Revolving doors

September zipped by …  where? I’m not sure.

Avocado season is now over and has been replaced by cassava, passion fruit  ‘how di how’ clams.

September was an unusual month with comfortable warm weather.  Though, it’s officially the rainy season, rain and humidity sporadically crept in.  Thon, a local Bunong, one of Kevin’s English student, told us that the 'lack of rainfall was attributed to climate change caused by local deforestation,’ one of the culprit for illegal logging.

In early September, the grade 12 exams took place throughout Cambodia.  56% passed!  In Mondolkiri province, 80% passed, the highest province to pass the exams in Cambodia.  A remarkable turn around from last year’s results!   Savy, my translator mentioned that with this high number of students who passed nation wide, that there was indeed some cheating done.   In spite of this, as a teacher himself, Savy felt that it wasn’t the responsibility of the government to do /pay for a retest, but it was the teachers’ responsibility to do a better job with their teaching.  He added, that the ministry is now stepping up to the plate to ensure that teachers are being  properly trained  to deliver a  better  teaching curriculum.

It's been a month with numerous training workshops that took place both at the education complex, the villages and out of town: inclusion, multilingual education, library management, love of reading, what does it mean to be a teacher? and more.   We plan to do follow-ups from November on, after the school enrollment campaign in October, and, when school opens again.

Elsewhere in Sen Monorom, we’ve noticed that a number of street signs are cropping up throughout town, yet, there are still no streetlights in site.   Consequently, motorbike drivers continue to insanely ride in different directions, ride in close proximity, nearly colliding with each other.  No one blows their horn at each other and everyone seems to be cool about it.   Ironically, however, on the air strip, on the way to the villages, a new no horn sign was recently put up for the purpose of the heavy truck drivers who have a tendency to blow their horns at anyone their pass, (motor bikers, pedestrians,) no matter what the circumstance.  In the town itself, a Honda dealership was just newly erected and  is now fully in operation, sadly spoiling the authenticity of the market scene line on the main street of town.  With modernism, unfortunately, there will always be consequences.

Other news,  recently, there’s been a revolving door of high turnover of VSO volunteers and VSO staff.   One of the  full time VSO staff member, unbeknown to the rest of us, also had a full time job with the government.   Finally, he was given an ultimatum:  VSO or the government.  He chose the latter.   As for us, since the mass wave of VSO volunteer’s departure, we’ve been rather fortunate to hook up with other NGO volunteers here in MDK.

A happening place as always on the ranch :)   Nana, the guard dog, in her excitement went completely berserk, when the landlady/ landlord returned from their trip away in Phnom Penh to get their car fixed.  Savy in her wisdom had  accidentally smashed the family car on the corner of their newly built house.   In the meantime, (whilst the landlord, Sukhon waited for his 'pride and joy’s ’ car to be fixed), Sukhon somewhat resembling ‘Inspector Cluso’, rode around town with his old beaten motor bike lol.  

Last but not least, September was an exciting month because it was our 36^th anniversary and we got to celebrate it in Phnom Penh, at the end of the month, when I attended an in-service with the educator sector and met the new education manager, our 4 in two years.

More later … :)

The local 'Bunong' market

-a revolution …

The Bunongs selling their fresh produce on the airstrip

Recently, Savy my translator told me that the Bunong people, who walk to Sen Monorom everyday to sell their fresh produce, have stopped selling them at the local market, at the ‘Bunong’s place’ that was built ‘exclusively’ for them.    

It was a place for the Bunong to sell there freshly, painstakingly, grown produce at a wholesale price to the Khmer buyers due to high demand.  It’s important to note, that the Khmer people preferred to buy the Bunong’s fresh produce from them, because not only is their produce cheap to bargain for a lower price, it is also freshly grown in Cambodia, unlike other vegetables that are grown and sold from the neighbouring countries such as Vietnam.  In turn, the wholesale buyers, the Khmer buyers, at the local market, sell the Bunong’s produce at a retail price, at a higher price.  The Bunong, aware of the situation, realized that they  too, could independently sell their own produce directly to the Khmer locals at a retail price.  As a result, they have since moved to a different location, away from the market, and have settled along the air strip to sell their goods, such as fresh sweet-scented lemon grass, sweet basil that’s used in traditional Cambodian cuisine and much more.   

A Bunong family walking to the airstrip to join the others

Ironically, elsewhere in Cambodia, although 80% of the country relies on agriculture, as a livelihood, poor farming infrastructure and competitive prices from neighbouring countries are holding back local produce from dominating the domestic agricultural market in Cambodia.  

There is good news however.  The Ministry of Commerce with improved farming infrastructure in mind,  with the help of several NGO programmes that were put in place in specific areas of Cambodia, are in the process of training farmers in organic production methods to support the nation’s farmers.   This is to encourage local famers to grow a variety of produce in order to enhance the agrarian nation’s initiatives.  Local attitude, as a result, is slowly changing, and more and more retail buyers are buying directly from the Cambodian farmers supporting their livelihood and their families.   In the case of the Bunong farmers, not only have they become an independent commercial industry in their own right, they can now begin to ‘comfortably’ support their families by what they grow and sell ‘freely’.  

More later :)

Two years today

An incredible two years it's been! 

A celebration for Kevin and I is indeed in order!  September is an exciting month for us, because it marks the beginning of our third year here in the Kingdom of Cambodia. What’s more, it is also our 36^th wedding anniversary.

