Post
Production/Safe Haven Project Blogs
January 2010
22 hours of traveling
seems a LOT longer when you can’t drink
As usual the countdown to leaving for Cambodia involves a
lot of scrambling, last minute packing and good old fashion swearing.
While I careened my jeep around Rose Bowl detours in Pasadena in an
effort to get Cher and I to all the last minute stops we have to make, my little
sister clutched the side of the door, eyed me warily and announced if she wanted
to be involved in a crash – she’d much prefer to take her chances on the back of
a moto in Cambodia. By five o’clock,
the car service was in the driveway, Cher was still in the shower and I was
randomly tossing items into my suitcase that may or may not come in handy but I
no longer had time to weigh the pros and cons of its inclusion.
I’ll fess up that I was dreading the flight just tiny bit.
Okay, maybe more than that.
My job requires constant travel and under most circumstances I can keep my deep
seeded fear of flying in check. (Though my sister would be quick to point out
that bad weather and propeller planes reduce me to a babbling pile of terror –
what can I say? I have an aversion
to turbulence and traipsing about the sky in a child’s wind up toy) During long
flights, I am aided by the smiling flight attendants and their never ending
supply of wine and scotch in little plastic cups.
However, due to a pesky little lung infection I picked up as a souvenir
in Cambodia last summer, I am still stuck on antibiotics and therefore cannot
drink. There’s no doubt about it.
These 22 hours are going to suck.
Cher apparently agrees because she pushing pharmaceuticals
at me like Mary Poppins on crack.
She dives into her bag and comes up with a pillbox with an assortment of
options. “I only have one valium”
she muses. “Maybe I’ll just take it and sleep so you don’t drive me crazy
clutching the arm rests the whole way.”
I am sure there was a snappy retort to be made but I am trying not to
look at her display screen, which is currently set to “pilot’s view.”
Cher thinks its great fun to watch the plane hurl down the runway and
take off. I find it utterly
disturbing and am not reassured by the giant white arrows pointing THIS WAY in
case the pilot was unsure what direction he is suppose to go.
I close my eyes and try to meditate through the sounds of Bing Crosby
telling me to have myself a Merry Little Christmas though the Thai Air
loudspeakers.
This is my 3rd trip to Cambodia in just 9
months. I could never have imagined
while filming my documentary Small Voices, that Cambodia would become such a
permanent part of my life. And while
that project is finished, another one has sprung up to take its place.
Last spring, while in Siem Reap I met a young boy with Cerebral Palsy
named Sum Namg. This sweet boy was
unable to move on his own, his life limited to the four walls of his crib with
no chance for his bright, inquisitive mind to be challenged and given the
opportunity to grow. His situation
was representative of the challenges and issues facing handicap children in
Cambodia. I worried over what his
future held and suspected I knew – a drastically shortened life expectancy.
To make matters worse, the orphanage where he was being cared for was
only able to support and shelter him until he was six years old.
After which he would be sent back to the village he was born, despite the
fact his parents were dead. Together
with my friend Hasan, we began to search for a safe place for Sum Namg to live.
Somewhere his special needs would be met and an opportunity for education
at his own pace. And we pretty much
came up with nothing. Frustrated, I
decided to deal with the short term first and dragged my sister Cher to Cambodia
in August. And by ‘dragged’ I mean I plied her with pictures of Sum Namg and his
situation and then simply sat back as she charged forward full stream ahead,
only occasionally pausing to see if I was still behind her.
Cher is a CP specialist and if anyone could access the situation and
develop a plan for improving little Sum Namg’s quality of life – she could.
After only one week of working with him – his progress suggested an
entirely different future if only he had a place to flourish.
Over dinner one night with my friend John Whaley, an
amazing guy who heads the board of CFI (The Coalition For Financial
Independence) in Siem Reap, we decided if a place didn’t exist, then we’d simply
have to build one. Thus the concept
of Safe Haven was born: An educational and therapeutic live in school for
handicap children. I’ve discovered
that building a school in a developing country is a lot like making a movie.
It requires an exceptional crew, a lot of money, and nothing ever goes
according to script.
My attention in Cambodia remains firmly divided between the
Safe Haven project and my Small Voices kids and the first part of this trip is
as always, dedicated to spending time with them.
Cher and I land in Phnom Penh and I’m eager to get to the hotel and go
find my sweet little Lina, the street wise 6 year old I met while she was
begging on the streets with her brother Charam when she was 2 and he was “12”.
(Charam told me he was 12 for nearly 3 years so I’ve never been sure how
old he actually is. These days he
looks around 14 or 15, so I suspect he was really 10).
Cher is pleasantly surprised at the weather.
There are 3 seasons in Cambodia: Very Very Hot and Humid; Very Very Hot
and Humid with Heavy Rain and Very Hot.
In January – the height of tourist season – it is simply Very Hot and
Humid.
Very soon we are checked into our hotel- The Quay – a new
place on the riverfront. It boasts a chic roof top restaurant, occasionally
reliable Internet in the room and the world’s smallest elevator that doesn’t
have a safety mechanism on the door.
A fact we discover when they slam shut on Cher and she is leaping inside.
In short order, we have unpacked, changed and sallied forth into the
streets of Phnom Penh to hail a Tuk Tuk to take us to Azazi’s Place – the school
Lina has been living at since I enrolled her there last August. For the first
time since I met my little artful dodger living on the streets of Phnom Penh, I
arrive in Cambodia knowing exactly where she is.
Normally, the first part of my visit has always been spent searching the
alleys and abandon pagoda buildings for her, seeking out her latest place she
had found to curl up and call “home.”
Sometimes I was successful and sometimes I was not – each search filled
with apprehension about her safety and tremendous relief when I would discover
her, usually filthy and sporting fresh scars from her harsh life.
We arrive at Azazi’s Place and find Lina in tears.
She has just hurt herself playing and has worked herself into a state of
unhappiness as only a 6 year old can.
I pick her up and comfort her and she sits quietly in my arms for a few
minutes, tucking her head under my chin.
However, we are armed with presents and her previous hurt is soon
forgotten. I have printed her a
digital photography book filled with pictures of her and her brother Charam and
myself and she delights in each page, pointing us out and saying out names.
Then it is on to the box of Disney Princess miniature figurines and she
surprises Cher and I by knowing who Cinderella is.
But the big hit of the day is the Disney View master.
Lina is absolutely delighted with the “magic” of looking through the
Viewfinder and seeing scenes from different movies.
She looks at each picture, exclaims in delight and then slaps the
Viewfind against my face to show me what she is seeing.
And I am suspecting Azazi’s Place has a few Disney Movies on hand because
she loudly says “BOOBOO and MEEEEKKK” and then whaps me with Viewfinder so I can
see Boo and Mike, the monsters from Monsters, Inc.
Cher is busy teaching the other kids at Aziza’s how to make braided
bracelets and we pass a wonderful afternoon that ends all to quickly.
I kiss Lina goodbye and promise to be back to visit her tomorrow.
She carefully gathers up her dolls, View master and photo book and puts
them into a small box. Balancing her
box on her head, she tromps up the stairs towards her bedroom to store her
treasures in her closet, just like any other 6 year old.
Safe, loved and the future bright with possibilities: I watch her walk
away. It has been a long time
coming.
