Something I have noticed...

[This is a re-posting of a blog post published on Co-Executive Director Lauren Dawson's Tumblr. Original publish date was May 27th, 2011. To see more posts from Lauren's travels in Cambodia, check out: http://sheshallgofree.tumblr.com]

Since being back in Cambodia, I have noticed a few glaring changes between now and 2009. First, I have encountered far fewer children begging in the streets. When I was here last, children as young as 5-11 would be wandering through traffic in Phnom Penh, dodging tuk-tuks, motos, and cars whizzing by on busy streets. There were often children that looked to be 7 or 8 walking barefoot and dirty, caring younger siblings on their hungry hips. There was one road in particular where there never failed to be children begging in traffic, hanging off the side of our tuk-tuk when we stopped at a light. I often cried because there was so little I could give them or do for them. My roommate and I stopped in a market and bought cookies and crackers to pass out to the kids. It was heartbreaking and infuriating. But that scene has been startlingly absent this time around. Most of the children I have encountered this time are involved in selling items like bracelets, postcards, booklets, scarves, etc. And even then, they appear to mostly be concentrated around the tourist-heavy riverfront area--and they appear to be older than the children we encountered last time. Most of them look to be teenagers, though there are younger children out selling in the streets too--just not as many, and perhaps not as young.

My memories of Siem Reap from 2009 include aggressive, desperate, persistent little girls following us around temples and insisting that we buy their bracelets and scarves, forcing merchandise into our hands and demanding money, clearly desperate to make the sale. But I knew then (as now) that those girls were sent out by someone else. They wouldn't benefit from the money I gave them. It would go back to whoever sent them out into the streets in the first place. Maybe things haven't actually changed--maybe my memory of 2009 is a bit clouded by the exhaustion I was experiencing by that point in my trip. But things do at least appear better/different this time around. Again, the girls seem older, less frantic, less demanding and aggressive.

Of course, they are just as intelligent, creative, and sharply witty as they ever were. The kids I met in 2009 and those I have met this time around are incredibly capable and strong and wonderfully intelligent. I don't want to give the impression that they are helpless (they aren't) or that they are not/cannot be agents for change in their own country (they are). But like children everywhere, they need opportunities and love. They need the chance to go to school and cultivate their natural gifts and abilities and discover their true potential. They need to be valued and respected and seen as the capable and strong individuals that they are. Cambodia is changing and (I hope) moving forward. And these children are the ones who will shape Cambodia's future. So they need to be recognized as agents of change, not as hopeless and helpless and in need of "saving" by privileged white men and women swooping down and putting a band-aid on the larger problems (of poverty, a history of genocide and conflict, exploitation of local populations by foreign corporations and manufacturing companies, environmental degradation, government corruption, etc). These kids should not be treated as powerless victims. They can and should be treated as capable, empowered change makers. I just wanted to make that clear...

I forgot where I was going with all of this...I am not sure yet what to do with these observations, but I wanted to share them. I hope it was coherent...More thoughts to come...

Lauren has been in Cambodia for about 2.5 weeks and has another 5 weeks remaining. She has been traveling around the country and is now volunteering for Child Wise Cambodia, which works on children's rights and trafficking prevention efforts.