WHINGING ABOUT VOLUNTEERING

CAMBODIA IMPRESSIONS

Found a Mexican food place in Phenom Phen Cambodia on the internet while I was trying to find a place I could volunteer at that wasn't a scam to get my money. The food at the restaurant was OK though I suffered explosive diarrhea shortly afterward. Thus far, that fully expresses my feelings on Cambodia.



TEACHING GIG

My current thinking is that I'll need to volunteer in order to get some experience teaching English. Later, I can work on getting a paying job. I am currently in the capital city of Cambodia. I am astounded at how difficult it is to get an unpaid job teaching English! Yes, I've looked on the internet but most of them are just 'orphanage tourism' where you get to pay a sizable amount of money to 'volunteer' as well as see the 'human zoo'. So, I am a bit discouraged. I thought I'd easily have a job of some sort (bad pay or volunteer) within a week. I was clearly wrong.

I got a rejection e-mail from a volunteer organization. Now that's depressing. Hell, I can't even give away my time.

After reviewing Adam's words of wisdom - and trying to figure out which jobs I am actually qualified for and/or able to do, I might just keep working at finding a place here and do the 'hole up' option for awhile. I'm not saving much money here but I'm not sure where else to go from here. At least if I stay in Cambodia for awhile, I have the possibility of working. In Thailand there are way too many rules and laws to keep you from that. I just need to get a couple months teaching experience somewhere so that I have the faintest clue what the heck I'm talking about. From there, I can stretch that out on my resume to a couple of years. I had checked into Malaysia but it appears to be a 'more developed' country. More English is spoken as well. Naturally, the prices are higher. Not scary so - I could probably break even there but in Cambodia I am at least able to save a pitiful amount per day.

Looking at the map, it appears that my only options from here are either Vietnam or Thailand. I'd also have to go through Thailand if I wanted to hit Malaysia. I suppose that if I wanted to go back to Thailand I could 'hole up' in a fairly small town and rent an apartment cheap. I know that Tonto would be happy to find me a place in Pattaya but there really isn't anything there for me. Plus, getting robbed there did put a foul taste in my mouth for the city.

So, for now, I am just in a holding pattern. For several hours every day I am walking the city of Phnom Phen and trying to find a place to volunteer to teach English at. Yes, I could go back to Mrs. $40 per month but she was looking for a computer teacher - not an English teacher. That is also a possibility.