The whole AVEC volunteer team came together the 18th April to prepare the beginning of the school trimester. For a long time, we had been discussing the best methods to motivate parents and children.
Two weeks of vacation for the children means apprehension for us, since the vacation lets the children return to their bad habitudes. Again, they have all day to fish and chase crabs, and that way, they hang out all day while at the same time contributing to the family’s alimentation.

Some families have told us that during the two weeks of vacation, the children’s fishing contributes to the family’s economy with around 2000 riels (0.3 Euro) a day. That seems like a ridiculously low sum, but on this countryside, it is not negligible.
Therefore, we have made a visit to all the 43 families in the village, and we have announced that there will be a new rice distribution at the Dâksoso School. We have also put some stress on the fact that each child now has a sponsor who helps finance his or her schooling, and that for those who still don’t have a sponsor, we continue to actively look for one. Also, on the 24th April, we got into contact with the teachers and the school headmaster again, and we took the opportunity to repeat our objectives and the result of the schooling – which is by the way excellent. Again, we provided the teachers with school equipment and we decided to arrange a new schooling day on the 2nd of May.
Two of our volunteers went back to the rice factory to put 500 kilos of rice in smaller bags.

photos AVEC Copyright © 2005-2006
corrected and translated by: Charlotta Friedner