the cambodia project 5 year review

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The Cambodia Project

THE

CAMBODIA

PROJECT A FIVE-YEAR REVIEW

Prepared by

Kamarul Azlan Rahman

Kolej MARA Seremban

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“Only a life lived for others is a life worth living”

-Albert Einstein-

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THE CAMBODIA PROJECT

The idea for the Cambodia Project was mooted in 2008 by Loh Mei Lin and Kamarul Azlan Rahman , lec-

turers of MARA College Banting and MARA College Seremban respectively.

In March 2008 we took a group of 15 students from our two sister colleges to Hanoi , Vietnam for a com-

munity service project. The success of this project encouraged us to plan a series of similar projects across

the ASEAN region , our target being Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar and the Philipines.

In 2009 we made Cambodia as our first destination. We chose Kampung Jumnik, a rather backward village

5-hour bus ride from the capital Phnom Penh as our focus. Kampung Jumnik had a population of 8000,

80% of whom were Muslims from the Cham ethnic group. Electricity was non-existent and water had to

be pumped untreated straight from the nearby Mekong river into individual houses for a small fee.

Our team comprised of 20 students and 4 lecturers, all of whom were volunteers who paid RM2000.00 to

cover expenses which included air fare, ground transportation, accommodation and food. Staying in a tra-

ditional village minus all the comforts of home was a new experience for our students who were generally

city folks and came

Our guide was Rashid Abdul Hamid, an undergraduate of the International Islamic University of Malaysia

who is also a native of Kampung Jumnik. Rashid acted as an intermediary between us and the villagers,

giving us background information about the village and conveying their aspirations to us.

Based on requests from the villagers we decided to build a 2-classroom religious school for girls in the vil-

lage costing USD15,000.00 which would eventually accommodate 40 students in each class. We also paid

the salary of 8 religious school teachers for one whole year. Religious teachers in Cambodia are not paid

any salary and rely on donations from villagers and outsiders.

In a place where electricity is non-existent some villagers relied on high-powered generators to light their

homes for between 6.30 to 8.00 each night, again for a small fee which not everyone could afford. We

donated 5 such generators costing USD300 each and each one could be used to benefit between 120-150

families.

We looked for ways to help the young women in the village to learn a skill that they could use to generate

some income. We decided to help them learn how to sew. We donated 10 sewing machines costing

USD100.00 each. We even paid the salary of a teacher to teach them sewing for a year.

We discovered that the basic diet of the villagers comprised of rice with fish soup and fried or boiled duck

eggs. We donated 10 ducks each to 20 hard core poor families so that they could rear the ducks and use

the eggs to supplement their meagre diet.

At the end of the project we learnt a lot of things about the village and the villagers. Three main issues

stuck out, education and unemployment. We discovered that the level of education in the village was

very low. Most children go to national elementary school between the ages of 6 to 12. At the same time

they also attend Islamic religious school. The parents believe that if there is no balance between national

education and religious education the children might end up not being proper Muslims.

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When they finish elementary school they naturally progress to secondary school for another 5 years. This

is where the problem begins. The secondary school is located 15 minutes motorcycle ride away from the

village. Most children either ride a bicycle or walk to school which means the trip takes a lot longer. Dur-

ing rainy seasons in June-September the journey to school becomes a real challenge.

When they attend secondary school this means they miss out on religious education. The only schools

offering both national and religious education are private ones in Phnom Penh which not many families

can afford to send their children to. Not wanting to miss out on religious education many would just quit

secondary school and just attend religious school. This coupled with the belief that national education

alone would pull their children to become Buddhists.

An overwhelming majority of those who quit school are girls. When they reach 15 and 16 they are dis-

couraged by the culture from going to school. Instead, they would be married off by their families. Sadly

the husbands chosen are not much older, most being around 18-20 and are jobless.

Not attending national school means knowledge of science and mathematics is lacking. At one point we

wanted to train some youths from the village to take up nursing in Malaysia. The brightest talents from

the village were chosen and they were given initial English lesson in Malaysia. That was when we discov-

ered even the best brains in the village had zero knowledge of science and maths.

We also discovered that while the teachers in the religious school were a dedicated bunch they were also

sorely unqualified and untrained. The school also had no uniform syllabus with each teacher teaching

based on his own knowledge. There was also no particular textbook. The few textbooks we saw being

used happened to be outdated books from Malaysia and Indonesia published 30 years earlier.

