6:00 My phone rings – time to wake up
6:15 Finally managed to fall asleep again
7:00 Now it’s really time to get up. Jakob already got up to fetch breakfast with his moto.
7:20 I took a shower and Jakob is back with some baguettes. Breakfast time!
7:50 Breakfast is finished. Simone arrives on her bicycle and joins us for the remaining 10 minitues
8:00 Time to go to work. Today the schedule was a bit tight, as work starts at 8 and it takes 1-2 minutes to get there. Fortunately, you can count on the others being very patient.
8:15 Having spent some time discussing today’s activities with the other Teams, Neruh and I leave for Prek Luong commune, Ek Phnom district. The goal is to talk to some village leaders and the High School director to ask them for some youths to join our small meeting the next day.
I spend the drive in a state of half-consciousness. Not fully awake yet, I only perceive some single impressions: Wooden huts lining the road, Old women in street shops, a entire family manning a motorbike, palm trees on the riverside, a wooden bridge, a dirt road, a straw hut with some signs in front.
That last item turns out to be the commune office. We enter the (not so) big conference room. One wall is occupied by the Cambodian flag and the faces of the king and his parents (these insignia can be found in every official building, as well as in many NGO offices – ours included). On the opposite wall, there is another Cambodian flag, albeit an a-bit-out-of-date one – it is from the time of Vietnamese rule (1979-1989). When we close the windows before our departure and I have a closer look at the construction, I wonder what keeps the building from disintegrating.
We are greeted by a commune officer who is very willing to lend his aid; however, as he is new to the commune he cannot do so to a great extent. As we are not eager to await the arrival of the commune leader (in the afternoon), we let him introduce us to some of the village chiefs. Following his bicycle, we arrive at a street shop with an old woman inside. She kindly explains that her husband will be back for lunch and we agree to meet him then.
Again in the wake of the bicycle, we go to another street shop (apparently a favorite place for village leaders to live at). Here, we meet a middle aged man. The stylistic combination of fine black trousers and a ripped singlet makes an impression upon me. The village leader of Prek Luong, he welcomes our activities and in addition to assembling his village’s youth for the next day, he even offers a room for the meeting.
Next, we head for the nearby High School, as we think it a nice idea to have some youths from there join our meeting as well. Unfortunately, the principal doesn’t quite think so. Owning the tidiest office we had seen so far, with documents carefully ordered in folders and his inferiors working on wooden tables, supervised by the principal in persona from his comfortable office seat, he has used every inch of wall to cover it with statistics and royal insignia, not to forget numerous photographs showing him in the company of important personalities.
He would make a great German Kultusminister in the way he emphasizes the need for the students not to miss a single lesson – making it regrettably impossible for them to join our meeting.
He also expresses severe concerns about a Forum potentially taking place at his school – surely the young people would trample the grass and damage the interior. Only the prospect of inviting the police chief of Battambang somewhat softens his disposition towards us. He is suddenly even ready to give permission for a Forum – until 6 o’clock in the evening (it is supposed to last till 9).
Confronted with such convincing arguments, there is little left for us to do but to leave.
11:30 Lunchtime - time for us to revisit the first street shop. Here we meet the second village leader. A CCP cap hanging on the staircase indicated his party allegiance (not that this has to be taken for his political conviction – it’s just almost impossible for any official not to belong to “the party” if he wants to retain his office). A very friendly old man, he immediately agreed to assemble the youths for the upcoming meeting and even suggested a place for the “big meeting” which is to take place in November with participants from all three communes. With this site as our next destination we say goodbye to the village chief. A few hundred meters further down the dirt road, we find our “meeting hall”: a big open space floored and roofed with wood. We arrange to use it for our purpose with the few people who have set up their hammocks here.
12:00 we pay another visit to the chief of Prek Luong village to accept his offer to use the village’s assembly room for our small meeting the next day and buy some small cakes to strengthen us for the 5 minute ride to our last destination: The pagoda in Prek Kbop (the neighboring commune). We plan to use it for our forum, as we suspect the monks to be more cooperative than the village leader.
