Time flies! I have completed my volunteer experience with Trailblazer today. On this last day, I had the opportunity to deliver filters to a village, Sras Village with the man himself, the founder of Trailblazer, Mr Scott Coats.
It was an amazing experience to visit Sras Village as it was Mr Scott's very own pilot project thathe started eight years ago. Along with the chief village's daughter, Enach, we installed two filters at teo houses and gave a cooking stove to a lady who lost one of her legs (not sure if it's due to the landmine or not).
Sitting under a palm leaved-roof shelter, I had a memorable time talking to Scott as we sat facing across a primary school built by Trailblazer. He told me how he realised the importance of clean water in the village when no kids appeared in that school they built as most of them were not fit enough or unhealthy due to dirty drinking water! Eight years since the school was built, wells were dug and water filters provided, this village also known as the poorest village in the Angkor Thom region during that time, has now flourished and developed drastically as shops opened and more people started moving into Sras. Before, there were only 17 students in the school. Now, there are almost 400 kids attending! How amazing is that!
Before we ended, I took a picture with Scott and thanked him for the opportunity to vlunteer in Trailblazer.
I will upload pictures that i've taken over these past weeks so you can better understand the conditions of the village and how Trailblazer looks like.
Will be flying back to Kl tomorrow! Godspeed!
Saturday, July 19, 2014
Friday, July 18, 2014
Week 2 Day 5 - My Volunteer Project in Cambodia
Today should have been my last day but it's pushed to tomorrow, Sat as I will be joining Mr. Scott (the founder of Trailblazer) and a team of ladies (not sure who they are) to install two filters at a village 35km away from town.
Anyway, I said my goodbyes to the rest of the filter team and the staff after I finished my tasks at the filter-making site. It was truly a great time learning about the possibilities of providing clean drinking water to the neglected community of this country.
Hope tomorrow's delivery day will be interesting and hope I get to learn a lot from Mr Scott himself!
Anyway, I said my goodbyes to the rest of the filter team and the staff after I finished my tasks at the filter-making site. It was truly a great time learning about the possibilities of providing clean drinking water to the neglected community of this country.
Hope tomorrow's delivery day will be interesting and hope I get to learn a lot from Mr Scott himself!
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Week 2 Day 3 & 4 - My Volunteer Trip in Cambodia
Hi again! Sorry for the one-day delay! Was too exhausted after delivering six filters to a village which is an hour away from Siem Reap town on Wednesday and Thursday (today).
With Brigette, a new volunteer from Switzerland who came on Wed along with two other filter staff, we installed 6 filters on Wed and another 6 today. Only four of us, including us two ladies, each of us had to carry either the 80kg filter or the heavy bag of sand up to the truck and down to the village.
The tar road on the way to the village, Romduol began with a muddy and bumpy path (i will show you the road pictures soon!). Brigette and I were sitting on the filters at the back of the truck (without the rooftop) and we were just bumping up and down for an hour.
Alas. When we arrived, we met up with the village chief and he led us to the individual homes that requested for the water filters to be installed. So off we went to each homes, unloading the materials along with trolleys to install the filters.
The scenery of the countryside was just so peaceful, everywhere covered with paddy fields. I saw cows and buffalos, palm trees and kids walking and cycling to school. The kids were just so happy to see a truck passing by, they waved and shouted "Bye bye!", trying to run after our truck.
The homes there are just built plainly with wood, some with cement staircase. Most of them do not have electricity supply, if they're lucky, they rely on a solar panel which is provided by NGOs.
Another thing is that most kids in the village do not have the privilege to go to schools because there are either no schools or no awareness for education.
I really hope that more of them will utilise the water filters for clean, drinking water and realise the importancc of hygiene. There are no toilets in their homes!!! Rather, the toilets are in nature, they do their business anywhere they want.
Today, we have installed the filter donated by ME AND ALL OF YOU DONORS!! Some photos comin up on my FB page! I am so glad to install the filter ( i put the label, "JAMIE & FRIENDS) with my bare hands and meet the receipient of our filter!
On our way back, we had a picture with the chief and said goodbye. Then, we passed by the roads along Angkor Wat and thr other ancient temples, such a rustic road accompanied by big trees which are more than 100 years old.
Hence, today is my last delivery day and have really enjoyed and truly experienced the countryside living. Tomorrow will be last day volunteering at Traiblazer!
