Serve Cambodia has definitely made an impact in my life. Cambodia opened my eyes to a whole new culture and lifestyle which conflicts ours. The people there were really simple minded and the little things like playing with them, showering them with care and concern made them really happy and that made them really happy. I suppose through our complicated lifestyles where everyone is busy trying to attain perfection made us neglect all the simple things in life. We are never contented with what we have, like having a basketball court and we are still complaining like how it is not well maintained but for them, such simple facilities really made them happy. Having spent 2 weeks in a foreign land made me realized how fortunate I am to be living in Singapore. Many a times we take the things and people around us for granted, and after this trip, I learnt how to appreciate them more.
Though with the advance technology that we have in Singapore, we never get to experience how to mix the cement and scrubbing of the wall as all these are done by others. But within the 2 weeks that we’ve spent there, we experienced the “stone age” of mixing the cement and painting of the wall, which was pure manual labour.
The most difficult thing that we have experienced was the language barrier. We were not able to express freely or communicate with the people there as much as we wanted to. However the children there were very keen on learning our language and I had an enjoyable time teaching them some basic Chinese. The barrier has to be broken down somehow and for us, it was through playing with the people there. Playing is an universal language like playing basketball, soccer and hopscotch. We do not need to speak their language nor do they need to speak ours in order to play with us, because playing is the one thing that everyone has in common.
post by Ting Wei
posted by Here I am