Cambodia; the children of CFC

Kids are cute, didn't you know?
Well mine are cute AND smart. Not really book smart or anything but definitely street smart. There is no foam around sharp corners here, no real supervision, kids are free to climb the trees, furniture and get rowdy in the courtyard...they won't really cry if they hurt themselves, most likely they will get up laughing and keep playing...they can take care of their bleeding foot later. I usually run over to see if they are OK and get quite a scare sometimes. I am really amazed by how tough they can be and how they snap back into action after an injury. Ahh kids...

Sreneang on the swings, she loves to be pushed and I think if I understood what she was saying she would be saying this: "Push me teacha, Push me!"

Lucky for the kids Ben is big and strong, and he can easily carry them around...and they totally take advantage of that!

Ratanak is one of the older girls and quite a tough cookie, she can be a bit rough in her gestures sometimes, which might indicate a tough start in her life

Pheakdey is one of my favorites, he is the first one who hugged me the day I came

Svey Lin is a beautiful girl with big dark and shiny eyes, she is supposedly 14, but tiny for her age. She is quite shy and is more comfortable with body language than with words.

Khadda, is also one of my favorites, he has a smile that lightens his face and although he is still confused with the alphabet letters, he definitely knows which one is P. During a lesson I kept asking him over and over which letters where which and especially with P. Now every time I see him slacking off I ask him what letter is that??? And he smiles and cries out P!!!!!

My first week there we got a visit from the Japanese delegation who were coming to hand out some books, pens and school materials for the kids because Khmer New Year was coming up, so it was like Christmas for the kids. I guess kids do get presents on New Year here. They were so happy and began drawing immediately.

The Japanese Delegation is uncovering the donations as the director checks out the merchandise...

The kids pay attention as the director is introducing the Japanese delegation

Looking at the new pencils and deciding which colors to use

Komsan is my personal number 1, his laughing eyes, tiny body and voice make me melt every time he jumps up during a lesson saying "Knyom! Knyom!" (Me! Me!) when I ask the class who want to come up and try something.

Apart from that it was a fairly uneventful but exhausting week of playing, teaching, caring, and taking pictures of the sweethearts. Here is a sample:

Sreneang has a learning disability, sometimes she writes OK, but most of the time her letters and numbers are inverted, but she is always enthusiastic about learning and actually a very smart girl.

Nawee is a sweetheart and an avid artist, she draws very well for her age (6) and has a lot of love to give.

And this is Channa, she helps me translate sometimes although her english is very limited too. She is Vireak, the 2 year old's mother and a nanny for the kids. She is very sweet and has a gigantic heart.

Well this concludes the first few impressions of the orphanage. There are always things that shock me, especially today when one of the kids asked for "Teak" (water) and I got a cup (they have only a few) and got to the water filters and realized the water in them was full of algae and was moldy. Not healthy, so I told the director about it and he said yes they are broken but I have no money to fix. (he smokes around 2 packs of cigs a day...he has money to clog his lungs but not to give the kids proper drinking water!). Ben and I washed them thoroughly with the nannies and decided that water was the definite priority to get them. Not books, not pens, not toys, but water. The kids are always so resourceful and have so much love to give, but it is hard to give all of them the attention they deserve and I am constantly torn between several kids wanting me to do things with them. It is hard but I try to be fair and go with some one day and then later on do things with those that didn't get attention earlier. But you should see the smile on their faces if just when you walk past them you look at them, smile and gently touch their faces, I hope they feel loved, because I do love them.