Last holiday I was part of a group called the Cambodia Tabitha Foundation. Our family friends inspired us to attend this wonderful experience to build ten houses for some very poor people far away from the city.

The group all met in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Everyone got on well and it felt like we had known each other for ages. We met with Janne who told us a little bit about the history and how we should behave towards the people in the village. As part of the group we had to visit the Killing Fields and the Killing Fields Museum. That was harrowing.

After a four hour drive from Phnom Penh we arrived at the village where we were doing our building. The people lived in small shanties made out of palm leaves thatched together. They were chosen specifically, some of them didn’t have a partner, some had a lot of children, some didn’t have a house at all and one man was blind but all of them were very poor. The cost of the houses was covered by us through fundraising before we left Australia. The families themselves had to save $30US (this was a lot to them) towards their house.

We worked through two very hot days. Every 20 minutes we had to pour water over our heads to keep cool. We started off with the kids nailing the floorboards down and the adults cladding the walls. It was very hard work and many nails were bent. By the end of the day the children had finished the floorboards and were on to the walls. At lunchtime we played with the village children. They loved to kick a soccer ball around and play skipping games with the skipping rope. On the first day we had finished five and a half houses, past the half way mark! We continued on with the rest of the houses the next day and managed to complete them early in the afternoon. We had a celebration and many thanks went around. Each family received a blanket to use in their new home. They were very thankful and were excited to be moving into their home.

After two days there were ten houses built in the village. They were made from wood and consisted of one room and two small windows (no glass). To them this house seemed like a mansion compared to what they had been living in. This has been the best experience I’ve ever had and I’ve realised how much I have and how little they have in comparison, and what we can give from our wonderful lives to people who aren’t as fortunate as us. I hope to continue to do something like this in the future.