Another grave issue in the village is unemployment. Between 70-80 percent of the adult population are

unemployed. Many of the villagers are rice farmers. Due to the weather rice can only be cultivated once a

year. Many find work during the rice season which only lasts 4 months. The rest of the year there is noth-

ing much to do except fishing in the rapidly depleting nearby Mekong river and menial village work like

making bricks and roof tiles. Farming is not feasible due to scarcity of land. The norm of the Cham people

to build houses close to each other also leaves no room for farming or poultry rearing to take place.

Unemployment leads to poverty. This in turn leads to many men leaving the village to find employment

elsewhere especially to Malaysia. They normally save money from their employment in Malaysia and

come back to build a house for themselves in the village staying long enough for their money to run out

before leaving again to look for work.

It is very common to see young men flocking together or sitting under their parents’ house with nothing

to do. Young men at the age of 18-20 are pressured to marry even though they have no work. They end

up staying at their parents’ house with their wife. It is a very common thing to have 3-5 families sharing

one house that has only one private room.

What we saw and what we learnt drove us to abandon our plan to move from one country to another in

the ASEAN region. We thought that there are a lot of things that needed to be done and that we could

help. We thought that to make a difference we had to go back and do more. That was why we have kept

going back for the past four years and we plan to make this a continuous effort over 10 years. God willing,

with a lot of hard work and strong support and understanding we will succeed.

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THE CAMBODIA PROJECT 2

With the slogan “Service Beyond Frontiers” we continued our mission in Kampung Jumnik, Cambodia in

March 10-18 2013. A total of 22 students accompanied by 3 lecturers volunteered for this project. We

were also lucky to have the services of 3 medical practitioners who volunteered to conduct free medical

check-ups and circumcision at the village. With an initial cost projection of RM85,000.00 we started our

planning and work 5 months earlier.

We were further boosted when 6 local parliamentarians headed by YB Datuk Halimah Mohd Sadique

joined forces with us. Through our hard work and support from the parliamentarians we managed to col-

lect RM225,000.00 , a figure we never dreamt about. The extra collection allowed us to broaden the

scope of our work and do more for the village.

Our achievements in the second instalment of our project included ;

- Building a surau costing USD12,000.00

- Conducting free medical check-ups to 300 villagers

- Conducting free circumcision to 70 boys

- Donating 400 sets of KAFA books worth RM30,000.00 to be used by the local religious school

- Starting a goat rearing project worth RM30,000.00 to be used as a source of income for the religious

school teachers

- Donating 5 high-powered generators, each one capable of bringing benefit to 150-180 families

- Donating 10 sewing machines for young women in the village to learn a trade

- Distributing 700 copies of the holy Quran, 350 Muqaddams, 350 surah Yassin and 400 pieces of

prayer mats to 20 nearby mosques and suraus

- Donating material worth RM2500.00 to be sewn into school uniforms for the religious schoolchildren

- Donating RM80.00 each to 85 hardcore poor families and single mothers

- Conducting English and Arts classes for the village children

The activities we conducted in the village this time were well received and appreciated by the villagers.

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The Cambodia Project 3 was held from 9 to 17 March 2011. A total of 26 students from MARA College

Banting and MARA College Seremban volunteered for the project accompanied by 3 lecturers. Again this

time we had the services of the same medical practitioners who were with us the previous year.

Our budget this time was RM56,000.00 but again hard work from the team coupled with strong support

from a lot of concerned and generous parties we managed to collect RM82,000.00 , surpassing our target

and allowing us to once again broadening our scope of contributions.

Our main target this time was to build a library in the village. From our previous projects we noticed that

a reading culture was practically non-existent in the village. Many of the villagers are illiterate anyway.

We also did not see school children bringing books back from school. We were told that teachers almost

never give homework to the children. We also did not come across any reading material of any sort like

books, magazines or newspapers being sold in the whole village. We felt that a library had to be built in

the village to instil a reading habit especially among the children.

The library was successfully built at a cost of USD10,700.00 through donations from various parties. We

furnished it with reading materials brought in from Malaysia, mainly comics, magazines and story books

for children.

The initial intention was not to fill up the library with books from Malaysia. We aim to do it gradually and

the onus is also on the villagers to fill it up. We also wanted the library to be filled up with English and

Khmer reading materials. In fact we even gave allocated USD500.00 and assigned a few young men who

were university students to buy reading materials in Khmer for the library.

