A Week in Phnom Penh

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Right… Sorry this is late everybody, we had a tough first week at the orphanage. After realising our long work hours, intertwined with my late night revision sessions (becoming so monotonous…) I have only just found the time to write this superb piece. So let’s get down to business…




I honestly can’t remember the order of our activities and so I will try to describe each one in the best way possible. However, I shall order the events as much as possible, but my brain has been frazzled with the amount of science I am trying to remember at the moment (stupid medicine exams… who wants to be a bloody doctor anyway).




On Monday (28th August), the four of us set off for our first day at the orphanage. After our tuk-tuk driving round in circles for about 15 minutes, I finally gave the driver the orphanage’s (NFC’s) number and we got Socheat - the Director of NFC - to speak to him, in Khmer. We soon after arrived at NFC, where we were greeted by Socheat who literally has the cutest face for a 30 year old man I have ever seen. I had to restrain myself from squeezing his cheeks like Nana used to do and going “(in a baby voice) look at my little bubbalah.. aren’t you a kneidelach and a half”. As Sammy used to say to me, it looked like Socheat was stuffing chestnuts into his cheeks to harvest for winter. Basically a small, browner, more asian looking, far more attractive, hairless version of me.




We had our orientation and spoke at length about the background of NFC and the children that had been brought in, and not long after we had made a good start on our 6-week project. At lunch time, Socheat suggested we popped to a bakery round the corner to see if we’d like to eat their. We ended up walking for about 30 minutes along a dust-ridden main road in the blistering heat before we came to the world’s worst bakery. We decided not to get anything, as the bakery was not one you’d imagine in a nice French high street, rather a sauna with cake/sandwiches/whatever the hell they were, oozing green goo out of them. We turned around and walked back, only to eat at a random restaurant, if you could call it that, that was opposite NFC. Socheat went from hero to zero in the space of an hour.




Throughout the week we worked hard and decided that our lunch times would now take place at NFC everyday, as we could eat for free and with the children sometimes and it was tasty up until the last couple of days where we ate fish soup and rice and today was the worst; just rank vegetables and rice. Not even the soy sauce could save the atrocity of a meal we had to day. But who are we to complain, we weren’t paying.




We found our own regular tuk-tuk drivers who take us to NFC and back in the morning and afternoon and charge us a nice $1.50 for each person, for a half an hour drive, which is genuinely unheard of in London. The guy who takes us in the morning wears the same thing everyday; a blue cap and an orange shirt. In fairness, it is probably just so we recognise who he is. What a lovely man. He doesn’t say a word, but we know he means well.. probably because we are paying him far above the average wage, but we don’t have the faintest clue, so we just get on with it and when he drops us of say: “same time tomorrow” and he nods his head and off he trots back to where he came.




I am now known as “Chowmap” to all the kids here at NFC, which translates to “fat teacher”. Thanks guys.. I’ve come all the way to Cambodia to see if I can offer any help and that’s how you treat me… really good for my self-esteem. I actually don’t mind though, but I have started doing press-ups every day now… only joking, too lazy for that rubbish.




We also went to the Central Market during the week and managed to haggle a few early bargain buys for ourselves, including little things that I shall not mention as there may be a few prezzies in store for the lucky ones out there. You know who you are…




The Friday evening was extraordinary. Not only had we completed our first week’s work at NFC, but we headed out to the Night Market, which is only open on weekends. We did a lap of the market place and inevitably bought some cheap rubbish on the way round and then we came to the food court. It was majestic. It was simply food stalls around a perimeter of a square, all selling the same thing, with mats/rugs in the middle. We bought unreal dishes of pork/chicken fried rice/noodles, got a cheeky fruit milkshake to accompany the meal and sat cross-legged, with flip-flops off, bang in the middle of the square. It was amazing. The food was amazing. The atmosphere was amazing. The milkshakes were amazing. It was unbelievable. There will be many more weekends spent at the Night Market. We actually went back for a meal there the next evening as well. It was amazing.




BUT, it is only a matter of time before being in South-East Asia catches up with you. And I think you all know where I am going with this… On Monday evening we walked around for a bit in search of a new restaurant and we were all craving a bit of Western food. We found a small restaurant, that served some nice looking dishes and had a seat. We ordered 3 carbonaras and 1 fish and chips.




What came next was as you have probably predicted. The dreadful, awful, excruciatingly annoying DIARRHOEA!!! Mmmmmm mmmm mmmm, our favourite. And classic, I have had it worse than everybody. What’s worse is that when you fart-poo at NFC, everyone can definitely hear you, so now I take my ipad into the toilet and put music on out loud to muffle the sounds. LOL!




It was so bad that yesterday (Tuesday 7th August) I had to sleep after lunch for a while because my stomach was cramping so much and I had awful headaches. Nevertheless, being the aspiring doctor that I am, I took some Dioralyte and some Paracetamol and stopped moaning… until we were back at the hostel an hour later, where I weed out of my bottom and was back on my favourite, dirty, rancid hostel toilet seat. Thanks Cambodia.




We are all powering on through though. Emski got a little bit of the old poops too but she has a far better immune system as me and my digestive system is 7 times the size of hers, so no wonder all this crap has taken days to pass through my system and about an hour for her!




Anyways! What a great blog. Love you all lots. I’ll try and carry on updating as much as possible 😊



Love Tobes xxxxxx

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