Lessons I Learned

I wrote a comment today on our Geotourism Challenge site which I wanted to share: http://geotourism.changemakers.com/en-us/node/21932

It seems that a lot of people have been voting for PEPY on the site (THANK YOU!) and some have also gone so far as to write nice comments for us on our page. I was writing back to one from Aileen Cameron and I wanted to share it below.

Thank you to the PEPY staff who made the nomination as a Geotourism Challenge Finalist possible, and who work to make our programs successful every day.

Ha! If you saw the 400+ unanswered emails in my inbox right now or the state of my desk, you might not think I am so on top of everything anymore Our TEAM here are the organized ones – Sela’s spreadsheets and ability to keep everything in order in both his mind and his papers keeps our office running smoothly, Kimline’s “number one in her class” (though she doesn’t like to talk about it!) accounting practices and her pushing us to do things better and be as responsible as possible with our money and our processes make us more efficient at what we do. Soe keeps our websites running smoothly (except when hackers put viruses on our site! But even then he notices right away and is working on it!). Rithy keeps us laughing – keeps us thinking – and is the least afraid to say “Daniela, you’re wrong.” (which is very often the case!). Ratana gets EVERYONE’S opinion – makes everyone feel heard – and smiles through even the most difficult of conversations (even when we had him practice saying “Daniela, you’re wrong.” today to see if he could do it ;-)) Awat signs her name with a heart before her signature… I mean, come on! How can you compete with that!?

And the list goes on, our staff and THEIR commitment to improving education in Cambodia is what makes this work: Channeang teaching herself how to use the XO and then excelling at Scratch to the point where she is inspiring kids to want to learn to read Khmer through their computer classes, Thavry now being a published author/illustrator (woohoo!) and making our early literacy program better, Monkol taking it upon himself to work on a database for all of our scattered information, Sarrakk and Chim Seng absorbing any new information given to them and keeping their classes smiling, Srey Touh with her model library showing the visitors from the Ministry of Education around and training our team of PEPY librarians and others in the area, Kyla jumping into the team with new ideas and a eagerness to empower others to share their skills, Aim with HIS smile – my goodness he could light up Chanleas Dai – and his willingness to support all of the projects going on 7 days a week at PEPY, Saly/Noun/Sak making Khmer Literacy a priority in Chanleas Dai, our team of Child-to-Child educators who inspire children to be leaders in solving problems in their community, Joe/Bon making our office more efficient, Chanleas Dai’s school cooks keeping everyone smiling, Thy’s eagerness to learn and entertain, Sovandy stepping up to fight corruption and inefficiencies when he saw them, Aline teaching us how to run a better NGO, Meth/Kong taking care of us like family, the volunteer interns who have come out to join our team and give 6 months of their time to help improve our work like Anna who is making sure we say the right things and Katy who helps make sure our tours are life-changing…. and the rest of our 35+ staff who were each hired because they say things like “I love to learn” and “I want to support my country and my village” and then act in accordance with making those things happen – THEY make our work successful.

With them driving, how can we not be successful?!

We are looking forward to having YOU out here again some day soon! Thanks for the constant support!