The Other Side of Paying it Forward

I went back to Cambodia this year to build houses with the Tabitha Foundation, a charity that is set up to aid the communities in rural areas outside Phnom Penh.  There were 37 of us this year and we built 24 shiny new green tin houses.  Making it 56 houses in total over the last three years. We broke out into 5 teams, all with team leaders from the group of the year before to help the newbie’s and maintain what became known as “quality control”.

It’s a five day trip with many different elements to it - the first night we all meet at the famous Liquid Bar that is 50 meters away from hotel, a bar I wanted to rename “Fluid” because of my mental dyslexia. The first night is an orientation of sorts. Meet and greet, many beers, all of the “why are you here and how did you hear about this” stories. In actual fact, 99% of the people that go are from BT, because over the last three years the original clan were from BT and have done such a great job of spreading the word.  It was so impressive, there were people from Hong Kong, Australia, England, Scotland and Wales, and Singapore.  A mixed group of not many ties, but come the fifth day, there would a group of new friends that would be sad to say goodbye to each other.

The first night is a group bonding night. It’s warming and cute to see the eager new people talking it up about how fast they were going to build their green Mansions, making claim to be the first finished and wanting to be the winners, many-a-adult “Bob the Builders” knocking back beers!  I smiled like a mother would knowing we had some tough days ahead, but would learn only in their own time.

Day two is for the new of the group to understand the history of Cambodia. It’s an orientation at Tabitha where they hear about the graphic history of what the Cambodian people endured through the reign of Pol Pot. Then a surreal trip to both S21 the torture chambers and the Killing Fields, each to have a lasting impression on these fresh minds. I wrote about this last year. (http://thebigsheila.blogspot.com/2010/11/other-side-of-killing-fields.html)
 (http://thebigsheila.blogspot.com/2010/11/other-side-of-cambodia.html )

For old recruits that found that to be confronting and enough education in year one, chose to get involved in local life in a different way - Nigella style! We went to the food market and a cooking school to learn how they created dishes that we would enjoy on many a menu whilst there.

 Some of us wished we had this market in our own cities. It was magic. Bright colours, the greenest lush vegetables, fish flapping madly straight out of their morning bath. Tight packed lanes of produce, lined with the beautiful characters of the market woman whilst their men worked all day to bring these sumptuous local morsels to sell for what would be a single bus fair to us, each day. There were no used by dates here, nor conventional electronics like such things a refrigerator. Maybe we found it all a bit romantic, but it was spectacular.

Day three, after another night of our group bonding for drinks to share our days experience, getting to know each other better, the mood was a little bit more somber;  the reality and education process had set in.  At the crack of dawn we set off in the bus heading towards the community where our first lot of houses would be built.   All in gloves, some with kneepads or pillows to kneel on, new and old hammers, wall and floor nails in our pockets and tool belts to boot. Go Bob the Builder!!

It was extremely hot that day well into the mid 30’s.  Girls are on the floors, hammering hundreds of nails into bent and twisted bamboo and our thumbs just as much. The men were up 12-foot ladders brave and sure-footed reaching high enough to ensure the sharp edged sometimes lethal green tin was steadfast.  We all sweated buckets, there was nothing beautiful about us, most of us looking like we’d been dragged through a bush backwards by lunchtime. 

As team leaders, it was our duty to do quality control, with a gentle nudge from another leader, I picked my sorry ass off the floor, my back seized locked up almost from being bent over in the same position for hours, to check all was in upright, tight, flush and firm.  One of my team was a tall, strapping strong good looking lad, broad shoulders and full of gusto about being Bob on the first night, and as I turned the corner to ask how he was up that ladder, his face turned to me and told me the answer.  I felt like that mother again, seeing that look that I knew, I’d seen it the year seen – a face that shows you what that pain feels like, the surprise of it even, but showing the determination he felt to push through.

It's hard, hard work. Physically so exhausting, but mentally you don’t want to give up or look like you’re fledging because these families are with you, they are there - right beside you, trying to help hammer nails, or tact those killer tin sheets in so you can hit that final satisfying whack of the nail. Then as we high five each other, to say “way hay, we’ve done it that one's done", they’ve moved in and the house warming had begun! And guess what, we’ve still got three more houses to go….

