A few days ago I had the unfortunate experience of attending a parent-teacher meeting here in Pramaoy, Cambodia, and it was even worse than expected.
✍️ First, Drop Monkey-B Off
Our girls had barely attended three days of public school here in Pramaoy before a parent-teacher meeting was called, so I didn't expect much in the way of feedback from such a meeting. The meeting was scheduled for 7:30am, 30 minutes after the start of Monkey-B's classes, so we just decided to hang around the school and kill time until the meeting began.
We watched the students perform the flag-raising ceremony, even though the flag was already raised, something a little out of the ordinary. Usually different students attach, raise, and lower the flag each day, but here in Pramaoy I'm learning things are done a little different. Little did I know the overwhelming majority of parents would show up one hour late to the meeting, and the meeting was held back for those late arrivals.
🗣️ Finally It Begins
Well, after waiting a half hour to make sure we weren't late to the meeting, I was quite displeased and not shocked at all that the parents began trickling in 10 minutes late with the bulk of everyone arriving an hour late. An hour and half had passed before anything substantial had happened, and my back, knees, and butt were already hurting from the preschool table-desks we were made to cram into.
Just when I thought the meeting was going to start by allowing us a short personal conversation with Srey-Yuu's teacher, the school spent 1 hour simply calling out the names of the students to see whose parents were present. It was done in such a disorderly way that it took this long to simply read aloud 30-40 names.
This mess could've been avoided with a simple sign-in sheet and someone providing assistance for illiterate parents to sign in. Finally when all the names had been called, I thought I was going to get my little 3-4 minute with Srey-Yuu's teacher, but that's not how things are done here in Pramaoy, the program was more akin to a 1970s Khmer Rouge village meeting.
The school asked each of the parents to stand up one-by-one and address all of our complaints, thoughts, and ideas very directly in front of a crowd of strangers and powerful local government officials. Needless to say, this prevents the kind of honesty you'd have in face-to-face one-on-one meeting with the teacher.
Half of the parents are from the countryside, very humble, and simply scared to death to speak in a situation like that. This was made very clear to me by watching half of the parents mumble for 10 minutes with nobody able to hear anything, causing side conversations to form and the room to get louder.
😫 I Survived
I could go on and on about the meeting, but the main point is that it was the most disorganized and meatless school meeting I have been to in my 12+ years in Cambodia. The whole program ultimately consisted of the parents asking the teachers to stop their children from using the phone at home. The parents all complained that smartphones are ruining their lives, and they are unable to pull their kids away from the screens.
When it was my turn to speak, I let everyone the phone thing is a simple problem that be fixed with screentime settings and/or simply only allowing your child to physically have the screen device for 15-30 minutes a day, and to sit with them and monitor their activity. I let all the parents know that it's okay for your kid to whine about being bored, and boredom leads to creativity, and imagination.
Everyone clearly understood me, but the xenophobic lady director whom still has not looked at my eyes nor acknowledged my existence stood up and asked my wife to translate what I'd said because she couldn't understand a word. My wife then repeated, not translated what I'd said, because I said it in fluent Khmer. The crowd chuckled because they were impressed with my Khmer and understood me, but the director was simply trying to punk me or something, I really don't know what her intentions were.
A bunch of other boring stuff happened too, but ultimately the meeting lasting so long that when it ended, we were only a few minutes from Monkey-B's school day being over. Nearly 5 hours was spent to ultimately acknowledge the parents are frustrated that their kids are addicted to screens and the parents don't have enough backbone to simply take the damn things away part of the day.
I was so exhausted from the experience that I was unable to work that day, so I missed out on a potential Hive post and earnings of $15 to $18. I definitely think I should get back into teaching here, it's obvious the youths have very little conscious guidance. I'll obviously have to work independently to avoid the outdated systems I'd be forced to adapt to working with any local partner/director.
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The primary concern for parents is the time kids spend on their phones. Meanwhile, we're entering a world, where it is precisely those devices that open up a myriad of possibilities, not to mention wealth, though you have to learn about them for sure. Unfortunately, if a parent doesn't even know about the phone's settings, the mere idea of blockchain technology is light years away. I almost expected you to mention your daughters' screen time, and how they use it (the @kidsisters are about to earn more than $15 USD, just for their last post! How does that compare locally?) but then realized how out of place a comment like that would have been. Though I'm sure, bit by bit the word is going to get out, and who knows, maybe you'll end up teaching not only English but blockchain tech. Can you imagine the resonance it would create?
