If you like making love at midnight...

Here it is. This week's installment. On top of all the hard training we are doing we are pleased to report that Colin is doing a school assembly presentation at a teacher friend's school and I have been asked to play duets on the organ at the school's carol concert. We are very touched by the way people continue to help out - We know that there are lots of calls on everyone's money at the moment so big thanks.

I like to think that my constant talk about Grace House has had some influence on my niece's pronouncement that she is going to help out with a charity in Rwanda next year. I'd prefer it if she were going Cambodia with people we know. But it's good to know that even some 16 years olds do want to do some good. Even if she doesn't know where Rwanda is. I suppose it has some similarities with India.

Anyway. On with the blogging, and just in case.... www.justgiving.com/simonandcolin2

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Songwriters have long harboured this perverse notion that getting a drenched by an unexpected cloudburst is somehow good for the soul.  I blame Gene Kelly with his cheerful rendition of “Singing in the rain”. Then there was seventies songster Rupert Holmes likened the pleasures of a late night romantic encounter with walking through a shower in his catchy lyric, "If you like making love at midnight, and getting caught in the rain..."

Rupert Holmes: would you trust this man?

Even 10cc (who are British after all, and given our islands' propensity to rather too much of the stuff should know better), couldn't resist it with the lines "like walking in the rain and the snow when there's nowhere to go" in their romantic hit "The things we do for love". I can testify that there's nothing romantic about donning a scarlet cagoule and hiking boots (not scarlet) and walking six miles through wind, rain and cold on an English November afternoon.

A week of rain and rotting leaves had also turned the towpath into a hopscotch of muddles (that's mud and puddles together, the sum of which is altogether much more dangerous than the component parts) and meant we ran the constant risk of slipping over and hurtling headlong into The Basingstoke, and a near-guaranteed demise from either Weil’s Disease or, hypothermia.

Yes. We are still in England. Limerick is next week, so apologies for those of you who were expecting a soothing combination of craic, blarney and brogue.

But the English weather had taken on an emerald tone anyway, leading to few passersby on whom to test our theory that levels of friendliness are directly proportionate to county of origin. In fact the only people we saw were a solitary (and very muddy) jogger (in shorts no less) and groups of soldiers lurking, or possibly sheltering in the trees as we passed the barracks at Pirbright.

With the gloomy weather, the soldiers in the tees and the constant rat-a-tat tat of gunfire from nearby Bisley Rifle ranges we felt like a couple of stiff upper lip Brits in a black and white war movie.  "Your German is very good" said I, in my best German accent. "Why thank you very much" said Colin in his best Gordon Jackson lilt. Oops. Rat-a-tat tat.

Colin imagines what being a film star might be like....

We snacked at halfway on tomato and olive oil sandwiches. Incongruously Mediterranean, considering the climatic conditions, but as we headed back the rain finally stopped,  the clouds briefly parted and the sun made a welcome, it tardy appearance, low in the afternoon sky.

Goblin stole my sandwich.....or maybe a gnome

Of course walking in the rain can be quite nice in the tropics. Especially after a hot, dry summer. At least it’s warm. And it means there will be crops to survive the next few months. However there is always the risk of flooding if it happens to be a monsoon or a passing typhoon. Thankfully this monsoon and  typhoon season has now passed in Cambodia but life can still be pretty challenging. This week, Bridget has sent us a daily blog from a very hectic, and very emotional week at Grace House

Monday

Wood turning lathes and scroll saws arrived for the new vocational training course. 10 of each, we will teach parents and young people wood turning and eventually set up a workshop to produce bowls from recycled local Cambodian timber.

Interviewed for candidates for a support worker for Brul, our young man with learning disabilities. Asked 2 to return and see who Brul likes. His previous worker has just left to train as a teacher.

A local woman called Soreng visited the office, she is in her early 30’s (she is unsure of her exact age) with 5 children under 11. Her alcoholic husband had left her and she is 3 months behind with the rent. The family had moved here from Battambang (in NW Cambodia) after their house boat sunk. The landlady was coming at 3 pm to evict her so Dani and Piseth (two of the teachers at Grace House) and I went to the house. 

The house was like a cattle shed - brick built with cement floor and a tin roof, there is a bathroom but no water. The family are sleeping on a mat under a mosquito net on the hard floor. The whole place smells as the floor is porous and without water it is impossible to clean. The youngest child is about a year old and runs around naked.  Soreng collects water from a neighbour’s house about 100 yards away.

The landlady did not appear, but we met the children, none of whom have ever been to school, all looking malnourished, in need of a shower and clean clothes.

Tuesday

Grace House was closed today - Independence Day. I put a brief description of Soreng’s family and their predicament on Facebook to see if anyone could help out.

Wednesday

A quiet day at Grace House. Just 4 children to hospital with chest infections and suspected Dengue fever. Donations pledged from ex volunteers for Soreng’s family.  People are so kind

Thursday

Art club at lunchtime run by 2 volunteers from another NGO

Friday

8.15 arrived at Grace House - a family of 4 children had lost their father in the early hours.

This family live next to Grace House in a palm leaf house. During the gales last year the house was blown down and Grace House rebuilt it. At the time Dad and one of the sons lived there. When we had finished the house Mum and the other 3 children moved in together with Mum’s new partner. Dad moved out and had been sleeping in a hammock under a neighbour’s house until Friday. 

Repairing the house after the 2009 typhoon

We visited to pay our respects and made a donation so the family could proceed with the funeral celebrations.  Dad was in his early 40s and had a lung condition. We have been supporting this family with rice for about 6 months.

Friday pm

Soreng came to say her landlady was in Phnom Penh and would be back on Monday.  We discussed her life story and learnt that despite never going to school, she is a very skilled basket-maker. With the donations received we were able to offer her a job teaching basket-making to other mothers at Grace House in the afternoons.

We can’t pay much but it will cover her rent and give her some rice.  We were looking at expanding the bag making into the afternoons, and this has just moved it along. The condition of employment is that the children come with her, instead of running wild, and we teach them basic Khmer.

If you would like to donate to help people like Soreng and her family please go to:
www.justgiving.com/simonandcolin2