VSO is currently finalising its new strategic plan for Cambodia and it’s likely that they will start working on good governance at national, provincial and district levels. As public services are currently being devolved to district level (at least in theory), VSO will be able to combine this with continued support for health and education: volunteers will work in small teams with some supporting public services and others supporting district councils to administer these services effectively and to improve democratic accountability. I think it will be a big challenge for VSO to work in this area as Cambodia’s culture of deference as well as widespread corruption makes democratic development very difficult, but it’s also probably the single thing needed to help move the country forward.
VSO is also planning to reduce its geographical presence to the four poorest provinces in the east, including Mondulkiri, so there will be more volunteers here over the next few years. The good news for me is that it is likely that I will be able to extend my placement for five months to continue the work on education as well as help set up the new volunteer placements, which will begin next March. As the alternative is the miserable thought of supply teaching until next September, I think I’m keen to accept.
It’s also good that Tak will keep his job and will then have new volunteers to work with in March. We might need to clarify our respective roles, though, as I definitely feel there’s been some confusion in the volunteer/volunteer assistant working relationship. In fact I think I might be the victim of some highly exploitative working practices: as well as chopping down trees to clear his land, I also seem to be expected to build his house. Last month we went to Bousra to collect wood (not from the forest, I mean; from his cousin who he’d already bought it from). I thought it was nice of him to ask me along, and was imagining a nice trip to the countryside, and maybe a break at the waterfall on the way back. For some reason it didn’t occur to me that lifting and carrying enough wood to build a family-sized house might not be that much fun. It wasn’t, especially when we arrived back in Sen Monorom and realised we had to do it all again, unloading the wood, which took hours and hours. There were 294 planks of wood altogether, and there were no Mars Bars to help us get through it.
The sad news this week is that Ingran is leaving. He’s given up Cambodia for the bright lights of Watford, so it can’t be long before he’s back. But still, we’ll miss him in the meantime. Last week lots of people from our original September 2010 group came down to Phnom Penh to see him off. He's awesome and Cambodia won't be the same without him.