12:30 Our hopes have been fulfilled. The head monk, and the head of the villagers living at the commune have agreed to provide space for the Forum at the pagoda compound and will even lend us microphones and amplifiers. Now we only have to get the permission from the village leader of the surrounding area, which shouldn’t be too difficult, considering the number of village leaders we have already successfully dealt with today.
Note: I always write “we”, however, it is to be remarked that it it exclusively Neruh to whom these exploits have to be attributed, as he handled all the conversation (except with the monk who was quite proficient in English).
12.35 Opposite of the pagoda, we ask a boy where to find the village leader. He leads us through two backyards into the official’s kitchen. In the backyard, chicken are raised to be grilled later at the market. Although roofed by corrugated iron, it is only encompassed by the living room on one side and the toilets/bathrooms on the other. Over the elevated working space, a hammock is placed to allow for relaxation when there is no work to be done (this is a common and practical arrangement, which can also be seen in many street shops).
After dressing, the village chief invites us to have a tea at his dining table, crafted from tropical timber. Just like his predecessors, he is delighted with our plans and happy to allow us any activities in his area. Suddenly, an American woman descends the stairs, obviously on her way to the shower. Being a teacher at the pagoda’s English school, she already came to know the first generation of YFP volunteers in Battambang. As she rushed to the shower, there was little time for further conversation.
When lunch is ready, we leave our new friends to enjoy it and to have our own in the town. Again, it is quite a trip (15 or 20 minutes), but this time I am more alert to the surroundings, carefully noting the beauty of the rice fields, bordered by palm trees, the idyll of the river, the peculiar styles of buildings, the shabbiness of the outskirts of Cambodia’s second biggest town, the faces of the people expressing all the different emotions the human being can feel, but most of them smiling. But I’m getting romantic - that’s not my genre.
12.50 We arrive in Battambang. Neruh will have lunch at his home, we agree to meet at PTD at 14:30, so I start thinking about the kind of restaurant I want to visit today. Somehow I’m not in the mood for rice or noodles. Knowing the menu of “Madison Corner” by heart already, I decide to go to “Khmer Delight” to try some fusion food.
At KD I run into Jenny, the Swiss co-director of our cooperation NGO. She lives across the street and orders her food here. We make an appointment to have a lookout for guitars in Battambang the other day, as we both plan to buy one. I have a pizza topped with vegetables which does taste good, but is too small (especially considering my hunger and the price of $2.50). The pizzas size allows for a quick meal and leaves me with enough time to have a coffee at Madison Corner. Here I’m greeted with a hearty “Big coffee” which is exactly what I order. – The restaurant’s menu doesn’t contain a “big coffee” (only espresso-size). Jakob introduced it and he and I are the only ones ever ordering it. This explains our nicknames “big coffee” and “big coffee with milk” (Jakob).
14:25 Time to take a moto to PTD. Just before I arrive at the market, where all the moto-drivers wait for customers, a stray one approaches me. With his price ok, I jump on the backseat for the ride. The driver turns out to be very friendly and communicative and even offers a small discount when he learns that I work and live at PTD.
14:50 After a short Team discussion, Nehru and I again get going. This time, we are headed for the town center to recruit speakers and materials for our forum.
15:20 As ADHOC, one of the local Human Rights NGOs, is not staffed today, we go directly to the police station. The police chief is to be our main speaker after all. The police (especially the traffic police) is not exactly loved, so we entered the public relations office with a slight uneasiness. Befitting the image of strict executive power, it was furnished rather spartanly. The officer was not exactly hearty, but still cooperative and assured us that, as soon as we sent him a formal invitation, the police chief was ready to join the Forum, also the police would provide some movies about the subject of violence. Delighted at the easy success, we continued to meet with staff from Licadho, a second Human Rights NGO in Battambang. We had to wait some time, till a consultation was finished, which left me time to inspect the room closely. It was well equipped, with shelves, comfortable chairs and a computer. The walls were covered with posters advertising Human Rights. One of them struck my eye, as it was obviously from a Finnish NGO and read “Ihan tavallinen lapsuus”. Maybe my Finnish readers (are you out there?) can get some information on that one. I would certainly be interested in getting some.
