We write so often about how amazing our CCF students are, and you might think “well, of course they would say that”. Well, if you want unmistakeable evidence, here it is – one of our students giving a brilliant TED talk in English on the topic of teenage morality, in front of a packed room. Impressed?…
View Post
“I don’t think I’d know my parents’ faces if I saw them on the street today. When I was little we were a family but then they got divorced and my father didn’t care about me. He took me to live with my uncle in the provinces, and I haven’t seen either of my parents…
View Post
“This is Vicheka. She was the first case I ever took on, 3 years ago. She had a very bad situation back then,” says Hoin, CCF’s community outreach manager, as he talks to a smiling young girl of 7. “Her mother only cared about her new boyfriend, so she lived with her grandmother. But the…
View Post
“It’s been my dream to run a marathon since I was little and saw one on a TV, but I never thought it would happen,” says Sattya, now a friendly and confident young man of 19, in his excellent English. “When I was 4 my family were robbed and lost everything. Between the ages of…
View Post
“I found this photograph recently. It was the first photo ever taken of my family – we dressed up and went to the pagoda to get it. I was about 8, I’m the one with short hair. But though we look happy, we weren’t really. My father was always away from home trying to earn…
View Post
“See the house behind me? I live there with my family. That’s my little sister, but she’s too shy to come down. We didn’t always have a nice house like this. When I was young we lived in a village in the country, and my mother worked long hours every day as a scavenger. There…
View Post
“For me, right now, it is enough – but I want more for my children,” Phan Bopha. This quote sums up the dreams of many Cambodian mothers, but through sheer determination and hard work, Bopha and her husband have taken themselves from near destitution to an independent life in a new home in the countryside.…
View Post
“My parents moved to Steung Meanchey before I was born to work in construction, because they couldn’t survive on the money from the rice harvest in their village in the countryside. Construction was hard work but not well paid, and they didn’t have a home so they slept at different construction sites, always moving. “My…
View Post
Many of us will remember the excitement of trying on a school uniform for the first time, but for our new students at CCF it can mean so much more. It’s often the moment it hits home that their dream of getting an education is actually going to happen – a dream that their parents…
View Post
“I wish I had spent more time with my parents when I was little. My father ran away with another woman when I was a baby, and my mother had to move to Phnom Penh to find work to earn money for us, leaving me in the countryside with my grandparents. But there wasn’t much…
View Post
“Life is a journey of struggles. Yet, if we try hard, I believe it is a beautiful journey of struggles.” – Sophanna, CCF volunteer If you’ve ever read articles criticising volunteering in Cambodia and had doubts over whether volunteers can truly contribute to an NGO, you should meet Sophanna, the focus of this month’s Spotlight feature. A…
View Post
“I was often sad when I was a little boy. My family were always moving all over Cambodia, trying to make money. My parents sold vegetables but didn’t earn enough to feed our big family. There were 8 of us, until my older brother got sick and died. I would make friends and have fun…
View Post
Joseph A Mussomeli,
Former US Ambassador to Cambodia