With Brigette, a new volunteer from Switzerland who came on Wed along with two other filter staff, we installed 6 filters on Wed and another 6 today. Only four of us, including us two ladies, each of us had to carry either the 80kg filter or the heavy bag of sand up to the truck and down to the village.
The tar road on the way to the village, Romduol began with a muddy and bumpy path (i will show you the road pictures soon!). Brigette and I were sitting on the filters at the back of the truck (without the rooftop) and we were just bumping up and down for an hour.
Alas. When we arrived, we met up with the village chief and he led us to the individual homes that requested for the water filters to be installed. So off we went to each homes, unloading the materials along with trolleys to install the filters.
The scenery of the countryside was just so peaceful, everywhere covered with paddy fields. I saw cows and buffalos, palm trees and kids walking and cycling to school. The kids were just so happy to see a truck passing by, they waved and shouted "Bye bye!", trying to run after our truck.
The homes there are just built plainly with wood, some with cement staircase. Most of them do not have electricity supply, if they're lucky, they rely on a solar panel which is provided by NGOs.
Another thing is that most kids in the village do not have the privilege to go to schools because there are either no schools or no awareness for education.
I really hope that more of them will utilise the water filters for clean, drinking water and realise the importancc of hygiene. There are no toilets in their homes!!! Rather, the toilets are in nature, they do their business anywhere they want.
Today, we have installed the filter donated by ME AND ALL OF YOU DONORS!! Some photos comin up on my FB page! I am so glad to install the filter ( i put the label, "JAMIE & FRIENDS) with my bare hands and meet the receipient of our filter!
On our way back, we had a picture with the chief and said goodbye. Then, we passed by the roads along Angkor Wat and thr other ancient temples, such a rustic road accompanied by big trees which are more than 100 years old.
Hence, today is my last delivery day and have really enjoyed and truly experienced the countryside living. Tomorrow will be last day volunteering at Traiblazer!
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Week 2 Day 2 - My Volunteer Trip in Cambodia
Today's the final day for another volunteer, Michael ( previously in my previous posts, i thought his name is Marco! Ha) and we snap some shots with the filter team just before he left.
A film crew dropped by today at Trailblazer as they are filming a documentary on the NGOs in Cambodia. So, while we were working at the filter-making site, there was a guy using a Canon high-range DSLR taking a video of us. Aint sure if my face was seen or not! Haha.
After lunch, I helped Lon Sey, the volunteer coordinator to cut out the names of the filter donors to be labelled onto the donated filters. Carving long, long names on OHP film papers using a blade is such a highly-skilled required job. Lon Sey took three days and ten papers just to figure out a way to carve the letters without breaking off. It's hard to explain this in writing. But yes it required some nice carving skills.
While talking to him, I found out that his village does not receive any power supply ever since heaven knows when! The thing is, his village is only 17km away from Siem Reap town but look at the vast difference in basic necessities! And, while chatting with Michael, I just realised that there is a place in Cambodia which is similar to India, that is there's a dump site where people literally live within the heaps of garbage and they would go around searching high and low for edible or valuable items once a fresh pile of dump is thrown into that area.
This is Cambodia in the 2000s which looks the same, perhaps worse or a little bit better than a few centuries ago.
Pray for Cambodia will be the utmost important agenda if we wish to see a democratic Cambodia that provides basic human rights to its people!
It's delivery day tomorrow and am real excited to visit another village, Rom Duol!
Praying for a fine day without disruptive rain!
A film crew dropped by today at Trailblazer as they are filming a documentary on the NGOs in Cambodia. So, while we were working at the filter-making site, there was a guy using a Canon high-range DSLR taking a video of us. Aint sure if my face was seen or not! Haha.
After lunch, I helped Lon Sey, the volunteer coordinator to cut out the names of the filter donors to be labelled onto the donated filters. Carving long, long names on OHP film papers using a blade is such a highly-skilled required job. Lon Sey took three days and ten papers just to figure out a way to carve the letters without breaking off. It's hard to explain this in writing. But yes it required some nice carving skills.
While talking to him, I found out that his village does not receive any power supply ever since heaven knows when! The thing is, his village is only 17km away from Siem Reap town but look at the vast difference in basic necessities! And, while chatting with Michael, I just realised that there is a place in Cambodia which is similar to India, that is there's a dump site where people literally live within the heaps of garbage and they would go around searching high and low for edible or valuable items once a fresh pile of dump is thrown into that area.