The Walls Of My Hotel Room Are Feeling
Frisky
My sister is very chipper in the morning.
I am not. As I groggily open
my eyes and start to come to terms with the fact that I must eventually give in
to coherency, Cher skips about the room like Pollyanna.
“Breakfast?” she chirps at me as I try to pry my eyeballs open.
I stagger out of bed and pause when I hear what sounds suspiciously like
bed springs creaking. Now I have
stayed in enough hotels to recognize certain things and for a brief moment, it
appears someone has more energy this morning than even my sister.
But then I notice a peculiar look on her face.
The bedsprings squeak again, but this time as a result of Cher leaning on
the wall. We look at each other,
reach out and start poking the wall of our hotel room.
“Squeak, Squeak, Squeak.” It
is disturbing pliant to the touch and has an amorous language.
How romantic.
Feeling more awake and perhaps a bit frisky myself, Cher,
Karen and I decide to walk to Fresco, my favorite café for breakfast.
Karen is one of my oldest friends.
We’ve known each other since we were toddlers and went to high school
together. Both of us live lives far
from the small town we grew up in.
Mine takes me all over the country and the world and her life as a teacher in
international schools has taken her from Spain to China.
We seldom are in the USA at the same time so we decided to meet up in
Phnom Penh for a few days. I’m
excited to be able to share a bit of my 2nd home with her.
The night before, she and her partner Gary had joined a group of my
friends for dinner and I looked about the table at our party of 9 and thought it
ironic to be enjoying an evening with old and new friends in a place so far from
where I started out.
While Gary has to return to China, Karen has extended her
stay for 2 days to tag along with me as I traipse about the city.
We finish breakfast and are eager to get going to CCF, the school where
many of my documentary kids now call home.
The plan, after a quick stop at the hotel, is to grab one of the many Tuk
Tuk’s vying for our business. Both
Karen and Cher are vastly amused that many of the Tuk Tuk and Moto drivers know
me by name. Trey, a driver Cher and
I used almost non stop back in August greets me with a warm smile and a
handshake. He shows off his shiny
new Tuk Tuk with fancy cushions and gold accents.
Cher wryly comments with all the money we gave him in August, he has
obviously upgraded his transportation.
I often suspect I over pay the Tuk Tuk drivers.
No wonder they are happy to see me return….
The best reintroduction happens outside the hotel.
I hear my name and turn expecting to see yet another Tuk Tuk driver I
have become familiar with in my years here in Phnom Penh.
But it turns out not to be not just any driver – it is Vantha.
When I was filming Small Voices, Vantha became our unofficial wingman.
For the entire shoot, he carted my crew, equipment and I around the city
acting as transportation, guide, unofficial advisor and Sherpa all rolled into
one. I have not seen Vantha since
the end of the shoot 2 years ago.
The hotel I used to stay in while filming had been sold and the new owners had
kicked Vantha and his Tuk Tuk out from the spot he occupied in the front and I
had no way to contact him. But there
he was – smiling and giving me a big hug – a gesture of familiarity I am sure
the other drivers on the street will gossip about for days.
Apparently a moto driver friend of his recognized me and sent word.
Vantha and I grin at each other.
I’ve found my driver for the week.
Within a short span of time we are at CCF and surrounded by
my kids. I have made each of them a
photo book and they are big hits.
The kids are eager to be able to bring them home to show their parents –
physical glimpses into their lives that they can share.
Layseng whispers in my ear that her parents are hoping I will be able to
visit them at their home in Stung Meanchy – the city dump and I promise I will
be there Saturday. They are my
extended family and Layseng’s mother has been ill.
I hope to be able to see what can be done to get her to a local clinic
while I am here.
All too soon, after a brisk game of football with Charam in
the yard, which serves to reminder me what an old lady I am, the kids have to
head to school and we find ourselves with some free time before we are due to
visit Lina. Chirpy Cher knows where
she wants to go and I have no objections – U and Me Spa for our $7 massages.
(Though I am absolutely NOT getting a full body scrub this trip after my
embarrassing ‘spa bra’ incident in August.”
As it turns out – a foot massage is a little more intimate
than I remember. As my massage
therapist is enthusiastically finding pressure points on my upper inner thigh –
I debate mentioning to her that my feet are not located anywhere in that
vicinity but opted to keep my mouth shut.
My Khmer isn’t that good.
Our indulgence has left us running behind schedule and we
hop in Vantha’s Tuk Tuk to head to visit Lina in the middle of rush hour
traffic. Let me provide you a visual
of rush hour in Phnom Penh. Take the
worst traffic you can imagine; add in a complete lack of lights and road rules;
sprinkle about 5000 motos carrying various dangerous objects sticking off the
back and sides and top it off with a dash of kids on bikes and hapless Western
pedestrians. Vantha whips his way in
and out of traffic. I am facing
forward and try not to let my face reflect the near accidents all around me.
Cher is recording with her Iphone.
“What are you doing?” I cautiously ask.
“Capturing the moments before our impending death.” She
replies. Karen starts to weigh in on
the situation but gestures a little to widely with her left hand and nearly
loses it to a moto. Said moto driver
is sporting a helmet per the new helmet law.
He doesn’t seem as concerned with his toddler sans helmet who is balanced
on the front handlebars.
We arrive at Aziza’s and Lina comes skipping over and hops
into my arms. Chaos turns to calm in
moments and she gives me an Eskimo kiss.
For this I would brave anything.
Having A One Night Sit In Cambodia
Vantha’s Tuk Tuk, which was in deplorable shape 2 years
ago, qualifies as a disaster waiting to happen today.
Its frame rattles with death throes as we lurch along, large tears in the
upholstery and a make shift automatic gas feeder that pretty much is an old gas
can duct taped to the side with a rubber hose running into the tank.
Each time we lurch to a stop, a thin stream of gasoline runs out from
underneath. Cher and I eye it warily
hoping the Tuk Tuk is not going to blow up.
But the gas has other ideas in store.
Apparently, while stopping at a roadside gasoline vendor to
buy a Fanta bottle of fuel, Vantha was the victim of ‘bad gas.’ Gas mixed with
water to make the supply go farther.
The result is an engine that begins to buck and vibrate like a Khmer line of
adult sex toys. The entire Tuk Tuk
is made of metal, so the situation is quite amplified.
Karen, whose seat in the front happens to be directly ABOVE the engine is
certainly getting the full effect.
She keeps shifting her position and finally tries to slouch down as far as
possible with her weight on her legs to keep from having too much contact with
the seat. And we are going nowhere
fast since the Tuk Tuk with its dodgy fuel is moving slower than a bicycle.
Which we know because they are passing us on the main road giving us
annoyed looks. We finally arrive at
our destination and Karen staggers off and collapses onto a wooden bench.
Cher asks if she needs a cigarette as Vantha heads off in search of
better gas.
Ah, just another day in Phnom Penh.
Cher is enjoying the balmy weather this time of year in Cambodia and
delights in showing off her armpits to me.
“Look!” she crows. “No sweat
stains! I don’t have to change shirts and shower three times a day AND!” she
stops to sniff herself. “I actually
smell pretty good!” Words to live
by.
It is our last day of relative leisure before the meetings
and visits to other organizations that deal with handicap children start in
earnest as part of the feasibility study I am doing for Safe Haven.
