We're here to participate in a volunteer project for New Futures Organisation (NFO) orphanage and educational program based in Takeo. The orphanage has around 42 live-in children, 8 more away studying at Uni in Phnom Penh and a handful of permanent staff that manage the daily needs of all the orphanage children as well as English classes at several local village schools.
On arrival we found that we had old friends in the crowd. A family we knew from Brighton and Hove was here volunteering as well, two ladies with 3 boys that are roughly our guys' ages. It's easy to tell our kids apart if nothing else than their kids all have light blonde hair and our boys are all bright red heads.... we will not lose these guys in a Cambodian crowd!
All of the boys travel with us to the orphanage where we meet numerous children hanging out after school on our first day. The orphanage itself looks quite well kept and is laden with activities for the kids such as swing sets, a tree house, a duck pond, a climbing frame with a slide and a small football pitch nearby. There are lots of animals. Lady the dog has just had puppies (their eyes aren't even open yet!), a cat climbed up into a shed and had kittens up in the rafters, and the group of NFO goats wandering about has recently added a new little one as well ... no shortage of babies here!!
The children are all older than I expected - I had been hoping to cuddle lots of little toddlers and babies, but the children here are aged 7 to 18. Most children do look younger than they are with their petite frames, the 10 year olds look 7 and the 7 year olds look 4 ... Regardless of age, I do still get lots of cuddles. The children all seem very happy to welcome us in - which must be quite a job for them as they do get lots of volunteers here, with regular (maybe too frequent) changeover. But they are polite to a fault and mostly full of smiles.
The initial lack of structure left me feeling a little frustrated for the first few days. We found it difficult knowing where or when to jump in and help out. It certainly was easy to feel like spare part until you could find a niche. At that time, there was not much guidance available for sorting out newly arrived folk.
But quickly we fell in love with the kids at the orphanage. Their ready smiles and cheeky playfulness just welcome you in to their family. We were all drawn in to chess and Connect 4 games with Sovanara, Sokheang and Chai right away... and embarrassingly, most of us lost our socks in those matches - these kids are gaming pros! The girls are so sweet but they give as good as the boys in football and seem happy to join in whatever's going on.
A group of pretty girls quickly found Sam was an easy mark for teasing and had him running away as they called 'Sam, you my boyfriend?' ... They chased him down and swung him round, tickling him and holding him over the pond until he ran out of fight. I'd say they had a very good style of Sam-management.
Sot, at 18, is the oldest of the kids at the orphanage. He hung out with Justin and accompanied him on excursions to look for computer parts in the market area. Sot's a bit of a Jack-the-Lad and is the guy to go to for anything you need. Later, Sot returned with me to help purchase a couple of second-hand computers that Justin had identified for the kids in the orphanage to use. Sot seems very interested in the kids and mentioned they could use some toiletries and washing detergent. So, of course, we armed ourselves at the market with some toothpaste, toothbrushes, soap and shampoo for each child, returning in our tuk-tuk with 2 massive boxes.
One day as we were having lunch, Sam proposed to me (again). This was the first proposal since Indonesia when he'd approached me on bent knee. It seemed he'd been thinking again... So that when I said no Thank-You because I already have a husband (among so many other basic reasons), he was ready .. But Mummy, he says, our friends here have 2 Mummies, soooo, you can have 2 Daddies! OK, it was really tough to argue with that logic!! Hmmm, how best to describe same-sex relationships and alternative family structures to a 6 year-old?
We heard that the coming weekend was the beginning of a few days to mark the King's birthday. I guess when you're King you can choose as many days as you'd like to mark the occasion.. Like some other NFO'ers, we headed off to Kampot and Kep towns by the seashore. These areas are famous for crabs and pepper - especially when combined as peppered crab in tasty dishes. The area was much more quiet than Takeo and the general activity is to relax in a hammock. As the boys have too much energy to properly relax, we were lucky to find an American-run hotel with a rustic 9-hole mini-golf course just down the street.
The best aspect of staying in Kampot had to be the air conditioning. I had been waking hourly during the night for the past couple weeks in Takeo and CanTho with sweat running down my arms and legs and only a small fan to stir warm air about the room. In Kampot we paid a little extra for a good air conditioner in the room. I just laid about like a starfish on the bed, soaking in the cool air, ahhhhhh.
Our favourite part of the weekend was visiting the seaside of Kep. What a bumpy ride we had in the tuk-tuk though .. It was like riding a bucking bronco for 26 km, in a kind of fun way and with decent scenery. We wished we could stop every 50 meters to take photos of beautiful boats, or wedding decorations, or monks riding past us on motorbikes or oxen standing in rice paddies ... So many gorgeous images!!
In Kep, we were just about the only foreigners around that day. The market and beaches were filled with locals out crabbing in the shallow rocky pools or swimming in the waters further down on the beach. Coming into Kep, the roads were lined with trees overflowing with bright red flowers and the road was littered with so many fallen petals that we literally arrived into town on a red carpet.