Isn't that weird, I did make a point about Hive and how we allow screen-time for useful things several hours a day if necessary, but only 15-30 minutes a day for mindless things like gaming and wild cartoons or androgynous Korean music videos.
You're not far off with your comment, the younger generation may not know what a blockchain is, but everyone wants to study IT here even though they often haven't even turned on or used a computer yet. I think that's a sign of the times. I'd really love to start a mixed English, computer skills, photography/blockchain-crypto-Hive class of some sort, but I would prefer to have some whale support for such a project, something I wasn't able to get for the ASEAN Hive Community, even though a collective grassroots effort has given us enough HP to occasionally land Southeast Asian content on the trending page where the bigshots will upvote it.
We've already onboarded several Cambodian in-laws, but the standard of computer literacy is probably the worst in Southeast Asia apart from maybe Laos. An entire semester could be devoted to learning how to registers and use Binance P2P to get fiat through a local bank account. I've already calculated it would take about $500 per computer/desk/chair combo, and I'd prefer at least 10 students. By this calculation it would take probably at least $5,500 USD to kit out a room for such studies.
Right, everyone wants to study IT. Just recently a friend of mine who's a teacher in Canada shared the results of a survey of high school kids on what they wish their school curriculum would emphasize more. It struck me that it's pretty much the same three things that me and my peers listed, back when we were in 9th grade in the early 90s in Germany: IT related things were one (including computer programming, as well as using programs), the other thing was finance (from doing your taxes, running a business, to investing in the stock market), and finally sex education (not only about reproduction but pleasure and gender topics). Seems like these three areas are still what young people miss most in their schooling, all over the world. The sex part may run into socio-cultural obstacles, especially in pubic schools, but I really don't understand why the first two are so neglected, even in "developed" countries.
So it's even more awesome to see you wanting to change that. And for sure, you can't do it without funding. But $5,500 doesn't sound so much, unless it comes out of your own pocket. But then again, I'm certain there are some potential sponsors for that, even off the blockchain. I keep my fingers crossed for you to find them, and start turning your town into a hub of young IT / financial experts!
Wow! Just wow! Talking about censorship...
meatless? At least it suited your diet ;<)
Nice to hear about this! Perhaps that was the only reason for you being there ;<)
Would be great if you could indeed start doing some teaching there but then indeed without any xenophobic 'director' breathing in your neck.
Sending you a hug from Portugal!
P.S. I still can't stand to see the mask wearing, let alone young kids wearing masks.
I really want to do an English/computer/Hive/photography class, but not sure if we want to do it here in Pramaoy or one of the nearby towns. The areas around here have much more natural beauty and outdoor recreation opportunities, but perhaps zero schooling and medical care. We hope to try and explore 4 different areas each Sunday for the next month, then we'll have an idea of which place we'd like to maintain a rental room for the next few years as we look for land purchasing opportunities.
Of course we're buying nothing now with HIVE's price in the dumps. My CAKE and TIME are still in the hole too, so withdrawing anything other than HBD seems foolish right now.
The mask thing is still technically enforced indoors and in all public outdoor areas, but here in Pramaoy nobody cares, even at the public school the teachers won't say anything if a kid isn't wearing a mask. We are still wearing them because we're new in town, and that alone is strange because nobody wants to live here.
The COVID fears are for foreigners and those who've traveled from afar, and as we are constantly scooting around the country lately and also new in town, we can sense that still many of the locals would like to maintain some social distance, even if they don't practice with the hardcore locals.
I have experienced something similar in Thailand. I speak Thai relatively well but there are just some people who don't want to understand you for some reason. The worst situation is when some people almost want to punish me for speaking the local language by intentionally changing the conversation to include unnecessarily complicated words.
It's almost like they are offended that you learned their super-secret-magic language.
I have only experienced this attitude with the wealthier more entitled types. I've had a similar experience here, although it's definitely a small minority of people, and poor/working class people are 100% stoked to see foreigners speaking their language.
exactly. If i ride into some random mom and pop shop in the middle of nowhere they are absolutely thrilled that I can speak the local language and will even sometimes call the other people out to revel in this very rare incident. I can't imagine why anyone out there would want to look down on you for learning what is, let's be honest, a relatively useless language on a global scale, but I guess looking down on others is what the entitled elite thrive off of.