So we opted to spend time with the kids.
Cher is overly anxious to see Shrey Leap, the little talkative 6-year-old
Khmer girl who ran away with her heart on the last visit.
Cher became her sponsor and is excited to be back and fulfilling her
promise to visit again. She is
weighed down with coloring books, beads, crafts and a stuffed bunny.
We arrive at CCF 6 where Shrey Leap lives and goes to school.
It is a primary and kindergarten facility with over 100 children from
Stung Meanchy. They simply love
visitors and mob Karen, Cher and I the second we arrive.
Shrey Leap appears and hugs Cher tightly, wiping tears from her eyes.
She clutches her bunny and that is the last I see of both of them for
some time because 50 children pile on top of Cher and she disappears in a sea of
little lice covered people.
My attention is otherwise occupied when I spot Theary –a
little garbage picker I knew from Stung Meanchy who has apparently made it into
school! He comes over and I cover
him in kisses, a bit dismayed to see he has not grown at ALL since I saw him
over a year and a half ago. He,
however, loves school and proudly shows off his monkey dance skills with some
friends.
Then remembering that he loves football, we dig up a ball
which is mostly flat and worn through.
Making a mental note to buy a ball for them at market, we head outside.
Like the Pied Piper, I soon have attracted 15 little boys and within
minutes two goals are set up and I am in the middle of the Kindergarten Stung
Meancy World Cup. I have taken off
my shoes because they are all playing barefoot and I don’t want to step on them
and the cement is HOT in the sun.
The boys are suitably impressed with my soccer skills and I manage to last until
my team hits 10 points. I call a
Mercy Rule, but it is more mercy for my poor, overheated, huffing self than for
the other team. The kids ply me with
water and help me practice my Khmer.
I think I get a glimpse of Cher under a pile of nearby children. Karen has about
7 kids gathered around her looking at photos.
But the visit cannot last forever and the kids reluctantly say goodbye,
as they must get to afternoon class.
Shrey Leap hugs Cher tight and nods at the news we will be picking her up
tomorrow to visit the market so she can go shopping for some new clothes.
In short order, we have driven over the Stung Meanchy Day
Care which is just down the street.
We were hoping to see Channy. Channy
is the baby sister of Layseng, one of my documentary kids.
My honorary “niece” Christina has become her sponsor and we have pictures
and presents for her. Channy is
Shrey Leap’s best friend and will also be coming to the market tomorrow with us.
But we’ve just missed her – she has started 1st grade and
already left for school. Navy – the
head teacher is happy to see us again and we introduce her to Karen.
Navy is eager to show off the new medical building and talk to us about
the new maternal care program that has been implemented.
We get a detailed tour, which is very informative and will help us shape
some of the ideas for our own medical facility for Safe Haven.
I am excited to learn some of the young women at CCF 1 who are
approaching 18 are being trained as medical aids and then being employed in the
Maternal Care Program. Cher has a
great suggestion: Safe Haven could
use future CCF graduates who are trained in this field as well.
It is something to think about.
A group of dripping wet toddlers have just been scrubbed
down and dressed back into their newly washed clothes in preparation for their
return back home that afternoon to the village in the dump they call home.
They laugh and jump all over us.
Karen and I sit down and at least 7 kids, wet and lovable, all find spots
on our laps. They are needy in their
desire for affection and we are happy to oblige.
As it is Karen’s last night – she has a flight to China at
midnight – I take her and Cher to a traditional Khmer restaurant so we can have
the best of local cuisine. They both
opted to NOT try to Stirred Fried Red Ants or Crispy Tarantulas in Lime and
Chili Sauce but the meal is very enjoyable nonetheless.
Cher, who NEVER drinks, orders a Honey Martini with Fruit.
Now let me tell you about my sister drinking.
Normally, she may order a drink.
Then she takes one sip and decides she doesn’t like it.
Always. However, tonight she
takes a sip and grins. Then proceeds to toss the drink back like a frat boy on
spring break. She orders another.
I mentally cringe thinking someone is going to be buzzed.
Who knows? If Vantha’s Tuk
Tuk is free later – perhaps someone will get lucky tonight.
Cockroach - Free With Every Purchase
Cher wakes up particularly chipper this morning and not
just because she smells good. Today
we are bringing Srey Leap to the Russian Market with some of her friends to go
clothes shopping and Cher is anxious to spoil her little Stung Meanchy princess
a little bit.
Before we can play, however, there is work to be done.
First up is a meeting with Saloth, the former head administrator with
Handicap International. Now she
works with my friends Pierre and John at CFI,
The Coalition Of Financial
Independence, who will be acting as Safe Haven’s non-profit umbrella.
Saloth is very excited about our school proposal and wanted to meet to
discuss various organizations she feels would be beneficial for us to meet and
partner with. We tell her all about
our little Sum Namg, the boy with CP in Siem Reap who was the inspiration for
the school. She is particularly
interested in the fact we want to help CP kids and says that there are NO places
currently focused on helping these children.
In fact, she informs us it is not uncommon to go into a village and see a
family with 7 children and 4 of the children have CP.
Because CP is caused by birth trauma and a lack of oxygen during birth,
this is not surprising. There is not
a whole lot of pre natal care happening in the middle of the villages.
Saloth promises to take us to visit some of these families when we arrive
in Siem Reap. Both Cher and I feel
it will give us a good idea of what the range of severity we are going to be
dealing with at Safe Haven. Saloth
also recommends that we meet with both Hannah of Epic Arts in the village of
Kampot and Saorath, the executive director of Cambodian Disabled Persons
Organization. She is impressed that
I already have meetings set up with both.
In fact, we have to dash out the door to get to our meeting with Saorath.
The address we were given was a fairly vague “somewhere in W’aht Than”.
Unsurprisingly, we are late.
But Saorath graciously overlooks our tardiness and greets us warmly, excited
over the possibility of having western partners who want to join in the fight
for handicap rights. He introduces
around the office and proudly points out that 95% of his staff are educated
handicapped adults. In addition,
half the staff are also women. His
right leg is withered and deformed due to polio, but his energy and passion far
exceeds most able-bodied individuals I know.
Saorath is keen to know the details of Safe Haven and we spend some time
outlining the basic mission for our live in educational and therapeutic facility
for handicap kids. He highlights the
need for such a place with some disturbing facts.
90% of handicap children are not allowed to attend public school.
He shares his personal story of his struggle for education.
After battling to be allowed to be educated, he finished high school with
high marks only to be denied entry into college.
For ten years, he fought to be accepted into college.
When he finally was, they assigned all of his classes on the 4th
floor of the university. He wrote a
letter to the school to explain his predicament only to be told, “One person
cannot change the way things are.”
Undaunted, he took up the battle, rallied students behind him and ultimately
succeeded in getting his and other disabled students classes moved to the 1st
floor. He is clearly a man to have
on our side as we work together to make Safe Haven a reality.
Already, we are planning on tapping into a vast well of educated,
disabled professionals who have fought to get degrees yet still cannot find
employment due to prejudice. Can you
imagine what an inspiration to the disabled kids at Safe Haven to see their
teachers, aids, administrators and health care providers who are also handicap
yet are confident, successful
professionals? We are excited at all
the possibilities. Saorath drives us
out to a village to see a house and plot of land that the Japanese recently
donated as a village safe house for the disabled.
