Derek Zoolander and my meh attempts to drill a well ......

Apologies, this post is super late! I am now actually finished with my time at Trailblazer in Siem Reap and am in Phnom Penh for one week to do a few interviews with NGOs here before going home on the 24th. Where has this entire summer gone?!

Part of what I had been doing with Trailblazer was going out with the well drilling team (with Sumnang, Vichet, and Kat) to villages around Siem Reap Province. The village chief chooses the family who receives the well, while the family chooses where they want the well. Trailblazer makes sure to work within existing village systems instead of waltzing up with wells and installing them, in turn increasing the sustainability of the project because it is integrated within the community.

I went to Trapeang Svay Village, Reul Commune, Puk District twice. Fun fact: “Trapeang Svay” means “Mango Pond.” I did not see any mangoes when I was there.

My first time in Trapeang Svay we were drilling the actual well. I pretty much embodied Derek Zoolander coal mining as I was basically utterly useless for drilling. This is not a machine drill-- this is a manual drill that you need to be pushing down onto while twisting. A sort of jump-push-twist movement that no machine in the gym can simulate well (or maybe, I need to go to the gym more). The pole is actually made from a bunch of poles linked together with a handled twisting contraption. This is tough work!! Simple and easy(ish) for the well drilling team when the water source is close to the surface, a lot harder for everyone when you have to drill through clay and rock (as we did).

Water being pumped into the truck. Pretty sure the water
buffalo just chilling was not too pleased.

To make the well at first before any drilling, we dug a small pit close to the would-be well that we then filled with water. This water was pushed down the hole (that would become the well source) to coax the pole to go deeper while drilling. 

When the pit ran out of water, we went to a river/field/pond nearby and got water using a pump and lots of tarps (and in the end, most of the water ended up on the ground, not in the pit) laid out in the back of the truck. Two little boys accompanied us for this (although this was midday, many schools are only for half days), and Sumnang and Vichet seemed to trust them more than me. This might have been perhaps due to my Derek Zoolander status or my being a woman, which sadly is more likely to be the main factor.

We continued drilling, only breaking for a meal of morning glory (Khmer water spinach), rice, and oily bony fish with a red tomato/onion sauce. At the end of day, we hit eighteen meters. We tried to pump water from the ground (an up and down movement with one pipe within the other) but sadly with no avail. We had to take out the piping from the well and succumb to the fact that the next day we would be back to drilling. In the end, this well had to be twenty-five meters deep, while at other homes in the village ten meters deep was sufficient.

In Trapeang Svay the second time but at different part of the village, I could help a bit more. This time, rather than drilling, we were making the cement base for the well. Again, this was completely manual. We had no cement machine, but rather I manually mixed the Camel cement mix and sand together with water and a shovel to make the functioning cement.

1. We dug a dirt platform and flattened it right in front of where the well pump was.
2. We then put large rocks in the dirt--still retaining platform’s flat structure (in other words, the rocks we used were flat on at least one part).
3. We filled in the dirt gaps surrounding the large rocks with smaller stones.
4. We built a brick square around the well’s platform that would later become the raised edge of the well structure.
5. We put the concrete mixture on the bricks, and then the stone.

This is super confusing without a plethora of visuals that my slow internet prohibits me from uploading (hopefully the ones that did upload are okay!!), but I hope it makes some sense! Basically: ground --> platform base -->  walls --> finished well. I have noticed that whenever going into villages for filter installation or well drilling, the project seems to encompass the entire village and not just the filter or well team. While in the US one might not help the contractors re-doing your kitchen, in Cambodia this seems completely normal and appropriate.

The mom at this home seemed to have really taken a liking to me, especially as I was helping her son with his English (he was perhaps the only child who actually would talk to me when I spoke to him without parents’ help!). I also sat and talked with her about all of her children, told her about my family, and also looked through her daughter's drawing book which was adorable. Her school notebooks showed photos of (still) current prime minister Hun Sen and his wife--unsurprising to say the least. The mom also wanted to make sure that I was out of the sun to protect my super white skin, and kept telling me to be very careful with my head because I am so tall. When she found out that I was vegetarian, she sent her daughter out to buy me rambutans! I was elated at their kindness, even though I have no qualms about having morning glory and rice every day.

