Pictured is the girls room, in the upstairs part of the complex. There are 9 girls and 1 bunk bed, so this is where most of them sleep and on these poor excuses for mattresses. Another thing to mention is that all the boys have their own bunk bed, and mosquito net and downstairs is a heck of a lot cooler. Part of the reason why they sleep on the floor is apparently its cooler, granted their room is like a sauna, but I still don’t believe it to be a valid enough excuse to not split the bunks equally. So frank and I went halves in purchasing 4 double bed mattresses so firstly they can sleep in comfort, and secondly 3 aren’t squishing onto one bed. A big thank you from some very excited girls!

The kids and their very first Tim Tam’s, two king size packets went down a treat. You should have seen their reactions next Australian taste sensation… Vegemite, which was up next!

And there you have it, lunch is served. Accompanied with big bowls of rice, and chilli, garlic dipping sauce for the meat, we sat on the floor (at their dinner table) and there was silence….for once, for a very long time. The meal went down an absolute treat, but something to point out is Cambodia’s are extremely generous (this morning I was delivered mushroom, noodle soup by Socheat that her mum had cooked me cause she knew how much I loved the strange mushrooms here) they will give you everything they possibly can give up, chairs are pulled out and put directly under fans whenever you have to wait, and today we were served up the biggest meals of anyone. It’s seen as offensive to not finish what they serve to you here (no wonder I’m getting a “Buddha belly”) of course because the don’t want to waste any food as it’s scarce for a lot. But I literally could not have eaten it all if my life depended on it, and still I had fruit pushed into my hands afterwards. This week has been so special just seeing every ounce of appreciation across all the kids and Borin and her husbands face, for the simplest of actions. Today everyone learnt the word FEAST!

I thought I was just chopping, but nope, I was a cook too. Pictured we have the huge bowl which was to feed all 17 children, and 3 adults and the still ginormous bowl, and realitivitally, to fee 2 of us it was HUGE! Mixed the vegetables with garlic, ginger, oyster sauce and some fresh chilli! (They don’t seem to use much salt or pepper here)

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.