Day 7

Today was the first build day, we woke up and were on the road at 7:00. The drive to the build site took half an hour and when we arrived a bunch of the villagers welcomed us giving us a chance to try out our new words. We then separated into to two groups of six and a group of five.

Each group picked a house and started working on it, some people doing floors while others did walls. Each house took about an hour to build and by lunch we had build a total of nine houses. For lunch we all had fresh baguettes from one of the local bakers in town which, since Cambodia was a french colony for a while were great. While we were eating someone took out a frisbee and we started to play. After a while a little boy joined in and soon enough the whole village was running around diving for the frisbee and having a great time.

After lunch we got back to work and finished the remaining houses. At one of the last houses there was a brand new litter of puppies,

and a one day old water buffalo,

 both of which we petted and mum photographed like there was no tomorrow. Once the houses were finished all of the new home owners gathered around and were each given a blanket as a sort of house warming gift.

We ended the day with fifteen and a half houses done and returned satisfied and a little sore back to the hotel. For dinner we all went to the Magic Fish, which the reviews had promised was the best restaurant in town. We spent the whole night being bombarded by bugs and some of us (including me) didn't get our food till about half an hour after everybody else. Whatever though the food was good when it did arrive and it made for a good story!

-Chloe :)

Day 6

Moving day!
Today we loaded up into two nine person vans and were on the road by 11:30. The drive wasn't bad, we made a pit stop about halfway for ice cream and beer before continuing on down the road. It took about four hours and a ten dollar car crash before we arrived in the town we'd being staying in, Pursat.
Pursat is not too big, though with only four official roads on google maps it somehow manages to have thirteen things to do.

 We settled into our rooms and then met up downstairs to try to get an idea of the town setup. Mum, Mark (one of the other builders, not my dad), Rosie and I decided to explore so we set off. Our first stop of the evening was the market which unfortunately by the time we arrived was starting to close up. So we kept walking and met up with Paula who had gone on a run. The town is on a river so we followed that for a while till we came across one of the thirteen things to do here, visit the giant boat in the river. The boat had long since run aground and it was far too big to have any hope of moving it so instead the town converted it into a sort of boardwalk with stages and even a kids place area.

 One of the first things we noticed when we came aboard the boat was the people where line dancing. So of course I recorded while everyone else started dancing. Paula continued on her run but mum, Mark and Rosie amused ourselves by following along and even in some cases throwing in freestyle moves to impress the townsfolk. Once they had finished dancing up a storm we walked down to the end of the boat and then walked back to the hotel. There we found some people in the restaurant and joined them for dinner before heading off to the room to do our own thing.

-Chloe :)

Day 5

Today we all met up at breakfast again and then all seventeen of us set off to our orientation. The orientation was at the Tabitha "headquarters" where they have their store and such and was about half an hour away by tuck tuck. When we arrived we all went upstairs, sat down and were given silk scarves as welcome gifts. Jan (the top dog for Tabitha) welcomed us and gave a detailed explanation on what would be happening and the rules we were to follow. Since the village followed old traditions and customs some of the rules were a bit strange: "Don't tap people on the head" or "You can only touch the a member of the opposite gender if they are married to you and you, being a girl, are carrying their child." Then one of the other heads, Nadi, told us about her personal experience, being present during the rule of the Khmer Rouge (if you don't know who they are you've obviously skipped the last post so go back and read it!). After she had told her story we were taught a few words to be able to communicate with the villagers, hello, goodbye, sorry and thank you. After that the orientation concluded and we were allowed to go shop in the store below.

Once we had finished shopping we split up, some going back to the hotel, some going for lunch.... Though mum and I decided to jump back in a tuck tuck and go to the genocide museum. The genocide museum was originally a school that was then converted into a prison and torture facility by the Khmer Rouge. The prison had been left unchanged since 1978 when the Vietnamese discovered the place and shut it it down. Though before that the it was where the Khmer Rouge interrogated people before sending them off to the Killing Fields. As we walked through the rooms we saw that there was still dried blood on the floor in the cells and several torture devices lying around. The place painted a gloomy picture and so I was keen to get out of there was soon as possible.

