Land Of The Broken Hearts

“The question is not whether we can afford to invest in every child, it is whether we can afford not to” – Marion Wright Edelman, President of Children’s Defense Fund

I’ve been in South East Asia for less than a week, and it’s hit me how immense the problem is. Tonight in Phnom Penh, I was having dinner with a British man and his wife, and a tiny girl came to me begging for money. She wasn’t the first child that night. I played thumb wrestles with a young lad earlier for books he was selling (I let him beat me, gave him what he was asking for a book, didn’t take one, and he asked for more money) and I just wanted to put these kids in our pockets and take them back to Australia to a better home. One of the dinner guests remarked “Where are their parents?”

Their parents were probably the people down at the markets asking “You like? You buy?” when you walk past shaking your head. The ones, and only some, that after you shake your head and keep walking say, “Please?” They are parents; they have just the same love for these children as a mum baking cookies for the all American dream kids coming home from football practice. These kids are wanted, they are needed, they are the future and pride of their family, but they can’t be supported. I was angry at first, when the 10th tuk-tuk driver would follow Shorty and I down the street yelling “You need tuk-tuk? Where you going? Lady? Mr? Where you want to go?” when we just needed to get away from everything. But then I realised, this guy relentlessly hassling me, this lady yelling “Please?” well after you’ve said no, is probably trying to feed a little kid like that little girl.

It’s fucked, but there’s hope I guess.

I asked our tuk-tuk driver the other day why the children are not at school, is it because it is too expensive? Not government funded? He replied that school is affordable for all in Cambodia, but the uniforms, pencils and such are not. Here is where our trip has found some depth. The more we learn about what is really the issue in each country, the more we can help. Aside from helping washing dishes and playing soccer with orphans which seem nothing in comparison. The Khmers have gone through so many years of terror, political uncertainty and poverty (not to mention the massive areas still covered by Khmer Rouge land mines), and are just emerging from this. They have a long way to go, and no-one can be accounted for it. But we can help.