One fear aroused by the COVID-19 pandemic was shortage of food due to disruption of the food-supply chain. Some people rushed to the shops to stock up on canned and packaged foods. At the Goducate Children’s Home, staff and the children got down to work, preparing the land to plant corn and green leafy vegetables and to breed more poultry. They also began to rear geese, turkeys and different breeds of chicken.
The Home has started to harvest the crops, and is also encouraging the children to eat more greens.
I have been living at the Goducate
Children’s Home, Cambodia, for 14 years, since I was 6 years old. Apart from
attending the school, like all the other residents, I have been helping with
work needed around the Home. As I grew up, I joined the bigger boys helping out
with maintenance and construction work.
Since October last year, I have been
earning a little money by helping with the building of a church. I sent the
money to my family.
At the beginning of this year, I was
asked to help out in the learning center at the Home instead when the
supervisor had to go abroad for a couple of weeks. For helping at the learning
center, I was given the same allowance that I received for helping with the
construction work.
I have continued to help out at the
learning center. The many days helping the younger children with their
schoolwork has enabled me to revise what I had learnt, especially mathematics. The
work here has also made me think back about, and be grateful for, the effort
and commitment the teachers put into helping us.
The Home has given me an education
that is different from that which I would have obtained outside. It has also
given me a different perspective on life and an understanding of what really
matters in my life.
I love my family very much and so I
have been studying hard so that some day I can earn enough to help them. My
desire is to study computer programming. I would like to continue helping out
at the learning center until such time as I get the opportunity to study
computer programming. However, I fear I have to give in to the pressure my
father is putting on me to go out to seek work.
Whatever I end up doing I will not
forget this Home and the people whom I’ve grown up with and shared my life with
there and who have become my family.
Sarah Kong, the first girl to be admitted to the Goducate Children’s Home in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, about 13 years ago, started a course at the MaPa Fashion Design Academy in Phnom Penh this week.
Sarah during her entrance exam at the Academy, an assessment if she knows her way with the sewing machines
Sarah, the youngest of 7 siblings, lost her father at a very young age. Growing up in one of the villages of Sihanoukville, she helped her mother to sell food on the streets. The family came to the attention of a staff member of the Home through a community outreach. Sarah and an elder brother were taken into the Home and attended the school based at the Home. Their mother was invited to serve as a cook at the Home. The older siblings had by then become independent.
Sarah has taken part in the various activities in the Home and has made special contributions to some of them. She was taught by some visitors to the Home how to play the violin, and not only became part of the Home’s mini-orchestra, but also taught the younger members of the Home how to play the violin. She has also helped in many of the Home’s community outreaches, especially in the English Literacy Program, where she served as interpreter, as well as teacher to the younger kids.
Sarah helping the Home with community outreach by teaching kids
Through the school she learnt about various professions, and she also met professionals from different fields who visited the school. However, her choice of career was determined by her strength in art. When she learnt the basics of sewing and dressmaking in one of the technical classes offered at the Home, she began to sketch dress designs in her free time. She also mended clothes for the younger children in the Home.
Sarah sketching during her free time in the Home
Sarah started her course on April 22. Her dream of setting up her own fashion academy and her own clothes line should motivate her to work hard and excel in her course.
*Our guest writer is Shelia O. Benosa, a teacher at the Home’s school.