My Bob the Builders were excellent. They hammered with a special beat to keep themselves going, they held each others ladders and swapped every time their hands would cramp to a point that they couldn’t actually release the hammer or the claw that their hand had become. And the ladies we relentless, hammering like no tomorrow every once in a while stopping, biting their lips because they wanted to scream "F-ME -ARGHHHHH".  After some hours and a combination of my thumb being flat and probably the loudest yelper,  I told them to just let it out, the locals really didn't know what the F bomb meant!

Some of the guys had cramps going all the way up their arms, but thank god for their inner strength because they never complained, when some-one yelled “that needs another nail up there”, there they were, up the ladder, shouting at their buddies to hold the strut on the other side so they could hammer the nail straight.  We built 16 houses on that first day. So proud. 

We all struggled; there is no shame in that, although we were all there with gallant intentions, it is impossible not to deplete our banks of raw energy doing what we were doing in that heat and condition. Commendable though is the mental determination to continue on by every single person in our group, no matter what. We just needed water every 30 minutes and someone to please feed us some sugar!

On day four, we went out again to finish the job. There was a real momentum amongst us now; we could all feel it, comradery at its best.  My team had an especially difficult shaped house, backed against some massive Cambodian Urns that meant we couldn’t get our ladders to the right places, so we fell behind.  Every one had finished by now, and we had the last house to do, so I approached the groups having a well-earned rest and drink to ask for some strong men please come and help us finish this last final house.  Within moments there were 16 people gathered, nailing floors, hoisting up green tin, helping each other to hold the struts, even the Cambodian men were helping me get the nails in the first time to the tricky bent bamboo, maybe they took pity or worried about me wasting nails because I kept flinging them left right and center as my aim was so rubbish by this point.  Kids were scurrying below the house where I sat as every nail flew like tennis kids fetching the balls on a finals match! It was real team work and very inspiring I tell you! 

Next to our final last house stood an old, dark dirty brown aged shack. Quite a contrast to our architecture.  An old man watched with his few dogs in toe, an old duck shedding her feathers with her babies cheeping and bouncing close by, not in cheer like you would hear them by some angelic pond, but in pain, for they would not last the week.  Then as I hammered, I actually noticed the wise old man. He struck such a chord and interest with me being the first elderly man I’d seen in Cambodia, considering the travesty of murders that had taken place with his generation.  Who knows what age he could have been, but purely by his presence he earned my respect and title of being wise to me as he represented a survivor.  

He sat observing us, expressionless on his perch, watching our group’s effort come to life. He didn’t move he sat stagnant for the 2 hours while we worked on his abode, staring at us.  Stoic.  Then, when more men turned up to finish the difficult bits, he rose, moving slowly, leaning on his cane for strength towards his green tower - curious or was he checking up, I wondered?  I stopped working for a moment to enjoy my knowing smile - he was now doing quality control, there was no doubt about it!  He was checking out original leader, Doug’s work. It made me gleam with a lovely sense of appreciation.  To be fair, Doug was limping with a knee brace up a 12-foot ladder; it was fitting of our wise man's stature.

When the team had finish and headed back to the base I stayed, I didn’t’ want to leave at this point.  I turned to him and raised my hands together in the pray formation to offer my blessing to him and his family.  His body didn’t respond immediately but he connected with my eyes - and after some great pause, I put one hand on my heart and raised the other to point at the house, cocked my head towards him and giving him a look like a child wanting her elder’s acceptance.  Finally, he rewarded me with a wide open gummy, wrinkled, beaming smile of gratitude and cocked his head to mirror mine.  I wanted to run and hug him but it would have been like disrespecting the Brigadier,  so I did nothing but returned the gaze,  my smile gripping my ears, heart racing, eyes warmed with tears, but desperately trying not to let them flow so not to embarrass my dear man. That was something, a very warm and fuzzy moment taking away every weight of my exhaustion into thin air.   What an honour!

