You know you work in a Cambodian office when…

1. When you have a two hour lunch break for food, a massage and a sleep

2. When you go into another office and someone is lying on a table asleep

3. When we were in a staff meeting and suddenly everyone started singing ‘Happy Birthday’ for no apparent and later on started spontaneously dancing in the corner and doing a strange slow shimmy.

4. When I was drinking orange juice in a sandwich bag full of ice and after I finished it, I was on my way to put it in the bin and my colleague comes running out of her office to take the bag of ice. She grabs it from me and puts it on her head and goes back into her office.

5. When a colleague had forgotten to open my office and she ran upstairs to do it. As she let me in she shouted; “Chol Moi” which means Cheers, with a massive grin on her face.

6. When the police came in for a conference about trafficking and they inadvertently locked us in our glass-walled office. They proceeded to sit on the sofas outside and all took off their tops. We had to be rescued by our boss and we laughed extremely hard and ran out of work.

7. When our boss came into the office to ask for a word in English and started doing an impression of a rabid dog in front of us.

8. When you have a cleaning day once a year and it is appropriate to come in wearing old clothes and a cloth wrapped around your head (and a face-mask of course for dust).

9. When the monks come into the office for a Khmer New Year blessing – one spends the whole time on his phone and then burps whilst he’s praying.

10. When we were fake crying because we didn’t want to leave the job and our boss joined in, so we had a communal ‘waaaaaa’.

12. When you’re leaving your job and your presents consist of a silver plate stamped with Angkor Wat and some awful t-shirts, ‘specially selected’ for us, that barely fit!

I’m really going to miss this place!

Khmer New Year – Visiting a Friends' ‘Homeland’

Cambodian’s call their place of birth and family home their homeland. Ella and I were lucky enough to be invited to one such homeland over Khmer New Year – one of the most important holidays to Cambodian people. This year it has become the year of the snake and everyone was very excited. There was a mass exodus from the city at the beginning of the holiday and you get a full 3 days off work (or more) so why not get out of the city for a while?

Our friend Pheakna works for a partner organisation, Skateistan, who teach skateboarding and other skills to underprivileged children whilst training local youth workers to become youth leaders in their communities. We also took one of the girls from our shelter, who couldn’t go home over New Year. His homeland was only 30 kilometres out of Phnom Penh, but it felt a lot further and completely different to the fast paced city life. I certainly managed to fit in well, having a nap on the second day from 8-9.30am after we had to get up at 6am to go to the market. And there were plenty of other times available for naps if desired.

The house was a traditional Cambodian house; all made of wood, with a lower open, communal area and the main upper room on stilts. They had quite a big garden full of mango trees and a working pump for all their water needs (including for the bucket toilet and shower – nice and cold!) There were the usual chickens roaming around and thankfully their cockerel was not very good at his job, so didn’t wake us up at 5am – although the gecko on our wall did a good job at around 3am.

On arrival we went to three other houses in the village to meet relatives and just some other members of the community who welcomed us in. We met a lot of small children singing Gangnam Style and babies, including one who had ears bigger than Ella. What fascinated people most was our noses which they loved (as they are so huge) and also wanted to swop our skin for theirs. They were very excited about Ella’s sun cream and she left it with them, explaining that it is not whitening but simply protects you from the sun and getting burnt.

The village celebrations for Khmer New Year were all held at the Pagoda. On both evenings from about 4pm they had a love band with many singers who continued on till about 11pm. Everyone joined in the traditional dancing which was done around an offering of fruit and drinks. It was a lively atmosphere with lots of young people dressed up in smart clothes (as well as one man in a women’s dress!) The dancing is quite slow paced with a lot of intricate hand movements, but it’s quite easy to pick up the dance steps as it is repetitive.

