Today
marks the completion of my second week here in Cambodia. So much has happened
and so many experiences were made. In the next few blogs, I will be
documenting my experiences and my work progress in Cambodia. First off, I
am a recent graduate from the University of California, Davis in mechanical
engineering. I am working in Cambodia for one month with two other mechanical
engineering students on an engineering project. Throughout this time, we are
partnering with an NGO based in Cambodia called WetlandsWork. The project
focuses on developing a sustainable sanitation system for the floating villages
in Tonle Sap Lake, Cambodia. Due to their open water deification and waste
treatment, it is imperative to look for a solution to better their sanitation
practices. So far, WetlandsWork had developed a feasible sanitation system and
we were asked to design a way to attach it to the floating houses. This project
is challenging because we have to design something that will work for all of
the floating houses that have different structural integrity. Over the last six
months in the USA, we have designed, prototyped, and tested our solution. Now
we are here in Cambodia to implement our design.
On
the first week, we arrive to a completely different world. The schedules here
are much different than from the States. Usually I find myself hard to wake up
in the morning, but here it was very easy to wake up 7am in the morning. Maybe
it is because of the humid heat that envelopes our body in the hot afternoon,
which deters us from waking up late. Or maybe it is because of the construction
that happens right next door of our Airbnb apartment every morning. Either way,
time works very differently here. People are more sluggish due to the humid
heat, but at the same time they are very productive. I would find myself waking
up 7am in the morning, eat breakfast, do work, eat lunch, take a nap in the
afternoon when it is the hottest time of the day, wake up and do more work,
wait for nightfall, and eat dinner. This process repeats itself every day.
On
August 6th, we stayed in the floating village for two days to assess the houses
there. For the first time, we got to see what we are designing for. During our
stay, we got to experience a different lifestyle. Instead of housing on land,
we were sleeping on floating houses. There were no trash cans, and clean water
was limited, so showers were hard to obtain for a foreigner. Though it was a
difficult living condition for us, we got to taste different kinds of tasty
Khmer food. The villagers were very friendly. Lifestyle in this community seems
much unified. Each villager trusts each other. No matter the gender, they were
comfortable enough to take showers on the edge of their house in the open. When
riding the boat along the lake to our work site, villagers would wave hi and
greet us with warm welcomes. At night, we would dine with our host and tell
stories about our home country. The villagers were eager to learn about us and
we were eager to learn about them.
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| At WetlandsWork office looking at the sanitation model. (Going from left to right, top to bottom; Taber Hand, founder of Wetlandswork. Rachel, teammate. Professor Moore, engineering consultant. Joanne, teammate. Chandy, translator and field assistant.) |
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| Little floating store |
Phat Sanday floating village, the place where we will implement our
designs.
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Meeting
on a floating house about designs and schedules. (Far left are two of my
teammates. Middle left with hat is our professor, Jason Moore, who introduced
us to this project. Middle without shirt is Hakley, our host for staying in the
floating village. Right side are Wetlands Work! staffs, with the front facing
one, Puthea, our project coordinator.)
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