Saorath dryly points out it has its drawbacks as it is NOT handicap
accessible, the well has gone bad and they need at least $40k to make it
sustainable and livable. But it is a
step in the right direction.
After a very productive morning, Cher and I head to CCF to
pick up little Srey Leap and her three best friends to take them shopping.
One of her best friends is 5-year-old Channy, who is Layseng’s little
sister. Layseng, one of the stars of
Small Voices, adores her little sister.
Channy has a little role herself in the film, appearing in many of the
shots of Layseng when she is home in the dump village of Stung Meanchy.
My honorary “niece” Christina, the older sister of the young woman my
sister Cher cares for, has recently become Channy’s sponsor and Srey Leap is
excited to be headed out on the town to go to market.
Now when Cher and I were here in August, Srey Leap was very
shy and barely ate afterwards at our lunch outing.
This time around, she is an old pro.
She knows exactly what going to market with her sponsor means: new
clothes. She literally bounces with
happiness on Cher’s lap in the Tuk Tuk and skips into the market when we arrive.
She chatters away in Khmer telling Cher with no hesitation what she
thinks of this color or that shirt.
Channy is overwhelmed and clearly past her naptime as she is content at first to
simply lay her head on my shoulder as I hold her in my arms.
Cher picks up a shirt that Srey Leap has her eye on and
holds it up for inspection. A large
cockroach scampers eagerly up the side.
I casually mention the stowaway to Cher. Now it is a measure of how much
my little sister loves Srey Leap that she simply flicks it to the ground and
then stomps on it for good measure instead of screaming and immediately whipping
out her bottle of Purel from her bag to begin disinfecting everything in sight.
A short time later, our 4 little Stung Meanchy toddlers all
have new outfits and are busy picking out completely inappropriate footwear.
Cher tries to be stern when Srey Leap picks out a little tiny pair of red
high heel shoes and insists that she also get a pair of flat flip flops for
school. Srey Leap of course has no
objections because really, all that amounts to is that she gets TWO pairs of
shoes instead of one. My sister- the
disciplinary. Shopping complete – we
head to lunch walking to the sounds of little feet clopping along in their
‘grown up’ shoes.
We decided to eat at a little roadside café called “Good
Time”. Which, in retrospect, was not
a “Good Time” at all. First up – an
inability to figure out how to put two tables together to accommodate us without
hands on intervention. We order
drinks all around and each one arrives solo with about 10 minutes in between
deliveries. We all order-fried
noodles with shrimp, chick and beef.
Have you ever taken a group of six year olds out to eat?
Not only do they drink their beverages within 10 seconds but also usually
you ask that their food be brought out first in order to keep them occupied.
A full hour later – drinks gone and no sign of the meals in site – I
don’t know who is more agitated. The
kids or us. Well, us probably since
the kids are all busy playing with the gifts Christina sent to Channy.
Plus these little children, living a life of depravation in a garbage
dump, have WAY more patience than we do about waiting for the arrival of a meal.
Sadly, that is something that they have a lot of practice in.
Cher and I are not so patient.
We’ve asked for more orange juice for the kids 4 times over 40 minutes
and I cannot see what the difficulty is in pouring some damn juice into a glass
and handing it over is. Plus, three
of the kid’s meals arrive, but not the 4th.
Srey Leap plows into her meal.
For a child who is so small and light weight I can hold her in the palm
of my hand, she sure can pack away a plate of noodles…
Three meals gone and still no juice and no sign of the 4th
meal or of the adults meals for that matter.
Navy – our CCF translator, finally gets her noodles and gives them to
Srey Nik, the girl who’s food had not yet arrived.
My noodles arrive but I am too annoyed to properly enjoy them.
I should however, take a lesson in patience from our little Stung Meancy
girls, who simply enjoyed their meal and day out and could have cared less about
the delays. We decide to forgo ice
cream because we don’t have another 3 hours to spare for lunch and with a touch
of regret that the day must end, we load our precious little princesses onto a
Tuk Tuk with their bags of clothes and shoes and kiss them goodbye.
Srey Leap waves out of the back of the Tuk Tuk as it pulls away.
Cher and I return to the hotel feeling sad at having to end
the outing and also feeling something else: ill.
Perhaps we were distracted at the bad service of the café but we went and
ignored a major rule while dining here in Phnom Penh.
NEVER drink anything that isn’t out of a sealed can or bottle unless you
know it is from a purified source.
NEVER. Needless to say, this is also
not a “Good Time” as promised by the café’s sign and Cher and I spend a
miserable night having the complete opposite of a “Good Time.”
Good times.
How Curiosity Can Kill Stupid Western Foreigners
According to Wikipedia, the average weight of an American man AND woman is
around 164-167. I mentioned this
because the 3’x5’ coffin style elevator at our hotel says it can hold 6 people
and 400kg. After barely fitting
Cher, three Asian guys and myself in it yesterday, I am here to tell you there
is no way 6 big old Americans could cram themselves into that space, let alone
fall within the weight range without the chance of said elevator plunging to the
ground. Frankly, it is likely it
could plunge to the ground just on principal.
Just one of the ways Stupid Western Foreigners can die in Cambodia.
These are my thoughts as Vantha’s Tuk Tuk stalls yet again in the middle of a
busy intersection and Cher is resolutely NOT looking at oncoming traffic in an
effort to pretend vehicles are not coming perilously close.
Then a guy on a moto swipes by us taking
Vantha’s side mirror with him. It’s
not like Vantha actually uses the mirrors anyway.
Briefly, earlier in the day, we had entertained the notion of traveling
to the “Shoting Rang” a tourist destination advertised on a white placard in
Vantha’s Tuk Tuk. I ask him what it
is and he happily shows me a colorful photo of some white guy trying to shoot an
AK 47 in the middle of a field. The
rifle nose is up in the air as bullets spray forth and the guy looks like he
barely has control of the weapon.
Behind him is a Cambodian Guide with a big smile.
No doubt because he cannot believe a Stupid Western Foreigner paid him
$40 for the privilege to almost blow himself up with a decrypted, rusting weapon
from the 1940’s. We decide to forgo
the experience – not the least is that we don’t believe Vantha’s Tuk Tuk can
actually drive OUT to the countryside.
Besides, we have a taxi waiting for us to take us to Kampot to visit Epic Arts.
Epic Arts provides a range of professional dance, drama, music and art programs
to people of all abilities and disabilities in order to promote empowerment,
integration and acceptance for deaf and handicapped individuals.
We hop into the car for the three-hour drive out to Kampot.
Cher is a bit apprehensive because she has never ventured outside the
city and is familiar with my horror stories of traveling the roads in Cambodia.
As we drive off, we discover only one seat belt buckle in the back in
working. I tell Cher to buckle up.
She refuses. I demand she
buckle up in my “big sister voice”.
She refuses in her petulant “little sister” voice.
I play my trump card and tell her if she doesn’t buckle up, I will tell
her boss, who is not happy that she is here in Cambodia in the first place.
She pulls her ace in the hole and announces she’ll tell Mom.
I relent and tie our seat belts together and clip us in.
