Students of the Month

Every month we get to give out books and school supplies to Grade 1 and Grade 2 students at one school. It helps the teachers to set monthly exams. It helps the students, who are rewarded for good grades and also for effort. Soon most of the Grade 1 and Grade 2 children will have received a resource pack, all of them having earned it in some way.

Child Protection Policies

We often talk about how we need to take our work seriously in order for kids to have fun! Part of loving the children and youth in our programs is protecting them from potential harm. Therefore, we spent two days in training presented an NGO in Phnom Penh this week. We also helped to organise their visit so that other local church leaders could benefit from training on Child Protection.

It's hard work! I've been reviewing 'The self-audit web' for organisations who work with children and seeing how we're doing in our:

Philosophy & principles
Policies & procedures
Implementation & training
Monitoring & review
Information & communications
Good practice & prevention

It takes time. It takes effort. We're not yet where we need to be but we're working hard to keep kids safe as they have fun.

Pics from Training this week

Secret Tabloid Headline Obsession

Snap Poll: How many of us have a curious appetite for Woman's Day headlines? Sure, it might not be the kind of literature we studied in High School, but you have to admit that some trash mag headlines are awesome!

A quick check of freebie goss from WD reveals these 'True Confessions':

I rigged the Easter raffle.

I still check my ex's emails.

Top WD Celebrity stories include:

Angelina bans her boys from eating bugs.

Kate's not too thin: The palace hits back at anorexia claims.

Okay.. so the bar has been set high. But I gotta say, I write my own tabloid headings for the things that happen in my everyday life! I don't know why. I guess I just enjoy musing on how simple events can be communicated in scandalous ways?! Anyway, here's one:

Imprisoned & Left with less than a Dollar!

The stories behind this headline [much more dull]: I visited a drug detention centre. After saying formal goodbye's to the government officials and supervisors I went to the gate only to remember that I was actually in a secure facility. So I had to turn around and ask the guard to let me leave. Oh yeah, and the other day I went to get coffee but I forgot my wallet and had less than a dollar in coin. So I drank my morning coffee with a promise that I'd come back later in the day.

So..anything exciting going on in your life at the moment? (If not, make it up!) What's your tabloid heading?

What we're on about..

I've been writing our organisations' core values. This probably won't be the final version, but I think it expresses something of what we're on about:

EMPOWERMENT
We acknowledge our dependence on God and express this through prayer, worship, asking for advice and listening to the Scriptures.
We recognise each other's gifts and skills. We also build out capacity through training, coaching and professional development.
We recognise that a long-term commitment needs to be made to see transformation in individual people's lives, in churches and communities.

HONESTY
We strive to keep our commitments.
We honestly evaluate the communities we live in and our responses to the people around us.
We share information with our team, donors and the government and friends and family through formal and informal reporting.
We acknowledge that we don't 'have all the answers' but we are continually learning.
We take risks, make bold plans, offer second chances, forgive mistakes and hold onto hope, knowing that failure isn't final.

SERVICE
We value people and maintain a respectful attitude to people from all cultural and subcultural backgrounds.
We 'put the last first' by removing barriers to participation in our activities. We especially encourage participation of children, women, the poor and people with disabilities.
We develop relationships with the people we serve.

SUSTAINABILITY
We initiate and sustain cooperative relationships with churches, NGOs and schools in Poipet through our work.
We prefer to work in partnership with other groups rather than doing any activity by ourselves.
We are patient with each other and the people we serve, accepting people as they are and encouraging them to be what God intends them to be.

FUN
We relax in the security and joy of God's love.
We encourage lunchtime naps and time off on weekends and holidays to keep our smiles and our sanity.
We seek to infuse all our activities with some fun and to help others' recognise their own moments of joy.

Warning

Over the weekend I went into a department store in Thailand on a mission to buy some mud coloured pants. (Not chocolate brown, not beige, not tan...) I decided it is essential to have at least one pair of pants that blends with the mid-brown around town. Even when I was shopping for my mud-coloured clothing, I wondered, 'Is this a sign that I've been in Cambodia too long?"

Other warning signs that you have been in Cambodia too long might include:

You wear flip-flops every day, everywhere.
In the wet season you wear your pants rolled up to your knees.
In the hot season you wear a long-sleeved shirt over your t-shirt for extra sun protection.

It's okay to eat rice every day for breakfast. Then lunch. And dinner.
Your top three ice cream flavours are taro, corn and green tea.
You're fine eating with a spoon and fork or chopsticks.... but trying to use a knife and fork you feel something between awkward and inept.

You pay for everything in cash (in one of three currencies if you live in Poipet).
You spend ten minutes bargaining over the price of something silly, partly because you're enjoying the convo.
You feel generous when you give a trip that equates to fifty cents.

You sometimes forget words in English.
You think you speak Khmer fluently.
You are actually pretty fluent in NGO-speak.

work not ping pong today...