This is Cambodia in the 2000s which looks the same, perhaps worse or a little bit better than a few centuries ago.
Pray for Cambodia will be the utmost important agenda if we wish to see a democratic Cambodia that provides basic human rights to its people!
It's delivery day tomorrow and am real excited to visit another village, Rom Duol!
Praying for a fine day without disruptive rain!
Monday, July 14, 2014
Week 2 Day 1 - My Volunteer Trip in Cambodia
It's Monday week two and the humidity in Siem Reap just keeps increasing!
It has been raining here almost everyday, not only once daily but two to four times in a day. With the high humidity and heat, everyone I've met, travellers from around the globe have been talking about how much they've sweat!
However, cycling along the tranquil landscapes of the Siem Reap river en route to Trailblazer is an unforgettable, precious moment I will never forget about Cambodia.
Today, the tasks I did very pretty much the same with what I did last week.
Again, got me hands greasy with dirt stuck in my nails while handling with the filter moulds. Next time, I shall use gloves just like how the staff does it because It takes too much time just washing my hands to get rid of the dirt!
Also had cement splattered on my arm while the cement mixer was turned on and poured the cement into the moulds. Phew, thankfully it was easy to be washed off!
After sand sieving and sand washing, it was already lunch time! Just in time coz I was hungry!
At 2p.m., I returned and helped Mr.Gardener (don't know his name) at Traiblazer's garden plantation. Due to the pouring rain this past month, vegetation did not survive well. Instead, weeds grew everywhere. So, i did my best in pulling out weeds as long as 50cm long. I "did my best" in weeding as much as I could because gardening activities just isn't my thing.
Anyway, i made it through even with my torn pants. Haha! It somehow tore into a big hole the day before.
After six hours of physical work, i'm heading off to bed now!
Thursday, July 10, 2014
Week 1 Day 3 - My Volunteer Trip in Cambodia
Woke up to a cloudy morning day at 6:45a.m., I thought the rain will pour throughout the day.
Rode my bicyclette to the NGO office, 5minutes ride away from my hostel. When I arrived, the staff was having a meeting on keeping up-to-date on the number of water filters that have been installed and those that will be installed in the next coming week(s).
So I headed to the filter-making site and got down to business. With the guidance of another volunteer, I removed the moulds of the filter containers by unscrewing greasy bolts and nuts at the corners of the steel-moulds. The cement mixture that filled up those moulds yesterday have already dried up to form solid filter containers. Due to the grease around the screws, boy, my hands and even underneath my nails were charcoal-black! But i always love meddling with spaner and screwdrivers and tighten or loosing those bolts and nuts!
Besides the sand washing I did after that, I helped one of the staff to label logo of Trailblazer and name of donor onto the filter containers by spraying cans of paint spray. I liked the grafitti artist feeling while doing it! As I have donated one water filter to Trailblazer -thanks to you contributors, there will be real evidence of Trailblazer installing my/our donated water filter in the village as they will label my name of the filter and will send photos of the staff installing that filter along with its receipient - the villager! I am waiting to see that and will definitely post it up here and Facebook!
After second round of cement-making and cement mixture into the moulds, I headed for lunch and came back to Trailblazer again at 2pm to help out with the vegetable garden they have.
Trailblazer assists villagers in its microfinance as well by introducing new and various vegetables and mushrooms so they can sell more kinds of vegetables other than their common staple plantation like paddy and potatoes.
I helped in emptying bags of mushroom compost into a huge wooden container as the compost is to be reused again for growing mushrooms. If you don't know what's compost made of - i just checked on Google that its mainly made up MANURE. So I've been stepping on a pile of manure while i was emtying each bags. If that sounds disgusting, how about considering the smell of those compost oozing out from the mountaneous pile of it? Well, the smell didnt smell like your faeces, it has a starnge smell which I cant figure out what was that. It's a bit like what stale white mushrooms smell like. You're probable not going to eat anymore mushrooms from now. Ha! I guess me too. I can still remember the smell now and it came back to me when I tasted some black-coloured salt which came on a saucer along with my Khmer Lok Lak Pork rice for dinner! I didnt touch the salt after tasting a lil bit of it!
