An hour far from PSE headquarter, hidden in the middle of Kean Svay’s jungle, Kean Svay being a South-East district of Phnom Penh, there is a very new, very small place built less than 6 months ago: Paillote III.
Last summer, a whole village kicked out of the land they were living on has been helped by PSE, both to get the children busy during the summer and to help the families rebuilding their houses thanks to the 2018 Construction project. And a few months later, these same kids are welcomed in a very new daycare center whose blue walls and roof are synonyms of education, safety and stability for the families.
Paillote III is one of the PSE centers with the most complicated story. Being the third paillote Papy and Mamy opened and helped a few years ago, it has suddenly been closed in July 2018 because the landlord decided to get his land back for other purposes than welcoming poor families and educating children. The whole village had to move out of it and PSE supported them in finding a new place where they could settle. The 2018 School Continuity Program for the Paillote III project required a very specific organization to both take care of the children and their families and to help them building new houses. Twelve months later, Paillote III is writing a new chapter of its story.
Dirt roads and palm trees in the middle of which the smell of good food and children’s laughs guide you to a new education center.
When arriving in Kean Svay area the very first thing to be noticed is how green this area is. Indeed, after an hour drive from Central PSE there’s no more traffic jam, or concrete roads, only dirt roads and palm trees in the middle of which the smell of good food and children’s laughs guide you to a new education center where one of the School Continuity Program takes place starting from this summer. “This Camp is quite unique compared to the others, it has a beautiful landscape and is surrounded by trees and flowers near the rice fields, even if it’s a small camp it is so astonishing for me.” describes the Khmer coordinator of the program, Vannoeun.
A year ago, Solène the European coordinator of the program, was giving her best to organize activities and get the children busy in the middle of the village-to-be. There was nothing, no buildings, no cook, no playground; a big empty land and several dozens of kids to entertain. Before PSE entered their lives, Kean Svay’s kids didn’t really have any opportunity to improve their lives, whether through the material conditions or with education. A few months later, most of them go to school and live in houses that PSE School Continuity Program helped to build. Along with the Social Team’s work – who was in charge of convincing the families to let their children go to school, PSE decided to build a new care center, 10 minutes walking from the village, so that the kids can easily come every day.
They are now all welcomed in this small new care center. Among them, for example, a family of nine kids – 5 girls and 4 boys – whose mother didn’t want the girls to go to school. For a few months now, they are going to school. Mrs. Sok Saran, the cook from the paillote confirms: “PSE has changed lives and had a huge impact on both children and parents in this community.”
They are particularly loving and cuddly.
Here the kids are wild, running, jumping, screaming everywhere with huge smiles lightning their faces. During the siesta, those who don’t want to sleep are allowed to go back home in exchange of the promise they will come back for the afternoon’s activities. Indeed, they are so full of energy that they could keep those who want to sleep from doing it. And when, sometimes, Solène goes to the village with the driver and a couple of monitors it’s impressive to see all the kids running at them and the parents hurrying up to get their kids ready so they can go back to the daycare center. All the monitors are giving their very best every day to bring these children everything they didn’t have for years. It’s about playing games, having fun, making them smiling, but also about teaching them to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’, not to behave violent or to respect the rules.
However, as wild as they are, it is not what eventually define them the most. Undoubtedly, what is striking when entering in the center’s courtyard is how much they need and ask for attention. Children are like sticked to their monitors, giving them tons of hugs and kisses all day long: it is literally impossible to see a monitor without at least one and sometimes two or more kids hung to his neck. They are particularly loving and cuddly, and they make lots of efforts to get to know their monitors, Europeans and Khmers. And none of the monitors could tell you the opposite. “I’ve never seen in any camps the kids knowing our names so well and so quick”, testifies Antonia, European monitor for the third time.
These children are eager to learn.
Wild, loving and.. bright! The children from Paillote III are learning fast and well, some of them understand English quite well and can speak a few words, several times a day the little song to learn the alphabet in English resonates in the center. If that can seem surprising knowing where they are from, it can be explained by the lots of efforts they put in communicating with the Europeans volunteers that are taking care of them during a month. And, even if their monitors have sometimes to remind them that school is not an option, these children are eager to learn and show it by any mean. A shift had even had to be implemented during lunch time so that the kids who have class half of the day can come the other half. Once more, the emotional intelligence-oriented activities show well their goodwill and their motivation to improve themselves.
“That’s what is PSE about!”
With the cooperation of the Khmer monitors, lead by the sweet and smiling Vannoeun, the European volunteers made this Summer Project working as if it has always been existing and it is impressive to see how fast they implemented such a great work.
The final word goes to Solène, who sums up quite well what magic happened in Kean Svay: “See, what warms my heart is to see them in uniforms while last year they had nothing, no uniform, but not even the perspective to get one. That’s what PSE is all about!”
PSE would like to thank McKinsey & Company for their economic support to this project.