During the day the main ceremony at the Pagoda consists of making offerings to the Buddha and to the monks and elderly. We went with Pheakna’s auntie, cousin and her daughter, who brought a three-tiered food holder to offer to the monks and elderly. We sat in the beautifully painted main hall for a while which had many decorations and a happy atmosphere. Next, we went to offer rice, you put a spoonful of rice in each receptacle along a row on one side and pray at the end. When you turn back, there were slots for money on the other side and most people put in 100 riel into each one (about 2.5p). On the other side there was a golden Buddha statue which you would pour water over to make a blessing. The last activity was to take a bowl of little stones (gravel) and pour them on sand piles which had incense sticks burning in them. You threw a handful on each one as you went around and some people put money and said prayers at each one. There was a lovely atmosphere with music, many children, balloon sellers and happy monks.

On our trip to the market we picked out two live fish (very large) from the basin and then the woman would knock it on the head to kill it, de-scale it in front of you, with pieces flying everywhere and then gut it a bit – BUT the guts would go in the bag too. Cambodians will eat these parts too and the inside of the head – a fin doesn’t scare them either. It made for a delicious dinner though and seemed a better option than the chicken with heads and feet still on, which would touch the other meat and people would just grab it for a while and carry on. Not the hygiene standards of a supermarket but pretty fun.

The final experience I will tell you about is when we had a few beers with the uncles in the afternoon, one of them made a beer snack of fried chicken, which included the feet to chew on (as you can’t eat rice when you drink beer). Many other people popped in and out for a beer, including a very drunk man with his top off and had white paint on his face. He stumbled about for a bit and then attempted to wash off the paint, but failing to do so, stumbled out of the grounds again. They all found it as hilarious as we did and we were just glad we were not drinking rice wine as we may have been worried it was the effect of the alcohol otherwise! 

Top 5 things to do in Phnom Penh when you aren't a tourist

1. Go to Olympic Stadium at sunset – there is an amazing view from there and it is a hive of activity with people doing aerobics all across the top of the stadium with big speakers at each station booming music. People walk/run around the circumference on the seating area and there are groups of guys playing volleyball, football and tennis. At the top there are plenty of refreshments including sugar cane juice, fried banana and fresh mango. Also, go swimming in the Olympic pool as well, it is lovely and you will make instant friends with Cambodian children. I often started spontaneous swimming lessons. There are also very high diving boards which are fun to jump off!

2. Make friends with your local noodle man/coffee man. It is easy to become a regular customer of the local noodle place near your work and you soon become part of the family regardless of the language barrier. They will even start getting shocked if you go somewhere else for lunch or if you don’t finish your food, suggesting that you don’t like it anymore. Our local is Lucky Family restaurant who do great noodles with Taro spring rolls which I think I am slightly addicted to. We became friends with their son, who speaks very good English and we took him swimming and on a night out with us.

3. Sit by the pool during your lunch break. Yes, you are in a tropical climate but you don’t often get to appreciate it in a big city. While most of your colleagues are having a nap, go to a nice pool to get a bit of a tan and relax. The Place gym is preferable as it has many sun loungers with constant sun and it’s the best gym in town!

4. Get your nails done at the market. There are plenty of nail parlours for tourists at a premium (well for residents) price. If you venture deep into your local market you find much cheaper places for a no nonsense mani-pedi. You can even get amazing nail art done for under a dollar. (Yes I have had penguins, Irish flags and pink sparkly nails to name a few). Whilst you are there, go down to the food area and grab a quick lunch. There are little noodle stalls with plastic chairs to perch on – just be careful of dried blood, heart and intestine floating in your soup – not for the faint hearted.

5. Go to the expat bars instead of the touristy ones – this way they are a lot cheaper and a lot more fun! You do get to know pretty much everyone in town so these are the places you will bump into them and get pretty drunk. You may not be lucky enough to get a Pontoon VIP card for free entry and reduced drinks prices but you can always hope. If you are out and about on street 51 make sure you get drunk and then go to Katy Perry’s Pizza before you stumble home – it is immense even when sober and I’ve been to a house party where they stationed themselves in the garden. Epic.