After we finished with the museum we went back to the hotel and had lunch by the pool. Later we walked down the street and checked out the neighborhood market with some ice cream. Which was a nice end to the day. Before going to bed mum had had enough of the hard beds so she went out and grabbed one of the pool chair mats. Apparently it made the bed a lot softer so I guess it was worth it. 

-Chloe :)

Day 4

Hi everyone,
I'm so annoyed because I already wrote this out but it completely erased it for some reason. Anyway I will try to remember what I wrote to the best of my abilities.

We met up with everyone over breakfast and then set off with a bunch of the other builders for the Killing Fields. The Killing Fields were about forty minutes away and seeing how each tuck tuck can take four people, Carrie and Rosie came with us. When we arrived bought our tickets and the first thing I saw was a giant monument though at the time I didn't know what it was for. We walked over to the museum and looked at some of the big panels and maps on the walls but weren't really able to get a good look at them because we were quickly ushered into a theatre playing a documentary explaining what the Killing Fields were about.

During the war of Vietnam the Americans were fighting against the Vietnamese. The Vietnamese had many trade routes through their surrounding countries, one of which was Cambodia. So during the war the Americans bombed villages in Cambodia in a desperate attempt to drive the Vietnamese back to their own country. When the war ended in 1975, the Americans having lost badly, quickly pulled out of all the countries they had been posted in and returned home. An air of peace settled over Cambodia and for the moment the people were happy. The Khmer Rouge, a rebel group led by Pol Pot that had loosely attached itself to the king at the time out of convenience, marched into the city streets of Phnom Penh and were welcomed back as heros because the people at the time thought that that was what they were, their saviors. Though the the peace soon came to an end and the cheering soon stopped as the Khmer Rouge ordered the people of Phnom Penh to leave for a few days while they cleansed the city. Though in truth as soon as everyone had been driven out they burned all the money in the banks, making the currency usless, and using the seperated people to their advantage slowly rounded up the children and brought them to labor camps where they either worked or died. The adults on the other hand were brought to consentration camps where they were interogated, tortured and then disposed of after in places such as the Killing Fields. The king fled and Pol Pot took over power.
This continued on until 1978 when the Vietnamese invaded, discovered the Killing Fields, their purpose, and then shut them down taking Pol Pot down with it. Pol Pot went to court for his crimes but died under house arrest in 1998 before he could be sentenced.

At the Killing Fields the people killed would be placed in mass graves, some of which have now been excavated which each of their bones organized by age, gender and cause of death in the giant monument that we had seen when we first entered.

Once we had finished with the Killing Fields we jumped back in our tuck tucks and returned to the hotel. It was really hot so we mostly sat by the pool for the rest of the day until dinner time where everyone kind of split up and did their own thing.

The beds are REALLY hard here so at this point we are considering taking the poolchair matteresses and sleeping on those!
-Chloe :)

Day 3

Ok so today we woke up early, had some crepes for breakfast and then jumped in a tuck tuck with Allan to go do some shopping. Our tuck tuck drivers name was Sky and she is the only female tuck tuck driver in Cambodia. Her goal in life is to become the first female taxi driver there too. Our first stop of the day was a little store called peace where handicapped people were given a job making either silk bags (they have some of the best silk in the world here) or bags made out of recycled fishing nets and rice bags. I thought they were pretty cool and my mum must have agreed because she bought them out of most of their store. After that we strolled down to the Russian market which is basically a huge maze of little twisting passage ways set up with stores. We bought more stuff in there but soon the heat started to get to us so jumped back in Sky's tuck tuck and Allan took us to a restaurant called Ocean where Sky's sister works. The food there was awesome and this being dollar store country the whole thing was only 20$.

After eating we decided to retire poolside and hung out there welcoming the rest of the build team as they slowly arrived one by one. Then at dinner Paula, one of the board members, gave us a welcome speech and gave us a brief explanation of the rules and what was going to happen over the next few days.

Tomorrow as one of the mandatory things we have to visit before going to build we are going to the Killing Field where they tortured and killed most of the population of Cambodia, but I'll go into more detail about that tomorrow.

-Chloe :)