An excursion to... the rubbish collection management center!

No, this is not the kind of visit I would describe on a postcard to Grandma.

Front of the Building

Today, I went to the head office for "Global Action for Environmental Awareness" (GAEA) after seeing the logo on many public rubbish bins (yup! we aren't in Kansas anymore, so trash = rubbish) throughout Siem Reap. (Although there are rubbish bins, rubbish is littered throughout the city and dogs often pick through the rubbish... as do people collecting anything of value including but not limited to: plastic bottles, cans (3 cans is 100Riel, or $0.025 I am told), cardboard, and kitchen scraps to make pig farms.) Why did I set up an appointment to go to GAEA? Because I was interested in how the rubbish collection system works as it is vital to the functioning of a clean and healthy city. Where do you think rubbish goes in New York? Dear reader, it does not vanish into thin air.

Note: GAEA is the only legal mechanism, but in Cambodia you are more than welcome to dispose of your rubbish illegally without direct consequences to yourself.

I could barely find any information about GAEA online except for a yellowpages.kh website. I found this very strange seeing as it is a company of immensely huge importance for the city to function well. When I finally found a website for GAEA, it would not load on my computer. I later found out that GAEA has a website domain, but the company just hasn't actually created their website because as GAEA's director Pho Phallkunn told me, there is really no need for one. At first I was a bit shocked (um, seeing as I have multiple websites about myself i.e. Facebook, Twitter, this blog, another blog, and a super old blog from 2010), but then realized that because most people in Cambodia do not have steady access to internet, they would not be looking up their rubbish pick up system online. And in reality, I have never looked at New York's rubbish pick-up website online either.

The office was in what looked like what could have been a house. There was a secretary office with about six people working, and then Phallkunn's office more toward the back. I first asked for general background about GAEA because, as I said, I could not find a lot online.

In 2002, all of Cambodia's waste collection system was officially privatized; however, before then, it was privatized unofficially anyhow. Phnom Penh has a private rubbish collection system with a Canadian company, Phallkunn told me, and was the foremost rubbish system in Cambodia until GAEA. Founded in 2007, GAEA is a for-profit business for rubbish collection and is the only rubbish collection system in Siem Reap (honestly, from the name, I assumed it was a non-profit business concerned with the environment solely). For $1.50 a month, you can have your rubbish collected (although I am unsure if this is for individuals and also for large hotels).  GAEA estimates that they handle 180-190 metric tonnes of rubbish every day. They have a 50 year lease on the Siem Reap City rubbish system (the villages' rubbish collection consists of collecting it into a pile and burning it). In the past five years, GAEA has expanded to other cities in Cambodia including Kampot, Bantey Meanchey, and Kampong Thom.

In 2009, GAEA relocated Siem Reap's open dump that was only 7km out of Siem Reap town to one that is 25km out of Siem Reap and 500 meters from the closest residence (the one 7km out of town was in a town-- and I am unsure if this dump might still be used unofficially). GAEA's dump is 8 meters deep and protected with clay compact on all sides (except the top, of course).  GAEA would like a technical and closed dump to enable them to collect methane gas and use it for energy (a CDM project or "Clean Development Mechanism") as opposed to an open dump, and although supposedly money has been funded for this, a technical dump has yet to happen. GAEA receives no consistent formal funding from the government. South Korea gave roughly 2 million USD five years ago for a technical landfill that has yet to materialize--and sadly, the money seems to have mysteriously "vanished" (a.k.a., it has likely been used to purchase a yacht or two). Yet two years ago, the Ministry of Environment in Cambodian pledged about 4 million USD for a technical landfill (which supposedly is happening at least in Poi Pet on the Thai border).

GAEA's open dump outside of Siem Reap is subject to scavengers and fires in the dry season, making a covered dump a lot safer. According to Phallkunn, there is no cut-and-dry way to remove the scavengers from the dump (this is how some people make a living). People scavenge through the dump, and people scavenge through the rubbish bins in Siem Reap city. People know that scavenging has awful health side effects, but this is what they have to do to get by (and this is where the overarching government ideally should step in and help out, ex. job creation or something). However, private companies like GAEA are basically left to negotiate with local politicians and the government without actually receiving any tangible and measurable support from the government. The government has no initiative to help, and GAEA can only work so hard and still remain afloat as a profitable business. GAEA's hope is to have a technical landfill in Siem Reap in the next five to seven years.