I took a break in between my gardening task and lied down in a hammock which was under a wooden shed while reading a newly bought book (bought from a man whose legs were most probably decapitated from the landmines during the Khmer Rouge) about the history of this troubled and poverty-stricken Cambodia.
There will be no work tomorrow as it is declared a national holiday to commemorate the previous King who died in 2012.
So, I will be back with my next update on Mon, 14 July! Bon weekend and Godspeed!
Rode my bicyclette to the NGO office, 5minutes ride away from my hostel. When I arrived, the staff was having a meeting on keeping up-to-date on the number of water filters that have been installed and those that will be installed in the next coming week(s).
So I headed to the filter-making site and got down to business. With the guidance of another volunteer, I removed the moulds of the filter containers by unscrewing greasy bolts and nuts at the corners of the steel-moulds. The cement mixture that filled up those moulds yesterday have already dried up to form solid filter containers. Due to the grease around the screws, boy, my hands and even underneath my nails were charcoal-black! But i always love meddling with spaner and screwdrivers and tighten or loosing those bolts and nuts!
Besides the sand washing I did after that, I helped one of the staff to label logo of Trailblazer and name of donor onto the filter containers by spraying cans of paint spray. I liked the grafitti artist feeling while doing it! As I have donated one water filter to Trailblazer -thanks to you contributors, there will be real evidence of Trailblazer installing my/our donated water filter in the village as they will label my name of the filter and will send photos of the staff installing that filter along with its receipient - the villager! I am waiting to see that and will definitely post it up here and Facebook!
After second round of cement-making and cement mixture into the moulds, I headed for lunch and came back to Trailblazer again at 2pm to help out with the vegetable garden they have.
Trailblazer assists villagers in its microfinance as well by introducing new and various vegetables and mushrooms so they can sell more kinds of vegetables other than their common staple plantation like paddy and potatoes.
I helped in emptying bags of mushroom compost into a huge wooden container as the compost is to be reused again for growing mushrooms. If you don't know what's compost made of - i just checked on Google that its mainly made up MANURE. So I've been stepping on a pile of manure while i was emtying each bags. If that sounds disgusting, how about considering the smell of those compost oozing out from the mountaneous pile of it? Well, the smell didnt smell like your faeces, it has a starnge smell which I cant figure out what was that. It's a bit like what stale white mushrooms smell like. You're probable not going to eat anymore mushrooms from now. Ha! I guess me too. I can still remember the smell now and it came back to me when I tasted some black-coloured salt which came on a saucer along with my Khmer Lok Lak Pork rice for dinner! I didnt touch the salt after tasting a lil bit of it!
I took a break in between my gardening task and lied down in a hammock which was under a wooden shed while reading a newly bought book (bought from a man whose legs were most probably decapitated from the landmines during the Khmer Rouge) about the history of this troubled and poverty-stricken Cambodia.
There will be no work tomorrow as it is declared a national holiday to commemorate the previous King who died in 2012.
So, I will be back with my next update on Mon, 14 July! Bon weekend and Godspeed!
Wednesday, July 9, 2014
Week 1 Day 2 - My Volunteer Project in Cambodia
It's only day two but i've learned quite a lot about the process of filter-making!
The first thing I did was very similar to one of the methods in baking! Which was sifting bigger chunks of sand into finer sand - reminds me of sifting flour and sugar during baking!
After sifting the sand twice - the second sift made of tinier holes, I shoved the fine sand into a bucket to be washed. In order to utilise clean sand to be filled into the filter container, I have to wash the sand around 5-6 times! There are many water hose at the site of the filter-making so I sat beside one of them and washed the sand continuously. After that, With the help of Marco, the Aussie volunteer, I poured the bucket of clean sand, as heavy as twice my weight, into a 'karang guni'/big sack.
Besides that, I used the artsy side of me to paint the cement-made filter containers with white paint.
Elsie, a French volunteer also joined me in painting the containers. Managed to find out more about her volunteer trip as well!
Once we were done with 2 layers of paint, one of the staff who work with us began pouring buckets of sand and gravel into a cement mixer which made loud noises when it was switched on. When the cement was ready, I scooped the mixture and poured into the mould of the filter container. We managed to build 4 filter containers!
I felt that it was quite a fulfilling day, getting many tasks done. For tomorrow, it may be delivery day again! That means going to the village and installing more filters! This time, i'll try to carry out conversations with the Khmer villagers, but i gotta learn some Khmer words first! Till tomorrow!
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