16:10 I’m starting to get fed up with formal letters. Alright, Licadho is also happy to join the Forum and can provide some film footage on the gangster problem, but of course, a formal letter is a prerequisite. Nehru doesn’t even want to go to the department of women’s affairs without one, thinking the attempt futile. I can understand him. But with Piseth in Phnom Penh and not coming back for two weeks, there is little we can do to obtain one. Plus, I think it’s always good to have some informal talks with people, this keeps them informed, interested and sympathetic to us and our causes, at least that’s what I hope. At the department, we meet with three women, one of them heading the establishment. She makes a kind impression on me, and is indeed eager to cooperate. The request for a formal invitation is not much of a surprise and all in all, I leave this office with a sense of satisfaction at what we have achieved today. Nehru for his part, doesn’t seem as happy, which might well be due to the fact, that he had to do all the talking, which I consider a great but fatiguing job.
16:35 Back at PTD, there is a small setback, as we cannot print the lists for tomorrow’s meeting – the generator is already turned off. Nehru takes his leave and I also retire to my hammock to relax, read and wait for Jakob to come back from the slum school.
17:30 Jakob is back on his motorbike (the sound is unmistakable). As I’m overcome with a strong desire to sleep, I decide to revive myself by jogging half an hour or so.
18:30 I’m back from jogging. Well, it took a little longer. After watching a magnificent sunset on the fields, I was not quite sure which road to take – after half an hour of traversing unknown settlements, I was quite sure I had lost my way. As nobody knew of PTD, I asked for the road to Phsar Nat (the central market). The answer: Far, far to the south. Finally I arrived at a familiar crossroads. My legs are going to hurt tomorrow.
19:00 Back at Madison Corner, I have a vegetarian sandwich (mushrooms, onions, tomatoes, pickles and cheese) and a coconut (for drinking and eating). I spent some time in the internet and get a Khmer lesson from a very friendly Cambodian lady living in France. With her as strict teacher, I should be able to enlarge my vocabulary quite a bit in the weeks to come.
21.15 Tomorrow the time of awakening will be the same, so Jakob and I make our way to PTD.
21.25 A well established tradition, we spent the last minutes before sleeping in our hammocks, discussing whatever topics come to mind.
23.30 Once again, the discussion went a little out of hand. Time to finally go to bed!
It took some time to write everything down. The account is of the 22nd of October.
I know I still didn’t upload any pictures. I’m very sorry for that, but I promise an adequate compensation when I do upload some.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Initiation
While the last few days haven’t exactly been filled with work, they did contain other interesting events. Firstly, (ok this does concern work) we began concrete talks with Jenny, co-founder of Children’s Future International, our first cooperation NGO. We will probably start working with them after the end of water festival (4th November), when both of us will be a bit better set-up (CFI is just starting its work, with their center still being a construction site – a state that is supposed to change within a month or so). There, we will work with children and youths of all ages from the poorest backgrounds, providing them with English and Khmer classes, offering our own workshops or simply having some fun with them.
Aside from that we were visited on the weekend by two volunteers from the first group. (There were two volunteer groups arriving in
Tomorrow there will also be some more pictures, after I’ve had the time to edit them.
Monday, October 12, 2009
Lifestyle
This island forms the center of PTD and provides a nice space for dining (as long as it's not flooded like last night.
Some other houses at PTD, very similar style.
The landscape behind our house - an ideal breeding place for mosquitoes of all kinds.
My room, filled completely by my bed, wherein I spend my nights sleeping like a stone.
Our wonderful wooden house at PTD, with the (less wonderful, but still ok) Jakob in front.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Omniscient waiter
Ups and downs and constants, those are the elements the last two weeks were made of.
