Thursday Oct 27 Today we travelled with Vantha to another project around 90 mins from Phnom Penh on the Makong River. NCDP had identified 15+ children in two villages with intellectual disabilities that were severely marginalized. In conjunction with the village and the local primary school, they've been able to allocate resources from Baptist World Aid to help these young kids learn some important life skills. After observing the class and asking some questions of the teachers, I had the opportunity to sit at the feet of several mums and listen to each of them recount their personal stories. One such mum was called Sarah. She had five children. Of these five, three of them had severe learning disabilities. Sarah's struggle to raise these kids has been compounded by the death of her husband in 2004. Her eldest child has had to take on the responsibility of providing for the entire family. His decision has come at a great cost. He will probably never marry for his mother is unable to pay enough dowry to enable her sun to marry a bride. Sarah was very grateful to NCDP for their help for she felt that her intellectually disabled children has learnt enough life skills to survive in the village when she finally died. The issues confronting these families with intellectually disabled children seemed incredibly enormous. Not only did they face the day to day challenges of caring for needy children but they lived with the constant disdain of their local communities. Often kids would throw sticks / stones at their helpless children and their families would suffer the pain of feeling isolated and marginalized from mainstream life. They were treated like lepers. I must admit that I was humbled by the resilience of these women. So courageous and strong as they sought to do all that they could to ensure that their child or children had a decent go at life. These women were such hero's!