Day 4 - 9 : Food Rations & Old Clothings Giveaways

To us, the old clothes that we brought to Cambodia didn't come easy. The clothes were donated by the ntu students and the public. We had sorted the branded ones out for flea market sale as we are not allowed to give to the Cambodians given that they might face being robbed of branded clothing. Next, we needed to take out those skimpy clothings as the locals were very conversative. The last step is to categorise all the 'accepted' clothing into men, women, children. Besides old clothes, old bags were donated as the children's schooling bags.

As there were too many of the old clothing, all of us decided to choose those which we could wear during the trip to bring over as our personal clothing. After we were done with the clothes, we will wash them locally and donate them.

Besides that, some of us brought unused stationary, pencil cases and small toys over. One of the alumnus Yuan Man brought a big box of stationary and schooling materials given by her colleagues and herself too! Same goes to Prof Chui. She brought some cute small toys and stationary over. Auntie Esther provided us with new school uniforms for our visit to Chom Trak School and Village.

As for the food rations and hygiene packs, the materials are brought locally. This was done so to reduce our baggage capacity (in order to bring more old clothes over) and to generate income for the locals.

This is the plan for preparing the food rations, hygiene packs & old clothes giveaways.

Day 3: Pack Food Rations
Day 6: Pack Hygiene Packs
Day 7: Pack old clothes and other 2nd/unused bags, stationery and small toys.
Day 8: Distribute Hygiene Packs in school after Hygiene class
Day 9: Distribute Food Rations during Home Visits
Day 10: Distribute old school uniforms, old/unused stationary and school materials in Chom Trak School & balloon sculptures & old clothes in old/unused bags in Chom Trak Village

We did Home Visits on Day 9 to get to know the villagers as well as giving them food rations. All of us were being spilt into groups of 4 (including a senior) to visit 10+ households with a translator attached. We took the opportunity to communicate with the locals that we visited. We realised the culture there was not as what we expect.

Take marriage for instance, the guy and the girl could only get married at the age of 18 and above. If the girl is getting education, she could only get marriage at the age of 21 and above. Same applies to the guy, he will get married at age of 25 and above. Unlike the chinese culture of betroth the girl to the guy, the local culture requires the agreement between both parties. The couple will stay with either side of the family which is more poor. After the guy has earned enough to build a house, the couple will move out to create a family of their. Divorce is common too if the parents find either party incapable of supporting the other party especially financially.

Besides having a chance to communicate with the locals, we could see with our own eyes the living conditions and lifestyle that the villagers are leading day-to-day. Some are jobless or critically ill that they can't afford any food or even proper housing. They were grateful that we came to visit and gave them food rations. The food rations to us are just normal items that we need to take everyday. To them, they are so precious that some of them cry out of joy to receive that.

Day 10, we went to Chom Trak. Chom Trak is a very poor village as it was very far away from the town area. Being remote, we took 45 minutes on le-mok (motor with a long carriage behind) to travel there from Khmer Homestay. We stopped by the Primary School to distribute the uniform, stationary and schooling materials to the students. Those kids, that were not schooling, we gave them balloon sculptures. This goes to their mothers, who are hanging around the school, we gave them hair accessories provided by Prof Chui.

Then, we moved on to do home visits to distribute the bags of clothes. Each bag contain 4-5 pieces of clothes regardless of gender and age. As noted from the conversation of Auntie Esther, the families will exchange their clothes within themselves if any unsuitable piece is spotted. So, this made our packing task simplier.

None of us could realise how precious our unwanted clothing or daily food items. Now, we could. We will really treasure what we had.

Packing the big sack of rice into small packs The volunteers start to organise themselves to help
Some went to sort out the coffee bags and instant barley we brought over
Besides rice pack, we have another bag of foodstuffs and daily necessities eg. sauce, towel...
Prof Chui helping out!
The completed packs
Come on! Left a few more!
sorting out to that we could slot into the indivdual pack fast
The Foodstuffs and Daily Neccesities Pack
Putting the rice packs into the big sack
while those left behind...we got to carry them into the storeroom one by one!
The Day for Home Visits!
Loading the Food Rations up the 'le-mok'
It's all up!
And now is our turn to 'load' ourselves up another 'le-mok'
at every stop, a group of 4 will follow a translator to go for home visits in that area
they will carry with them 10 sets of Food Rations
There it is!
Walking to the 1st house
More to go!
The 'breathing-taking' scenery as we go visiting!
Is this bridge 'cross-able'?
one of the houses on the plains
beware of every step!
The stairs up the villagers' houses are very 'fragile'
One of the houses that we go visiting
see the condition!
they don't even have a proper cupboard to contain their clothes and belongings
is that their kitchen?
welcoming us to their house!
Our shoes by the stairs
this is their door!
The house will be 'wet' when rain come...
the living conditions of a very poor family
the kids crowded at the stairs when we are doing visiting at the house
examining the conditions in the house
another house...beware of every step taken!
when we are in the house, we could communicate with the owner by telling the translate what we want to talk about
Thanks!
This is the gesture of thanks/appreciation that all Cambodians practise
Passing the owners theFood Rations
Passing....
we even help them to see how we can do to repair their sewing machine!
This is ripe rice grains (with the husk on)
One of the local food that the locals treat us
*It's fried rice balls with potato filling inside)
One of the unique fruits offer to us!
Pic with the family!
Group pic with the family
Group pic with the family
group pic with the family

Visit to Chom Trak Village
Packing all the old clothes and bags that are donated by kind Singaporeans
Such a skinny pig!
From this, we can see how poor is the village.
The classroom
their flag raising ceremony
singing their national song
some are without shoes!
the uniforms (donated by auntie esther), schooling items and stationary
Receiving the school uniforms
Distributing in progress!Pass pencil cases one by one
See their smiles on their faces!
Who still don't have uniforms?
Gathering the group of us in front as they show their appreciation to us
innocent looks into the camera
*they should be wondering what that we are holding on our hands*
smile!
The group pic of us at the school
Next up, distributing balloons sculptures to the non-schooling kids
they should be wondering what's that we are holding our hands
The bags and bags of old clothes in the 'le-mok'
They are too shy to take!
Doing Home Visits now...
This is for you!
This is for you!
This is for you & you're Welcome!
The houses in Chom Trak are in a very bad state
Appreciating the gift from us!
For you too!
The puppies that are wondering around & they eat them!
*check this out here!*
No lighting in their houses
Going further...
This little girl is camera-shy!
But glad to receive the bag!
Waiting for instructions
Taking more packs with us
The street hawker?
The kids that follow us around...
They are very happy to receive this little gift from us
*they should be wondering how to play with this*
Going more houses...
Each group follow the ' local ICs' to go to the different houses
They rear cattles to help them out in the padi fields
Yea! We've new uniforms!
Should we go up the houses?
I think we should just pass them at the ground level
Treasuring the balloon scuplture while pumping water
the bad road situation

Sherri