Seeds on the wind
We accompanied Yang on a visit to inspect a well project. According to UN statistics, as much as 70% of Cambodia’s population has no access to running water. The water people in rural communities use tends to be rainwater or drawn from local streams, and during the dry season they not only have to deal with a lack of water, but also face increased odds of catching dengue fever, malaria, or gastrointestinal diseases.
Since 2015, the FRA has been collecting donations for specific uses, like sinking wells for schools in rural Cambodia; to date, they have completed 50 such wells. With a well, not only do teachers and students not need to take a bucket of water with them to use the toilet, an hour of motorized pumping can fill a large tank with clean water, and children can even take water home for their families to use. But these wells are more than just the cleanest water sources available locally; the water from them will be invaluable in the long-term development of these communities.
During our visit we see many of these wells and crematories that the FRA has constructed in rural communities, but Yang also reminds us with a smile that in fact her background is in education, and she is also principal of the FRA Secondary and Vocational High School in Poipet. This school, with its red-tiled roof, wooden window frames and traditionally decorated eaves, was built with donations from Taiwan, but is brimming with Khmer style. The only high school in a five-village area, it currently boasts a roll of over 300 students between seventh and tenth grades.
Yang began her work in Cambodia in 1987. At the time, she was a flight attendant with China Airlines, and had volunteered to aid in a Thai refugee camp. With the Thai‡Cambodia border area still a war zone, she often saw firsthand the devastation and extreme poverty the Cambodian refugees were suffering under in the wake of their nation’s civil war. She decided she wanted to stay, settling in a village known as “Landmine Village” despite the difficult conditions. She began taking in homeless orphans along the border who were surviving by begging, and in 1995 she established the Field Relief Agency of Taiwan.
Over the past two decades, the FRA has provided relief in the form of education. “Ultimately, only education can end the cycle of poverty that the civil war began and help the poorest stand on their own feet.” Behind Yang’s desk in Poipet hangs a huge map of Taiwan. She works to collect donations of money and supplies from Taiwan and ship them to Cambodia, and has already helped to build or rebuild some 18 Chinese-medium schools in the country, as well as the FRA Secondary and Vocational High School. The people of Taiwan have also generously donated stationery, textbooks, and student stipends, all of which have reached over 70,000 students so far.
“For the price of a good restaurant meal in Taiwan, you can support a poor child,” Yang says, adding, “I feel lucky to be able to play my part in history. I’ve seen how the people of Cambodia have refused to be beaten down by the chaos and destruction of war, and I’ve had the chance to sow the seeds of good through the FRA.”
In 2005, the Lions Club of Taiwan helped build a high school in a Cambodian village known as “Landmine Village,” providing a solution to the problem of large numbers of dropouts. (courtesy of FRA)