Drama in Samraong!

Hello Everyone

Samraong is such a noisy place that we are not easily distracted by loud noises so it was only when Carol was woken at 4 am by the crackling of wood and people shouting that we got out of bed and saw a fire on the other side of the road . A large wooden house had flames soaring up through the roof and the upper part of the structure was crashing down. A large crowd had gathered and our landlady was soon banging on our door asking us to switch off the electricity to the house as they thought it was an electrical fire. The family were very frightened and were visibly shaking. We headed up to the roof for a better view and saw that people were doing what they could to put the fire out but had only buckets and pans to work with. Most houses do not have running water.

About 15 mins later, just as we were beginning to think there was no fire service in the town, two water trucks arrived and sprayed water over the heads of the spectators onto the fire. We wondered whether the house in question belonged to Tee, an employee of Malteser and one of my students. We discovered later that it was the house next door and the water trucks arrived in time to prevent the fire from spreading. It was our landlord who rang the police station where the fire service is based and the response time was 20 minutes. We think that they had to go to the lake to get water before turning up.No crowd control, cordoned off areas, police prescence, or safety helmets but it worked, and all that there was left next morning was a smouldering heap and no one hurt. Health and safety has yet to be introduced to Cambodia - just poor people helping each other!


Another drama this morning -we awoke to see the preparations for a 100 day funeral right outside our house. A green, pink and yellow marquee, lots of plastic chairs and tables, and a huge sound system. Even the family came to warn us about the noise! From 4.30 am tomorrow there will be unbearably loud plinky plonk music with monks adding the vocals. And its the weekend! We are moving out to stay with our friend Emma, another VSOer who has almost become a second daughter, and lives just up the road so that we can at least wake up naturally. The huge cauldrons for the cooking have arrived in the compound.


We arrived back home this morning to find the funeral music blaring out but no guests. The compound was busy with women and their children preparing food, including a pigs head and indescribable bits of animal innards adorning the low tables as well as colourful vegetables. We'll head off on our bikes to Samraong shortly for our weekly shop and iced coffee at a little cafe.We no doubt will arrive back home to 100 + guests, the women wearing white silk tops. Tonight will be the 'wake' when there'll be more raucous, loud music and it will all carry on tomorrow.It seems the wealthier you are, the longer the ceremony. The music needs to be loud to drive the bad spirits away and hasten the deceased to the next life! The guests give money as they leave. The going rate in Samraong is $10 and if you invite enough folks you can make money out of the occasion. So it will be another dinner and DVD with Emma tonight!

Other news. I spent some time in UK in January. My mother has made a fine recovery physically, but her morale was low having been a prisoner in her own home owing to the snow and ice. As it cleared, we were able to get out and she resumed her social life. I was also able to meet many friends, staying in Manchester with Win and Brian, and I also caught up with Nick, and Laura and Alberto, whilst in transit in Singapore. Because it was so cold I had no regrets coming back to Cambodia.

I flew back to PP and was joined by Carol . As well as our routine medical check-up with our motherly Russian GP, although we're pretty healthy here, we enjoyed some lovely meals, haircut, pedicure and a different hotel, largely used by business people and NGO workers which was well away from the tourist area and gave a different feel to the city.

Carol now - Work is fine, the good news being that our donor has extended our funding to Dec 2010. So, we have some breathing space, although there's only me who seems to have any sense of urgency or the confidence to get out there and network in order to find a donor. I'm supporting the field staff to conduct a questionnaire and interviews with our recipients - families, village chiefs, health centre staff etc so that we can write up an evaluation of the project so far and come up with a way forward. Its all very slow going as the staff are not very confident in this area and our recipients are largely illiterate. Still, as ever, I've had some heart warming experiences, particularly in the field, when it just feels a real priviledge to be here, regardless of whether I'm doing anything useful!

My volunteer assistant, Vatnak, started to work with me for 2 1/2 days a week in Jan. and is a star. He's employed by VSO and acts as my interpreter and cultural guide. He's clever, warm, friendly and enthusiastic and wants to improve his English. He's also a great moto driver, even with me on the back! On a trip north he wanted me to meet the family of a 20yr. old girl who'd died following the birth of her 1st baby. It was perhaps the remotest village I've been to so far and we drove on sandy tracks through extensive areas of deforestation - slash and burn is common here and there is little awareness of environmental conservation. The baby had been born at home with the help of village women and a traditional birth attendant. She had slowly bled to death over the next 5 days. Traditional belief holds that bleeding cleanses the womb and is therefore a good thing. The road was flooded and impassable as it was the rainy season, the family were afraid to go to the health centre even if they could have made it as they didn't like the HC practice which only allows 1 relative into the delivery room, and they had no money for transport costs anyway. We just sat on a log in their village listening to their story, told largely by the girl's sister who looked severely malnourished. They were sad, dignified but accepting and pleased that we had visited them. Cambodia has one of the highest death rates in SE Asia - 470 /100,000 live births compared to our 9.
On that salutary note we'll close and look forward to Howard and Sue's visit next week - temples, sun and sand!
Hope you have all survived the Arctic conditions at home. Please keep in touch.

Love to you all
Geoff and Carol xx