Q3 2022
More than three quarter gone and before you know it the year 2022 would be over soon enough. We are not slowing down yet as we have several projects being implemented. These include the construction of an additional floor of our Head Office building for volunteers/donor visits and the rollout of our new Community Development Program.
Rather then to wait until the year is out, it is timely for everyone to consider for themselves what they would still want to do in their lives to make it meaningful. We are already seeing this with the visit of our first volunteers (since borders reopened) from Sweden which you can read about.
Don’t forget, we are partners. Together we can make the world a better place while trying as much as we can to help you make yourself into a better person.
Education
Education is a core program of BLCP because we know that it is capable of transforming lives. One of our former English class students, Makara, whose parents are farmers, was able to study Chemistry at university. She tells us that with so many of her subjects taught in English, she was very happy that her increased proficiency in the language enables her to progress well in her studies.
She was also able to find part time work in a restaurant where she regularly communicates in English with its many foreign customers. The money she earns helps put her through her course as she has to live in the city without help from her family.
Another student, Bopha was a former computer student at our Head Office computer class which is supported by our donor, No Moss Co, an Australian IT company. Our objective in establishing the class was to help young job seekers to quickly gain employment.
As an accounting student at the local polytechnic, immediately upon completing her course with BLCP, Bopha found work as an accountant with a company where she uses her computing skills to record business transactions and to prepare financial reports. She is thankful for the opportunity to have learned computer skills with BLCP and now looks forward to a bright future. These examples are testimonies of what we can all do to help end the cycle of poverty and to empower especially young girls who would otherwise be exposed to the risks of being used in child labour (as maids) or married off as child brides. These are real life occurrences to young girls that we encountered in the village where the principal of our Community School had previously reported.
We recently welcomed our first foreign volunteers since borders reopened. Karin and Anna are two young girls in their late teens from Sweden who spent time teaching and sharing their life experiences with children at our Community School and visiting our Model Schools. They helped with story time accompanying our mobile librarians visiting schools and in setting up the pop-up libraries.
Their visit to Cambodia was also made possible with the help of their parents, who in the past had stayed in Phnom Penh. As parents, they saw the value of such overseas volunteering experience to open up one’s perspective of life. We would welcome you as a volunteer with BLCP where we do not charge you any fee for your time spent with us as we feel that the experience is for our mutual benefit.
Further information may be obtained from our website or to contact us by email at info@youraid.org.au, leanlee@youraid.org.au or kinpheap@blcp.youraid.org.au
School Development
As part of our efforts to enable children to have a positive school experience which in turn motivates class attendance, we built a new canteen at Kdat Secondary School. This was made possible by funds from your contributions and from our primary donor, the LUFF Foundation which is involved in several of our programs.
We have completed the first of our school toilets with wheelchair access. The design incorporates inputs from one of our volunteer directors, Mark who is an architect. Together with the school children, we can certainly appreciate the clean lines and well thought colour coordination by Mark!
Community Development
This is a new initiative which was implemented this year and is primarily funded by both LUFF Foundation and Club 500 (formed by ex-volunteers who upon return to Australia continue to be involved with the people in Cambodia). While we have in the past supported children in schools by way of providing clean water for drinking, additional class lessons and free dental treatments, we felt that we could not ignore the welfare of children at home.
This is an extract of the report we received from BLCP staff there:
“...Her family doesn’t have a toilet or well, so they go to their neighbors’ house or go out into the field at night, which is hard especially in rainy season. Without well or water container to harvest rainwater, they use water from the nearby pond for drinking, cooking, and washing. The water looks terrible, and it is contaminated by the agricultural fertilizer and pesticide from the rice paddies..”
Our community development efforts include addressing clean water availability, housing conditions, sanitation and food security. In the last quarter, we supplied 30 water jars to 17 poor families and built the first two of our house latrines.
Our latrines are built under a new funding system which we have developed. Each latrine cost USD430 which both LUFF Foundation and YourAid jointly funds USD300 with USD50 downpayment by the householder and the balance USD80 is funded by a No-Interest Microfinance loan by BLCP with USD10 monthly repayment by the family. This greatly facilitates our ability to implement this new initiative with the involvement of all stakeholders. However, there are families who are just too poor and cannot afford to even place a downpayment. We would be happy to receive your donation of between USD50 to USD130 for this purpose.
We provided allowances for children to enable them to have their meals and to pay for their tuition fees. In order to ensure that the children are in good health, we also brought the children for medical checkup at the hospital.
We hope that by learning all that we are doing in Cambodia would inspire caring givers like you to continue to be involved in our programs in every way possible. Our thanks goes out to dentist Dr Sumar of Florida, USA who donated SDF supplies, a fluoride dental application which we use in tooth decay prevention for the very young in Cambodia.