Weekday volunteers turn into weekend tourists

COUNTRY: Cambodia
PROGRAM: UniBreak
PROJECT: Community Healthcare & Teaching
WRITTEN BY: Emily Miller

Well if someone told me two weeks would be done and dusted in the blink of an eye I definitely wouldn’t have believed them. Today marks two weeks for us Aussie girls. Personally I feel like I haven’t done anything memorable as of yet but there is still two weeks to go and don’t we have a lot planned.

I promised an update on our weekend adventures from last weekend, so here it is. Imagine waking up at four in the morning after a full week of work and having to ride 7km in the dark with just a single head torch. May I add thanks dad for being the bright one and telling me ‘you never know darl you might need it!’ well I definitely don’t know how I would have done the ride to the temples without it! As a group along with Dayvy we did a 17km bike ride for bike4kids. The ride was spectacular, we got to ride around most of the main temples and sneak in a few pictures along the way.

We decided to dedicate our weekend to doing the temples over two days. Day one we were able to fit in Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom and a sunset ride down the mountain on an elephant who was 55 years old, doing pretty good for his age I would say! For the second day we hired a tuk tuk driver to take us around. We did some shopping at the market where we each purchased paintings done by a man, and visited Bayon and the temple where Tomb Raider was made. By the end of the two days we were exhausted yet full of awe from witnessing first hand one of the wonders of the world.

Now you would think any normal group would go home and rest up for the week of all those adventures, well you thought wrong. We managed to store a little bit of energy to complete a traditional Khmer cooking class. Definitely something I recommend for any tourist or future volunteer going to Cambodia to do. It was amazing to get a firsthand look at how everything is made. And mums out there if you’re anything like my mum she’s expecting me to bring the recipes home and cook for her, something that is very rare for me.
The week went well for all of us, on Monday we attended the child protection workshop at concert.

The day may have been long but we each learnt a lot from it and it was really eye opening. Each morning Amanda and I complete a health promotion class for the males while Sasha and Rachael complete a health promotion class for the females. The classes are going well, we all had hoped for a lot more people to attend but you work with what you’ve got and hope the word spreads. We also started house evaluations this week which I personally was really looking forward to. It was fantastic to gain a better understanding of how these people live and find ways in which we can help.

The English classes are going along fantastic, the kids are amazing and so willing to learn. This week we focused on food, body parts, and days of the week. On Thursday because it wasn’t a compulsory school and numbers were low we decided to join classes and incorporate a craft lesson to help get the kids active. The class ran really well. Overall the week was a success.

This weekend we are off to Phnom Penh for a bumpy six hour bus ride followed by a day at S21, the Killing Fields and a sneaky little shop at the Russian markets. Stay tuned because I have a surprise for you all next week, I hope you have strong stomachs!