I’ve left my main residence in Phnom Pehn now, and so there are no main additions to Shadow Voices, as all these interactions centre around Duan Pehn, and now I live out of the city.

However, I did go back for health reasons for two weeks and there are a few updates. One is YooUn, there is no update about the missing Kresar, but her other child, a girl called Dany, has an update. Yooun told me she’d given her to an ‘Auntie’ who took her to Siem Reap to live, because she can have a better life there and go to school.

So now she just has the youngest son, Bot. I’m not going to pretend I understand these situations sometimes. She stays in the slum now, rarely in the street, as do most people, they tell me the police cause trouble.

Lim was doing very well for a while. She had a sponsor and bought a very nice, large room for two months. She tells me now she’s lost the money and is losing her place soon, but I never know what to believe any more.

There is another voice I never got round to adding, Srei Nui, whose children were left homeless when the police rounded her up. I’ve known her well for years and have been to the various places she lived at, including a tent in a building site.

So her children were homeless for more than a year, and then they let her go. The older boy has been arrested for something, and when he gets out, they’re all gonig to leave the city.

But she seems really on her feet, has a job and paid for a room. It’s the closest thing I’ve seen to success since I started this and I might write it all up soon.

As for myself, I am dealing with some serious health problems, and I am writing it up as a seperate section of this site. I’m making it so as I am also a shadow voice in this respect. I’ll perhaps include a link soon. Signing off for now xx

I’ve decided to write brief updates as the seasons change, just to keep all abreast of what is happening. 

Arrey (Sokri) is pretty much in the same situation, ducking and diving and getting by. As far as I know she’s still in a cheap room on 172. I actually saw her yesterday and she’s letting another homeless woman stay who just arrived from the province. Her situation is not ideal but OK.

Lim seems to have taken a turn for the worse. I only ever see her alone in the back of a disused tuk tuk nowadays, which isn’t a good sign as they are the only ‘public space’ to go to nowadays, there are no benches or parks or anything here. It’s even worse to see people sleeping or living in them, although I don’t think she’s at that point. 

I think she’s angry that I didn’t rent the two bedroomed placed we looked at. The reason for that was the landlady was away and they wanted me to pay two months rent and deposit with no receipt or contract, just a handshake. I had a bad feeling about this guy I was dealing with and said no, and she stormed off. 

She only spoke to me once since then, to ask where I ended up renting (single room so I can’t invite her). After that I was talking with a friend whom she knew and she came to say hello to him. She told him she’s homeless and he donated a small amount of money, but I think essentially everything is the same for her and I don’t know how to help.

I’ve got a new interview recorded with Niza, who had just arrived from the province. She was to be homeless the next day. She came to Phnom Pehn from her family farm because she needs a birth certificate to get her two sons in school, but the hospital won’t give them to her and she doesn’t understand why. This is her simple problem. She can’t go back without the paperwork, and she doesn’t know how to get it, and this problem obtaining documents is common in Cambodia. It’s mentioned in the studies I’ve refered to elsewhere on the site, and contributes to the facts of poverty and homelessness. The interview will be uploaded soon. 

I’m working on various other projects, but will try to get more interviews, inclucding Nari (YooUn), whose missing child actually sparked the idea for the Shadow Voices project, and I also have the ‘Missing Child’ poster I made myself, which I will post when I write a page for her. 

Eventually, I hope to have a first fund raising attempt. The main issue is finding someone suitable, with a sensible, workable plan and stable enough that I can stay in touch with them long enough to collect and deliver the money, and then hopefully record a follow up of the difference we can (all) hopefully make. 

I’ve had some health issues recently (worse that usual that is) so I can’t make any guarentees on timeframes. I’m letting life energy guide me to the people and circumstances I need to make this idea, or some idea, to improve things for all – be drawn to me.