City Dump

While we have been in Phnom Penh, we have been looking for an organization that helps the most in need.

 On our second last night here, we were handed a pamphlet at a restaurant,:-   …Please come with us, to help the children at the City Dump.   Join us on our working trips to help feed hungry children that live at the city dump. You buy the food with us, we recommend $15 upwards, we buy 3 meals for $1, you give them the food you buy.  Warning: You may find what you see distressing, please prepare yourself, they need your help desperately.” 

 The next morning I went to the bar named Rick’s Place in search of the man running this operation.  I met Rick, an Englishmen in his sixties, who came out here six years ago, and has never left.  He has identified a real need, that still exists today. 

Previously, children scaveneged at the dump for food and recyclables to make money for their families.  The dump was closed last year and a new dump was opened  that is more modern and not open to scavengers. Even though the dump was closed, there are still families living on the perimeter – some with no water or electricity and very little if any sanitation.

Rick first went to the dump 6 years ago to help the children and still goes now to provide food and sometimes medical assistance, whenever he can.

After talking with Rick, he advised me that he usually likes to raise at least $45 per group, before they head off to the market to buy food etc.

So far today, no one else had come to visit him, so he said to me, “If you can afford to put in the $45, I will take your family & we can go & feed about 150 people!”

So I rushed back to the hotel, got the troops organised, and we met back at Rick’s Place an hour later, ready to go. We all piled into a tuk tuk and headed off to the market about 10 mins away. Our first stop, a roadside bakery. Rick had called ahead, so by the time we got there, the lady had 3 large bags full of fresh baguttes, about 200 in all, waiting for us. This cost about $13.

The local market, was down a long alley way, we followed closely behind Rick, definately not a place, that we would have ended up on our own.

Rick bartered on our behalf, and we ended up with about 80 kg of mangos (3 large bags) & 50 pineapples (2 large bags) and a large bag of red fruit that we couldn’t identify.  Including the bread, this cost us a grand total of $50 - to feed 150 people.

So with the Tuk Tuk now almost overflowing with 7 people, and a lot of food, we headed off to the City Dump, about a 10 minute ride away.

When we arrived we were immediately surrounded by hungry  people and they all formed 2 orderly lines on either side of the tuk tuk. Over the last few years, Rick has trained them to line up – any pushing or shoving and he will remove them from the line.  They learned very quickly to behave!  He said the first time he took food there, it was like a mob that swarmed all over the truck he had loaded up, with little kids getting pushed out the way and most of the times the girls got nothing.  Now he will not tolerate pushing in and even the smallest child lines up for a piece of fruit.

 There are children of all ages and mothers-to-be and mothers and fathers.  All lined up quickly and quietly – some with bags at the ready and we helped dispense the fruit and bread – the pineapples specifically for the mothers with babies or pregnant women.

The housing is basically what a lot of people in Australia would house their chickens in – wooden plank walls with iron roof, built on stilts over the top of the rubbish which has been compacted over the years.  As in most rural homes in Cambodia, chickens run in and out under the the house and a cat and a puppy were running around.  Unlike, most of the other villages we had seen though – the rubbish and muck under these houses was just gross – it was just slop.

Their situation leaves you feeling quite helpless and drained and you do wonder what is the best way to help these people.  We asked Rick the same question and he admitted that he didn’t know the answer long term – but providing food was helping and he would keep doing that as long as he could.

Please look at our photos on Flickr and if you are interested in learning more about the dump community contact Rick at free26844spirit@yahoo.co.uk and if you’re ever coming to PP – please contact him and go on a visit.  The more people who know about the dump community, perhaps something more long term can be done for them.