Alison's Adventures in Cambodia

Saturday, June 30, 2007

Cookery lesson

Last week, I joined some tourists for a Khmer cookery lesson. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and wish I’d done it sooner. I now know what some of the strange items in the market are, how to prepare them and how they can be deliciously cooked together. During the day, I learned how to make spring rolls, cambodian chicken curry, fish amok (my favourite Khmer meal, beautifully served in a banana leaf cup) and a desert of coconut, banana and tapioca.
Since the course, I have bought fish from the market – finally! I was always too squeamish to buy fish before, as mostly they are still alive and thrashing about. Also, I am a product of an academic school which didn’t have home economics on the curriculum, so I had no idea how to cook fish unless it was prepared and wrapped in cling film! I have started buying things I didn’t even notice in the market before – galangal, kaffir lime, morning glory, fish sauce and lemon grass. I’m even eyeing up the meat (every part of the animal is available, including pig faces and cow hooves, and covered in flies unless you buy it at 6 a.m.), and trying to work up the courage to buy some of that soon!



Saturday, June 23, 2007

Happy birthday, Your Majesty!


21 June was Queen Elizabeth II’s 81st birthday, and to mark the occasion the British Ambassador held his annual party in Phnom Penh, to which all the Commonwealth citizens living in Cambodia were invited. For me, it was a great excuse to put on my glad rags, eat good old British grub (miniature portions of fish and chips, Lancashire hotpot, fisherman’s pie and Cornish pasties!) and drink Pimms and wine surrounded by wonderful ice statues of London sights (Tower Bridge behind us in the photo!). I enjoyed my taste of the high life, but for me the evening was in stark contrast to the rural village of stilted huts and barefooted people wearing kramas which I had visited that morning.

Volunteer fury

Two weeks ago, VSO London announced a 20% cut to the volunteer allowance in Cambodia. Unsurprisingly, the majority of the volunteer community is furious. As a member of VolCom, the VSO volunteer committee, I have been in the thick of all kinds of heated correspondence, calls and threats of action. Volcom held a weekend meeting to discuss the situation. Many volunteers felt devalued, and believed that the decision and the process for making and implementing the decision was flawed. The strength of feeling against the cut was heard loud and clear by the London office, and today’s response is that the decision has been suspended, so that further consultation can take place. The right short term decision, but in the long term the agony is prolonged! This has been a rather uncomfortable fortnight...

Bats


Having no power to light the streets last week had the favorable consequence of enhanced viewing opportunities of the magnificent starry night sky. As my evenings were spent outside, I was also able to watch the flight of bats which swarm from their daytime home on Kompong Thom’s ”bat tree” at dusk. Weird creatures, and for me a bit like being on the set of Scooby Doo!

Camping

Kampong Thom’s electricity company excelled itself last week. The daily power cuts of an hour or so didn’t have a high enough nuisance effect to warrant charging a higher price per kilowatt. The ante was upped and power in the town was turned off completely for 4 days. For me, this was a nightmare. I can cope without electric light – candle power is fine – but no fan at night is impossible. After 2 nights of not being able to sleep in the heat, I set up camp in my living room and slept in front of open doors. As there was no electricity in the office, I took my laptop to my friendly local restaurant, and plugged it into their generator-powered electricity for the price of coffee, but my work productivity (and CoDeC’s) was not very high for several days. Power was restored a few days ago, so I don’t know if this means that agreement to the higher price has been reached.

Saturday, June 09, 2007

Fantastic Facilitators!


That’s my VSO friend Jo and I, who have just run back-to-back four day facilitation skills training workshops, firstly at her NGO in Kampong Chhnang (CCD) and then at my NGO in Kampong Thom (CoDeC). We have been preparing the courses for nearly 3 months, putting in many more hours than I would have done for equivalent training back in England. Our verdict is that the courses were exhausting but extremely worthwhile and great fun. We had lots of translation issues, in spite of having a translator helping on each course, but we became more skilled as the courses progressed. Our Cambodian colleagues are almost childlike in their love of games, drawing, role-plays and appreciation of new things, which made them really rewarding to work with. We introduced a range of new skills and concepts to them, including designing Powerpoint presentations (in between power cuts!) and developing SMART objectives. Jo and I shall be following up the training by providing supervision in the field, but I am confident that the participants have really learned what we taught them and will put their learning into practice.

Livelihoods Study Tour

Three weeks ago, I attended a VSO Livelihoods Volunteer workshop in Battambang. The workshop was held at Ptea Teuk Dong (Coconut-Water House), the NGO centre for street families I’d visited with my CoDeC colleagues earlier this year. We stayed in Ptea Teuk Dong’s visitor accommodation, comprising these charming traditional houses, newly built by the centre’s beneficiaries as part of the training they receive. The houses have a lovely rural outlook, with lots of night-time firefly sightings – magical! All our food was prepared and served by residents learning the catering business, and the youngsters again gave a wonderful dancing performance. During the two day workshop, we visited communities where locally based VSO volunteers work , and were taken to see this newly dug fish pond. The purpose of the UV light and plastic sheeting is to attract insects at night time, which fall into the water to become fish food.