Donate your old Palace shirts to orphans in Cambodia

Last year my wife and I decided to go to Cambodia and travel around the country for a couple of weeks purely because we like that part of the world and its people and had not yet there. After making our plans a work friend of my wife told her that she had visited and helped out in an orphanage in Cambodia and that it was a life changing experience.

Initially I was not interested as I had never done anything like that before; I had run the London Marathon for a cancer charity earlier in the year and to be honest I thought I had done my bit. With a lot more persuasion I finally agreed to pop into the orphanage for a few days on our travels mainly just to keep my wife happy.

Before going out to Cambodia I did the usual thing and bought the Lonely Planet book to get a bit of background on the country and its traditions but nothing prepares you for the level of child poverty and begging in the capital Pnom Phen. To get a sense of the country and its people we visited the killing fields and the converted college where everyone was tortured and murdered during the Khmer rouge's barbaric rain over Cambodia. It is absolutely shocking that this happened not even 40 years ago and after seeing all this and the huge number of street children you are left dumbstruck and have an overwhelming sense of helplessness.

It's hard not to give all the children you meet money as they have nothing but anything you give them usually goes straight back to gang leaders and drugs/prostitution. The orphanage is in a province called Takeo about two hours inland from Pnom Phen. The orphanage is called NFO (New Futures Organisation) and is run by an Englishman called Nevil who has been running it for a couple of years after the previous managers stole all its money.

Nevil is one of life's true heroes and an incredibly selfless man that gives up everything for the children, who range from five years of age to 18 and there about 60 of them there at present. They are a mix of economic orphans where parents can't afford to feed and keep them, children whose parents have died and have no family and children that have very sadly been abused. What struck me most about the kids was how happy they were even though they had absolutely nothing and how much they look out for each other. Once there it became impossible to leave the place and we decided to stay there for almost the duration of our time in Cambodia.

The atmosphere at the orphanage is very laid back and you soon learn how much the children appreciate your company and how eager they are to learn. You help out with reading, writing, playing games and anything practical if needed. It's easy to quickly strike up friendships with the kids and a lot of the boys were intrigued by my stories about Crystal Palace - a team they had never heard of. One of my highlights was getting some of the boys singing Glad All Over in the classroom.

There were a couple of the usual Premier League tops knocking about that had been left by previous volunteers but when I gave my top to one of the kids I was made to promise to return with a Palace top for each of them. The ideas of NFO is to give the children a stable, safe, happy environment to live in and an education for their future. When the children are old enough they can go to college with funding that is raised through the orphanage. There were many highlights during my stay but I took away with me the happiness that the children exude at all times even though they have nothing.

On returning to England I found the materialistic way of life very hard to deal with for a few weeks having seen just how far money goes over there and just how much is wasted over here. This may sound a little pretentious but I’m just a normal bloke that had quite a humbling experience that I was not expecting.

On our last trip we bought everyone new mosquito nets and on this one hopefully we can help out with something else worthwhile but as sad that it may be, the thing I am looking forward to most is seeing the kids in Palace tops. No matter where you go in the world it's always good to see someone in a Palace top so lets take over Takeo, Cambodia!

Source = fiveyearplanfanzine.co.uk