About an hour into the drive I look over to see Cher with her eyes clenched
shut. Normally my little sister, who
gets car sick, must look out the front window while driving to help with feeling
nauseous. However, the amount of
dust and debris kicking up from the road has completely obscured the view and it
is impossible to see anything except the huge cloud of red dust that encases us.
As it turns out, the fact our driver is merrily cruising along with
absolutely no visibility is more stomach turning than being carsick in general.
The dust settles for a moment and the driver swoops around a large
backhoe and a ditch. A marker shaped
exactly like an American headstone states how many miles to our destination.
Lovely. The driver stops
three times to get out and slam the trunk, which keeps coming loose and bouncing
open. The roads are not paved in
various places and liberally strewn with rocks and debris, which kick up and
thump against the car in a steady rhythm.
I am horrified when a puppy appears out of the dust and a moto driver
rolls right over it. I wonder how
the moto drivers can even breathe in the thick dust.
Even the crops on the sides of the road are covered in a heavy dusting of
red clay. We can taste and breathe
it even inside the car and I am wishing I had not forgotten my inhaler back at
the hotel. A sign on the back of a Tuk Tuk says “Breathe Right”.
We finally reach Epic Arts and meet Hannah, their executive director.
She pulls out some yoga mats and offers us tea and we sit down to hear
how Epic Arts came into being. She
takes us on a tour and we watch a group of 8 deaf kids in dance class.
There is a young man with Down syndrome running about.
Epic Arts also runs a café in the center of the city.
Hannah tells us he just started hanging around the café and become a
favorite of the patrons and staff. He eventually started coming to Epic Arts
Peace classes for the mentally disabled and learned to use sign language to
communicate. We are impressed with
Epic’s work with the disabled and looking forward to becoming partners with them
when we open Safe Haven. Hannah
recommends several other people we should talk and has a great idea about
visiting all the villages’ in/around Siem Reap where the school will be located
in order to create a history of the children living with disabilities.
That way as we build the school, we can develop relationships with the
families well in advance and know who are students are going to be and what
challenges they will face prior to enrollment.
Epic keeps track of the disabled children in the villages around Kampot
in a similar fashion. It is an
excellent idea and I intended to have Saloth help me implement it when I arrive
in Siem Reap. It is likely we will
not be able to manage the census next week but we can plan it out and it looks
like I will have to plan for a return to Cambodia in the next few months.
After lunch at Epic Arts Café, during which I am shocked to see Cher dipping her
toast in the bowl of honey they have given us despite the fact there are bugs
stuck in it, we hop back in our taxi, tie our seat belts together and begin the
3 hour drive back to Phnom Penh.
Though we would like to stay longer, I try to make it a rule to NOT drive long
distances in the dark here. While
there are many ways for Stupid Western Foreigners to die – today I’d like to
avoid one of them.
The Road To Siem Reap Is Paved With Water Buffalo
I’ve just come back into my hotel room jacked up like Cher
on a 12 pack of Mountain Dew. It’s
been a great morning. Normally, I
take my Cambodian kids out shopping together for new clothes and lunch but I’ve
decided this trip to focus more on spending time together and less on
“presents.” The change of venue
thrills the boys, for whom shopping with the girls is its own form of slow
torture. Instead, we head to a
nearby boutique villa for a morning of swimming in the pool.
The hotel allows outsiders to use their facility as long as you buy
breakfast or lunch. Considering I
have 6 hungry teens and Lina, who frankly, EATS like a teen, I don’t think that
will be a problem. Within moments of
arriving, all the kids have changed into their swim clothes and are in the pool
screaming with laughter. I am
wearing a bathing suit, shorts and a tee shirt so as not to make the kids
uncomfortable. Modesty here dictates
that even a one-piece bathing suit is too risqué for them.
Lina is giggling so loudly it is infectious and makes all of us laugh as
well. The boys and I race from one
end of the pool to the other and this old lady surprises them (and myself) by
coming in 2nd in both races.
I teach them to play chicken, which they think is great fun.
Layseng is on my shoulders and nearly strangles me in an attempt to stay
on. Management comes over and asks
us to quiet down ‘just a little bit’ and I can’t help but grin and think we are
just like any other noisy family of kids staying at the hotel – a far cry from
the streets and the dumps where they grew up and survived.
The next new game I teach them is Marco Polo and they think
is this a blast too. Lina is a bit
of a give away because she can’t stop giggling so it makes the person carrying
her (me) an easy mark. I
toss her into Layseng's arms just as Meng Ly comes towards to me to avoid
detection.
J
After a few hours of joyous fun, we tromp over to the patio
tables and order some lunch. Meng Ly
grabs my camera and the boys show off in front of the camera with silly poses
with their towels. I make a mental
note that swimming is the new standard activity over shopping for the
foreseeable future. Lunch complete,
the kids change into dry clothes and we are off on the next special stop of the
day: University Of Phnom Penh.
My older kids have 2.5 years left of high school but I am
constantly encouraging them to work toward college NOW.
They are all capable of going on to higher education, but it can be a
struggle. Meng Ly, who wants to be
an architect, sees his CCF friends who are not on the university track learning
trade skills and already employed at hotels and restaurants – living in shared
apartments, driving their own motos and MOST importantly, already earning money
to send home to their families. A
top priority for all of these kids is to be able to send money home to support
their families. Getting Meng Ly and
the other teens to see the importance of sticking it out for another 6 or 7
years in school can be hard, even if it is something they want.
That is what this field trip is about.
It is highly successful. The
teens are thrilled with the campus.
We get visitor passes and explore the whole school.
My CCF teacher/ chaperone for the day attends this school so she is a
perfect guide. They marvel at the
size of the library and the students studying together in the café over
computers. Meng Ly is thrilled with
the display cabinets showing the models made by the students in the engineering
program. He poses next to them and
next to the sign for the School Of Architecture and Design.
Shyly, he comes up next to me and whispers in my ear.
“Heather – may I really come here to study if I stay in school.
May I?? “ I look him in the
eye and promise if he studies hard and stays in high school, I will personally
see he has the financial support to attend college.
I tell him I understand it is hard when he wants to be supporting his
family but the results of a college degree will do so much more for him AND his
family in the long run. He has a big
smile on his face. They all do.
It is just a wonderful morning.
But now I have to leave and head to Siem Reap where my
other little boy, Sum Namg, lives. I
kiss all the kids goodbye and Lina cries. I promise I will be back soon and head
back to the hotel to get Cher, who was still feeling the effects of the dodgy
water. Our “taxi” is waiting to take
us to Siem Reap. We get settled in
and discover, yet again, only one working seat belt.
Despite the assurances that our driver “be so safe” on the road, I am not
taking any chances, so I tie Cher and I together once again in the back.
And we are off – careening down the highway to Siem Reap at a teeth
rattling 70 miles per hour. Which is
way faster than it seems when the road is paved with water buffalo.
More than once, the car slams to a stop to avoid the roaming cattle.
A one point, a tour bus, several tuk tuks, our taxi and two cows are all
converging on a tiny bridge and no one wants to give the right of way.
Cher slams her eyes shut and groans.
Somehow we swerve around the whole mess and make it to the other side.
The obstacle course is made more challenging by the fact the driver
doesn’t like sunlight coming into the car and has completely blocked off the
back window and all the side windows, leaving only the windshield as a visual
reference. Cher and I watch videos
on my computer to try and distract ourselves as we kamikaze toward Siem Reap.
