Phnom Penh

For the last week I've been living in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, a big, busy city full of contrasts and great people. My first day here, I heard about an orphanage that really needed volunteers. Two days later I was moved in and volunteering full time, teaching English to children in the morning, playing with them for the rest of the day and fundraising some evenings. The orphanage/ school is run by a local family, who make no money out of it but are just the most wonderful people I've ever met. It's completely run by donations and volunteers. We teach English to about 100 kids throughout the day; the 17 who live at the centre as well as those from the surrounding villages. Rainy season is coming soon, and there will be flooding in the area, as well as a huge decrease in the amount of tourists, meaning the owners will have to teach the classes, as well as continue fundraising attempts, so we're trying to do as much as we can now.
If anyone is going to be in Cambodia at any time and wants to help, or just buy a t-shirt or donate, the website is here (www.savechildreninasia.org) and I'd be happy to give you any information you need! :) It might be easiest to give the money to my Mom, who can put it in my account, and then I can withdraw it here and give it right to the centre.
I'm having a great time living with the family and being with the kids, and I think I'll be staying here for the next few weeks, extending my trip in Asia even further (I can't believe I was supposed to leave the beginning of April; it won't be until June now). That's it for now!

Vietnam

For the last five weeks I've been exploring Vietnam - from the very northern tip of Sa Pa, trekking through the rice paddies, to the Mekong Delta in the South, where I'll cross over to Cambodia in a few days - taking trains, buses, motorbikes, cars, tuk tuks, and boats to visit a dozen or so places of interest. Everywhere I've travelled I've been greeted with such a genuine curiosity and warmth, like I've never experienced anywhere else. Being stared at, touched, grabbed, poked, hugged, pulled, smelled and having my hair played with have become a regular part of almost every day, by adults and children alike. Everyone greets or gawks at my friends and I with such child-like wonder (it sounds corny, I know, but there really isn't a better way to explain it), and with no self-consciousness at all.

Sitting in a cafe, it's not unusual for a local person to come and sit beside me and strike up a conversation, which can go on for hours, asking where I'm from, wondering why I'm travelling alone (most people here think it's strange and would never consider travelling, even within their own country, without at least one other friend). In these conversations I've learned more about Vietnam than I ever could have from studying countless books or watching any number of movies. Lots of kids love practicing their English with me too, which is always adorable. In Ha Long Bay, a friend and I were followed by a group of children on their way home from school, while they held our hands, played with our hair(they couldn't get over my friend's dreadlocks), stole my camera for a photo shoot, and got us to repeat Vietnamese phrases that were likely incredibly inappropriate, since they always responded by laughing their heads off.

Impromptu Vietnamese lessons from anyone patient enough to listen to me stumble over and mispronounce every word have become one of my favourite past times, and helped me get such a better understanding of the language. One woman, a restaurant owner, sat with me for over an hour, going through every word in my small phrasebook with me, then sending her grandson to get a Vietnamese-English dictionary, so we could continue the lesson once we'd finished every word in the phrasebook.

With new friends from across the world, from countless twenty-somethings from Europe & Canada, to a 67 year old American war veteran, I've barely been alone for more than a day since I got here. In the last five weeks I've slept on a boat in Ha Long Bay, had way too many clothes custom-made in Hoi An, lay on the beach in Nha Trang and Mui Ne, done nothing but watch movies & eat fish and chips all day with 2 British friends, just to have a break from being a tourist.. gone rock climbing and failed miserably at rock climbing in Da Lat, rode motorbikes all over various cities and survived my first solo motorbike trip in Mui Ne, crawled through the tiny and claustrophobic Cu Chi tunnels, where the Viet Cong lived underground & fought from during the American War, slept everywhere from fancy beach bungalows to cold, hard-tiled floors, and awful night buses.

I've been ripped off and scammed more times than I can count; because of the way I look I'm often charged 2,3,4,5 times or more than what a Vietnamese person would pay for the same thing. Also because of the way I look, I've been showered with gifts and compliments; my blonde hair and blue eyes are intriguing for most, because they see them so rarely, and I get comments about them everytime I step outside. I got the ultimate compliment today, when a really sweet older woman said how nice my nose is because it's so high up on my face... which was nice, I think.

Originally I was supposed to be in Europe by now, but I added an extra month to my trip in Asia because there was so much left I still wanted to see - I just hope I can make myself leave in another month! In the next few days I'll be arriving in Cambodia, where I'll travel for a week or 2 before heading to Malaysia, then the beaches of Thailand, which will be a nice, relaxing way to end my time in Asia before heading to Europe to spend the rest of the already dwindling amounts of money I have left...