The opening of the library was officiated by the Grand Mufti of Cambodia , Haji Kamaruddin Yusof. He

was impressed by what we had done in the village. According to him the library was the first of its kind in

the whole of Cambodia.

We also wanted to get the youths in the village to be given skills training so that they could earn a living.

Working with GiatMARA, we managed to identify 17 young people in the village to be brought into Ma-

laysia and given training at GiatMARA training centers in Ledang, Sik and Paya Besar. The whole endeav-

our of training them costs RM 65,000.00 and was financed by Yayasan Pelajaran MARA (MARA Education

Foundation).

These youths were brought in June 2011 to begin training for 6 months and 1 month of practical training.

They did very well in their training and in most cases even outdoing their local counterparts. They gradu-

ated in February 2012 and left for home to look for employment. Some are now employed in Cambodia,

while some others are already running their own business.

We see this as a very useful venture. Not only does it give the youths valuable skills training it also opens

employment opportunities for them. What is more important is that it exposes them to an outside world

they have never seen or even imagine. Being in a more developed foreign country taught them a lot of

things about life besides giving them a lot of new knowledge and experience. As one of the youths ad-

mitted “it’s like getting out of a dark room with no light and the windows all closed”. We would like to

continue with this programme but the financial implications are just too high that it is beyond our means.

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Our contributions in the village this time also included;

- Conducting free medical check-ups to 320 villagers

- Conducting free circumcision to 97 boys

- Distributing cash contributions to 220 hard core poor amounting to RM34,000.00

- Distributing cash to 90 orphans amounting to USD 2,200.00

- Paying for the electrical wiring of the village mosque costing USD500.00

- Getting sponsorship for 3 village youths to study nursing in a university in Phnom Penh costing USD

2000.00 each per year for 3 years.

- Paying the salary of a librarian to look after the library for a year costing USD300.00

- Conducting English, Maths, Science and Arts classes for the village children

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The Cambodia Project 4 was carried out from 7 to 15 March 2012. The team this time consisted of 24 stu-

dents, 4 lecturers and 4 medical practitioners. Again all were volunteers who paid their own expenses

amounting to about RM 2000.00 each.

Our main target this time was to build a secondary national school in the village. Our main intention was

to address the education malady in the village by having the school right in the middle of the village that

would be accessible to everyone. The school would also offer both national and religious curriculum that

would appeal to the villagers and their children.

Our estimated cost for the whole project was RM 306,000.00 with RM 300,000.00 going to the school

building. Despite our best effort we did not come close to the amount needed. A lot more work had to be

done with proper planning before we could get anywhere near the amount. Therefore, we decided that

the school was going to be a two-year project; that we would try to make it a reality in 2013 instead.

We scaled down our projections this year and shifted our focus to the hard core poor in the village. We

were informed of the predicament faced by two families. The first one was a single mother looking after

her mentally challenged daughter living in a dilapidated house. We spent USD3500.00 to rebuild the

house for them with proper wooden flooring and indoor toilet.

The second family was another single mother looking after 3 children, one of whom was suffering from

leukaemia. They were living in a small house tilting precariously on the bank of the Mekong River. We

spent USD 4500.00 to build a new house for them on a piece of land belonging to a relative. Sadly the boy

who was suffering from leukaemia died 4 months later.

We got some funds to be donated to the hard core poor and single mothers in the village so we distribut-

ed RM70.00 each to 220 of these people. We donated also RM50.00 worth of rice, sugar, cooking oil and

condensed milk for 120 families at the nearby Kampung Srei Pahul.

We discovered that the people in Kampung Srei Pahul were in dire need of water supply. The only source

of water was from a well dug up 30 years ago that was fast crumbling. The 120 households needed water

from a new well for their daily needs like washing, cooking, bathing and taking ablution. We dug a well for

them at a cost of USD750.00 for which they were very grateful.

We also conducted our regular free medical check-ups, managing to treat 330 patients throughout the 4

days. We also managed to circumcise 112 boys from the village and nearby villagers for free. As usual our

students conducted English, Maths, Science and Arts classes for the village children.

Still a lot more needed to be done and we are going back again.

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The fifth edition of our project in Cambodia was carried out from 20 to 28 March 2013. This time 24 stu-

dents were accompanied by 3 teachers. We had a tough time getting medical personnel to come with us.

Our regular doctors were tied up with work commitments and Dr Gomez was floored by a sickness. We

tried hard to get replacements but our efforts came to nought. In the end only Dr Andi could make it for

the trip for fourth straight year for the circumcision programme.