Toward the end of out chat, we discussed how tourism creates an opportunity for more rigorous rubbish collection. Who wants to come to Siem Reap when the city is overrun with rubbish? Phallkunn estimates that 65% of all hotels comply with GAEA's standardized rubbish pick up schema, the majority of this 65% being larger, internationally managed hotels. Angkor Wat Complex uses EnviroCam, a private cleaning service to pick up litter all over the park. EnviroCam is actually associated with APSARA, the management group that runs the Angkor UNESCO World Heritage site. The real challenge, as stated, is in the cities. In fact, Phallkun joked that EnviroCam gets a lot of the credit with GAEA being overlooked.

I asked Phallkunn when the rubbish problem really ballooned in Cambodia. He mentioned that in 2004 and 2005, Cambodia experienced an economic boom and there was a lot of rural-urban migration. Phnom Penh's population, for example, has increased to 2.2 million residents from 634,000 in 1990, and at the end of the Khmer Rouge genocide a reported (as per Wikipedia) 32,000. This is wicked fast, people!!

To distill this post into crucial points: the key to solving the the rubbish problem, according to Phallkunn, will be a combination of education that leads to behavioral change and market forces at work (a lot of the same rhetoric used for solving environmental problems in general). There are still a plethora of challenges that face GAEA, such as electronic waste, road conditions prohibiting rubbish pick up at all, illegal disposal on the streets, and practices that people have a hard time giving up, such as burying and burning rubbish.

*the first line of this post does not include my Oma, who would love to read about this :)

Kñom rree-in pia-sa Khuhmy (I learn Khmer language)

The Khmer Alphabet on the back of my
(1st grade) workbook

Not surprisingly, Khmer is a very hard language to learn. Surprisingly, it is one of the easiest Asian languages *not including Asian languages written in the Latin alphabet (ex. Indonesian, Malay)* to learn because it is not tonal, while Khmer is surrounded by languages that are tonal. What I find most difficult are not the sounds (the "ng" does not come naturally for me) but rather having to write the words in Roman letters to remember them, all the while knowing this is not how they are really written. One person, i.e. my textbook, might write the words one way, while I may write it another making it super confusing to flip through my notes and textbook simultaneously. Moreover, my teacher might say a word one day, I write it down, and then the next day he says it again and it sounds different. Or more commonly: two different words sound the same to me, and when I am finally told that I have said them differently enough to move on to a new word, I just think "UHHHH I was saying the same thing!" Ugh.

That all being said, some of the words in Khmer (or rather "pia-sa Khuhmy") that I have learned so far are super interesting (for a nerd like me) and frankly a few are hilarious. Being a former French colony, it is only natural that some French words entered the Khmer language, especially for things/ideas/actions etc. that did not exist previously in Khmer before the French. Other words just hammer down the fact that rice is an integral part of Cambodian life (although again, being a former French colony, baguettes are quite common as well and although some people I have met have a strict "non-western-food-diet," I welcome bread into my life. Although now the title of this blog at the moment does not make sense, whatever). Below are some true gems of the Khmer language:

Pia-sa onglei = English language
Pia-sa alamon = German language
Pia-sa espan = Spanish language
P'ly pom = apple (get it? "pommes" in French too)
K'tim barang = onion, or translated literally, "the thing you chop that is French" (barang = French)
P'ly sau mau = rambutan, but really means hairy (as in, um, armpit hairy. They taste good I swear!!)
K'lean bai = hungry, or rather, hungry for rice (rice = bai)
ñam bai = to eat rice. Although ñam is to eat and you can eat whatever you want, if someone is asking you if you are going to eat, he/she says "ñam bai."
bai peil prruk = breakfast, or rather, rice time morning
bai t'ngai trong = lunch, or literally, rice afternoon. Even more literally, "t'ngai trong" means "day straight" (noon-- get it? the sun) and when giving directions, "trong" can signify to continue straight. Hence, lunch means: rice, continue with the day
bai peil yoop = dinner, or rather, rice time night
srrool = easy. Doesn't that word just sound like it means easy? Because I always forget the word for hard yet remember this amazing word, I continuously say "not easy" rather than hard. #whatever.
yoo yoo m'dong = once in a while. this is just a hilarious word, nothing else.
book-a-look = staff. again, just funny.
twerka = to work. like "werk" lolz.

