One hell of a lot of vegetables, to give these kids a mega vitamin boost, something we really take for granted but it’s a wonder they’re all the biggest eaters but still skin and bones, no matter what the age.

Borin marinating and caramelising the pork, and I tell you what, she definitely didn’t go easy on the sugar…

Lyda preparing the stoves and heating the oil for the meats.

We’d already lost the kids schooling attention by the time we were home, and Emma was feeling sick and had gone back home, so they spent the morning playing “educational” games and listening to music with Frank. I really wanted to get a feel for what it was like in the kitchen side of things, always cooking meals for at least 20 people (and sometimes guests) In an out door kitchen verrrrry different from what we have at home. The older girls are in charge of this and spend there days, whilst we teach preparing the food. Never ever extravagant like today, in fact if they get vegetables usually it’s beans and that’s it (you can get a kilo of beans for about 10 cents here), and we needed all hands on deck to get all these vegetables prepared. So we washed them all and got cutting- I had the job of the spinach, green tomatoes, carrots, capsicum and lucked out with the onions as well. I was thankful I didn’t have to peal the 50 odd cloves of garlic they got or the chicken.

Frank really wanted to take the kids out for a meal and pay, but all that money seems like a big waste for Borin and she wouldn’t agree to it. So, we thought of a new (and better) plan; we would purchase fruits, vegetables and meats and cook up a big feast at the orphanage. Borin was much more impressed. So this morning at 8 we went to the market buying kilos of carrots, onion, beans, Cambodian spinach, capsicums, green tomatoes, spring onion, potato (a gem here!), cabbage, lychees, bananas, pineapple as well as large portions of ‘fresh’ pork and chicken (too fresh for my liking, if you ask me) as well as sugar, salt, oil, lime and chilli. We loaded the tuk tuk back up and drove home. Pictured is half the foods we bought. I spent 15 dollars which bought all that fruit and vegetables, plus chilli and oyster sauce.

This afternoon was seriously the most fun ever. I spent the first half reading to the kids books that Emina had posted to us, and then basking in the joy of all the kids and parents for having food to eat whilst there are no volunteers. The rain volleyball game just topped it off. I’m too happy for words, and dreading Thursday’s last lesson and saying goodbye to the kids for now…

This was our playing field and Leang and I were the only two girls to embrace the rain and play against the boys.