Cambodia's so-called winter is by far the best time for cycling. And in just twenty minutes or so from home I can be over the Mekong and deep into the countryside.Turning right off the main road to Vietnam and into a dirt road, briefly brings a silence not found in Phnom Penh. But soon the sounds of village life and the cheerful banter and smiles of Cambodian kids are stumbled upon.
Further down the track the kids get more plentiful. However, it strikes me that these aren't the usual village kids that one encounters. For the boys call 'hello' loudly but then follow up quickly with 'money, money,' and that's not something that I have heard before from other country-kids; it's a city thing.
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| One of the victims of the Cambodian Land-grab? |
Perhaps, I think, this is where some of the many Phnom Penh land evictees have ended up: thrown off there land without adequate recompense their choices of where to go are limited. The makeshift huts with three thatched walls and a tarpaulin roof adds to my suspicion. And while the kids are as smiley as ever, the elders seem tired, wary and beaten.
Turning back for home and the village kids come running from everywhere. And they look happy enough, don't they? But the reality is that it's unlikely that they will see the inside of a school for any meaningful period of time and they will be exposed to the dangers of dengue
fever and malaria and malnutrition.
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| Sunday- a day of rest? Not for these hard-working villagers |
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| Ice cream is never far away even in the villages. |
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