There's a banner hanging over the highway: Cambodia To End The Worst Forms of Child Labour by 2016.

My first thought? Pathetic! If this is an important issue that needs an urgent response, what's with this vague reply with a deadline half a decade away?

I did some research and found out that ILO (International Labour Organisation) stats from 2001 showed that 52% of 7-14 year olds in Cambodia, over 1.4 million, were 'economically active'. Perhaps it isn't easy to change the lives of 1.4 million children overnight. So we think about the children working in the 'worst' forms of labour....seven year old boys in Battambang working in brick factories, nine year old girls puling carts across the Thai border with their brothers and sisters, ten year old kids begging on the streets of Bangkok. These are dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs. Sometimes (often?) these children are forced to work without payment.

More recent ILO surveys conducted in Poipet in 2010-2011 found there are approximately 2 246 children in Poipet who are working. About 500 are employed pushing carts across the border. The rest collect rubbish, sew, work in agriculture and beg.

As I sit writing this blog, our staff return to the office from Ping Pong looking a little disappointed. They say that the kids didn't come today.
Nobody at all?
Well, only two. The rest were working. We saw some of them pushing carts down main street while we were waiting at the front of the building. They said they wanted to play but they had to work today to help their families.

Kids need to learn to play. Ending the worst forms of child labour by 2016 seems almost like a token response. But it's a start.

Super Birthday

Yesterday Katey sent a text from Hong Kong, 'Hope you've had a super day with all your new friends...' In reply I let her know that some of the friends who shared my birthday lunch were so new, in fact, that I didn't yet know their names!

Yesterday, a team from Australia came for an 'Experience Poipet in 6.5 Hours' tour. In addition, one of our Khmer staff had a relative visiting from her home province. As we sat around the table and I tried to introduce everyone, I realised that it was probably quite indicative of my life that I was sharing a birthday meal with old and new friends from both Cambodia and Australia.

Gretchen came to visit in the evening with this awesome cake (fun & delicious)! More messages, phone calls and emails into the night left me feeling known, remembered, valued. Thank you : )

Be Stupid

The top pic was taken from the back of a magazine at Palais (coffee place in a Poipet casino....)

I read today that the Diesel Be Stupid campaign was banned in the UK last year. Sad. Some people were offended by the nudity. (One picture shows a woman in designer jeans standing on a ladder flashing her chest in front of a security camera, for example.) Yeah, stupid. Other people think that members of the general public need no encouragement to Be Stupid.

Some of the images are......err.. suggestive... but I like the idea to risk. Life is play and what looks like stupidity may actually be genius disguised?! So when was the last time you did something Stupid?

Friday Quotes

Friday quotes from The Grace To Race:

'When you think about it, everything in triathlon is very natural and childlike. You learn to balance a bike at an early age, toddlers often break into a run rather than walk, and we all floated in our mothers' wombs without fear. So what is the big deal? Some traithletes tend to get puffed up about themselves; I would like to burst their bubble.' page 109

'People always ask me how I'm able to compete in the Ironman competitions at my age and do so well. I have a very simple answer: I don't know.' page 132

Sport and Rec

Next week we've got a new employee starting in the role of Sports and Recreation Worker. So, yeah.. he pretty much gets to help people play: ping pong, run club with guys 12-17 years, sports and games for primary school kids and monthly visits to guys & girls in a Drug Detention Centre.

I've been reviewing some resources stashed in our office to give him ideas. My top find so far is from a bootlegged copy of a NSW Department of Education, 'Games Book' (circa 1972).

ROLLING PIN THROWING

Make a dummy husband by filling a sack or a pillow slip, tying it to a pole or sitting it on a chair. Put a hat, etc. on the dummy. The women are given five hits with a rolling pin- 7 metres distance away. Score one point for each direct hit- none for glancing blows.

Just wondering which group to try this with first?!

The Grace To Race

A few weeks ago a friend sent me a message before a race to say: Run FAST.. and with grace. A few days later I started reading a book by Sister Madonna Buder called The Grace To Race.

Sister Madonna Buder is an 80 year old world champion triathlete known as the Iron Nun or the Flying Nun. She started running when she was 48 years old and competed in her first marathon four years later (in Boston). Not long after, she transitioned to long distance triathlon. How far is a long distance triathlon? Well, this Sister does the full Ironman distances (2.8km swim/ 190km bike/ 42.2 km run). I thought I could get some inspiration on how to race with grace from this amazing woman who has set countless world records & keeps pushing the organisers of races to have to open new age group categories! I will pull some quotes from her book and update you every week.

For this Friday's inspiration on The Grace To Race, Sister says:

"Running does change people's lives. When I first entered the religious life at the age of twenty-three, I was set apart from the world. Once I began to run and compete, my path opened wide to include the whole world. God's ways are not our ways. I would probably be less effective sitting in the convent than i am now, being thrust into the public life where I can influence people by example."