Our week volunteering at a school in Cambodia

 Hello, thought I would write the blog this time! (Georgia)


After leaving Koh Chang we arrived at the land border between Thailand and Cambodia and was just as stressful as any other land border we have been to. The minivan dropped us off on the Thai border and then we had to walk a few minutes down the road to enter Cambodia. There were a load of locals on the Cambodian side trying to con as many tourists as they could and we fell for a "health check" which included an old woman shining a torch in our eyes saying we were okay and charging us. We eventually found a taxi and a bus to take us to a little village called Andong Teuk and we was on our way. The bus driver decided to drop us off in a field about 10km from the village and we had to call up the school to say we were stranded on the main road in the middle of nowhere. He agreed to pick us up and arrived on his little motorbike thinking we were all going to fit on the back plus too huge suitcases, needless to say we had to negotiate a price for a tuk-tuk with a local.

We were volunteering at BCDO school and was teaching and living at the school for a week. The BCDO school was a place where children came before school, at lunchtimes and after school to improve their English as well as to play games.When we first arrived they had lunch prepared for us by the mother of the family who lived at the school. We were fortunate to be teaching with 2 other volunteers called Ben and Amira who were only staying for 4 nights and were from Australia. Amira had previous experience teaching children from her main job back home in Australia and was sure to put our non-existent teaching skills to shame! When we had all finished lunch we were shown around the grounds of the school by the director including the "luxury"" bucket shower, squat toilets, the classrooms and the bedrooms. We were lucky that we arrived before the Aussies as were given a choice of bedrooms. One bedroom had no bed with just a carpet on the floor, the other bedroom had a bed with no mattress so we grabbed the bed. My theory was that the spiders, geckos, and other strange wildlife could not get us so easily especially as we had a mosquito net that covered  the whole bed. It was now Sunday evening so we decided to have an early night ready for our 8am morning class the following day.

The legend that was Mr Hong Thong Song.

Kids playing games before lesson

Cebloase posing in the background

We woke up on the Monday morning ready for work to be told that there were only a couple of children coming in the morning as it was their school holidays at the government school and not as many children would come along. Me and Georgia were relieved and we followed the lesson plan and we were given the task of teaching the letter "B". The kids were practicing their handwriting and learning new words beginning with B. We also taught at lunchtime to around 15 children that increased to 20 by the end of the week. They were all aged between 7-11 and usually went crazy after half hour of teaching and had to abandon the lesson a couple of times but was still good fun! The evening class would consist of children 11 and over and was my favourite class as the children was older and not so naughty. One of the Cambodian teachers, ""Teacher Hong" who was only 19, and on the first day got confused and thought Georgia was with the Aussie man, Ben and that I was with Amira and was adamant we should teach together as couples lol. Nobody wanted to correct him as he was quite a strange character to put it politely. So we ended up teaching the classes with a different person. I hated teaching under Mr Hong, he would correct my English even though he barely spoke any decent English himself. He would constantly say 'you've spelt that wrong', I lost count on how many times I told him , he was the one who was wrong, needless to say I ended up bunking Mr Hong's class and by the end of the week switched classes to help James. James's class with Amira was alot better, they children were very clever and wanted to learn English. The work we set them was too easy and so we had to re-arrange our plan and teach them 'harder' words. With Amira being a teacher at home herself, the class was made easier. I enjoyed teaching this class and looked forward to my afternoon with the children who came. We had one more lesson that all volunteers helped out in 'The discussion class'', this class was made up of a few boys who were 16+ and had a good standard of English already. We took the time to discuss things in English and spoke with them; they were typical teenage boys and on more than one occasion when the conversation began to flow, we would speak about 'girls'and 'whiskey': not too different from home (I imagine ). They were interested in what England and  Australia was like, so a lot of the lesson was always based on home.

Discussion Class : Facebook, girls and whiskey

So they were the classes: what else did we do with our spare time?  PAGODA.

After lessons had finished we did what most hard working teachers do - pub, or in our case a cheeky Sprite down the Pagoda. (we had nothing but water to drink all week- Honest!). The pagoda was a place of worship in the village, where you could go to pay your respect to Buddha, or play darts, and gamble in this case. It was the most dodgiest (even a word?) place of worship I have ever seen. There was an old monk trying to keep the kids out of the temple, who were running wild! There was a few stalls selling soft drinks, that tasted like heaven after a week of water, rice and vegetables. And then comes the techno music... young boys had placed huge speakers into the pagoda and was playing music loud so that everyone could have a little rave up. All the local teenagers would go crazy when the beat was dropped. People watching was a must!

One night we had an invite from the Dad who lived at the School. He was a strange man with little English. He had one conversation with James, that ended up in him playing charades. James ultimately worked out he must of been in the Army, as the grenade noises gave it away. 'Pow pow I shoot guns'. We then asked his son who spoke better English if his dad was in the Army. His reply was 'yes', we didn't ask too much of his Army days, out of the fear he may of been ex Khmer Rouge. If you know your history, then we don't need to explain! Anyways cut a long story short he asked us to the Pagoda one night with him and his Army Pals. James went along with it, I however being the paranoid freak I was, was worried he was capture me and sell my body parts for dollar in Thailand. Thank god he didn't, I am here to tell the tale, ( or write the blog). No alcohol is allowed at the Pagoda, but The dad didn't seem to care. He was downing shots at the back in a secluded shots with his friends. They instantly looked like they could all appear on crime watch. I was already having nightmares. After politely declining Dad's offer of a shot, out came the beer! James had one, I was still refusing. Dad's mate consisted of a journalist (hmmm debatable) , and the other one was a 'lady boy" which in Cambodia doesn't mean a man who dresses as a girl , it means a gay man. After too many beers said Lady Boy was offering James more alcohol, whilst rubbing his leg affectionately. Needless to say we headed off home.

Peace

After a heavy night at the Pagoda, all you want is a decent bed and some decent food. Which leads us to our diet for the week- Rice, water, vegetables, occasional meat and more rice. The mum made us lunch and dinner everyday, to her credit she made good sweet and sour vegetables. Meat was limited because there were no shops where they lived. Just a simple daily market were the locals would get their basics for the day and cook up a Cambodian feast. The mum made sure we were full, we were expecting to be constantly hungry. Rice however dulls the hunger and literally bloats you to the point of being so full you don't want anything else. Although I'm sure for James a bar of chocolate wouldn't go a miss after dinner.

We end the blog by talking about the son in the family. Mr Cebalose Vorn; the nicest 17 year old young boy you will ever meet. He runs the classes when there are no volunteers. He dedicates his time between going to school himself and teaching English to those in his village community. He had a love for music, myself and him would have regular bonding sessions over the little music he had. One day he was singing 'all my bitches love me''. I told him what 'Bitch' meant and he was shocked haha. We would speak about how he wants to be rich, I really hope it works out for this boy because he deserves it.

So after all our classes had finished, we were ready to leave. James really enjoyed the experience a lot more than he had imagined. My experience was good, but hiding from the children is definitely a sign that I do not want to become a teacher anytime soon! Mr James Bond thought we should of stayed longer, I would have but the living conditions were starting to get to me. I didn't wash my hair for a week.

The children were fun and it was a good experience, to be able to teach someone something. Very rewarding. Oh and before I go, I've got to mention my main little man Jerry 'Jel', one of my fav children. Definitely going to miss him saying 'Teacher Angry Birds I phone'.... What a experience and memories made.

Until next time,

Georgia and James.