Decision time…

Current Location: Sometimes Chhuk Village and sometimes Siem Reap, Cambodia

Well hello again beautiful perusers of my blog. As I sit down to write this post I am nice and wet from the afternoon rain and I’m half heartedly wiping the mud from the back of my legs. The reason I’m kind of half hearted about it is that I always seem dirty here so really, I don’t much care about a bit more. You really get used to dirt, dust and bugs living in the village. I have deliberated long and hard about what to write in this post, mainly as I have been a little undecided about things, however I’ve had my moment of clarity and made some decisions. Thus, I have a story to tell you.

So I have now spent three weeks in the village and the first thing I must say is that living without running water and power really isn’t all that bad. In fact, it is a lot easier than you think. It’s all a matter of what you are used to I guess and after a fews days of living like that it is amazing how quickly it becomes normal and routine. Us humans are an adaptable bunch when we want to be or have to be and particularly when we approach things with an open mind. So how do we live without such western comforts? Well for a start we have a lovely big well that goes about 20m down (which really is not so far for a well – the one at the school is about double that I think) and we pump water from said well every day. It’s fairly physical work so we tend to do this bright and early while it is still cool – somewhere between 6am (when we rise for the day normally) and 8am. Generally we pump about 6 buckets each day. Most of them go to reservoir in the bathroom which we use to scoop water from to flush the toilet, one goes in the bathroom for our “shower” (a term I use very loosely) and the other we use to filter about 8 large bottles of water to see us through the day.

At the moment we have two volunteers in the village, me and a 19 year old English dude named Nick. Generally we take it in turns in the mornings to do the water thing or start the fire. So while one pumps and filters, the other plays with paper, kindling, charcoal and a lighter. It’s not as easy as certain people would have you believe this fire lighting business but I think I have the knack now. Finally. It was a long time coming that one.

Chhuk village itself is really quite adorable. It consists of one road and one road only. It is a dirt road and basically runs on and on after you turn off from the main road out of Siem Reap. Every so many kilometres the village changes. Houses line the way either side and then off behind them are the rice fields. The rainy season has started a little early here so that we are now getting rain almost every day, even if it is only a light shower in the afternoon , so in the 3 weeks I’ve been there it’s become greener and greener and is just so pretty. In general the weather is actually much more bearable than I thought it would be without any sort of cooling device but again, I think that’s down to an open mind and acceptance of the situation. You know there is no other option but to get used to it, so you do. Although we don’t have power to help us out we do have a car battery which powers a light bulb in the general living area (where the kitchen and hammocks are) so this helps of an evening. It is pitch black by about 7pm so this way we can stay up for a few more hours and chat and read books etc.

As for what we do all day…well besides pumping water and cooking breakfast, we have a few more chores – we need to feed our chickens and dogs, do some general cleaning, all that really exciting stuff I’ll try not to bore you with! At about 9:30am the Cambodian teacher Von comes over and we do lesson planning for the day. After that we pretty much have nothing to do until school starts at 11:30am. We teach for four hours a day: 11:30am – 12:30pm, 1pm-2pm, 2pm-3pm and 3:15 – 4:15pm and every class ends up being my favourite at some point! The little ones are just so cute and if you are having an average day they can really lift your spirits but the older kids are inspiring too as you can really see them starting to get it sometimes which makes it all worthwhile. After school we are basically back to having not much to do. The kids generally come over for a bit and we do some playing. I recently taught some of them how to make paper cranes and hung them in the house which they just loved so now they pretty much come over every day at some point and make some cranes and give them to me to hang up which is really quite cute. Paper cranes, it seems, are the flavour of the month. Aside from that it’s basically more reading in the hammock.

So after all that, what’s the big decision then? Well as with anything there are a few negatives about this program. There are some operational concerns, which on their own I would just live with however coupled with other things they add some weight. Jan, the guy who started this organisation, is a great guy with a huge heart and a vision to make a difference and I take my hat off to him for what he has done so far. He is an ideas person though, not a detail person, and that seems to have caused him a few problems with some recent volunteers. The organisation and the role the volunteers play lacks structure and support which is ok if you are me but not if you are either young or unsure on how to handle people or things. I have spoken with Jan a lot about these things and have made some suggestions which he seems receptive to but really I don’t imagine anything to change that much or that quickly. This is a guy with very little time on his hands, he has a tonne of projects on the go but the inability to build in some structure so that they won’t fall over in his absence. Anyway, as I said, that on it’s own isn’t really that big a deal as I’m happy to raise questions and make small decisions and he seems to trust me so that’s nice. The main problem is that really, this is a two person project, at maximum. To be honest, the second person is just there for conversation. You could do this whole thing on your own no problem – a teacher doesn’t really need more than one teaching assistant, any more than two and you have a crowded classroom and too many people with not enough to do. At the house one person could do all the chores – you’d be a little busy but there would still be plenty of rest time. With two people on the chores there is loads of rest time – too much. Again this wouldn’t be so much of a problem if the intention was only to ever have two volunteers at a time however we have another starting next week and one more the week after that. Four volunteers? You have got to be kidding me. I’ve told Jan that there just isn’t enough to do and offered to help with other stuff but I’m not hopeful. So where does that leave me?

Well I deliberated and deliberated over what to do. I didn’t want to feel like I was abandoning the project or letting it down but at the same time, I did not turn my life upside down and spend all this money to pretty much sit around in a hammock and read for most of the day and with new volunteers arriving I really am superfluous. I think too that Jan knows there isn’t enough to do but he wants the income for the organisation and I am not that pleased with that at all really. You need to strike an appropriate balance, I believe. In the end I have decided to stay here for 8 weeks as opposed to the 3 months I arranged in the beginning. There are more than enough volunteers that I won’t be missed. My number 2 choice for volunteering is a place in Phnom Penh that I intended to do a stint with later in the year if I had enough money. This position will be more NGO business related and will certainly be quite well suited to my skills so I am going to apply to do 8 weeks there straight after I finish my 8 weeks here. That will take me up to August when Kristin (my friend from the states for those who don’t know her) will arrive and we can take off and do 5 weeks worth of traveling. This I am very excited about. So there you have it in a nutshell. It feels good to have made a decision and I think I have made the right one. I am excited about the future once again and look forward to new things.

This week I am off to Phnom Penh to visit some people as we have a few days off for public holidays so I am really looking forward to that. Fun times ahead I’m sure!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful time wherever they are in the world. Now I’m off to enjoy the mud again.

Over and out.