Another interesting aspect of Khmer language is that some words, such at to eat, to go, and to sleep, change depending on who you are talking to. Talking about myself, or "simple people" as my teacher puts it, uses a different word than talking about the King or a monk. This derives from Pali, a language from India that was used in ancient Buddhist texts. Although no one speaks solely Pali anymore, it still wiggles its way into Khmer.

I might ñam bai, but the king, queen, prince, and princess so-y bai. A Buddhist nun / female monk can either peer-saw bai or baw-rit poh bai, but a male monk ch-han bai. Hun Sen, Southeast Asia's favorite human rights abuser since 1985, baw-rit poh bai along with female monks. If I am from a village and there is a big ceremony at the pagoda, I hope rather than ñam. Ma-hope means "food" in any case. My dog does not ñam bai but rather see bai, and saying that a human see bai is very rude and derogatory. I pointed out that if we spoke Khmer in the United States, we might say that dogs also ñam because dogs in the U.S. are treated as if they are part of the family. When I told my teacher that my dog often will sleep in my bed with me, he was horrified. I explained that dogs in the U.S. often stay inside and are kept very well, making this not uncommon.

Speaking of sleeping, I can kane or dayl, but a male monk sung and a female monk sum rahn. The king, queen, prince, and princess all praw-tumb. When I go somewhere, I tao, but a male monk nit mon tao, and a female monk can either twer dom na or cheng dom na. The king, queen, and prince can yee-ung, but only the prince and princess can nit man. I forgot to ask what animals do, but can only assume it is yet another word. Luckily, I will likely only be talking to "simple people" and do not need to remember all of these words!

Case Study Writing

Part of being a not-for-profit NGO is just that: it is not for profit. Trailblazer's funding relies on donations, and soliciting donations is not an easy feat. Roughly just over half of donations come from individuals, meaning that the personal case studies from Trailblazer's projects are very important. They need to make that person reading them at, say, 1am be compelled to send a check or click on the paypal icon. Last Friday, I went to Chea Smun village (per usual, not how this village is spelled in Khmer (obviously) but how I understand and pronounce the name) to interview two students who had received donated bikes from Trailblazer. 

Srei Mau and her bike

Chea Smun, about an hour by moto away from Siem Reap, was one of the most remote and undeveloped (in terms of infrastructure) village I have been to while in Cambodia thus far. The dirt-clay road was a brilliant sinopia-tawny color, accentuated even more by the puddles left from the immense amount of rain the night before and that morning. We arrived at the secondary school: two lines of classrooms with a portico attaching all of them and a tattered Cambodian flag in the center. 

One of the hardest parts of doing the case study was making sure that the questions my Cambodian partner, Lon Sey (works with Trailblazer), asked were indeed the questions I had prepared. A lot can get lost in translation! Getting more sentimental / opinion answers to the questions (versus one-word answers) I was asking was a tough feat as well from the the boy and girl I interviewed. They were so shy! Then again I would probably be shy too if this massively tall foreign woman wearing strange clothes came to my school asking questions about my bicycle. As for the case study itself, this is what I have written: 

FINALLY got a smile :)

Every day many children in Cambodia have to walk long distances to get to school, meaning they arrive physically tired and mentally drained before class even starts. This situation is exacerbated in Siem Reap province, one of the poorest in Cambodia, and specifically in Meanchey Commune where children often walk to school. The reality is that walking long distances limits students’ capability to succeed and disincentivizes them from attending school. To address this problem, the Trailblazer Foundation has provided bikes to multiple students in Siem Reap Province, allowing for the students and their families to have more mobility and save valuable time. 

As part of Trailblazer Foundation’s Cambodia Assistance Program, Trailblazer provided bikes to students at Chea Smun Secondary School in Chea Smun Village, located in Meanchey Commune of Prasat Bakong District. Besides this, Trailblazer has also installed four biosand water filters at Chea Smun Secondary School to help the students maintain good health. More than half of the students at Chea Smun Secondary School have bikes, making it important to help those who do not integrate at school. The donated bikes in general are easy to use and bike maintenance has so far only included simply repairing flat tires. 

