Reporter of the People’s Army Newspaper had a chance to join the delegation of the Department of Economy under the Vietnamese Ministry of National Defense to visit the school right on the occasion of the Vietnamese Teachers’ Day (November 20). It is a complex of wooden houses, painted with blue and yellow colors with red roofs and located among locals’ temporary houses on the lakeside. A board with the inscription, “Vietnamese primary school presented by Military Region 7 of the Vietnam People’s Army” in the Vietnamese and Khmer languages is attached to the wall of the school.
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The Vietnam Primary School on Tonlé Sap Lake |
According to Thai Hong Son, Deputy Headmaster of the school, Tonlé Sap, or “Bien Ho” in Vietnamese, is the biggest fresh water lake in the Southeast Asia region and the first biosphere reserve in Cambodia recognized by the UNESCO in 1997. Most people living in Tonlé Sap are Vietnamese people, who pursue their traditional livelihood of fishing. Under the regulation of the Cambodian Government, they could only fish from October this year to June of the following year annually because the remaining time is the breeding season of fishes. In spite of struggling life, the local Vietnamese community here always wants their children to learn the Vietnamese language to maintain their roots. Understanding the Vietnamese residents’ desire, Teacher Tran Van Tu from Tay Ninh province decided to open a Vietnamese school in the area in 1997.
In a sad voice, Son told that Tu has been ill several days ago and went to the city to take medicine. Tu is an admirable man, Son said. He is the person who raised money to build the school, mobilized each family to send their children to classes without any school fees. When Military Region 7 lent a helping hand to build the school and open new classes, he again called on teachers at home, even his son and daughter-in-law, to go there to teach and feed local children, Son reminisced.
Thanks to the new school, the number of students increased remarkably from 100 to over 300. All students are provided with books, notebooks, and three meals per day for free. It is not easy to take care of over 300 students, Nguyen Minh Luan, a teacher of the school said. Luan told the PAN reporter that teachers must get up early every day, prepare over 300 bowls of instant noodle for students before starting their lectures. They had no time to rest because they also had to take care of the students during lunch and afternoon and they even had to ask local people for food when the school’s stores run out of rice.
The teachers here work voluntarily and received no official salary as normal teachers do. Their fee comes from the donations of students’ families and sponsors.
Before bidding farewell to the school’s teachers and students, we were proud of the Vietnamese community in Tonlé Sap, who have always wholeheartedly helped each other in life, showing the tradition of “the good leaves cover up the torn ones” of overseas Vietnamese around the world.
Translated by Trung Thanh