Cambodian women do not wear swimsuits, considered way too risqué, and were splashing around the water in jeans, tunics and long dresses. There were huge numbers of monks there that day, their lovely red-orange robes fluttering about in the light ocean breezes. It's so funny to see the occasional monk carrying a phone or camera .. given that they renounce worldly possessions and are usually found in only robes and no sandals. Justin and I pondered a reasonable bit over the fine line between traditional life and modern living in a monks' world.
As the time neared, I felt a little apprehensive. What would I do when the kids got out of hand and my singular torturer methods didn't work? How would I manage to get myself and the 3 boys and all the luggage up to Phnom Penh and then Siem Reap? As usual, these niggly bits always seem a bigger issue until you're actually doing them. It all went fine in the end.
Actually the last few days were my favourite. They spanned the Kings Birthday holiday which meant the kids were out of school for several days. In that time. We also really got to know Princess, Neville's 10 year old adopted daughter. She is a gorgeous girl who loves girly dresses of silk, lace and swirly materials. We had a lovely time hanging out with Princess and playing Snakes and Ladders in the evenings.
We also started feeling more at home, getting about on our bicycles , heading to market, knowing folks at the Centre and orphanage both. Ben was very enthusiastic about cycling into town to search for fruit shakes and we laughed as we steered around cows in the street. We giggled at huge wandering pigs who stopped to stretch or sniff garbage here and there (or horses meandering down the road). Ben would get upset when his rusty chain would fall off (again) or he hit another pothole (again) ... I'm sure he wished he could swear @#%**! But he did improve and it felt great to be out and about in Takeo together.
The other really fun part of the last few days was taking the NFO kids roller skating at the place across the lane. It had seemed outrageous to have this amazingly fun activity visible across the road, but the NFO kids couldn't usually use it - just like dangling a carrot really.
So we pulled out a handful of NFO boys for skating day one day. We paid the $1 for each NFO boy to share the available skates for the afternoon. We were joined by more and more NFO kids. Lots of boys hadn't really rollerbladed before, but Bodi was amazing and flew past skating not only forward and backwards but also up the ramps and down the curvy structures. Andy was on a mission to do the same and was soon making his way up the ramps and scaring he bejesus out of me rolling over the wavy ramp and turning sharply at the end where nearly everyone wipes-out, landing in a heap on the cement floor.
Oh, if only the floor had been rubberised like western skating rinks or the business supplied helmets and padding ... I wished I could click my heels 3 times and make this come true. I was scared to death that someone would break a little bone or other sort of body bit. But we made use of what was on offer. The kids squeezed their little feet into whatever old, well-used skates that roughly matched their foot size - a la Cinderella, I think they would have chopped off little toes to get feet to match the shoe while others wore shoes that looked like canoes on the end of skinny little shins. But no one minded. Not a bit. So why should I? We all laughed and sweated and fell and got up again, rubbing our sore bums. Everyone had such a blast!
As we skated, the skies opened and heavy monsoon-like rains fell from the heavens and pounded the daylights out of the roof above us. The business owners raced to pull the massive speakers from the sides of the open rink and onto bricks to hold them up in the centre of the rink. Water came in from all sides and the floor became twice as slippery -and scary! - yet skating continued and the rain just added to the ambience. My boys took advantage of the distraction to slip into the little cafe to request plates of noodles - 2 each of course! But they were overall very patient to share their mum with 40-odd kids all day.
The following days were long extensions of the first. The girls skate took place first thing on the second morning as arranged. The girls were much more nervous and found comfort in skating in 2's, 3's and 4's. This was fun, but backbreaking as I was usually grabbed by little hands reaching to hold my arm or hand for stability. Lines of us would grow extending behind like a train or sideways arm to arm .. until someone would whistle past, knocking us down like dominoes. But everyone grew braver and braver and it was great to see the kids helping each other to skate. The toughest part for the kids was sharing skates - no one really wanted to take off and hand theirs over.
The Little Ones - including Srey Nang, Kosal, Kosalina, Srey Mao and Sam - had the toughest job of all in sharing the 1 small pair of skates amongst the 6 or 7 small pairs of feet. I had to use a stopwatch for 20 minute intervals all day. This was tough for the Littles who anxiously checked the time every few minutes on my phone's stopwatch. I really felt for them as they hung out with the rest of us on the sides of the rink, trying so hard to be patient. Those Littles are the cutest, toughest group with no fear in the rink and sheer delight when it is their turn.
Eventually, though, it was time to leave Takeo. As our days ended I spent some time with Neville setting up a donation to be used by NFO for necessities, including a fund to allow the kids to continue skating once a week for a year . I also caught up with the 2 big kids I knew best - Srey Moch and Sot - and exchanged emails, letting them know we'd like to help them out as they go to uni (all the kids need 'sponsors' to help them pay for uni in Phnom Penh). As our taxi pulled away, I felt sad but our family had a great experience and we knew we'd have to return again.
Find all of the pics from Takeo, Kampot and Kep at:
