At the airport

Many ask me what is my purpose of going overseas at this point of time? I said I needed to take time off the heavy work load and to do a recce for my friend who is leading a team over to Cambodia. I may be joining this team in December when they are going over to Cambodia for another Youth Expedition Project. Well, when I checked in 15 minutes ago, I saw yet another bunch of young teens from an institution in Singapore going over for another YEP. How do I know? Cos it is written all over their shirt!

After embarking on my 4th trip, I am seriously a little tired in leading yet another team over. It is always so mentally and physically straining, especially when you are in the teaching profession. So yar, I went for a KTV session before I came to the airport, and my friends from PA X were commenting on how my bag pack looked the same as what I brought for 22 days, and I just laughed it off. Who would have known that it contained some of my most valuable stuffs? Computer manuals for my Cambodian counterpart, loads of assignments/ compositions from my dearest students (seems like I am going to enjoy soo much there, haha) I promised myself not to return with any of the assignments unmarked!).. , my laptop and the DVDs that I promised to burn for my friends.. There seems to be so much to accomplish within these 5 days of trip, would I be able to complete all?

I would be revisiting one of the villages that I have gone to, and I will also be dropping by a more rural area where I will be looking out for the suitable accomodations, transport, food for a next project in one of the more untouched places in Cambodia. When I say "untouched", it means that the children there have not been exposed much to foreign culture, or have not seen strangers other than their own villagers. These are the places that probably need help, but I do believe this Team from NIE, Project Builders of Hope, will be able to achieve so much more other than just any other projects. I do hope that they will be able to apply what they have learnt in the schools that they will be posted to in future. There are so many things that we can learn from our Cambodian counterparts, and every visit there, I would be looking forward to learning something from them. Hopefully, I manage to visit some orphanages and try to come up with a rough proposal for my future projects. I do hope to bring my students over one of these days, probably from next year onwards to do a project there. But of course all these would need support from the school. Probably I will start from NPCC..So stay Tuned.

Anyway, I would try to post at least an entry every day to keep you guys updated of what is happening in Cambodia. If there is chance, I will take fotos too.. Good Morning Singapore, Time to wake up, it is 5.20am on a Sunday Morning!