The Other Side of Paying it forward

We all have tough lives, at some point we’ve all faced tremendous challenges, whether from our jobs, our families, past history with lovers or misfortunes that threw our balance off course.  Many of us wish for more, say “what if”, don’t follow through or just become complacent because we don’t have the strength to do what we hoped for.  So we look for distractions, we change jobs, change lovers, enjoy too many drinks, eat too much, or point out the negative before seeing what the silver lining really is from that experience.   But let me remind you, that these communities in Cambodia don’t have restaurants, top shelf alcohol in abundance at the local pubs or nightclubs to create a distraction. They don’t know what Xanax is or have psychologists to help with their historical pain or sexual abuse that the children suffer because their parents are so badly affected by what happened in reign of Pol Pot.  They have scrawny buffalo’s to sow their rice paddies, wooden leaking boats to catch their fish or wooden poles to fish from the pond that sits at the edge of their village where they defecate, and they now rely on charities like Tabitha and people like us to reach out to pay it forward.

37 people decided to give up their personal time and money to come to Cambodia to work tirelessly to help these wonderful people and pay it forward to give back and help others less fortunate than most of the people we are associated with in our daily lives. Actually, it’s not just the people that actually came on this trip we should thank it’s all the people that donated money and time to attend charity fund raisers and our plea’s for help.

My gorgeous friend Belinda Bowtell committed suicide this July and our family and friends decided to send money to this fund instead of sending flowers because she had wanted to be apart of this group since the day I returned from our last trip.  I had the great pleasure on behalf of all those that knew and loved her to mount a plaque in her honour – I chose to place it on the first house that my team built.

After feeling a real sense of pride doing this for her, admiring the gesture I’d just nailed, someone asked if I was ok, which is always the trigger, I had to walk away to be alone - I’d started to cry.  But you know what, if you have any spirituality or faith, you’ll understand what saying here, she was there with me that day, I definitely felt that. 

On our last day we left our families with a Blanket Giving Ceremony, a gift and tribute to each house that we have created. It’s very cute - we’d all became so attached to these people that have watched over us with joy and the lovely softness of their manner.  Flashes went off nonstop – it was like a red carpet moment, yet on a dusty road with sweaty red-faced foreigners all loving the connection with our people for the last time.  It was a special ending for our group  – we were rather proud, united, backing each other completely through the heat, pain and exhaustion, and sharing a great giggle and tight lingering hugs, no matter what level of sweat.

There may have been a bit of bravado and ambitious intentions on that first night’s bonding session at the Liquid bar, but I know there is not one person that was on this trip that was not emotionally affected by what they were able to give back to these people.  Each and every one of us has a story to tell about how we were impacted by this experience and I’m sure that even after the hang overs that we all got from enjoying ourselves each night - we’ll take moments while we’re back in our own stamping grounds, talking to our mates, to our families, or even when we catch our selves in the mirror just out of the shower, we’ll spare a thought for those people and wonder how their getting on in theirs. Who knows, they may even create new life for us to build homes for next year!

And as for our mixed group of many - we'd become one by the last night, we arranged a celebration for  kings, a feast at the local restaurant called "Friends" where they teach the local how to cook, delici-os-so!... ah, and then a treat of kicking up our weary heals, dancing the night away, a mass of group hugs, flashing camera's and WAY over the suggested amount of fun and giggles they suggested on the label! Lots of indulgent warm and fuzzy stuff that happens at the end of an experience like this, that can only be discussed on tour!

SO - Whenever you’ve been given something or experienced something that you have felt had a positive impact on your life, look around and see who else would benefit what your support or gesture of a simple hand.  Pay it forward, because as we all help each other out, the mutual reward in abundance is a very grounding experience for us all. 

If you’d like to be apart of this group and wonderful experience next year, get in touch. Our fund-raising starts in April 2012, I’m holding a WAX OFF again – it’s a fun event where we wax men for the charity of Tabitha!

It will be something you’ll cherish and talk about for years to come.

Lots of love to all and our new Cambodian friends

TBS

Xxx