COUNTRY: Borneo & Cambodia
PROGRAM: GapBreak
PROJECT: Building & Conservation
WRITTEN BY: Eva Reda
Greetings family and friends, and hello one final time, this time from Cambodia! Once again the volunteer team was beginning a new adventure, that of being TEAM CAMBODIA 2012! Excitingly, we welcomed five new international volunteers to the group from the October Borneo gappers. And once again we were in a new and foreign country. That meant a whole new language, currency, culture, countryside, and people to get acquainted with. Quite a task to be getting on with, but one which we undertook with great pleasure.
Upon arrival in Cambodia, there was no time for holidaying - it was straight to work for the volunteers! Camp Beng Melea was situated 1.5 hours from Siem Reap, in Cambodia's west. Essentially a smaller version of Tinangol, it included longhouse accommodation, eco-friendly compost toilets, communal living/dining area, a very loud generator (electricity from 6 - 9pm only!) and a fantastic countryside view. As a welcome to the camp, we received a good-luck blessing from one of the local Buddhist monks, and were taken to see the ruins of nearby Beng Melea temple - a surreal and somewhat haunting place that was once again being reclaimed by nature, and was great for exploration!
Our volunteer project work was based in a local primary school, where we worked on building a temporary classroom so that the existing ones could be renovated and repaired. General consensus was that it was probably the most trying work we'd done to date - with 6am wake up calls, long hours, and relentless sun all day (shade remained elusive, unfortunately). However, the international volunteers truly got a measure of how much hard work pays off during our time here. We started our three week stay with a basic frame, and by the time we left we had the ground elevated and levelled most of the framework done, and more than half the thatched roof completed. Go team! As side projects, the volunteers also worked on building a small kitchen building out of bricks, and assisted the local Buddhist monks in building a new library/housing facility. By the end of our three weeks, camp had become a home - we were sad to say our goodbyes to it, as well as the constantly-smiling camp manager Han and his sidekicks (hehe) - the mischevious Pheaktra, and 'Flowers' (the literal translation of his name into English).
Weekends, however, were spent sight-seeing. The volunteers’ first tourist stop in Cambodia was Siem Reap. This quaint little town was an instant hit within the group, it had it all - huge markets, fine (and super cheap) dining, a hotel with a pool, massage parlours, and an entire street devoted to nightlife (accurately named 'Pub Street'), as well as being home to the famous temples of Angkor. We got to spend an entire day exploring these amazing structures, and were awed by the intricacy of the decoration and the complexity of the architecture displayed by these ancient people, not to mention the huge scale of the buildings at a time when the logistics of carting vast amounts stone from the countryside would've been incredibly difficult. We also visited the floating villages on Tonle Sap lake, which was basically a society made up of boats - house boats, shop boats, fishing boats, even boats with small gardens on them. What a way of life!
On our second weekend, the volunteer group undertook a six hour bus-ride (via the bumpiest road possible) south, to the capital city, Phnom Penh. Admittedly it didn't hold the charms of Siem Reap; it was kind of smelly, loud and dirty. However, the city was rich in cultural history, in which we spent a day immersing ourselves. The first stop on our tour was the National Museum which housed many artefacts salvaged from the temples, followed by a visit to the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda - unfortunately most of the palace was closed in mourning for the recent death of the King.
The second half of the day took a more sombre turn, as the volunteers learnt about the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge during the civil war. We visited S-21, the security facility where people considered to be political enemies were tortured until they confessed to committing fictional crimes against Pol Pot's regime. We walked through the killing fields, a green and peaceful place where only thirty years ago 20,000 people needlessly lost their lives because of one man's paranoia. Their bones still surface in the mass graves when it rains.
These people were ordinary civilians. They were men, women and children. This happened only recently - it may even have occurred during your lifetime. Genocide still exists, and it's horrifying.
As our journey drew to an end, the international volunteers were simultaneously sad and excited. Sad to be leaving the wonderful friends we'd made and return to boring old normality, and excited to be seeing our loved ones once again (not to mention having all the luxuries of first world living - clean toilets and warm showers, here we come!). On our final night we celebrated with dinner and drinks as a group, and in the morning all woke up to say our sad (and occasionally tearful) final goodbyes. Some of the group went home, whilst some of the group continued their journey through south-east Asia. At any rate, our volunteering group adventure was finally over. Over the last three months we'd learnt things, made friends, worked hard, partied just as hard, saw amazing sights, and had an amazing time of it.
Whilst I'm here, I just want to say some thank yous. Thank you to all our wonderful and amazing camp managers and in-country staff, for organizing, transporting and keeping us safe. Thank you to Lucy, Ellaina and everyone at Antipodeans for giving us this fantastic opportunity. And especially thank you to Amy, Aniella, Ashlee, Atty, Beth, Brigid, Dan C, Dan G, Emily, Gaby, Hannah, Jahaira, Kayleigh, Liz, Natalie, Nicole, Paige, Olivia, Olivier, Rupert, Sacha, Sam, Steven and Tom for becoming my family-away-from-home, and for being there in good times and in rough ones. You are all truly beautiful people, and I'm so glad I met each and every one of you.
If anyone reading this is contemplating whether to take a gap year - do it. It'll be the experience of a life time, and one you'll never forget.
For the last time, this is Eva Reda signing off for blog #7, Camp Cambodia 2012. Take care, and thanks for reading!
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