What to expect on a Cambodian work trip

I want to tell you about some of the things that happen when I go to the provinces with work. I have been on two of these trips now, seven days in total and I will try and give you an idea of all the interesting things that happen, in no particular order. It is really quite hard to represent some of these situations, but I will try to represent them here as accurately as possible to give you an idea.

The roads – on average I found that you would almost run over three cows per day and perhaps one dog. The chickens often came close, but wouldn't really venture out onto the road. The cows sort of lazily stroll across the road, oblivious to the huge trucks overloaded with potatoes or other heavy goods.

The next challenge on the roads was the surface, or lack of. At certain points the tarmac would disappear as you drove along, creating large red dust clouds which make it very difficult to see. If you are unlucky enough not to have air-con (we didn’t for our first trip) this results in you having to have the windows down and therefore inhaling plenty of dust. Face masks are a compulsory counterpart on any out-of-city trip. At some points we were thrown to the roof of the truck, whilst flying over bumps in the road – or craters! The road works that pop up along the way divert you onto the side of the road, with very little room for two-way traffic and in some cases a very steep camber with a pool of water 20 feet below.

Another safety issue is the close shaves. The main roads have one lane of traffic in each direction, which means there is a lot of overtaking. However, this issue is made more complicated by the continuous stream of motorbikes and other possible traffic such as horse carts, weird tractor type vehicles and often school children on bikes. As a 4x4 speeds past to overtake a large truck, the truck swerves out to avoid a cyclist or some such, all whilst the on-coming traffic is in a similar position of overtaking, leading to a very close shave – as nobody wants to give in. All vehicles beep their horn in this situation, to make everyone else they are aware they are there, which doesn’t help at all. I was sharply in-taking my breath quite regularly, especially on the earlier trips, but you sort of get used to it.

Overloading – pretty much every vehicle is overloaded. You would not believe how many people and items will fit on one moped. Luggage can really be way over the sides with about four passengers behind the driver. Then there are the trucks which are packed full of produce, the boots are often open to allow for produce hanging out the back and the roofs are off to keep piling stuff in, on top. There can then be people even higher, teetering over the edge. The minibuses are jam-packed full of people, sitting on top of each other, with chickens and there are regularly mopeds tied onto the back. I even saw a moped hanging off the back with a woman sat on it, effectively not even in the minibus at all – incredible!

The overloading leads me on to when we were following a sugar cane truck that was so overloaded that every bump in the road (frequent) would lead to a stick of sugar cane falling off the back. Our truck and another car ended up doing a yo-yo of picking up sugar cane, then driving past them whilst they picked up the next one, and then grabbing the next lot. It was pretty hilarious, with shouting out the window, motorbike drivers getting involved and a lot of running about chasing sugar cane for about 20 minutes.

Khmer Meetings with government officials – Everyone fumbles about over where to sit and chairs are moved around, it seems aimlessly. It can often begin with awkward silence and then formal introductions, give an explanation of what they are doing, statistics and how good they are. Everyone’s phone will ring at least once with a garish ringtone and they will answer the call. Cover their mouth but made no difference, this includes if they were the person currently speaking during the meeting, or translating! Everyone would start to get anxious if the meeting ran into lunch or dinner time, which can be as extensive as 11.30am to 2pm.

Trip to Siem Reap - 5th-7th Feb

With the money we raised on Global Giving for the safe shelter at CWDA we were able to take a trip to Siem Reap so that the girls could visit the cultural epicentre of Cambodia and to enable them to understand more of their heritage. None of the girls had ever been before and it was clear from all their faces that they enjoyed themselves!

We arrived in Siem Reap at 3pm and checked into the two guesthouses where we were staying. Thirty-six of us went on the trip and we were all excited to discover the wonderful city. After we had settled in, we went to the Phnom Bakheng Mountain to watch the sunset and to have dinner on the hilltop.

