Quick updates...

01/06/08-

First things first- we have to wish everyone all the best in health and happiness in this fantastic New Year. Olivia and I want to personally thank EVERYONE who made 2007 such a productive and empowering one. We are eternally in debt to you all for allowing us to pursue our passion of serving the amazing people of Cambodia! We cannot say thank you enough!

I will try to give you a quick update on the happening of the last week.

*Mr. Meng is the assistant director at the VDPCS School, if you have been keeping up on the Blog you know Mr. Togh as the Director at the school. Well Mr. Meng was out with Graham getting cement for the foundation of the new school. He returned from the cement shop to find his motto had been stolen. He had the keys in his pocket even. Long story short I sent out an email and was able to raise a quick $500 to buy Mr. Meng another motto! Thank you so much Graham, Nick, Kipp and Chann, we were able to give Mr. Meng the best possible Christmas present!

*We returned to Sao’s village with Brian and Gwen in tow. As always the hospitality and kindness that is shared through the village leaves us in tears, there are not words to describe the kindness and sheer joy we feel. I will let the pictures speak instead!

*Sao took us to his pagoda in his village, Bangro pagoda to be exact. It is a humble place, maybe 20 or 25 monks living there. We watched Malay teach English to the children of Sao’s village. I felt bad as they were more focused on us then their lesson. Giggles and smiles seemed to be the topic of the class! Malay is a 22-year-old monk/teacher; he shared his simple classroom and explained to us the frustrations of trying to teach English to the children, as he had only one textbook for 60 children. We discussed the possibility of Project Enlighten helping provide materials for a very simple and basic school. As you will see by the pictures, it was standing room only and even some children were using their bikes as a make shift desk! I hope to make this a thing of the past, as every child should have the ability to write on a desk, not a bike seat.

*Olivia and I have been visiting the local universities and speaking with students with the pro’s and con’s of each. I want to Build Bright University or BBU and was able to speak with Mr. Siv Vutthy (First Vice President) and Mr Srin Sivhorng (Vice President Student Affairs). I shared with them my intent for Project Enlighten to provide 2 scholarships for 2 students. One under the John Fletcher McKim scholarship and one under the Dave Linsdell scholarship. Mr. Vutty explained to me that he had a list of 49 students who met the entrance requirements for the university but where to poor to attend BBU. For the price of $330 to $390 a year for tuition, we will do some massive fundraising when we get home, as my dream is to wipe that list of 49 students to zero!

* The team is together. As I mentioned earlier, Brian and Gwen are in Siem Reap. Bill Morse our dear friend from the Land Mine Relief Fund came into down and we had a wonderful dinner and caught up on the work we need to accomplish in our time together. Lisa McCoy a wonderful fundraiser from Canada was in town as well. She raised close to $4000 to build schools for Akira in the rural villages in northern Cambodia! As Olivia and I were waiting at the airport to pick up our Board Members Matt and Riva we were shocked to see Richard Fitoussi walk down the ramp! Wow what a day, the whole team is here!
We were so happy to see Riva and Matt today as well, we were so worried that the massive storms in California would cancel their flights, well after many delays and cancelled flights we were so happy to see their smiling faces at Siem Reap Airport! We are so fortunate to have a wonderful people like Matt and Riva on our Board! We will be interviewing 6 prospective scholarship candidates at the University on Wednesday with Matt and Riva, we will keep you posted! We have a very busy week upcoming as we attempt to get Matt and Riva up to speed on our TEAMS many projects! Life is grand!