Moving in, Mosquitoes and Mad Chickens

It’s day two here at Tonle Bati: I am writing this from our newly constructed bamboo home and it’s all fairly idyllic, it must be said the grouted floors are looking particularly spectacular.  Although we love our new home already, I think our squeals last night as we tried to escape the onslaught of mosquitos, bugs and enormous beetles provided a fair bit of entertainment for the builders.   That’s not to mention our group expeditions to the toilet which 25 of us share, equipped with head torches and buckets of rain water to flush.   Once safely in bed though (8.30pm seems pretty late these days) we are in a fairy canapé of white mosquito veils and bamboo bed frames.  

6.30 starts mean that we are able to do some sport with the children before it gets too hot, but even that wasn’t considered early enough this morning as we brushed our teeth in front of expectant faces and cries of ‘How much longer teacher?’ There’s talk of 5.00am tomorrow which sounds fairly intimidating but the resident cockerel is easily confused and lets out raucous half-formed crows just outside our room long before the sun rises. We hope the resident cockerel will be appearing in one of our meals someday soon.  Our first activity this morning was rounders, something that the children have all taken to straight away, although we have had some difficulty explaining why they have to always run around the outside of the posts. A narrow victory was awarded to Team Dragon, who quickly developed a knack for hitting the ball directly into the ditch making it fairly tricky to retrieve. 

News of our presence here must have spread quickly, as at lunch time a few local children turned up to find out what all the fuss was about and have been included in English lessons already.  The register for when the school opens officially in August is filling up fast and we have three full classes already!  Summer camp with the Seametrey children gives us a great chance to practise some of the activities that we have planned with kids who already speak quite good English and are accustomed to the Montessori method before we start fresh with the new school year. 

As I write, the rest of the volunteers are helping the children write diaries recording everything that they have been doing here, both to help them practise their writing and so that they will have something to take away with them at the end of the week. Our summer camp tie-dye T-shirts are currently drying out in the sun, although it seems like us volunteers are even more excited to see how they will turn out than the children!

I realise that this blog leaves a gap over the weekend but our main activity was a visit to the killing fields and genocide museum which we think deserves it’s own blog post that will follow shortly.