On the last
day of our trips we met with our PEPY Pen Pals. First we went to the PEPY
learning center where we met some of the students. Lucy and I met with our pen
pal, Sochea, and began talking about our daily lives and school experiences. Sochea
talked about how she wanted to become a doctor, but the only medical schools in
the country were in Phnom Penh and that she did not have enough money to go to
University there. Instead, she opted for another program special to Cambodia
which helps young students learn different skills and trades to be able to make
money doing something else rather than farming or factory working. She wanted
to try and save up money to go to medical school, however it was unlikely she
could do that due to the economic status of her family. Lucy and I learned
about the difficulties of getting into college, and how Cambodian culture and
traditional dedication to family can persuade young students to opt out of
University to go and support to their families.
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| Mixer at the PEPY Centre |
After telling Sochea
about school in the United States, we left to go back to the hotel to clean up
before dinner with more Pen Pals. Unfortunately Lucy’s and my Pen Pal was not
there due to her job, however, I was able to connect with many other Pen Pals
of the other students, each speaking English with different degrees of
proficiency. Most of them wanted to go into the tourist industry (one of the
biggest in Siem Reap) and support their families, while others got jobs as tour
guides to save up for college, one example is a girl who took a gap year to
work to be able to pay to go to University to study International Relations.
After dinner, everyone went to the night market with his or her own Pen Pals.
Our Pen Pals bargained for us in Khemi and also showed us the best restaurants
and social places in the market square. Unlike the United States, our Pen Pals
were telling us how Cambodians get all their clothes, food, and materials from
the market, not stores. At the end of the day, the Pen Pals taught us popular dances in Cambodia and sang us a traditional Cambodian farewell song. We exchanged information with students who weren’t our Pen Pal and went back to the hotel for our last night in Cambodia.--Alex
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| Dinner with penpals |
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| Gifts from LA! |
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| Goodbye selfie |