Coming back from the conference, I was still full of euphoria and an overwhelming desire to change the world (or for the moment, Ek Phnom district in Battambang, which is to be our target area.
However, this euphoria was quickly to be diminished. Still having received no funds, our project was all but nonexistent, which forced us to stay idle for another couple of days. Quite opposite to vacations from school, this “free time” did not exactly cause any joy for me.
I used the free days to study some more of the Khmer alphabet (of which I know at the moment about half, i.e. 50 letters) and to establish some constants of my life here. Unsurprisingly, these are exclusively tied to the subject of food. The first constant is the vegetarian restaurant I recently discovered at the 2½th street. It is a typical Khmer eatery, fitted with plastic chairs and ever-smiling staff that offers excellent vegetarian food for low prices and is frequented almost exclusively by Khmers.
The other constant is quite the opposite: It is a French bar/restaurant called “Madison Corner” that is frequented only by tourists and expats and is one of the most expensive places in town. It offers food of excellent quality, constituting a welcome variety from the typical Khmer vegetarian food. In addition, it serves the best coffee in town and has free access to the internet which is the reason why right now I’m enjoying a coffee here as well. The staff here knows Jakob and me already by name, and we seldom have to take a look at the menu, as most of the time, our orders are pre-known to the waiters. We also have established a good relationship with the French patron (who would better keep it up, if he doesn’t intend to loose his “meilleurs clients” as he once called us). This allows me to train my French a bit, which might turn out to be quite useful.
The next “up” in my work life occurred, when we met our Khmer counterparts, all of which are very sympathetic. They are all very proficient with the English language, which somewhat facilitates communication (a good thing, as the cultural differences do hamper it quite often already). But let’s take a look at them individually:
• Nareth is studying at the university; she is 22 years old and very good at English. She is very enthusiastic and active, having no fears to express her political opinion or addressing Piseth, our project official directly in order to ask for a change in working hours (to start at 8:00 instead of 7:30 AM – an action that earned her quite some sympathy with me). She works with Paula and Simone in the Training Team.
• Neruh is my partner in the Advocacy Team. He, too, is 22 years old and spends his weekends studying at university. He is very committed to the nonviolent ideals of YFP, despite planning to become an army official later in his life (a paradox that I’m still striving to comprehend). I discovered that he is very able in conversing with the authorities (his father being an official himself), a fact that may still serve us well in our work.
• Paula is the oldest of us all with 24 years of age. She is very patient and understanding and might well once be the island of tranquility in the team. Working with Nareth and Simone in the Training Team, she is also the best (written) translator of the team.
• Last but not least, Sopheeng is the only team member actually living in our target area at Ek Phnom. He likes to speak American slang, which he learned at the university which makes him sometimes a bit difficult to understand, but is still great fun. He works with Matthias in the Publication and Communication Team.
Knowing them for only about a week, there’s unfortunately not much more I can write yet, but it will be great to get them to know better, particularly, because it will make communication a lot easier when we get to know each other’s communication habits. (As for now it is still somewhat difficult to grab the actual meaning of each statement).
Unfortunately, despite having such a great Team, we still had to remain idle for another few days. During this time it the first thing I saw in the morning was Piseth’s face telling everybody how sorry he was not to have any work for us. We already went on the research for other NGOs to invest our workforce and motivation in.
Then finally on Wednesday the relieving message struck: We were to be funded for three months by DED.
Feelings then went continually upwards: During a two-day orientation workshop by Mr. Mony (the YFP program coordinator) we created a concrete action plan and got back all the motivation that had slipped away in the phases of idleness.
Now work can finally start!
Coming back from the conference, I was still full of euphoria and an overwhelming desire to change the world (or for the moment, Ek Phnom district in Battambang, which is to be our target area.
However, this euphoria was quickly to be diminished. Still having received no funds, our project was all but nonexistent, which forced us to stay idle for another couple of days. Quite opposite to vacations from school, this “free time” did not exactly cause any joy for me.
