noelle o designs

creativity + sewing + upcycling inspiration

friends, life, travel

beautiful people

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Today was our last day in Chung Ruk village. We’ve completed all of our projects (building a preschool, a fence around the school campus, we installed 46 bio-sand filters in villagers homes and a water catchment tank for the preschool) today it was time to party and say goodbye- for now. We all have fallen in love with the Cambodian people, especially the darling children.
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Six people on a scooter, I’m pretty sure that’s got to be a record…

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A friend who works at Sustainable Cambodia teaching us some sweet manuves. We also got schooled in kung fu. That smile is deceiving, let’s just say I’d avoid getting into a fight with this guy at all costs.

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My dance class- during the closing ceremonies party today we turned up the music and put to good use that one activity that supercedes the language barrier- dance party. These little ladies stood directly in front of me and imitated every move I made. I did my best to teach them the basics, the macarena and a few Saturday Night Fever moves.

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Cute, happy new friends we laughed with, understanding nothing of what each other said as we installed a bio-sand filter at their house. The filter is the grey cement item in the middle of the picture above.

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Most Cambodians stop smiling when you pull out the camera- it’s a cultural thing I’m sure. So getting a smiling picture is tough, with teeth showing is even harder to come by. But this friend wasn’t afraid to match my gigantic cheesy grin.
She would come over as I was working hauling cement buckets and squeeze my arm muscles and tell me stories in Khmer even though I blankly and uncomprehendingly stared back at her with my big nerdy grin.

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So many new little friends is what this gal was looking for- she knocked it out of the park.

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This kid looks so much like my nephew Chris when he was this age, I had to hunt him down for a picture. I’m sure he was wondering why the weird old white woman with the camera was following him around all afternoon.

20120626-230924.jpgOne of the bikes purchased by Youthlinc and donated to a deserving villager like this gal in the picture.

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Q and her new Cambodian boyfriend. I think they held hands every minute they were together for the last three days we were in the village. She’d take him home with her if she could.

What an amazing trip this has been- but it’s not over yet… tomorrow we go to Siem Rep and to the temples at Ankor Wat, a place I’ve really been looking forward too visiting. Stay tuned.

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