Back to School

Woke up this morning feeling like the new kids at school... which we were! Poe - our tuk tuk driver who we met a few days ago and have since said we will use for the next 7 weeks or so - picked us up at 8.00am and off we went to Anjali House. Was great to finally start and meet the staff and kids at the school.

The school is a few km's out of town and down a dusty road. It is very basic, dirty and dusty and the kids now have an appreciation for the facilities that they have at their school in Australia compared to what is here. The local kids are in bare feet all day until they get on their bikes and ride home in sandals or thongs! Will put on a few photo's of the school in our next blog but didn't want to take any photo's on our first day.

Clarissa will be helping in the kindergarten class (kids range in age from 5 to 10 years old) and loved it. She said the kids were so cute, well behaved and really liked the 'teacher' she will be helping. Savan (the teacher) is 20 years old, has no training and started out helping with the young kids that turned up with their brother or sister. Since she did a good job with the young kids she was offered the role of the kindy teacher - guess there is nothing like on the job training!

Jazz was in Clarissa's class today and loved it as well. It is great to see Jazz so excited about Anjali House and has settled into life over here after her first few days away.

I will be in the beginners class (8 years old to 14 years old) and really liked the kids in with me. They were great with Ben who was in with me and are such good natured kids. As most of the kids come from extremely poor families a few of them are very short for their age due to the lack of nutrition. This meant Ben was taller that some of the 10 years olds in the class! As you can imagine Jazz was a giant amongst them. I'm sure there will be some challenging times ahead of us but compared to the challenges these kids face we will be fine.

Lunch is provided by the school and was interesting looking so I'm glad Clarissa went first (not so brave after all!) It was actually pretty tasty and Clarissa being a hairdresser was very happy to have an hour lunch break and didn't know what to do with herself.

We have been enjoying eating out every night at a cost of between $15 up to $30 - not to bad for 4 people! The food has been pretty good for the most part and is hard to complain when it is soo cheap! Had a great dinner the other night on the roof of a hotel 50m from us.

Me and the kids in pub street

Dinner on the roof of Santa Maria Hotel

The bad thing is that the beers are either 50 cents or a dollar which has made saying no impossible so far. I better be careful otherwise I'll end up like my brother.

Before we started at Anjali we went to some of the temples of Angkor which were amazing. We started with the smaller temples on the first day, then went to some of the bigger temples on Saturday. Hard to describe how amazing they are, even the picture don't do justice so would certainly recommend them to anyone.

The Bayon temple

The Baphuon temple 

Clarissa and Ben resting 

Otherwise we have been enjoying the pool which is great in the afternoon and after a day at the temples is just what you need. The kids have had us playing games most nights after dinner that they were given which has been great - thanks Heath!

I'll finish with a paragraph from Ben's diary that he was happy to share -

"On Monday morning we woke up at 7.00am to go to a buffet breakfast and I had 3 or 4 mini pancakes and a bowl of cornflakes. Then we had to be at Anjali House at 8.15am. When we got there we met another volunteer who showed us around. The day was so fun I can't wait till tomorrow."

The Bayon - our favourite so far

Doorways - lots of 'em