I used the free days to study some more of the Khmer alphabet (of which I know at the moment about half, i.e. 50 letters) and to establish some constants of my life here. Unsurprisingly, these are exclusively tied to the subject of food. The first constant is the vegetarian restaurant I recently discovered at the 2½th street. It is a typical Khmer eatery, fitted with plastic chairs and ever-smiling staff that offers excellent vegetarian food for low prices and is frequented almost exclusively by Khmers.
The other constant is quite the opposite: It is a French bar/restaurant called “Madison Corner” that is frequented only by tourists and expats and is one of the most expensive places in town. It offers food of excellent quality, constituting a welcome variety from the typical Khmer vegetarian food. In addition, it serves the best coffee in town and has free access to the internet which is the reason why right now I’m enjoying a coffee here as well. The staff here knows Jakob and me already by name, and we seldom have to take a look at the menu, as most of the time, our orders are pre-known to the waiters. We also have established a good relationship with the French patron (who would better keep it up, if he doesn’t intend to loose his “meilleurs clients” as he once called us). This allows me to train my French a bit, which might turn out to be quite useful.
The next “up” in my work life occurred, when we met our Khmer counterparts, all of which are very sympathetic. They are all very proficient with the English language, which somewhat facilitates communication (a good thing, as the cultural differences do hamper it quite often already). But let’s take a look at them individually:
• Nareth is studying at the university; she is 22 years old and very good at English. She is very enthusiastic and active, having no fears to express her political opinion or addressing Piseth, our project official directly in order to ask for a change in working hours (to start at 8:00 instead of 7:30 AM – an action that earned her quite some sympathy with me). She works with Paula and Simone in the Training Team.
• Neruh is my partner in the Advocacy Team. He, too, is 22 years old and spends his weekends studying at university. He is very committed to the nonviolent ideals of YFP, despite planning to become an army official later in his life (a paradox that I’m still striving to comprehend). I discovered that he is very able in conversing with the authorities (his father being an official himself), a fact that may still serve us well in our work.
• Paula is the oldest of us all with 24 years of age. She is very patient and understanding and might well once be the island of tranquility in the team. Working with Nareth and Simone in the Training Team, she is also the best (written) translator of the team.
• Last but not least, Sopheeng is the only team member actually living in our target area at Ek Phnom. He likes to speak American slang, which he learned at the university which makes him sometimes a bit difficult to understand, but is still great fun. He works with Matthias in the Publication and Communication Team.
Knowing them for only about a week, there’s unfortunately not much more I can write yet, but it will be great to get them to know better, particularly, because it will make communication a lot easier when we get to know each other’s communication habits. (As for now it is still somewhat difficult to grab the actual meaning of each statement).
Unfortunately, despite having such a great Team, we still had to remain idle for another few days. During this time it the first thing I saw in the morning was Piseth’s face telling everybody how sorry he was not to have any work for us. We already went on the research for other NGOs to invest our workforce and motivation in.
Then finally on Wednesday the relieving message struck: We were to be funded for three months by DED.
Feelings then went continually upwards: During a two-day orientation workshop by Mr. Mony (the YFP program coordinator) we created a concrete action plan and got back all the motivation that had slipped away in the phases of idleness.
Now work can finally start!
Youth Participation Project: project structure
In order for you to understand the following entries I just want to make a brief outline of our project. I’ll do so in a dry, non-humoristic, but all the more informative way:
YFP as an organization based in Phnom Penh that organizes workshops and village dialogues all over the country. The Battambang branch of the organization called “Youth Participation Project” (YPP) is something of an anomaly in this context. It was established with the explicitly for the cooperation with the DED and the German volunteers arriving via that partner.
Last year seven German volunteers and an equal number of counterparts manned the project. However, there were reportedly some problems with overlapping competences and failing communications. Therefore, the project was reduced in size and the competences were clearly divided among three Teams, each of which was to consist of a Khmer and a German volunteer. The teams are as follows:
• Communication and Publication Team (CPT)
o Collecting information about all YFP activities as well as activities of other NGOs in Battambang.
o Publishing regular newsletter, advertisements and web-entries.
o Contacting other NGOs in order to cooperate with them, profit from their activities and offer them to profit from YPP’s.
