The Countdown is On!!
Today we celebrated the fact that it is officially 100 days until we fly to Cambodia. Many of our group has never flown before so this is a milestone that we view with equal amounts of excitement and nervous energy. Now seems like a good time to give everyone a clearer idea of how we plan to spend our time in Cambodia as well as how we have celebrated the start of our countdown.
Our flight will leave late at night and take us straight to Hong Kong. We will have a short amount of time to look around the bustling airport before we board the plane to Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Upon arrival we will take a coach from the bottom of the country the top, arriving in Siem Reap several hours later. From there we will travel out to rural Cambodia and to the camp where we will spend the majority of our time.
At the camp we will have the opportunity to assist in projects to help the local community. We are really excited to find out exactly what we will be doing but some possibilities include, helping in the classroom, constructing housing for local families, installing and improving local amenities to improve healthcare and sanitation, installing new water supplies or caring for the local environment. While we don’t know exactly what project we will be involved in just yet, we do know that whatever we do will be helping the local community.
We will also get the opportunity to visit local sites and experience Cambodian culture. Our group will have the chance to go shopping in the Siem Reap night markets, see the worlds largest religious monument at Angkor Wat, explore the Russian Markets in Phnom Penh and learn about the devastating history of Cambodia at the Killing Fields and Camp S21.
Not surprisingly, the fact that all these new experiences are finally drawing nearer is something we want to celebrate. We decided to have lunch on the day and Liam and Miss Woodrow declared that it was time to try some Cambodian food so they started searching recipes. Miss Woodrow said that her favourite food in the world is Khmer Curry so it wasn’t a shock when she said she’d make it. Liam also found a recipe for chicken amok which he thought looked good and they made a passionfruit smoothie.
Luckily Jade and Megan were there too because neither Miss Woodrow nor Liam knew how to work the rice cooker. Jade quickly had it sorted and there were some amazing smells wafting through the kitchen. There was also the smell of fish sauce which we all agree, we don’t like.
Lunch time finally arrived and the whole team flooded into the kitchen. We all pulled up chairs and, after one alarming moment when Megan thought that Khmer curry contained pumpkin and flat out refused to eat it (it’s sweet potato), we all sat down to try the food. The feedback was pretty positive and we were even able to deliver some to Maison who was in a music rehearsal. Most of the group decided to take a container full for their dinner at work tonight too!
The feeling among the group, who have all been wondering if we could get Maccas or KFC in Cambodia, was summed up by Jamie who announced “I’ll definitely be trying all of the local food, except tarantula, there’s no way I’m eating tarantula!”
Peace out
Cambodia Team 2018
