On July the 3rd I visited the SISWP Federation Project in Sampovloun.
As Lynn Ciurlionis is away at the moment, back in Australia with a very sick mum, I took two friends: Jill Whitelaw, who is the past President of the Australian– New Zealand Women’s Group (ANZWG) and Celeste Shadie, also from ANZWG. The van driver Khun Noy, along with Khun Songpong, Lynn’s Thai driver were also with us (two years ago a group of friends from ANZWG donated a well for the hospital).
The main purpose for this visit was to deliver the new Oxygen making machine and the repaired operating room’s sterilizer. For the last six weeks, they have been wiping surgical instruments with alcohol).
Our entry into Cambodia was very quiet. The Khmer General did give us a huge smile, but we were given no escort of any sort.
The first task was to pick up Sopheap, for translating. I gooed and gaaed at her beautiful four months old baby, while Jill and Celeste looked through all the quilts made at the mission. To everyone's delight, they spent quite a lot. Jill and Celeste also want a selection to be brought to an ANZWG morning tea in Bangkok one day. So Gail, who is a huge help to our HAB project, will be very pleased.
We delivered the hospital equipment and Celeste went around passing out (almost literally at time at sights unseen by her) small cans of tiger balm.
The oxygen machine caused some panic, as we were just about to leave the hospital, we found the Hospital Director running after us......”Please Stop!!”
They couldn’t get the oxygen machine to work. Many questions were asked. I explained that I had not tested the machine back in Bangkok, and that Dr. Donna Robinson (SI Dusit) had organized the purchasing, with my driver picking it up…and so here it was.
We three musketeers started to look at it (honestly, none of us had any idea of what we were really looking at).
It was very, very hot...no aircon working, and we were all dripping with sweat. I was lying on that dreadful operating floor going over all the instructions. Luckily I took on the one simple instruction sheet, and started to read it out loud, as Jill started working through the operating manual (a mammoth task!).
One particular instruction, I read out loud, three times, trying to explain to them what they had done.
It just meant nothing to them. In the end... Jill grabbed the plug and hooked it up correctly......voila!!.......it started to hum away and produce oxygen. AND I was seriously relieved, as I had had visions of having to take it back to Bangkok.
Six weeks ago when Lynn, Barbara and I were visiting the project, we came across a real problem: Bugs were coming out of the ground around the largest of the hospital buildings.
These wood-lice/mite type bugs were in the millions. NO other buildings had them, no trees, no vegetation; they just seem to come out of the cracks in the base of this particular building.
There are so many that when it rains, they clog up all the drains, spouting, and water-storage pipes. They appear once a year at this particular spot, and least for about three months, then they disappear. No one knows what they are or how to get rid of them.
The Director kindly put five of these things into a small sealed plastic bag, with me promising, to try to find out what they are and how to deal with them. To my husband’s horror they survived the 24 hours in this little bag, when I showed him my surprise package in Bangkok.
Paiyon, Managing Director of EcoBeing, and a friend of mine, is looking into this problem for me alongside colleagues from Chula University.
At least the steriliser works, the Oxygen converter works, and so happiness abounds.
The school was not expecting us and was disappointedly quite untidy.
The plans they gave me for the teachers’ accommodation are ‘a little crazy’. As Khun Songpong said to me "It looks like a factory". He is right.
As the estimated cost is US $45,000, we are going to come up with our own plans. Apparently the cost of the materials adds up to US$ 37,000 and the labour to US$ 8,000.
Sopheap told me that it is because they want the base to be very strong, and that these materials are costly and hard to get in Sampovloun.
Fortunately for us Khun Margo from SI Bangkok is going to come up with some ideas for us. The school in the meantime needs a huge ‘working bee’, and a team from Australia is going to be there for two weeks before the end of the year.
Back at Sopheap’s home, we spent an hour trying to download information for the printer to be set up with their computer. Jill tried doing it over the Internet, but their computer still would not recognize the printer. The bedroom, where the By this stage we were all very hot, dirty and tired.
There are obviously a few things to think about……..
Kathy Barnett
SI-Thailand National Representative
SI-Dusit President
