any books yet so I did a bit of googling and set off some prospective emails to see if I can get anyone to support them.I also emailed everyone I know in Ban Lung to see if I can find myself a new place to live within an hour two friends had invited me to stay at their places which was such a big relief. Im going to live with my friend spanish friend Imma who works for a spanish NGO on health issues.I met Tanya for lunch at Sals, she sell comfort food so we ate and gossiped for two hours.In the afternoon we had a meeting with UNICEF and the Provincial Office of Education (POE) to discuss future plan for the‘District Training and Monitoring Team’ that UNICEF have funded. The plans haven’t been made yet but we are supporting the POE to run a big meeting on the 10th to work them all out.Every Friday all the ex-pats in town gather at A’dams resterant this week was no exception but it was a bit of a quite night so I was home in bed by 10.30So thats it a week in Ban Lung, the weeks are up and down but the work has definately developed since I got here and some days are great, some days are not so great but its all in a days work.