The next morning we woke up early to visit the beautiful Phnom Kulen Mountain and waterfall. The mountain has a major symbolic importance for Cambodians, as it was the birthplace of the ancient Khmer Empire. The line of market stalls led to the impressive stairs heading up the mountain, with beautiful statues on either side. Once at the top there were many statues and areas of worship, it seemed very majestic especially as there were local musicians playing traditional Cambodian music. We took off our shoes and hiked up the final staircase to see the giant Buddha and spectacular views of the area. Many people lit incense and encircled the giant Buddha, to pay their respects and reached out to touch his face.

After this visit we went back down the stairs and across to the waterfall for lunch. The waterfall was lively with people splashing about and playing in the water. We ate lunch by some temple ruins and enjoyed a swim afterwards.

We then drove back down the mountain and towards Siem Reap to visit the wonderful temple of Banteay Srei. This temple is renowned for some of the most exquisite carvings of all the temples and it definitely did not disappoint. It also has a lovely hue as it was mainly formed out of red sandstone. Returning to the hostel, we prepared dinner and had a well-deserved rest. We enjoyed the facilities of the hostel, playing pool and a large game of hide-and-seek.

Bright and early on Thursday we went straight to visit Angkor Wat to take advantage of the cooler air and to beat the mid-morning rush of tourists. The temple was magnificent and we walked all around, taking in the atmosphere. We climbed right to the top for the breath-taking view and well-preserved statues. Many of the statues around the temples are headless due to periods of raids and looting. However, Angkor Wat has been preserved well and it is a symbol of Cambodia, appearing on the national flag. We enjoyed an ice-cream after the temple and got back on the bus.

We drove to the West Baray Lake to enjoy lunch in the lovely huts on the lake front. We then went for a lovely swim with rubber rings and we could barely get the girls to leave when it was time to get back on the bus.

We then headed back to Phnom Penh with some very satisfied and sleepy customers. The trip was wonderful and incredibly successful. It would not have been possible without your support and it is definitely something the girls will not forget for a very long time.

To donate money to the girls’ safe shelter at CWDA, please follow this link: http://www.globalgiving.org/projects/safe-shelter-cambodia/ to donate in dollars, or http://www.globalgiving.co.uk/projects/safe-shelter-cambodia/ to donate in pounds sterling.

Visit to SMILE village

This week I went to visit Sala village where the SMILE (Supporting Maternal and Child Healthcare and Building Literate Communities) project is in action. The village has 413 people made up of 101 families. The project organises a meeting for the women in the community once a month for them to learn about maternal and child care and to improve their literacy skills. They each receive a pack with a SMILE text book and other resources they need for the course. The teachers are members of the community who are trained at CWDA workshops to give them the ability to teach at the SMILE sessions.

Today’s meeting was the 4^th out of 75 classes. The teacher welcomed everyone to the session, which included the chief of village who said a few words afterwards. The chief of SGK women’s affairs also attended and talked for a while about health issues.

The main part of the session was held and afterwards they allowed me to ask a few questions, with the help of Phanna (the director of CWDA) who translated. I asked them what the most important thing they had learnt was at the workshops. They stated that there were three key points they found the most important. Firstly, that they would be able to become literate; they all aspired to being able to read and write. Secondly, to learn how to look after their families when they were ill; especially older members. Thirdly, that they would become less susceptible to violence due to their increased awareness and confidence. I also asked them if they enjoyed attending the sessions. They all said yes in unison and laughed whilst saying that they always arrive early in anticipation of the class. This is really saying something in Cambodia when no-one turns up on time and everything starts later than planned.

The deputy of the commune also arrived at the end to say a few words. He told them that a doctor was going to visit to explain to the women about the causes and complications of rheumatism, as it seemed to be a problem in the village.  It marked a real sense of community and togetherness having so many reputable people from the community attend the session. Afterwards, I went with Phanna to take a closer look at the beautiful 6-month old twins and she showed me the village water supply which was a stream just the other side of the road.

It was a very interesting visit and I hope to see more projects in the future.

