From touring the Killing Fields and visiting an elephant sanctuary in Cambodia to working on a rice farm in Vietnam, Bega High School students have had a “life-changing” visit to South East Asia.
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The students returned from their 17-day trip on October 9, travelling through Siem Reap, Battambang and Phnom Penh in Cambodia before visiting the coastal town of Hoi An in Vietnam.
Liam Jolley, Renee Cooper, Eliza Terrey, Ellie Parker and Kaylah Faulkner of Year 10 said the eye-opening experience encouraged them to go travelling again as well as donate to charity.
“It taught me not to take things for granted,” Kaylah said.
“And to enjoy the life we have,” Renee said.
“Also, travel and see how other people live,” Ellie said.
“We can also use the resources we have to help other people less privileged than us,” Eliza said.
Liam said the trip made him more aware of the idea of money and how much wealth Australia had.
“You have to step outside of where you live to realise how lucky and privileged you are,” he said.
Eliza said she saw how the people of Cambodia and Vietnam have very different concerns to people in Australia.
“Over here you might worry about how you look and what people think of you, but over there it’s much more serious and you worry about things like your health,” she said.
One of the highlights for Renee was ecotourism in Vietnam where they went to a rice farm and ploughed mud with buffaloes then planted and harvested rice.
“It was interesting to see how much effort [the villagers] put into it, but it was sad to see how little money they got for it,” her friend Kaylah said.
They also visited the Killing Fields - where thousands of people were killed and buried during the Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s - which they described as “confronting”.
“It was terrible when we were there, but I think it was worse when we were in the villages talking to people and thought about what had happened to them,” Eliza said.
The students held fundraisers before they left, with $22,000 going to support the Cambodian Children’s Fund, Tiny Toones, the Cambodian Landmine Museum, ABOUTAsia Schools and Global Village Housing.
“Before we went it felt like we did so much fundraising,” Kaylah said.
“But we got there and donated so much money to NGOs to help them pay for rent or pay volunteers, so we were actually putting money into people’s lives.
“It was a life-changing experience.”