Hot Line? Emergency contact?

A few months ago, when my family was driving from Phnom Penh toward Kampong Cham province at about 11pm, we saw a man in his min 40 maybe beating a woman who looked like 30 years old or something. My father stopped the car and had a look on what really happening. My mum noticed that the woman whisper the world “Help”. I then search for polices numbers from other people who might have them. After about 5mn, I got two numbers which are hot line police for emergency cases. I was glad to get the number, but guess what? Nobody pick up both phones. I call and call and call many times, still no answer. That man walked to our car and told us “This is my family issue, just go.” My father decided to open the car window and told that man the he already called polices and polices are coming. That man picked her up from the ground, started his motorbike and quickly left that place. We followed while I keep trying to call that two hot line numbers. After about 2kilomaters, we realize that his motorbike was very very fast which could cause accident and the woman was behind him without the helmet, so we decided to stop following; otherwise, we would driver faster as we follow. I was sad that we couldn’t help much; but more importantly, that the hot line isn’t helpful. Polices were sleeping.

Last night at about 11pm, I got a call from a friend who relative was missing since 6pm. The lost girl was 17 years old. History has shown that she cannot be running with someone else since she has never had a boyfriend or any issues within her family. Her family of course files a complaint to the police office in her village already. My friend asked if I know any numbers for emergency contact or any assistant to find her. My sister, my brother in law, my boyfriend, and I spend one hour looking for hot line numbers whom we hope might be able to do something. We found many hot line numbers included head of police in that village, child abuse hot line, child help line, human trafficking hot line, ministry, and a lot more NGOs. My friends called to all the number I gave her, and guess what? Nothing works. Most of the hot line numbers ring without anyone answering the phone, the police said he already told his team to work on it but he was at home sleeping, the ministry said please file a complaint tomorrow, some NGOs said it is outside of our coverage area. After mid night, we lose hope and stop trying to call. It is morning now. That little girl has lost for 15 hours already. If that was a human trafficking act, she might end up in prostitute already.  

Shame on hot line numbers! How do they dare to put their numbers in the Emergency Contact list and call themselves “Hot Line” if they don’t even pick up the phone? Where and who can we, poor people, reach for help in such cases?

A better country starts from each of us

Being a part of Initiatives of Change Association (ICA) for many years now has been one of the greatest moments in my life. What made me so proud isn’t the title of a president, but the opportunity which has been given by this association to witness the greatness, kindness, friendliness, and a lot of commitments by young people of Cambodian in seeking a better country starting from them. Last weekend, ICA Food Program committee had organized the 6^th annual food program at Cambodian-Russian Hospital. I usually cannot help much except I do test the food they cook and taking their pictures. It just a short periods of time, the committee have been working very hard and resulted in having enough contribution to cook food for about 300 patients in that hospital.

HIV Patients

The food itself wasn’t really the main point of this program. What matters most is that those patients were visited and served by young people who don’t even know them but sharing the same nationality – Khmer. Most of the patients are poor people who were affected by HIV and TB disease. Let me go back into history a little bit to show the connection of why offering food related to helping Cambodia.

I’m sure we all know the regimes of 1975-1979 – Pol Pot regime. We all acknowledge that Pol Pot and his crew were the major cause of such a terrible leadership, but how could several people managed to get support by millions and turned the country into a zero year? Several people cannot kill 2 million people….right?  In a radio drama which was produced base on true story by the Women Media Center called “The last road” and together with my reading of some history books plus my family experiences in that regime, I came to realize that the killing of 2 million people were possible because of the hatred of poor people against rich people. In that mentioned drama, the poor people joined revolution military to revenge the rich who, in the previous regimes, enjoyed their luxury and not caring at all for the poor. The gap between the rich and poor were very huge. Many people were poor and lots of young people were jobless.

Kids who comes to the hospital with their family

 ICA is just a small volunteer organization and the food program can only serve food for some hundreds people. It won’t help much to close down that gap between the rich and the poor, but isn’t it better than not doing anything at all? Offering food was only our tool, but offering love and care were our aim.

I deeply thank, on behalf of ICA, to all the contributors who have made this program possible for 6 years and more in the future. A very big thank to the organizing committee who have contributed their time and energy to organizing this. 

A better country starts from each of us!