Hello Kandal Province

DAY 7: HOUSES ON STILTS, SQUAT TOILETS AND A HOARSE COCKEREL

Woke up at the crack of dawn for a 7am departure only for the bus to be delayed.  Eventually 11 people plus all our kit and resources (10 bags in total!) piled into a 8 seater mini bus ready for a 2 hour journey to the Province.  Grateful for the rest, most of the team fell straight asleep meaning we were blissfully unaware of the two detours en route to Kandal.   Upon arrival we found our new home for the next 5 nights to be a room on stilts (to avoid frequent floods) with squat toilet and splash bath (rain water with a saucepan!).  The floor of the room was made of narrow bamboo like slats with clearly visible gaps between them to the ground below – needless to say we were pretty nervous about walking on them!

After a lunch of ginger chicken and rice, we were off to training at the nearby school.  Just before we left however we were roped in to help push the minibus which had decided to give up the ghost and stop working.  After an unsuccessful rescue effort, we carried on towards our first English teaching session.  Initially we were expecting 20 girls, but we were all genuinely shocked to see 109 faces waiting for lessons!!!  

GOLD training prevailed and we divided the team and resources to teach two separate classes.  Katie and Emma took the younger class aged roughly between 4 – 11 year olds whilst Millie, Nikki and Rachel worked with the older class of 11 – 17 year olds.  Classes went well as the kids were eager to show off what English they had already mastered by reciting their ABCs and 123s.  Time flew by and soon it was the end of the day.

The sun set early (around 6pm)giving us only one precious hour to wrestle with our mosquito nets and DEET it up ready for our first night in our new rural settings.  Noises throughout the night were very animated and ranged from dog fights to bugs and a rather poorly sounding cockerel! 

DAY 8 : IT'S WARM!

Woke up early at 5.45am to get ready for teaching at 7am.  however we arrived a little late to find even more children waiting for us (139 today!) waiting for us but we felt more prepared and cracked on with teaching.  Topics included colours, basic conversations and recapping the material from the previous day. 

Lunchtime provided a Sarah who arrived carrying maoam, union jack pants and looking rather clean!  She quickly joined Emma and Katie with the younger class in the afternoon session.

The afternoon flew by and kids confidence starting to grow and both classes joined together for the final 30 mins to sing actions songs with Funky Chicken being the hit of the day!

The splash shower could be resisted no more as Nikki and Emma were the first to brave the rain water bucket shower!  Squeals could be heard for miles around!!!

DAY 9: LUEN! LUEN! (FASTER! FASTER!)

Arriving at school today we were greeted by yet more children (143!!).  Singing songs like Pizza Hut went down a storm with the younger class especially the "Harry Potter" glasses.  Teaching was again successful with all agreeing that they learnt something new and they enjoyed the songs.

After teaching our interpreter took us to an unfinished local temple to see some huge fish.  The journey consisted of borrowing push bikes from random villagers along the way, some lacked brakes and all lacked oil.  We were followed by lots of children and parents brought their children outside to wave at us.  The temple was beautiful with detailed painted ceilings and walls and stunning carvings throughout.  On the journey back, Rachel fell into a bush whilst stationary….make of that what you will!

Dinner was another local rice based dice and we shared the delights of a team mosquito net which slept all of us with a squeeze.

Having a great time, loving the teaching!  Lots of GOLDen love Team Cambodia xxx