I’ll say this for our driver – he makes excellent time and
we get to Siem Reap slightly earlier than expected.
Even better, we get there alive and in one piece.
And just in time to meet my friends and partners in the Safe Haven school
project, Hasan and Pierre, for dinner.
Hasan takes us out to a very nice restaurant for dinner and for a moment,
it seems like we might have transported right out of Cambodia.
Right up until the light fixture above begins to leak piping hot water
onto Pierre’s head in a steady stream.
He quickly moves to the other side but as we continue our dinner, the
water leakage increases until it is liberally splashing the table.
Hasan uses all of our napkins to block the spread of the steaming water
and we decide to call it a night.
The next morning Cher and I can hardly wait for 9 am so we
can head to the Sisters Of Charity orphanage to see our little Sum Namg.
We jostle each other getting through the gates and greet the sisters
trying not to seem too impatient.
Pleasantries over, we spot our little guy in his crib and scoop him up, covering
him in kisses. He is still
ridiculously skinny but he has grown in the last 5 months.
A good sign indicating he has been getting much need nutrition.
This is reinforced when the helpers bring over his breakfast for us to
feed him and it is the exact breakfast we taught them to make in August – a
smooth blended mix of honey, bananas, water and dried milk.
Cher spends some time adjusting his chair for his new height and I take
advantage and sit on the floor just cuddling him.
The orphanage is a busy place hosting a group of Korean
University Students who are helping out for the day playing with the 24 toddlers
that live there. One of the students
has a guitar and plays a Khmer dance song that the kids love.
We put Sum Namg in his chair and help him move his arms to the music so
he can participate. He loves it.
Cher spends time doing vocal and physical therapy with him
and by the end of the day, he is tired from all his activities and we are in
need of a massage, the effects of our crazy car ride catching up with us.
We meet up with Lina, a young woman from Sweden I met in Phnom Penh.
She showed up at CCF on Thursday looking for a place to volunteer.
Since it was a holiday, no one was around, except me – I was playing
football with the boys in the courtyard. She wasn’t sure
she was going to stay in Phnom Penh or go to Siem Reap.
I shamelessly plugged our handicap project and convinced her to volunteer
for us instead.
J
Over dinner, we talk about the project and she is very excited to be
involved. We make plans to meet in
the morning to head over to Sisters OF Charity.
After a relaxing back and neck massage- which for some odd
reason included being slathered ALL over in oil and then given a sponge bath,
it’s time to head back to the hotel and end our first full day in Siem Reap.
Round two in Cambodia begins.
How Many infectious hacking running nose children does it take to
qualify as a pandemic?
3 a.m. – someone who has NOT gotten the memo I am in
Cambodia and is calling my cell phone jolts me awake.
Excellent.
5. a.m. My friend Lane sends me a message that I have
accidentally pocket dialed his voice mail for 4 minutes from Cambodia.
That is the last time I try to turn off my phone at 3 a.m.
6 a.m. Cher and
I give up and get out of bed. Who
needs the extra sleep anyway? How
hard can it be to take care of 24 toddlers?
Lina, Cher and I arrive at the orphanage and are nearly run
over by 50 Korean tourists who are tromping all over the facility like it is an
ancient temple with little people on display.
Poor Sum Namg is on the floor with a dozen people surrounding him and
staring. He starts to cry and Cher
swoops in to rescue him. I pick up
one little guy who doesn’t look thrilled with all the attention being directed
his way and several people try to pluck him right out of my arms but he burrows
deep against me and refuses. I hear
blood curling screaming from inside: one very tiny girl who is afraid of people
has about 7 teenagers all around her in a corner.
I explain her fears and they thankfully move away.
We had brought some play dough and other activities with us
but it is not practical with the amount of chaos reigning so we opt instead to
break out the juice boxes from Khmer Market.
Suddenly, all the toddlers break free and gallop over to us.
Dehydration is a serious issue – they do not take in enough water each
day, evident in the fact that they hardly wet their diapers at all.
Lina and I cannot break open the packages fast enough.
They are clamoring for the juice and are drinking them down faster than
we can hand them out. I am grateful
I bought extra and still wish I had more.
Within minutes, we are handing out 2nd juice boxes to the kids
and they are sucking them down eagerly.
One boy spills some juice on the floor and Hasan arrives in time to pluck
another girl off the spot where she is licking the spilled juice up with her
tongue.
Defying the dry diaper average, the toddler on Lina’s lap
has a full messy blowout and she quickly holds him out in front of her in search
of the bathroom. The tourists
finally leave and get on their bus and all of us collapse on the ground.
We’ve been here an hour.
Hasan and his daughter Lauren will be in Siem Reap for the
next three months so we want him to learn Sum Namg’s physical, speech and
nutritional therapies. Lina and I
are in charge of distracting the other toddlers so Cher can train them without
interruption. We lead our merry band
out onto the playground, safely situated on a big slab of cement and made of
solid metal, such a plus in the heat.
The kids all pile onto the slide happily and careen down it.
Helpfully, there are little cross bars on the side handles that the kids
are constantly getting their little legs stuck in and twisted behind them.
I have visions of broken legs and cracked skulls as they flip off the
slide to land on the cement. The
ringleader of the group, a young boy with a devilish attitude, gives me a look
that needs no Khmer translation. It
is the universal look of cheeky toddlers everywhere – “Guess what I have found
and NO I am not going to give it to you.”
It is a rusted long piece of chain.
He proceeds to run about the yard whipping it over his head
and then takes pleasure in using it as a chipping tool at a Monument To St.
Christopher. I chase him all over
the yard growling “Tee!” (No) in my ‘stern’ voice but he simply thinks this is
the best game ever. I finally corner
him and confiscate the chain. I turn
to see how Lina is doing and she is running for the building hold out the same
little guy with the messy diaper from before. Guess
she has her hands full of little shits as well.
Hasan and Lauren appear with trays of fresh fruit that they
have cut up for the kids and our little gang dives into the watermelon, happily
sucking up the watery fruit with juice running down their faces.
Sum Namg is tired from his day of therapies so I walk around the yard
with him in my arms singing to him.
He gives me a sleepy smile and nods off.
I am really to nod off myself.
Naptime - not just for
toddlers anymore.
We round up everyone and put them into their cribs.
Which also turns out to be a fun game:
how many times can you get back out and hide from the Westerns?
Not everyone still has energy to play.
One little guy has fallen asleep right against the bars of his bed.
It is beyond sweet. We kiss
them goodnight and head wearily out the door.
Back at the room Cher unceremoniously sniffs me and declares I smell like
an uninviting mixture of baby bodily fluids.
I strip off my clothes and take a VERY hot shower.
9 p.m. Already
in bed, exhausted from the day. I’ve
turned off my ringer and locked my cell phone.
And ready to do it all again tomorrow.
I will never again complain about the quality of the water in Los
Angeles.
Pierre, Roman and Soloth pull up in a van they have engaged
to take us out to the village of Smatch and a neighboring village for both
handicap assessment of CP children there and to see the work being done by CFI
on the mosquito net factory. Hasan
and Lauren are already comfortable in their seats and Hasan, God love him, has
brought bags of freshly baked chocolate croissants for the 2 hour drive.
