Home delivery

I had another trip out to the province last Friday to take a patient, Tau, home. Also heading back was Tau's wife, a little daughter and two children who belong to Ngeit (still at the Healing Home) who are near neighbours. So, five was just a bit too many for one motorbike. Sypho took mum and two littlies and I took Tau and 12-year-old Dtouch on the 90-minute trip home.

Family group on the back yard. Sypho (pronounced See-poh) is on the right - a fantastic young lady who volunteers at our home - and has her sights set on becoming a school teacher.

They live in a sweet little village in Takeo Province that follows the now-familiar 3-step of tarseal - gravel - goat track. Tau's home is very simple. A river runs directly behind Tau's home and a couple of little boats are bobbing by the bank. Even tho' he has maybe 600 square metres of land, there is no garden planted - just a few banana palms and papaya trees.

Home sweet home for Tau. That's his little daughter in the white shirt.

Tau has a 16-year old daughter (standing next to Sypho in the top picture) who has been working in a garment factory. Garment sweat-shops earn something like 80% of Cambodia's export income. As a sign of the economic times that are hitting Cambodia, her factory has closed and she is out of work. Export orders are drying up and already many thousands of workers have been laid off.

From what we are able to ascertain, her $50 a month sounds to be the family income. With this scenario being repeated again and again in the nation, very many Cambodians are facing difficult days.