AsiaLIFE

August the sporting world will turn its eyes’ on Beijing for the XXIX Olympic Games. The hopes of any of Cambodia’s four competitors coming home with a medal are slim, but their mere attendance at the Games reinforces the Olympian ideal that it is the taking part rather than the winning that counts. Mark Bibby Jackson takes a look at four organisations that are using participation in sport to help change the lives of the country’s next generation.

One figure follows two fellow athletes around the track. It is 6.30 in the morning and this is a training session for the Cambodian runners going to the Beijing Olympics – all two of them. The venue is Phnom Penh’s own Olympic Stadium, built from 1962-1964 and originally slated to hold the 1963 South East Asian (SEA) Games at a time when, like other parts of society, Cambodia’s sporting future looked so full of promise. Not quite the loneliness of the long-distance runner, but 25-year-old marathon runner Bunting Hem stands head and shoulders above the rest of Cambodian athletes, if not in stature then in ability. A silver medal winner in the 2007 SEA Games, Bunting shattered the Cambodian record with a truly respectable time of 2 hours 26 minutes and 28 seconds.

Realistically Cambodia has no great prospects for Beijing, something that national coach Chay Kimsan acknowledges. “I hope that the athletes will achieve their personal best time, but I don’t think they will win a medal,” he says. He is looking towards London 2012 for Cambodia gaining its first Olympic medal since it rejoined the Games in Atlanta in 1996. If that dream is achieved then Bunting, who only took up running in 2003 because his mother felt that football was too dangerous, is the most likely medal prospect.

Seeing Ability

In Cambodia, perhaps more than most countries, sport is not so much about winning and losing, but in true Olympian spirit, it is the taking part that counts. Participating not just in the sporting activity, but in the wider community as a whole.

Chris Minko is Secretary General of the Cambodian National Volleyball League (Disabled). “The true national sporting heroes of this country are the national volleyball team and they are disabled athletes” he claims. Cambodia came third in the WOVD World Cup held in Phnom Penh last year. “They have broken down so many barriers within mainstream society by showing the abilities of people with a disability.” He talks of Khmers sitting in cafés watching their games, noting how good the athletes are. He proudly shows front pages of Khmer national newspapers where the volleyball team is pictured alongside all the other news. “Quite often they have dropped the word disabled, and it’s just the national volleyball league,” he says. “That to us is integration at its best.” It is indicative of the great progress the sport has made since the national league’s inauguration in 2000.

Unfortunately the team will not appear in the Paralympics, instead it will focus on the next world cup, to be held in 2009 in Slovenia. Chris explains that there is no team sport for standing amputees in the Paralympics – they are all sitting sports. Standing volleyball was thrown out after the 2000 Sydney Games and replaced with rowing. Chris is lobbying hard to have volleyball included as an event in the London Paralympics. According to Chris, standing volleyball is now the most well-paid team event in Cambodia. The qb National League, which starts on Aug. 2 at the Olympic Stadium will carry a purse of US$3,000 for the winning team, the highest for any sporting event in Cambodia, he claims.

But CNVLD is not just about success and money. Chris’ organisation provides support for over 300 athletes, working in 11 provinces. In 2005, CNVLD incorporated wheelchair racing into its programme. Now they have around five clubs, each having five to seven members, with a special emphasis on women. “Sport has a unique power to effect positive social change,” he says. This is especially the case in a post conflict country like Cambodia. “It brings ex-foes together in a sporting context. Sport is an important part of conflict resolution.”

He cites one example where five wheelchair athletes in Battambang were provided with ANZ Royal Bank accounts. When they turned up to the branch, they found there was no disabled access. Now, over the next couple of years, the bank is rolling out a programme to provide disabled access to all branches across the country. Chris believes that other banks will follow their lead. He also mentions how Caltex employs at least one disabled person at each of its petrol stations.

The people that CNVLD works with are the most marginalised in society. “By and large a woman in a wheelchair in the provinces is pretty well locked up in her hut,” says Chris. Part of his organisation’s work is to bring members back into the community with dignity. Members are provided with support and given an ANZ Royal Bank account to encourage them to save, but they do not receive an income from the organisation, which might stop them going out and finding work.

What they do get is a disciplined sports programme. If they break the rules they are thrown out for a year. “Everyone single person who has been thrown out of our programme has returned as a much better individual,” he claims. “Some of our leading coaches now, are people who were removed for disciplinary reasons.”