Cher, Lina and I pile in and we have exactly 45 minutes of smooth sailing
before we leave the main highway and being the rest of the journey on the barely
there roads out into the villages.
The van is rocking and rolling like a carnival ride – the kind where you are
sure the ride is going to fly apart at any given moment.
Cher has wisely planned ahead and is wearing a patch for motion sickness.
Hasan and Lina are feeling the effects and both are concentrating very
hard on not throwing up. Lina and I
smash into each other so often that we give up our continual apologies to each
other. On the way to the first
village – which shall remain nameless due to my inability to speak or spell the
name, Saloth gives us the run down.
We will meet with a family there with 7 children, 4 of whom have CP.
We are planning on doing an evaluation on each child and speaking with
the family about their experiences in an effect to better understand the role
Safe Haven can play for these children.
HIB – Handicap International Belgium, has been working outreach with this
family and many like theirs in these remote villages.
Unfortunately, in 2011 HIB lease will be up and they will cease
operations. We want to help fill the
huge gap that will follow in any way we can.
The family welcomes us into their hut and Cher is shocked
to see a Stander – a piece of equipment that assists CP children with standing.
It is made of local materials and has a simpler design than ones in the
United States. It is also just as effective and frankly, a fraction of the cost
at $100 compared to thousands in the USA.
We discover HIB manufactures them here in Cambodia and file that helpful
bit of information away. Cher and I
sit on the floor of the hut while the rest of our group quietly observes.
Cher begins her assessment starting youngest (at age 5) to oldest (at age
20). All of the children are vastly
smaller than they should be and we are actually shocked to learn their real
ages. The five year old, whom Cher
keeps referring to as “she” despite the fact he is naked from the waist down
looks so young we kept referring to him as the baby.
Cher defends her gender identification abilities by pointing out he is
wearing a yellow dress and they have put hair clips in his hair.
I point out the penis and think I have the stronger case.
Cher and I spoke with the family about their history and
then Cher did full exams of the kids while I took detailed notes. All four of
these kids will eventually be students at Safe Haven and they are part of our
preliminary study to help us understand the range of issues we will be facing.
The CP in this family ranged from mild to very severe. The youngest at 5 was the
mildest case. The 10-year-old girl could not walk but had good use of her upper
body and head. The 16 year old boy
who was the size of a 7 year old was the worst, mostly because he clearly also
showed signs of autism. Their 20-year-old boy, SO tiny. His lower body
completely deformed from a life of sitting in a twisted position not being able
to move his lower body. His spine and back have followed suit. NONE of the
children are verbal and could articulate any words, though the 16 year old had
developed basic set of grunts his parents understood to mean different things.
Most impressive was the 20 year old who count do basic math and completely
understand verbal language, as well as draw a circle with his deformed hands
suggesting excellent motor control. And he learned all this on his own twisted
up in his body in a hut in a poverty stricken village. Imagine his potential
with a full time care facility with therapy and a chance for actual education! I
left feeling very encouraged about the positive impact the school can have.
We headed next for Smatch but took a needed break for a
drink and some lunch at a roadside café.
Well, Solath ate lunch. The
rest of us looked around and declared we were not really that hungry and ordered
just sodas in cans. Which we cleaned
with wipes from Cher’s bag of disinfection.
We all had to sit outside because the Prime Minster was coming and they
have set up the entire interior for his party.
They obviously don’t get many white westerns because our waitress was
fascinated with Cher and myself.
First she got right up in Cher’s personal space behind her chair and kept
touching her French braids with a look of astonishment.
Then she came over to me and sat down.
I knew she wasn’t fascinated with my hair, which was in a ponytail and a
sad looking one at that. She plucked
my sunglasses from my shirt and then tried them on.
I took her picture and show it to her and she went away happy.
A short time later we were back in the van and en route to
Smatch. Lina makes the relieved
observation that this road was not as bad as the previous village road and
Pierre grins at her and says, “We haven’t turned left yet.”
She is not as amused with this piece of news as the rest of us.
We arrive in one piece, though Lina feels as if she been
shaken and stirred, and head directly for the village chef’s house.
There are introductions all around and we speak with him about the
education system in the village and the number of disabled living there.
Many adults are land mine victims and while they do have a number of
handicap adults and children, all of them are fairly self-sufficient.
They also have a two-room schoolhouse, which serves as grades 1 and 2 for
the 200 children in Smatch. The kids
just keep taking grades 1 and 2 over and over because they do not have the space
and resources to go beyond that.
There is a full primary school over 3 miles away and only the stronger and
largest children can walk that distance.
Child size bikes would solve the problem, but they are very expensive and
not that plentiful. As it turns out,
many bikes are donated but all of them adult size and these very tiny Cambodia
children can’t use them. We visit
the local vet’s family to see his disabled son.
What we were told was possible spinal deformity (I was already scheming
in my head how to get my friend, Dr. Matt Bernstein, who did Lyda’s spinal
surgery involved) turned out to be a badly set broken hip resulting in one leg
now being shorter than the other.
Handily, my little sister, who also has one leg shorter than the other and wears
an AFO and special shoes, quickly does an in field examine, takes rough
measurements of his feet and is already on the case to get him special shoes
with lifts so he can walk evenly. A
complicated fix just became an easy fix – something that doesn’t happen very
often here.
The last stop on our visit is the well that supplies water
to the village. It is all-purpose
for both drinking and bathing. The
well amounts to nothing more than a deep hole in the ground and it goes dry for
3-4 months out of the year. It is
clearer than expected, but heavily clouded with rust and other hard metals.
E Coli is present. Every day,
people come out to the well and pull up buckets to drink and wash.
As the chief hauls up a bucket to show us, several children with make
shift yokes approach ready to gather the families supply for the day.
It is blazingly hot and we all have cold bottles of water waiting for us
in the van. I look at what these
kids will be drinking from and feel a sense of dismay.
They are so thankful for this well and consider themselves fortunate.
When it dries up for months at a time – that is when they really
struggle. They cannot comprehend a
world in which they simply walk into a kitchen, turn on a tap and watch clear
water spurt forth cold into a glass.
It is something to remember every time you raise a glass to your lips.
You Can’t Always Get What You Want
Our last full day in Cambodia has been one of mixed
emotions. So much has been
accomplished these last few weeks and yet I feel I am leaving with tasks undone.
Wonderful connections with a variety of different organizations have come
to fruition. The scope and mission
of Safe Haven has become more refined and defined and I am anxious to more
forward. Two years in not a long
period of time in which to build a handicap school, staff it and be ready to
open our doors but two years also seems like an eternity when I want Sum Namg
out of the orphanage and under our care tomorrow.
Already, I am making plans to return in March to follow up with meetings
and leads I was not able to follow this trip.
Cher bounces out of bed and is already chirping her
breakfast song at me before my eyes have actually opened.
She is in good humor despite the fact the damn rooster outside our window
had been crowing since 3 am. Tonight
at Shinta Mani they are having a special “Wild Life” BBQ and we are both half
hoping rooster will be on the menu along side the Young Bees, Sweet and Sour Ant
Soup, Frogs on the Grill and Crocodile Filets.
We amble down to our breakfast table pleased to find it empty.
Yesterday, another couple had the audacity to sit at our table and we
discovered in the morning we don’t like change to our routine.
Cher orders tea and actually gets it.
