Mel’s Blog

My First Day at Work

Woke up at six this morning like an eager school kid on their first day. Packed up my things, checked out of the hotel and stepped out onto dusty street #5 to begin my new life in Battambang.

After dropping my bags off at Kate’s house, another Aussie volunteer who has graciously opened her door to me while I get my bearings, Hour (my in country manager), Aaron and Mark (the Sisophon boys) go for an early bird 7am breakfast of soupy noodles. Nothing like a bit o’ early morning curry at the White Rose to start the day of course with your Khmai style ice coffee with sweetened condensed milk! $6 (total) later the guys drop me off at Saboras all kitted up with my motorbike helmet, lappy and mini koalas – One Aussie Volunteer reporting for duty.

The day begins with an organisation wide meeting where I am introduced to the 20 or so staff sitting around a long wooden table in the main meeting hall. I frantically jot down my phoenetic version of their names and do a brief intro of myself in Khmai. Most of the meeting is in Khmai, but Mr. Sakon pauses every so often to help explain, but I don’t get much more than a shadow of an idea.

“Ah Kun” Thank you and it’s down to the grindstone. The office is like an old low lying six bedroom house with a big chunk of wall knocked out where the entrance now is. I am sharing an office with my supervisor and counterpart, Mr. Sakon who is the operating head, or Executive Committee Chairman of Saboras. We sit down and have a brief chat about my job description and work plan and I ask lots of questions about what Saboras’ pressing needs are, who will be involved in the business management training that I will design, what will the funding proposals be for, what is meant when the term sustainability is used… there is a lot to get my head around! To help, Mr. Sakon lands a six inch stack of documentation on my desk.

Before I know it, it’s 11am and it’s lunch time. I’ve been enthralled, learning about the ins and outs of how a vocational training program for at-risk youth works and how the microcredit program not only loans money, but also delivers training, individual consulting expertise, forms a community bank in that village, creates a revenue stream for that bank, provides capacity building and training to the community members overseeing the bank and can become completely self funding.

I pull on my trusty Aussie helmet (thanks Justin) and jump on the back of a Saboras stamped moto with Pou (uncle) Eng, one of the security guards. A brief chat with Sakon and I understand that we will all go somewhere together for lunch before all returning to our homes for a nap and then back to the office for 1:30. I use my excellent Khmai skills to confirm this with my driver and then vroom we’re off!

So you can imagine my surprise when we rock up at a random driveway and talk through the gate to a lady who after a while I realise has no idea who we are and why we are there. My driver seems equally perplexed and I ask him “Yeeng tiiw pteah knom…. pisaar baay tnghai trang” Are we going to my house or to lunch? I don’t know the word for “or” so I make up for it using hand signals. Neak knom?(your house), he answers gesturing to the house we are at. No, I answer, I will direct you. We jump back on and I direct him successfully to Kate’s house. He drops me off out the front and I thank him and arrange for him to pick me up at 1:30 to go back to the office. I wrestle with the heavy iron gate and let myself in. No one’s home. Kate’s gone to Phnom Penh for a week. I check the time. It’s 11:24am, it’s my first day of work, I’m home and I have two hours.

Attempting to assimilate I nap until 12:30 and then pop down the road for lunch. Stir fried veggies and rice, dollar-fifty thanks very much. I feel exhausted, it is heating up and I am sweating sitting still in front of a fan.

Back at the office, I plunge back into the Annual Report that I am devouring and begin to wonder what I have to offer at all? Saboras sounds like the best organisation to grace humankind. Four o’clock comes quickly enough and I leave work early with two of my colleagues to go house hunting.

One shack and two mansions later, I’m back at Kate’s place, covered in sweat and dust – what a lovely combination. I don’t care though, I’ve survived my first day.