😲5 hours for the parent meeting were long. Is it included the waiting time of 1 1/2 hour? Here at my place my parent only meet the teacher when getting my exam result (twice a year) and the teacher talks face to face with my parent on any matter related to my academic, complain and any recommendation. Nowadays, I saw my Aunty with my cousin who still study will discuss any matters in messenger group without meeting.
With the waiting and everything, yeah, right around 5 hours. All in all, for the amount of info covered between the parents and teachers, it would've been more effective to just meet each group of parents on a first come first serve basis, even as little as ten seconds would've been enough for me to say what I had to say and to hear what the teacher wanted to say. I have seen other public schools in Cambodia conduct parent-teacher meetings in more ordinary ways, but this was by far a very old-school way of running the whole process. I went for the experience to see how professional my fellow teachers running the school are, and I was let down more than I thought I'd be. I agree with you, face-to-face solo meetings would produce more honest feedback, questions and answers.
Sorry for being late at the party.. sometimes I've got lots of stuff to handle.. hahaha ... Such an interesting day. I had a good laugh reading line by line of how interesting things were with a parents teacher meeting called just as the school had started. Hahaha..
The one hour late.. ahhahaha..is quite funny.
But the classroom looks quite neat.. clean. 😀😀 Have a great Sunday.
No worries, I haven't had time to leave a longform comment on one of your posts in far too long, sorry for that. I do however get to read most of your posts, but as ASEAN Hive grows I have to adapt to the circumstances with what little time I have to commit.
Sometimes Cambodia is just too chill sometimes, and casually showing up an hour late to an important meeting is super common unfortunately.
Hhha.. I miss reading your longform comments.. really sarcastic at times.. But I know how busy you are getting things settled and all those.
Haaha.. I do understand the reading.. part.. cause I do that too.. and sometimes after reading and if that day, I am pretty busy, I may have just forgotten to comment. It's great to see the community updates.. =) hahaha.. The great happy lifestyle I guess is the slow one. There is a study I read about some while ago that states that those who are often late are people who are less strict and tend to be more friendly. I am those who sometimes is late too. =)
Although I do not have kids and cant relate directly to that story I have experience many times being "punked" as you say. When xenophobia of an educated farang speaking fluent Thai threatens the authority of a civil servant who is useless a their job. My sympathies go out to you as I can see you want the best for your kids at school. I guess the best thing is to supplement their education at home.
As a teacher, of course I try and educate as much as possible at home, but unfortunately I don't have the time needed to fully commit to giving them a proper homeschool education. I would love to do all the cooking, shopping, and homeschooling if I wasn't the breadwinner. Luckily the Hive gods have taken a liking to my wife's account lately, and lately my post payouts are crap considering all the years of effort I've put into Hive. More and more it may soon be possible that Pov could be the main breadwinner and I could become a "house husband."
I did the research and found that the majority of Khmer Rouge high-ranking officials and soldiers settled in this area. I was expecting some outdated mentality not so common in the rest of Cambodia, and I have definitely seen some signs of it.
This all sounds quite familiar, although the extension of the meeting is weird even for Venezuela. Teachers are often unprepared to teach children, especially in this generation. The fact that the entire meeting was about cellphones and screen time is also a sign of this. Profound misunderstanding of technology and how children and teenagers make use of it.
Yes, a definite letdown. The parents just need to not give the phone to their kids any time they ask for it, and also keep an eye on the amount of time spent on-screen as well as what they're doing. I think the main way of thinking here is to pacify and please the children, perhaps because many of the parents had hard lives and they just want to spoil their kids/grandkids.
Oh my goodness - what a difficult day! I feel for you having to put up with it and having the director not even acknowledging you. I hope your daughters are benefiting from it for that makes it more bearable. Happy to see you more settled back in Cambodia - will it look like you can get residency papers there?
It is what it is here in the boondocks, but the younger generation is a lot more promising. I have my one-year renewable visa again, and supposedly we can register our marriage and then I can get citizenship 3 years later. It's a new law, but haven't met anyone that's been able to register yet.
More than four hours means huge time, oh dad! I don't have that much patience because I lose my focus very quickly. But I have to praise your patience, you are really strong enough. And I didn't like the idea of xenophobic not being understood at all.
A bad experience, but an enlightening one. I am glad to know how the school works despite the fancy exterior. Most of all I’ll have to make sure my daughters are treated fairly by the director and staff despite having a foreigner Dad.
seems like attending a parent's meeting, at the monkey-B school is boring for you, and you also miss a post, for me it's a loss, but it doesn't matter, because the pictures around it can be some posts correct,,,????