Our main target this year was to build the secondary school that the villagers were craving for. We threw

ideas around and we came up with a plan to build a 12-classroom double-storey building costing

USD100,000 or RM300,000 depending on the current exchange rate.

We were initially quite sceptical about achieving the target since the amount would be the most we ever

tried to collect. Our morale was given a huge boost when the family of the late Datuk Hj Fickry Yaacob

pledged RM200,000 for the school building. With two thirds of the amount in the bag we decided to go

ahead with the plan.

However, collecting RM300,000 was no easy task. Without any NGO working with us or any kind of pub-

licity it was very difficult convincing any corporate body to support us. Nevertheless, we were not dis-

heartened but looked upon it as a challenge. It would have been easy to just give up but we believe that if

you intend to do something good for mankind God will help.

We relied on personal and family networking to get things going. Parents and family members played a

vital role in coming to our aid. Colleagues and students in our college, with strong support from the ad-

ministration, rallied to lend their support. The team members used all kinds of ways and means to collect

funds. They even resorted to selling t-shirts, cup cakes, drinks and friendship bands.

In the end the magical number was reached and work on the school began in full swing. We hope to com-

plete the school in October 2013, just in time for the new intake in November 2013. Our first target is an

intake of about 60 Secondary 1 students who just completed their primary years. The number will in-

crease as the subsequent cohorts will continue their studies at secondary level in this school.

Our only medical practitioner had his hands full this year doing circumcision. Though there was another

group from Malaysia that came 2 months earlier to offer circumcision for the village boys they preferred

to wait for us. Familiarity with us and the way Dr Andi worked and also trust in the revolutionary, yet rela-

tively simple Sunathrone technique were the deciding factors.

We decided to expand our circumcision service to allow more children from the surrounding villages to

get access to our programme. The problem was for them to come to where we were stationed at Kam-

pung Jumnik. We overcame this obstacle by hiring a bus to take 40 children from a pick up point and fer-

rying them to our station 40 minutes bus ride away. And when they were done we sent them back the

same way. This year alone we managed to get 87 boys circumcised.

As our normal practice we conducted a series of English, Science, Maths and Arts classes for the village

children with our students playing a major role in choosing, planning and carrying out the activities. Our

objective was to expose to them the miracle of the education world and to instil the joy of learning in

them. In our opinion the classes were a huge success judging from the responses of the children.

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We also took aside 25 children that the previous group last year identified as good potentials. We de-

signed special lessons for them and challenged them to further develop their potential. We realised that

these children were really smart, beyond our expectations. We believe they could really excel if they were

given proper opportunities.

We continued to receive pleas for help especially for scholarships to fund poor but bright students to go

to university. Due to the lack of funds since our main target was for the school we had to turn down most

of these requests. We prefer to focus on efforts that could bring benefit to a bigger group of people.

It was decided that we would expand our sphere of assistance to Kampung Srei Pahul. The people actually

moved there from Kampung Jumnik to seek new opportunities and to try their hand at agriculture since

kampung Jumnik was getting rather congested and the lack of land for farming there.

However Kampung Srei Pahul suffers from lack of water, power and accessibility. The only source of wa-

ter was from the well we dug the previous year. Though it was a welcome relief it was hardly enough to

cater for the 120 families there. We dug them another well at a cost of USD 750.00 this year to ease their

burden further. We also donated a high-powered generator that could provide the much needed source

of power and light for them.

When we tried to visit the village we were advised not to by our guides. The only access to the village was

a very dusty and winding earth road. The only other form of transportation to the village is via a bullock

cart. When the rainy season comes in June through September the road is rendered impassable.

The villagers are in dire need of a better road to link them to the outside world and for the children to go

to school. They need USD 6,000.00 to build a simple dirt road. They have collected USD1,700.00 for this

road thus far. We aim to help them get the road built by 2014.

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The Korban Programme

When we first went to Kampung Jumnik we found that the local diet consisted of rice and fish soup. Fish

can be found in the nearby Mekong River. They normally cook fish in a form of soup or broth so that it

can be enough to be shared by everybody in the household.

We also discover that the villagers hardly eat meat. This is because the price of meat is very high that the

majority of them can’t afford it. The only opportunity to eat meat for most of them is during the Muslim

celebration of Eidul Adha. During this celebration Cambodian Muslims receive a lot of contribution of

cattle to be celebrated in conjunction with the Eid. A lot of the contributions come from Malaysian and

Singaporean donors.