Here is the website link if you would like more information: http://www.pub22.net/cwda/community-self-prevention-against-trafficking-of-women-and-children-program-cspatwc/people

The Sights and Sounds of December in Phnom Penh

I want to tell you a few stories from my observations in PP – and yes I can call it that now as I am an official resident in a lovely apartment! I even cooked my first meal with Cambodian produce and bought myself a dragon fruit!

Outdoor photography exhibition on the riverfront

I have now had three skate-boarding lessons with some of the girls at the NGO Skateistan’s skate park. I was a little bit bruised and very sweaty after as it is so humid in the compound – one of the instructors we find very mysterious as he wears a face mask the entire time but is great at skate-boarding! He also teaches them Thai-kwon-do afterwards which is very impressive!

Thai-kwon-do at the skate-park

Weddings here are held on the street, so quite randomly, a large pink tent will be erected, filling the whole width of the street and blocking all the traffic. The festivities go on for a few days. One was set up near my hostel – I could see it from my window. Food stalls were set up at the end of the street to feed the guests and it looked like fun. However, it wasn’t so fun waking up to the chanting and prayers at 5am in the morning – thankfully that only went on for one day!

Another day when I left my hostel, there were young boys running around the entrance; one banging a drum whilst the others ran around with a dragon costume.

Teaching the staff English has become one of my favourite things to do. It is very entertaining as they are all so sweet and happy to learn. I have them a test to see what level they were at, and I got a lot of; ‘teacher, teacher, it’s too hard, too hard!’ They basically just discussed the test aloud and asked me questions, but they all tried hard so it was fine.

One evening, we went to Dreamland, the permanent amusement park in Phnom Penh. It was actually quite a big place and there were plenty of rides. We picked the ‘extreme’ ticket, so you pay on entry and go on all the extreme rides as many times as you like. Although we were sad this meant we had to go on only the stomach-churning rides, we somehow were allowed onto the carousel! As there wasn’t many people around, they let you stay on the rides for quite a while, which did leave your stomach turning after 10 minutes on the pirate-ship. My favourite was Apollo where you were locked in a cage and sent flying the whole way round – they kept you upside down for a fair while so you got a serious head-rush! It was all pretty safe – apart from the slightly unsafe dodgems where Ella scraped her knee. We heard a story later on where a girl was jolted out of one and was electrocuted as she hit the floor – she survived but it’s pretty shocking!

Apollo - I rode on it twice!

On the way back to work from the UN Women call for funds meeting, I rode on the back of my boss’ motorbike – I feel like we bonded a little bit as we flew around the streets.

With work we had the annual board meeting with all the staff and board members; it was quite interesting apart from the fact most of it was held in Khmer (Cambodian language) which left us sort of staring into space. They reviewed all the projects and spoke about the main achievements and difficulties. I gave a short speech on what the volunteers have done and what we are planning to do, which everyone seemed pleased with. The debate over the terms used in the strategy dragged on a bit and became very confusing between Khmer and English, but hopefully we will sort that out! We had a nice buffet lunch after in the courtyard.

Today I went to look for birthday cards and saw that some wedding invitation cards were spelt ‘invetation’ – just one example of the spelling errors all around the place.

Another amusing sign

We went out for a meal for a leaving party the other night, it was the most expensive meal I’ve had yet and happened to be the first one that made me sick… I think I will stick to the street food!

At riverside, I saw a motorbike with a basket straddled across the back with pigs and piglets inside, I tried not to think about the fact they were probably off to the slaughter house.

There was a slight Christmassy spirit around with Christmas trees in some shops and hotels and Christmas outfits and decorations on sale. It doesn’t have the same feel as the UK though and Ella has been doing an official countdown in the office and we play some Christmas tunes – but I feel like I could almost miss it by accident! Luckily I am taking the week off to go down to the coast for Christmas and New Year… I will post about that when I’m back!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!! Here is our work Christmas card – can you spot me?