• Training Team (TT)
o Organizing and providing Trainings to youths in the target area about subjects such as Good Governance, Human Rights, Environment, Domestic Violence etc.
o Facilitating trainings by guest speakers and inviting the guests.
o Organizing a mobile library to visit the villages.
• Advocacy Team (AdT)
o Creating and maintaining a youth network in the target area.
o Furthering participation of youths in the workings of the commune council.
o Organizing Forums in which youths have opportunity to meet with and ask questions to a local authority.
o Organizing field trips about different subjects and organizing actions on special occasions such as the Human Rights Day (10th of December).
The administrative work and the coordination of the Teams is the responsibility of Piseth, our project official. Every second week a Team meeting will be held to coordinate and synchronize activities.
YFP as an organization based in Phnom Penh that organizes workshops and village dialogues all over the country. The Battambang branch of the organization called “Youth Participation Project” (YPP) is something of an anomaly in this context. It was established with the explicitly for the cooperation with the DED and the German volunteers arriving via that partner.
Last year seven German volunteers and an equal number of counterparts manned the project. However, there were reportedly some problems with overlapping competences and failing communications. Therefore, the project was reduced in size and the competences were clearly divided among three Teams, each of which was to consist of a Khmer and a German volunteer. The teams are as follows:
• Communication and Publication Team (CPT)
o Collecting information about all YFP activities as well as activities of other NGOs in Battambang.
o Publishing regular newsletter, advertisements and web-entries.
o Contacting other NGOs in order to cooperate with them, profit from their activities and offer them to profit from YPP’s.
• Training Team (TT)
o Organizing and providing Trainings to youths in the target area about subjects such as Good Governance, Human Rights, Environment, Domestic Violence etc.
o Facilitating trainings by guest speakers and inviting the guests.
o Organizing a mobile library to visit the villages.
• Advocacy Team (AdT)
o Creating and maintaining a youth network in the target area.
o Furthering participation of youths in the workings of the commune council.
o Organizing Forums in which youths have opportunity to meet with and ask questions to a local authority.
o Organizing field trips about different subjects and organizing actions on special occasions such as the Human Rights Day (10th of December).
The administrative work and the coordination of the Teams is the responsibility of Piseth, our project official. Every second week a Team meeting will be held to coordinate and synchronize activities.
Encounter of the second kind
When trying to get some sleep at PTD (Ptheah Toek Dong, our wonderful home for the moment), you are frequently confronted with several factors trying to prevent you from achieving your aim: Firstly, there are often some weddings taking place in the neighborhood, creating music at top volume for just about the whole night. Secondly, the nearby pagoda regularly let’s us profit from its sermons whenever there is a religious festivity (which occurs quite often, but is, on the other hand, quite understandable). Thirdly, there is the army of frogs inhabiting the pond at PTD, who have the habit of copulating at nighttime. We now had the very questionable luck of finding out about other beings with the same habit.
As the fourth factor disturbing as at night is a karaoke bar, starting to play their music at about 11 o’clock, we once had the idea of having a beer and having a look at the place. On our arrival we were guided to a little hut, open to the sides, with an elevated wooden floor. At first glance it looked like a nice concept for a restaurant, with each group of customers having their own space to dine. The fact that two young women were present was not yet irritating, as in Khmer restaurants it is common practice for one or multiple waiters to stand at the customers’ table, awaiting their orders.
It was only when they started touching as that the situation grew weird. We successfully managed to ignore them until our order arrived: Instead of the two beers we had ordered, a tray with about 30 of its kind was brought. Luckily, it was accompanied by the only English-speaking staff of the establishment. After some time we even managed to convince him that the only erotic experience we whished for that night was to be with our beers. Finally, the girls left the hut, leaving us to “enjoy” our beer, the only joy lying with the fact that after having finished it, we were free to leave. Since that night, the disturbance caused by nightly karaoke music has somewhat changed in quality.