In the days leading up to our placement in Cambodia, swamped with this and that….., I took some time away to do some reflection, to share the news with family and friends, in particular with my special friend Wendelin.   Over lunch, we talked about everything under the sun.  We also talked about the uncertainty that I felt , having had limited knowledge of what we were about to embark on;   the mixed feelings of working and living in a different country for a long period of time. Further, undecided to create a blog, I wanted to find out from Wendelin what she thought of the idea, about us, Kevin and I, sharing a glimpse of  ‘la vie quotidienne’,   sharing a glimpse of our lives with family and friends, during our time away whilst living and working in Cambodia?  After much discussion, Kevin and I went ahead and uploaded our first post.   Now, it’s hard to believe, that two years today has passed with so many experiences, with so many stories to tell...

Lunch with Wendelin

I remember reading from the lonely planet that our placement, Mondolkiri Province, had  been portrayed, as the ‘Wild West’.  Others had claimed Mondolikiri to be in the middle of nowhere, in the jungle, far from civilization and more. ’   Not any more!  When we first arrived, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the road to Mondolkiri, from Phnom Penh, is  in fact exceptionally good and takes a mere 5 ½  hours by minivan– a far cry from what was described in various issues that we had previously read. The road to Sen Monorom was completed in 2010.  As a result, Sen Monorom Town, the capital city of MDK, now has a population of 10,000 people and it's growing :)

In terms of 'jungles' in Mondolkiri Province, there are still large areas of  dense forests to carpeted lush rolling open grassland, preserved parks,  hidden waterfalls that have been left untouched.  Sadly however, other parts of Mondolkiri have been cleared, replaced with rubber trees, palm oil trees and more by developers from other Asian countries, deals that were made between them, developers, and the Cambodian government.   What’s more, unbeknown to the locals, Cambodian’s luscious scenery is in the midst of being spoilt, damaged with garbage, oil spills, plastic bags, water bottles, containers that are strewn everywhere: on roads, floating around rivers  and more … 

Fishing in the Sen Monorom Lake

Throughout the course of our  2^nd year  here, once again there have been successes and milestones:  Corruption-free grade 12 exams  continue to be strictly regulated by the government.  Results of this year’s grade 12 exams will be published by the end of this month;  Roads throughout Cambodia, throughout Mondolkiri and on the way out to villages are improving. Sen Monorom town has grown considerably.  Many buildings are erected bringing more jobs to the locals to support this province;  More Cambodian writers and illustrators are writing children’s books, novels, journals for the Cambodian public to read and to enjoy.  That is wonderful news! The water supply in the education complex’s bathroom is ‘officially’ available and can now be used.  No more hiding behind the bushes. Lol  However,  there have been times that the boarding -school units, at the back of the education complex, who share the large water tank with them have been hard pushed to extract water for their normal use.

As for education, the Minister of Education announced that a new ‘5 -year strategic education plan’ had been put in place to help improve the quality of teaching throughout Cambodia . He also announced that: 'more money will be spent on education; teachers’ salaries are expected to increase over the period of 5 years; multilingual education will continue to be implemented with a focus on ‘minority inclusion’ in the two main northern eastern domains – Rattanakiri and Mondolkiri provinces.'

Other highlights, earlier in the year, the education complex had ongoing football matches between districts and communes.  Both the girls and the boys' teams from the 5 districts in MDK had moments of their winning glory.  Further,  last July, Cambodia had won 15 medals in multisports events at the 28^th SEA games Singapore 2015.   In 2023, Cambodia is gearing up to host the games here in their own country.  More enlightening, for the first time, health education will become mandatory and become part of the ‘3 Thursdays teaching and learning subject’ during the next school year.

What are the challenges?   Teachers  and students continue to be absent from school.  As mentioned before, in the villages where I work, teachers work on the farm, have family commitment and spend time working at other jobs to make ends meet due to low teaching wages.  As a result, teachers spend limited time preparing, delivering a child-centered curriculum and more.   Lack of good teaching practice, limited professional development support, limited-teaching resources continue to be apparent.    

Recently, the week before school closed, a group of MoEYS educators from Phnom Penh  came to the education complex to assess progress made in the schools here in MDK.  They were also  invited to visit some of the ‘better’ schools in the villages for the day.  Except, as per usual, they omitted to visit those that are in desperate need of help in the area of providing better infrastructure, better resources and much more.   

Rebuilding on education has been an enormous task

Understandably so, rebuilding education in Cambodia has been an enormous task with its challenges - however, it is indeed steady and getting better with much funding from  international investments and the Ministry of Education's new proposed ‘5 -year strategic education plan’.…  Further, my Khmer/Bunong colleagues at work continue to prod on, to work hard each day to make things happen to help improve the quality of teaching, to reach every student for a better tomorrow … 

As a long-term volunteer,  my job is to work along side teachers and school directors to strengthen education. Though I was warned that my work with the people would be a major undertaking, in fact it has been a ‘titanic’ task.  The prerequisite for this job is patience, determination, resilience, flexibility, and a sense of humour when faced with problems, obstacles and frustrating circumstances.

So what’s the best thing about volunteering, we were asked, over and over again? Connecting through the hearts, the minds of the people; feeling part of the community in an age where neighbours in other parts of the world have little time for each other; watching smiling children, the builders of the future, explore endless possibilities through play and work - realizing that there is hope at the end of the tunnel; watching them clap with delight when a classmate give an answer;  having fun and keeping our minds active at the same time - staying connected with the world around us; being endlessly entertained by new and unfamiliar situations - in short, there's never been a dull moment; learning from the locals.   We're lucky to be here and yes, we look forward to experiencing yet another incredible year!  

More later … :)