The floods here have been really bad the past 2 weeks with Siem Reap even hitting the 6 o’clock New Zealand news and the Guardian in the UK.
Where I live is prone to flooding, apparently the Tonle Sap Lake, in the middle of the country, doubles in size each year, but all of the Cambodians I’ve spoken to are saying it’s the worst they have ever seen with reports that 150 people have died and 100s more have been bitten by snakes in the water.
It started to rain last Friday and the water was over ankle deep in some places within an hour. By the time I decided it would be safe to cycle back home from work my feet were entering the water as the bottom of my peddle was closest to the ground. It took so long to cycle home cos everyone was trying to get out and home at the same time and you couldn’t see any potholes, which are a problem when it’s dry and you can see them.
After a few hours of rain I decided I would go out to have a look, as there were reports it was knee deep in some places. I just couldn’t understand how that could happen in such a short period of time. I got on my bike, got to the end of the road and it was already knee deep. And I live on higher ground!! I rode my bike as best as I could another 50m and you could see Cambodians evacuating their homes from the south, carrying bags in their hands and on their heads. It was quite a sight. There were also reports that people just north of the city were being evacuated in boats. Where were they all going?
I went to Kampong Cham, which is a city that the Mekong runs through, for a few days last week and decided that the best way to see the place was going to be on foot and by bike. In just a few hours I covered over 40km.
The journey there was incredible. Areas that I travelled through with my mum just a month ago were flooded and what was once rice fields now just looked like a never ending lake. Rice fields and feed for the animals have all been wiped out within days. What’s scary is that most people here are farmers to fed themselves not to sell it on.
As I rode my bike over the bridge from one side of the Mekong to the other the first house I came across had water up to the roof. I continued on and saw 100s more houses , and this is just on the roadside, that were in the same condition. About a km down I came across a tent city which appeared to be where everyone had moved to. There were 100s of shacks made from bamboo and plastic. It looked as though people had used what ever they could find to make shelter.
The water in Cambodia is by no means clean or drinkable and if you do drink it you’re almost guaranteed to get sick. It’s not something I’d choose to spend too much time in. What amazes me is that they will eat things that live in it, with fish being a major part of the Cambodian diet, and they wash in the water. I’ve watched the Cambodians lather themselves up with soap in the dirtiest water and wondered if they will be any cleaner when they get out than when they went in.
One reason the water is so dirty is because the sewage system here is so basic for the places that even have one and the second major reason is rubbish. The water is FULL of rubbish.
Everything in Cambodia comes in a plastic bag. Drinks, ice, food etc. There is no getting away from it. When the Cambodians are done with it they throw it wherever they feel like and it get just sits there for years. You can see years and years of rubbish lying around the place.
With the floods the rubbish that was thrown out the window or tuktuk is now floating in the street and everyone has to pass through it. I’ve seen all sorts float past me. Things you should not have to see.
You see the occasional rubbish truck arrive but they’re inconsistent and I’m not sure anyone knows what it is and where it’s going. I still haven’t figured out what they do with it once they take it away. There is however a company called GAEA who have rubbish collectors all over the country especially Siem Reap. These people work incredibly hard from 12 hours a day, 6 days a week. They barely ever get a break and if they miss work for any reasons they are fined per day. There is a group of about 40 of them that arrive at Touch a Life every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for lunch. This has been happening for years and the workers stay no longer than about 30mins each day but their company have now told them they are not to come to Touch a Life for food anymore. They have instead told them that they will be given 37.5c a day for food. Whilst things here do not cost that much 37.5c will only buy a handful of rice in comparison to 2 servings of rice, curry and egg at Touch a Life for free. For a western company running a business here you would assume that they would care about the people and have slightly better standards than some of the Cambodian run companies. Without these very hard working people Siem Reap would be even more of a rubbish dump.
There is a big attitude here of if you don’t know about it, if you don’t talk about it and it’s not having an impact on you right now don’t worry and they will not think any further forward about their actions. This attitude is not restricted towards rubbish. I find this an interesting attitude for a Buddhist culture.
But what’s a little water? We’ve still got to work right? Touch a Life still needed to deliver food.
We loaded up the jeep and took off as usual with people in the jeep and the motorbikes following behind. Little did we realise what awaited us.
The ground in Mondul 3, the area they deliver to on a Saturday, was covered in pools of stale, stagnant water and as we were driving through it was almost coming in the jeep. The guys on the motorbikes came off a few times. Even with the soft, soggy sand we were doing well but then the driver of the jeep drove over some ground that was like a swamp and the jeep stopped and wouldn’t move. We tried pushing it back out but the driver floored it and it just went deeper and deeper into the mud. The funniest things was all of the men who were trying to get it out couldn’t/wouldn’t communicate with each other and just let the jeep go deeper and deeper into the mud just cos they were too pig headed to work together. I’m a girl so obviously, according to them, I know nothing about how to make the situation any easier so I went and sat by and watched them get further and further into trouble.
Then out of nowhere comes one of the guys we deliver food to who must be in his mid 70s and has TB. He’s as skinny as you could imagine. What I found the most funny was that he, in his state, was allowed to help, but I was not.
Finally after about an hour of working on getting the jeep out they managed to free it from the mud. The driver turns it around and takes off through this lake of water and we have to wade through it to get back in the jeep and deliver the remaining 200+ meals. I pull my pants up so that they don’t get wet and as I’m walking through, lean over to one of the others and say “That smell is awful.’ We all knew we were walking through sewage. You can’t mistake that smell.
I’ve always been one of those people that mucks in and gets shit done but I never imagined I’d be mucking into the shit to get the job done.
Last time I was out there at this one village I was teaching one of the girls how to count in English as they need to tell you how many people they need food for. So she turns up with her two front teeth having rotted away from sugar (the Cambodian diet is full of pure palm sugar that the kids suck on and sugar cane drink) and says “Iv. Iv.” And held up her had to say 4. So we started all over again with her numbers. Then I tried doing them backwards from 5-1 and she was totally confused. As I went she grabbed my hand and counted my fingers “One, two, eight, ten, four” and looked me in the eye with this massive grin on her face as if to say “Look at me counting.”
After walking through sewage, getting the jeep stuck in the mud/sewage, night coming in and knowing that the last village is the worst village for being water logged (it was knee deep weeks ago before the river burst it’s banks so cannot imagine how it is now) we waiting at the entrance of the village with the food and the people came to meet us. What I constantly find amazing is that these people come walking out of areas that I would never dream of living in or having to raise my family in with these massive smiles on their faces.
I often wonder if the water and rubbish will ever be cleaned up. I wonder if the Cambodians have enough vision to see how things could be with clean drinking water and clean rivers to swim, wash and fish in. In some ways to me it looks as if it’s a situation of if it aint broke don’t fix it but then it could also be that they’ve never known any different so why would they strive for better?
Tonight all the shop owners are sandbagging up again as we’ve been told, that just as the water had started to go away, we are to expect our third bout of flooding tomorrow and the next day as a result of the typhoons hitting China, Vietnam and the Philippines.
You’ve got to wonder how much more of a battering this place can take. Who is helping to pick up the pieces of these natural disasters after the journalists leave when it stops being new news?
To see pic the Guardian has posted please go to the following link:
I’ve also posted some new pics on the following link;
Cambodia by elephant, motorbike, bus, bicycle, foot..........
and a few additions to;
Volunteering – Is this really what I signed up for?
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