Visitors from above

The last 3 days at CFI were one tremendous cleaning-, filing- and making-things-look-pretty -upheaval.
Thanks to that, our office has now again enough space to move without hitting over a guitar or set of publications, our storeroom can actually be used for storing and, importantly, finding stuff and our medical drawers are again arranged in a way that allowed me to treat a student's knee-wound in an efficient way (without first pulling out three drawers and spreading their contents across the table).
As an extra, all the bathrooms and other rooms are cleaned neatly, the outside areas are swiped and the walls are all plastered with charts teaching children alternatively about human rights, numbers, animal names and the alphabet.
Now, reader, you may inquire: why? what for? or you may not, thinking order being a high principle in itself.
There is, however, a reason to all this: In the afternoon hours of Wednesday, an envoy from the department of social affairs, responsible for all orphanages in the area, came for his first check-up visit to CFI.

So in the end of the day, there were three things to rejoice about:
The cleanliness of the center (somewhat marred by flower petals scattered around after the envoy's departure); The little number of complaints from the envoy; And, most importantly, many happy, smiling children, trying to fit out the staff members with flowers :)

I’m Singing in the Rain

A couple of days ago, Fong (a Cambodian Staff at CFI) and I were driving to the center through one of the heaviest downpours this rainy season has seen as yet. We were soaked and had lots of fun. That evening, I taught Fong how to play "Singing in the Rain".

Today, there was another downpour. This time, it crossed times with my English class. My students still came, wet as they were, but oral teaching was rendered almost impossible by the noise of water hitting the school's tin roof. Thus, the lesson was reduced to writing exercises, the instructions written on the blackboard. The guitar lesson which preceded this was more delightful, as it was less disturbed by outside noises. The student, Mady, was amazing in learning how to read tablatures and he mastered the intro of "Romance d'Amour" in a matter of minutes – the greatest advancement I have seen in a student up to date!

Another highlight of the day was the opening or our "Activity Room". We furnished a vacant classroom with mats, drawers, shelves and tables. Over the time, CFI has amassed quite a number of boardgames, blocks, small musical instrument, drawing materials, animal miniatures, puzzles and other creative stuff. Some of this got lost in a forsaken drawer in the storeroom. Now, it is all available again and during lunch break, the Activity Room was camped with kids playing all kinds of game, visibly enjoying themselves and creating their own little worlds. It was a delight to be present on the occasion and be it just to teach two boys to play chess – a game at which both showed a great deal of aptitude.

When the break was over, all children were extremely helpful cleaning everything away, leaving me almost a little ashamed not help them in doing so, as I went to prepare my guitar lesson.