It was terrible, but the worst was cramming into a preschool desk for the duration of the meeting. 15 minutes is the maximum time I can go without a backache sitting that crammed.
I think Parents who are late for meetings are everywhere. It is a problem that cannot be solved because of lack of conscience and responsibility. And the school doesn't take it seriously in this regard. Thank you.
You're double-right on that one, and especially in such a small sleepy town, nobody is more than 5 minutes away from the school, and the shops don't even need to be locked up here when the owner leaves during the day.
I can just imagine the disorganization. :D and I'm glad you survived. I used to attend meetings like this for our children. But since there is still no face to face class so no meetings like this so far. :D
I guess that is the upside, at least the kids are able to physically meet other children and socialize again, and they definitely developed some social phobias while in Suriname. Monkey-B doesn't study a full week in-class, but Srey-Yuu's Grade 6 study schedule is 100% like it was before COVID.
That is true...I am looking forward for the day that face to face classes will be available again here in our area.
I hope for your sake soon too.
Pretty much the same story everywhere - I never go to Parent-Teacher meeting and interestingly all the teachers know me for that reason :)
A combination of addictive screens and parents unwilling to put in the time and effort makes a perfect storm. The smartphone screen is becoming the new pacifier for children, and I guess I am an old outdate dinosaur. I'm not so sure I'll be attending another parent-teacher meeting especially if it doesn't involve the parents actually meeting with the teachers.
Ugghhh, I hate it when people arrive late in gathering especially something like this which is very important. It is very rude and disrespectful!
I am a 15 minutes early kind of person, hide for 10 minutes nearby and appear 5 minutes early. Here the thinking is still that the school is responsible for education, so the parents don’t have to educate their children about anything in life or at home. I was shocked that the parents wanted the school to do something that would make the kids not be on their parents’ phone nonstop. The answer is a little self-control and not caving into everything a child whines for. I
The definitely have a different kind of mindset when it comes to parenting and education.
I think if you could start your own school you could inspire the kids so much that they would be so eager to learn, that the phone would bore them.
Ideally I’d like to convert a $50 monthly rental room into a 10 student computer/desk classroom setup. I’ve estimated it would cost $5000 to kit out the room, so sponsors might have to be arranged. The locals could afford $30 to $50 per month for class fees, and I’d really like to make it happen once we’ve explored the area more and decide where we want to maintain a rental room for a few years.
What a nightmare. I think it says a lot about how much the parents care when they can't even be asked to turn up on time for a one-off meeting.
Yeah, I love Khmer people, but many of them just have no idea how to be an active parent nor have ever seen one. It's easy to blame the genocide for a lot of this, as the 30% of the most educated folks were killed. The trauma keeps passing down from generation to generation because nothing has been done to correct the psychological damage and PTSD. Even studies in California have show that third generation American-born Cambodians have high rates of PTSD even though they are very much removed from the Khmer Rouge history of Cambodia. It blew my mind that PTSD can be passed on.
You may as well have just attended school as a student for the day! It might have been more enlightening and fun. 😆
Is srey-yuu also attending school?
I am for some reason thinking of that old Adam Sandler movie "Billy Madison," where he goes back to preschool as an adult. Srey-Yuu and Monkey-B attend school at the same buildings, although different times. Next year if we're still here, Srey-Yuu would start studying at the big kid public school, covering grades 7 to 12. For $10 a month the private English school offered a taxi service, so we couldn't resist that deal. The girls are slowly gaining back their self-confidence, social skills, and also getting over their social phobias likely born being stranded in Suriname for far too many years.
I hope most of all the psychological damage our experience in Suriname did to the girls isn't longlasting.
I believe experiences like that can make or break you. If they don't break you they make you more empathic. Throughout it all they've had the unconditional love and support of their parents to help them through. So I think that they will come out on top and stronger for it.
It's always a tough call being a parent, because you can never really be sure you've made the right choices. What was a good approach for one was a bad approach for another. You have to just go with where life takes you, do your best and work with your children in they ways that work best for them. You also have to learn to forgive yourself when your best turns out not to be good enough. ❤
I definitely can admit I'm full of regrets from the last three years, but of course there's no way we could've known the world would close for business and both the USA and Cambodia would do nothing to assist is returning to either country as a united family.
Thanks for your insight, of course easier said than done, but that doesn't take away from the truth of your words.
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