The Mufti of Cambodia will take delivery of the contributions and distribute them to Muslim community

throughout Cambodia. The distribution is done based on the number of people in each village. For the

people in Kampung Jumnik the allocation they received from the Mufti was 30 grams each! It is prepos-

terous that even at this age there are people who get to eat only 30 grams of meat in a year.

Realising this situation we decided to do something about it. We launched the korban programme at our

colleges where contributions would be channelled to Kampung Jumnik and the nearby villagers. We in-

formed our teachers, parents of students, family members and friends about our programme. Those who

wanted to take part in the annual korban during Eidul Adha would channel their contributions to us and

we would arrange for the cattle to be bought and slaughtered in Cambodia and the meat distributed to

the villagers.

We started this in 2010 and we managed to distribute 39 heads of cattle to the villagers. This was contin-

ued and became our annual programme since. Every year we have managed to distribute at least 25

heads of cattle to the Cambodians.

It is also a culture among the Cham Muslims to conduct weddings during the Eid celebration. The reason

is to take advantage of the cattle donated for slaughter which would be used for the feast at these wed-

dings. Throughout the 4 years that we have carried out the korban programme at least 25 couples have

got married with the cattle we donated used as meat at their wedding feasts.

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Evolution of the School

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Acknowledgement

We have been very fortunate for the support that we have received for our projects in Cambodia. A lot of

parties and individuals have lent a big hand providing strength for us to carry out the work that we have

done so far. Many have come forward providing money and materials that we desperately need.

We will always be grateful to the late Dato’ Hj Fickry Yaacob for his immense contributions to our project

since we first started in 2009.He has continued his support without fail for the subsequent years. Even

after his demise his family has continued his good work which is not just confined to the time that we ac-

tually go for our official project there but also throughout the year. In honour of his immense contribu-

tions we have decided, with the agreement of the villagers and local authorities, to name the school we

are building “Fickry High School”.

We are eternally indebted to our panel of volunteer doctors who offered their services to conduct medi-

cal check-ups and circumcision not just for free but also paying for their own expenses throughout their

stay in Cambodia. Such dedication is greatly appreciated not just by the villagers but also us the organis-

ers. We hope that it would rub off on our students in the teams many of whom are medic students. The

doctors are Dr George Gomez, Dr Andi Berlian Fitriansyah, Dr Airena Mohd Noor, Dr Wee Ai Leen and Dr

Meenaka Mahendran.

We wouldn’t have been able to carry out our medical check-ups without the medical supplies that come

with the check-ups. For this we are very grateful to Dr Miszua Anuar Abd Hadi of Poliklinik Anjung Ka-

risma Seremban who has been supplying us with enormous amounts of medication and related medical

supplies every year that we have been doing this project

We have been successful in our circumcision programme. For that we owe a huge gratitude to Dr Tasron

Surat of Master Sunathologist Resources & Sunathrone Technologies Sdn Bhd for providing us with the

revolutionary circumcision kits that allowed the programme to be carried out smoothly and efficiently. It

is remarkable to note that Dr Andi, who carried out the circumcision singlehandedly, came all the way

from Pekan Baru, Indonesia to help us out.

Our project really took off on a much bigger scale than we expected in 2010. For that we have to thank

the 6 Malaysian parliamentarians led by YB Datuk Halimah Sadique and Datuk Hamim Samuri who actual-

ly went with us to Kampung Jumnik. It was due to their will that we managed to expand on our scope of

work at the village.

We are very fortunate to have a college administration that is very understanding and very supportive of

our efforts. The administration of Kolej MARA Seremban under the leadership of the Director, Dr Syed

Anwar Aly Mohammed Abu Bakar has been instrumental in motivating to be bold in carrying out what we

plan to do in Kampung Jumnik.

There are numerous other parties and individuals that have supported us all these years that it is difficult

to list them down one by one. Nevertheless we are eternally grateful for all their assistance and support

throughout the five years. We take upon the support given by them as a trust that we intend to carry out

to the best of our ability.

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THE COMMITTEE

En Muhammad Ikhwan Puan Hindon Osman Puan Khomah Ismail

En Kamarul Azlan Rahman Ms Loh Mei Lin

Puan Azizah Ismail En Asril Azizan

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the cambodia project 5 year review

Documents

cambodia project

community service project

backward village

religious teachers

mara college seremban

traditional village

religious school teachers

native of kampung jumnik