In Cambodia earlier this year, Nimbin’s Lois Kelly travelled to a remote school each morning to teach English to orphaned children.
In the back of a sheltered trailer (known as a ‘tuk tuk’), which was pulled along by a motorbike, Lois and her friend Moya Sharpe travelled along remote dirt roads bordered by rice paddies being ploughed by yoked oxen. They would arrive early at the Who Will Village and then spend the day teaching the children in the orphanage. When the children from the local villages heard there were two Australian volunteer teachers, they flocked to the school in the afternoons and filled up the classrooms.
“Some afternoons we had 60 kids in the classroom,” Lois said. “We taught them to sing, dance, and understand English without parroting. They really need more qualified teachers to go over there and volunteer their time… educating these kids really gives them an opportunity to create a future for themselves.”
This year was Lois’s second trip to Cambodia and before she went, she raised as much money as she could to donate to the Cambodian children’s charity Camkids.
Lois became inspired to help the children of Cambodia five years ago after seeing her friends Dominic and Bonita Sharpe donate their time and their lives to setting up the Camkids charity.
Dominic (Moya’s brother) and Bonita travelled to Cambodia to adopt a child seven years ago and were so horrified when they saw the state of the orphanages, they decided to put their professional lives on hold and try to make a difference to the lives of these children. Many kids were dying of preventable diseases, and they thought they would put in a medical centre and help fund a doctor to visit once a week.
Dominic and Bonita then spent years raising money to establish schools, medical centres and fund a wide range of sustainable projects in some of the poorest areas of Cambodia. They mortgaged their home in London and last year, moved to Cambodia.
“They felt they could do more if they were over there,” Lois said. “I have been so inspired by them and the work they are doing. They are totally committed and put a massive effort into it. They are up every day at 6am, checking their email and they are still working at 10pm at night to raise money and support for Camkids. They live very modestly, with no luxuries like air conditioning, so you melt while you are there… because every cent they have goes to the kids.”
Lois first visited Cambodia in 2006, after raising $3500, all of which went directly into setting up a medical centre at the Kais Village Orphanage in the Kampong Speu region. Lois said, unlike other charities, Camkids has no administration costs and she knows that every cent raised goes directly to helping set up infrastructure to help the children and make a real difference to their lives.
“In Kais Village, 28 out of the 41 children there had a disability,” Lois said. “When kids have a disability, their parents often don’t have the capacity to look after them. Many of the kids there needed operations on their eyes.
“I met a beautiful 12-year-old boy there whose mother had died… even though he had lost an arm, he painted more than any other kid. I wanted to take him home with me… but he was too old to be adopted. When you look at a kid like that you think ‘I’d like to send that kid to university’. A lot of things are cheap in Cambodia, but education is not cheap, that’s why they see it as such an opportunity.”
Cambodia is one of the poorest countries in the world. Due to the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s, today 60% of the Cambodian population is under the age of 25. This has resulted in the creation of generations of children who have been orphaned or abandoned through poverty. Often children are found in boxes on the orphanage doorsteps, or are left at hospitals.
“Pol Pot killed so many people in the 70s that today there are very few older family members to help with the raising of children,” Lois said. “We had a driver who was 45 and could remember being beaten when he was 12 and living on a handful of rice a day. His parents had died and only he and one sibling are left alive.
“Over 70% of Cambodians live on subsistence. I’ve seen a guy try to plough land with a stick… they are so thin and poor, we don’t realise how lucky we are here in Australia.”
During the five weeks Lois spent in Cambodia this year, she visited different orphanages and slum schools and brought smiles to the faces of scores of Cambodian children.
“The second day I went to the Who Will Orphanage, we all squeezed onto two buses, Cambodian style, and took the kids to Kids Kool in Phnom Pehn; it’s a bit like Disneyland,” Lois said. “Some of them went swimming or went on a jumping castle for the first time and ate a special lunch and ice-cream… One little boy stayed in a toy car for hours, I couldn’t move him out of it.
“There were so many screams of laughter and joy. I’m in love with these kids. They are like a garden of flower smiles… they are just beautiful.”
Lois visited Wat Opot, a refuge for children and adults who have AIDS to give them a place to live and die with dignity.
“The roads are so rough. Tourists don’t get to these places,” Lois said. “First there are no cars, then no tuk tuks, then only bicycles, then oxen, then only people on foot. AIDS is huge in Cambodia. Kids are raped and abandoned, and no-one will touch them. At Wat Opot, they have extended lives and brought in education. They are a beautiful community with over 60 kids and 25 adults.”
Lois said that the spread of HIV in Cambodia was being fuelled by the mistaken belief that having sex with a virgin would cure a person of AIDS. This belief, along with endemic poverty and child prostitution, was leading to large numbers of Cambodian children contracting the virus.
At Wat Opot, Camkids has helped fund the establishment of a fish farm and a pig sty to help the people there to become self-sufficient and sustainable. They are taught how to maintain solar units and raise fish to feed themselves, and then sell the excess food to make money. Camkids is now funding many different sustainability projects in Cambodia, with the main focus on education and health, so a lot of the projects are attached to schools.
Lois visited three slum schools in Phnom Pehn, one of them in an area where more than 3000 families live in cramped conditions. One of the slums was built on top of a filled-in lake and now seepage is coming up into houses.
“For the people there, it’s a tenuous existence,” Lois said. “Camkids has helped set up a school there… the kids have nothing, but they turn up for school.
“As you walk through the slums, you step over drains, then come to a little room set up as a classroom. The school also doubles as a medical centre and at night, sick kids come in for treatment. Those kids are spiritually richer than our kids; they share when they have nothing. They will be at school early and still study till 10 at night. They are very studious, happy and they don’t fight. They have the most beautiful hearts and are just delightful to work with.”
Learning English gives Cambodian children an opportunity to find employment in the future, particularly with a growing tourism industry. Camkids has also set up tailor and hairdressing schools to help young kids learn a trade, as well as funding sporting activities and buying tuk tuks and bicycles to help children get to school each day.
“Bicycles are good value for money because they manage to fit about seven kids on one bike,” Lois laughed.
After seeing the direct effects of the money she helped raise, Lois is more determined than ever to spread the word and encourage more people to donate money or time to help the children of Cambodia.
“Three US dollars a day keeps a child educated and clothed,” she said. “The money that goes over there makes a massive difference. The Cambodian people are so focussed on getting better educated and picking themselves up from the mire.”
Lois’s teaching buddy, Moya Sharpe, has just won an ‘Outstanding Teacher of the Year’ award and wants to use her $10,000 prize money to set up classrooms in Cambodian slum schools. Moya and Lois are looking for people to help take the computers over to Cambodia as well as donate their time to the growing culture of ‘voluntourism’ and help out in the newly- established schools. Any donations of money or time to help fundraise for the cause is also appreciated. If you would like to find out more about how to help, visit the website www.camkids.org. You can also look for The Cambodian Children’s charity on Facebook and see videos of the works in progress. Lois is also looking for local schools that would like to get involved in fundraising activities. For more information, phone Lois Kelly on 6622 4011.
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