Day in the life

Yesterday we visited a small village to further understand the lives and culture of Cambodia's people. They live out there lives in a simple manor with little regard for the modern world. Our daily worries are lost in there's, to support there family they must grow there own food and work for land owners in the fields or find work in the city to send there kids to school. Whilst with one of the poorer family's we set to work making palm leaf roofing. This was important as there roof needed replacing before the wet season arrives. Each panel took us about 15 to 20 minutes to construct whereas the locals skilfully produced them in 5 minutes. After we finished our panels, we each planted a fruit tree for the family which we had purchased through the community project we had gone with. Overall, we planted two orange trees, a mango tree and a local fruit similar to the lychee. Later, we met with a widow and her daughter that taught us how to make a delicious Khmer curry- a recipe that we have written down to try at home- all made from local ingredients. After lunch, we met another widow and her grandchild who lost their house in the storm last year and are currently living in a tiny shack with the other five members of their family! We made a donation of rice to her, which was very greatly received, and she came with us to meet some other members of the village. We were shown the house of the local 'magic man' who collects herbal remedies from deep within the jungle to sell very cheaply to the other villagers. Although we didn't meet him, we did see some of his remedies that he had left outside to dry.... Our next stop was a family who grew mangos and coconuts to sell in the floating village. They showed us how the men clime the palm trees to cut the leaves and coconuts down. Like a monkey they grip the tree with there hands and feet and walk there way up, No ropes, no laders, no messing around. It was only later that we saw how tall these trees can get, it must have been like 40 to 50 foot up! Afterward we met with the village nuns who are very old with shaven heads. one was 84 which is unusual in Cambodia as most people only live in to there late 60's. To end the day went to visit the temple and school which were situated on the same grounds as the monks used to teach the kids. We watched them going about there daily routines whilst viewing the construction of the new temple.