The last couple of mornings I’ve order a mocha latte because the young
hospitality staff at Shinta Mani, former street kids learning the hotel trade,
simply LOVE to use the espresso machine.
They get so excited when you order a coffee drink and they are able to
show off their newly acquired barista skills.
In fact, they’ve gotten so enthusiastic that every time I order one, they
bring a 2nd for Cher, despite the fact she keeps ordering tea.
We don’t have the heart to correct them.
Sated from my yummy breakfast of Cambodian pancakes with
raisins and honey (I wonder if the poor bees that produced the honey are the
same ones being featured on the “wild bbq menu later”) we saunter out the door
and hop into a Tuk Tuk to head to Krousar Thmey –the school for deaf and blind
kids. The school is beautiful and we
are both very impressed with our tour.
It turns out that the new Khmer sign language is basically French sign
with a couple of random cultural Khmer signs thrown in for good measure.
This discovery has a plus in that my sister can sign in French.
Within moments of starting our tour, she is attracting attention.
She signs through the windows of some classrooms with various kids and
silently, the word is spreading: There is a pale, white woman wandering around
who knows Khmer sign! Class ends and
Cher is engulfed by a sea of deaf kids all frantically conversing with her in
sign while they touch her white skin and marvel.
All except one boy who thinks white skin is pretty ugly.
He gets whapped on the side of his head for that comment (by another boy,
not Cher). We learn that the
teachers all go through a 6-week crash training course in Khmer Sign to become
instructors. I had been hoping we
could send our deaf disabled students for classes at Krousar when Safe Haven
opened, since they were already the leading facility/school for the deaf.
However, they do not take kids with other handicaps and they only allow
teachers who are going to teach for them to go through the training course.
The woman giving us the tour thinks I should be able to persuade the
organization to allow my teachers to take the course.
I agree and resolve to get this accomplished.
We leave Krousar in high spirits and head back to Shinta
Mani to meet up with Pierre and go out to look at a plot of land for sale a
short distance from the center of Siem Reap.
My friend Chitra, the manager of Shinta Mani, had put the word out that
we were looking for land to build the school and we got word of a plot that
seemed to good too be true.
The land is beautiful.
Because Safe Haven must be built from the ground up because there are no
handicap buildings here, we need an unusually large plot of land.
Situated in an excellent part of Siem Reap off of two actual PAVED roads,
the plot is not only big enough for the school, it is semi private with a
private road, actually has power lines that can be tapped into and well access
to potable water. A perfect combination almost unheard of.
We can’t help but grin and feel a sense of excitement – the piece is
exactly what we need. The owner is
letting is go for $40 per square meter, when normally the land in this area is
going for $90 per square meter, which would save us a huge amount of money in
the long run. Chitra is sure he will
hold it with a deposit, which I pledge to put down and allow us time to fund
raise the rest. We leave feeling
very euphoric and Pierre pin marks it on his Iphone map and saves it as “Safe
Haven Site”.
Unfortunately, the owner of the land is in a bit of a jam
and needs money right away, hence the half price deal.
He will hold the land for me, but only for 4 weeks.
While I can put the 10% deposit down, he wants the $79,000 balance within
a month. It is a crushing blow.
But I am determined not to let the land go so easy.
Hasan, Pierre and I agree to meet for breakfast to come up with a plan to
aggressively try to raise the money for the land within the month deadline.
It is a risk to put down the deposit, knowing there is a chance I will
not make the deadline and likely lose the money, but with the hardships and
risks these kids face everyday – it is the omen to press on.
$79,000 in 30 days? I believe
we can make it happen.
With our minds whirling with crazy fundraising ideas, we
head back and meet up with my friend Matt Bernstein, a pediatric orthopedic
surgeon from Los Angeles who trains surgeons in developing countries through his
non profit
Mobile Pediatric Orthopedic Education.
He is also in Cambodia due to his own non-profit work and we agreed to
meet up in Siem Reap to talk about how we might work together.
I’ve also asked him for a personal favor:
One of Chitra’s street kids, a graduate of her hospitality
program, fell ill a few weeks ago.
His family was having the local healer treat him but she insisted on taking him
to the hospital. His older sister
had died the year before after swelling up with a high fever.
The family thought it was an evil spirit and tried local remedies.
They didn’t work. This young
man is part of the Shinta Mani family and all of the employees were worried.
Chitra got him to a hospital where they ran some blood work.
The doctor then walked into the room, said, “You are going to die” and
handed him some pills. Cancer.
There are no cancer treatments in Cambodia or specialists to deal with
this disease. The bluntness of his
death pronouncement caused him to fall into a deep depression.
Newly married to another graduate of the street kid hospitality program,
he tried to kill himself twice this week.
In tremendous pain and despairing of any hope.
His family moved him back to the pagoda and he has been there for 2 weeks
while Chitra has struggled to find something, anything, to give him a chance.
Matt agrees to come with Chitra and I out to the pagoda.
Even though cancer is not his specialty, he plans to examine him and
review his records and meds in case there is a chance something can be done.
I had sent out info to every possible connection (matt was one) I have
and Chitra has started the process to get him an emergency passport in the hopes
we can move him to a cancer treatment facility in Thailand or elsewhere abroad.
We arrive at the pagoda and are welcomed into the family’s
hut. The young man is sitting
upright in a chair because his lungs are so filled with fluids, he cannot lie
down without choking. Sweat pours
off him and he shakes with pain. His
young wife gently rubs his face and neck with a cold cloth every few minutes.
He is moaning his despair.
Matt looks at the meds he was given: Tylenol, a vitamin, augmentin and
amoxicillin (2 antibiotics) and a mild pain medication.
He examines him and reviews his test results.
It is Acute lymphoblastic leukemia, which left untreated is
fatal within a few weeks. The young
man is already on the verge of death.
We quietly step outside and converse.
Nothing can be done at this point; he is end stage and will likely not
survive the next few weeks. Even if we could get him to a cancer center, it is
too late to start treatment. Matt
feels the best course of action is to try and make him as comfortable as
possible. He consults with some
fellow doctors via phone both here in Cambodia and the States and we head to a
pharmacy. Matt prescribes morphine
and steroids to ease his pain and some of his symptoms.
Nothing else can be done. We
are mostly silent in the van on the way back and contemplating the last
remaining son – who has now seen his sister and brother in the grips of this
cancer. I can’t imagine what
thoughts are running through his head.
Matt and I exchange weary sighs.
The hard truth is, you can’t win every battle you fight – sometimes
instead you must surrender as gracefully as possible.
Hopefully, this new medication will ease his transition.
It is a hard afternoon.
We head to the orphanage and spend a little time with Sum
Namg. Only this afternoon and
tomorrow morning left to spend with my precious guy, who is fighting a fairly
bad cold. Cher finishes his
therapies and I take him in my arms and walk around the yard singing to him.
It has become our routine right before I put him to bed and kiss him
goodnight prior to our leaving.
Today is the last day until March. I
put him in his crib and kiss his forehead, loving when he gives me his toothless
grin. We are a long way from Safe
Haven opening and the battle to not lose the land has just begun.
Sum Namg has a long fight ahead of him to reach his full potential.
Both are shaping up to be challenging fights.
You can’t win every battle.
But some you can.
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Displaced
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