As the fourth factor disturbing as at night is a karaoke bar, starting to play their music at about 11 o’clock, we once had the idea of having a beer and having a look at the place. On our arrival we were guided to a little hut, open to the sides, with an elevated wooden floor. At first glance it looked like a nice concept for a restaurant, with each group of customers having their own space to dine. The fact that two young women were present was not yet irritating, as in Khmer restaurants it is common practice for one or multiple waiters to stand at the customers’ table, awaiting their orders.
It was only when they started touching as that the situation grew weird. We successfully managed to ignore them until our order arrived: Instead of the two beers we had ordered, a tray with about 30 of its kind was brought. Luckily, it was accompanied by the only English-speaking staff of the establishment. After some time we even managed to convince him that the only erotic experience we whished for that night was to be with our beers. Finally, the girls left the hut, leaving us to “enjoy” our beer, the only joy lying with the fact that after having finished it, we were free to leave. Since that night, the disturbance caused by nightly karaoke music has somewhat changed in quality.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Short Report
Since 4 days I am already back in Battambang, but a certain laziness (and another Aircon-induced cold) hindered me up to this point to write about the YFP-conference.
Within the main subject of the Khmer Rouge Regime and its legacy, the conference covered a broad range of sub-topics. Starting with a penal about the function of art in the process of transmitting memories and a small exhibition of Cambodian artists’ works, there was a series of art workshops throughout the 6 days. Another reoccurring unit was the Action Plan Workshop, wherein the participants were to think of a means to establish a memory culture in their own province. The results, although they were not very diverse (almost all groups planned to built either a stupa or a library), where accompanied by a great enthusiasm and determination on the participants’ side.
The great participation and eagerness for further implementation of the acquired knowledge (both sometimes a bit dimmed by a noticeable, but understandable – and self-experienced – fatigue) were heartening. What was still more unexpected and all the more welcome, was the interaction between the generations: The villagers and village chiefs - many of them survivors of KR-times, communicated with the youth on a basis of mutual respect and curiosity.
One focal point of the conference was the subject of child soldiers and how to treat former child soldiers. With a former, internationally renowned KR-child soldier called Arn Cham Pond, Nicolas Davis, a former child soldier from Liberia, now fighting against the use of CS in the Philippines and Emmanuel Jal, once a child soldier in Sudan, today a widely renowned HipHop musician, it was certainly the most internationalized subject and treated in quite some depth. [If you have the chance: Check out Emmanuel Jal, its worth it!!]
Within the main subject of the Khmer Rouge Regime and its legacy, the conference covered a broad range of sub-topics. Starting with a penal about the function of art in the process of transmitting memories and a small exhibition of Cambodian artists’ works, there was a series of art workshops throughout the 6 days. Another reoccurring unit was the Action Plan Workshop, wherein the participants were to think of a means to establish a memory culture in their own province. The results, although they were not very diverse (almost all groups planned to built either a stupa or a library), where accompanied by a great enthusiasm and determination on the participants’ side.
The great participation and eagerness for further implementation of the acquired knowledge (both sometimes a bit dimmed by a noticeable, but understandable – and self-experienced – fatigue) were heartening. What was still more unexpected and all the more welcome, was the interaction between the generations: The villagers and village chiefs - many of them survivors of KR-times, communicated with the youth on a basis of mutual respect and curiosity.
One focal point of the conference was the subject of child soldiers and how to treat former child soldiers. With a former, internationally renowned KR-child soldier called Arn Cham Pond, Nicolas Davis, a former child soldier from Liberia, now fighting against the use of CS in the Philippines and Emmanuel Jal, once a child soldier in Sudan, today a widely renowned HipHop musician, it was certainly the most internationalized subject and treated in quite some depth. [If you have the chance: Check out Emmanuel Jal, its worth it!!]
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