Seyha, a 17 year old student in his eighth year of school, received a bike from Trailblazer four months ago. He said that already his studies and day-to-day life have greatly improved with the time gained from biking as opposed to walking to school. It used to take him thirty minutes to walk to school, and now it takes him five to ten minutes with his new bike. His father finished his studies through grade eight and his mother did not even go to school, so Seyha is excited to attend high school next year and complete his studies as he aspires to become a mathematics and chemistry teacher. Seeing as Chea Smun Secondary School currently only has six teachers for 176 students, Seyha finishing school and becoming a teacher would greatly help the Cambodian education system at large. Because Seyha’s high school next year is 10 kilometers away, his bike is going to substantially reduce the time it takes to get to and from school. On the weekends, his parents also borrow the bike to go to and from the market to buy food for Seyha and his two younger brothers at a much faster pace than before. 

Another one of Srei Mau's neighbors

One of Seyha’s neighbors, Srei Mau, also received a new bike from Trailblazer. Srei Mau is 15 years old and in grade eight as well, and her favorite subjects are chemistry and biology. Similar to Seyha, Srei Mau wishes to become teacher but for biology, yet admits that she has a lot more to learn. Srei Mau loves that her new bike allows her to stay after school for longer to continue studying rather than have to dedicate time to walking home. She will also attend the same high school as Seyha next year, likewise surpassing the education level of both of her parents. Her parents use the bike on Sunday to go work on the farm, while she uses it also to go to the market for her 3-person family.  

Seyha and Srei Mau thank Trailblazer profusely, smiling widely, for giving them the bicycles because the donation has helped them concentrate on their studies with more passion. Bikes save students’ valuable time so that they can study and learn more while following their dreams. Both students also ask if Trailblazer can donate more bicycles or school supplies in general to other poor students, Srei Mau relating poignantly, “please try to help us some more...because we need it.” For only $45, you can supply a bike to help a Cambodian student pursue his/her educational goals, thereby improving wellbeing and quality of life. More educated Cambodian youth means more power for development and social change, and a brighter future for Cambodia.

Me and the cutest savior ever! 

We went to both Seyha and Srei Mau's houses to get photos with their families (that I had to really try to coax smiles out of) and bikes. In both cases, the father was not at home. Seyha actually did not have his bike at school in reality because his mom used it that day. Unfortunately, this is not uncommon in these cases albeit slightly awkward (I mean, we were doing an interview about how he bikes to school). Nevertheless, his bike was at home which was great because using the same bike in their individual photos at school was honestly super obvious. 

For the photos at Srei Mau's house, I hid the TV that Srei Mau had in her house toward the front entrance within visibility of the camera. Contrary to popular belief, you can be in dire poverty and still have a television--but most people do not want to see or know this. "If they can afford a television, why do I need to donate a bike? Shouldn't the latter be the top priority?" Well, it can actually be easier to access a 3G network in the jungle than it is a proper waste system in a town, for example. What's more: who are you to tell a family how to spend its money? Just because a family cannot readily afford a bike, does not mean it should be deprived of any simple entertainment. Must a family live extremely basically / in borderline squaller if it cannot afford rudimentary items, but can afford a small toy for a child for the time being? I also made sure not to  photograph the solar panel that a Japanese NGO installed on Seyha's roof the day beforehand. The family also had a water filter from yet another NGO, furthering my burgeoning opinion that NGOs in Cambodia are, in a sense, enabling the government to continue their corrupt practices by doing a ministry's job. That being said, would the government actually step up to the plate? Moreover: we cannot wait ten years for water, transport, education, etc. etc. etc. 

What was most shocking about where Seyha and Srei Mau live is that the flooding is so bad in the rainy season that they must take a boat to cross the murky river that separated their neighborhood from the main village roadway (bike is not going to help in that situation!). Right now, a very slippery and narrow bridge connects the land masses--a bridge that a little girl held my hand walking across. Houses are right up against the river, and I can only imagine the living conditions inside of them during the wet season, and what this does to water supply as well as sanitation practices. Sadly on the way to Lon Sey's motorbike, the little girl was not there to hold my hand. But I sucked it up, realizing how silly I probably looked towering over this girl yet nearly shaking with my fear of heights.