Around 70 percent of the athletes find jobs for themselves, a remarkable statistic. Chris puts this down to a restored sense of self-esteem, a sense of discipline and the incredible strength of the disability network within the country. “We give people hope, what they do with that hope is up to that individual,” he says.

What Chris hopes for now is greater sponsorship. In the past the national team has received support from ANZ Royal Bank and recently qb announced that it would sponsor the national standing volleyball league. Though he welcomes this corporate support, Chris wants more. He invites other corporate entities to look at the positive side of corporate sector social responsibility – the ANZ Royal support of the wheelchair programme has been judged a role model for sport and development by the U.N.. “If we had the sponsorship I could open 40 volleyball clubs tomorrow and a wheelchair club in every province in the country,” he claims.

Tackling Poverty

Like Chris, Andrew Newman, puts a growing sense of self-belief as one of the greatest attributes that sport can bestow on athletes. For the past two years Andrew has coached the women’s national rugby team.

The women, who are between 15 and 20 years of age, started playing rugby at the Pour un Sourire d’Enfant School in Stung Meanchay. Like the athletes supported by CNVLD, they come from some of the most disadvantaged backgrounds in Cambodia, growing up around the rubbish dump there. Many used to collect rubbish.

At first they played low contact touch rugby, but seeing that boys their age were playing tackle rugby they soon opted for that version of the game. One of them, Srey Mom, admits she was initially shy of its physicality, but now she loves it. The game has had an empowering effect upon her. “Everyone says that girls should stay at home, that’s why we play rugby to prove them wrong,” she says.

Although her mother was initially worried by her choice of sports, once she saw how much Mom enjoyed it, she let her daughter carry on playing. Andrew admits that initially players’ discipline was sub-par, but this has improved vastly over the two to three years they have been playing. “They had to get from a level of nothing to playing internationals in one year,” he says. These internationals were against women who were much older and physically bigger than the Cambodian players. What they lacked in experience and physical bulk, they more than made up for in enthusiasm and ferocity in the tackle. But discipline, especially among the younger members of the team is something that still needs working on, according to team captain Sapoeun.

“I am proud of being captain, but sometimes the other players don’t listen to me and that makes it hard,” she says. In just a couple of years she has come a long way towards realising the value of teamwork and discipline, something which she carries through to her studies in IT. “Before we didn’t think too much about team sports, we just wanted to get fit, but now we realise we have to play together to win,” adds Mom. On their recent tour to Laos the team notched up their first victory – against a Thai university side – but lost narrowly against arch-rivals Laos. “We really want to beat Laos,” says Sapoeun.

Art of Losing

Perversely learning how to lose is something that Sam Schweingruber tries to instil into the children he coaches at his SALT Academy in Battambang. Sam, who was a youth football coach and special education needs teacher in his native Switzerland, first came to Cambodia in 2002.  He started SALT (Sports and Leadership Training) Academy in September 2006 to provide leadership training for young, unemployed coaches.

He incorporates life skills, such as learning to lose, into his programme. “Cambodians don’t like to lose,” he says, pointing out the shame involved in losing face. “If you grow up not knowing how to lose, you can blow up later on. Most kids will not have a villa and a Lexus when they grow up, so there is a danger that they are going to feel like losers all their lives.”One of his lessons is that the children are all part of one team. They can actually enjoy losing so long as they know that they all did their best in the process. “A Lexus is not the key to happiness in life,” he says.

In addition to coaching and leadership, the attendees learn self-respect – saying no to drugs, taking personal responsibility for their actions, awareness of health issues and a sense of fair play. He encourages them to have realistic and achievable personal goals. “I try to give them better options,” he says, a view echoing that of Chris Minko.

One of the people who has benefited from these options is Sopheak. The 25-year-old has been coaching since 2007. His motivation comes from his own experience. “I used to be a person who did bad things and I wasted a lot of time,” he explains. “I want to help other kids not to waste time in their life like I did. I want to see them get involved in sports and I want to be a good influence on them.” He recently started coaching a team specifically for kids with drug addiction problems and street children. “I want to bring a change to the kids, and make a difference to their lives,” he explains. “If they play football they have less time to waste and do bad things.”

Last season, SALT had 28 teams at under-18, and under-14 levels – both boys and girls. Like Andrew and Chris, Sam places a high importance on the role of sport in the personal development of girls in Cambodia. Last season was the first time that girl teams were incorporated into the programme. “It gives the girls a sense of equal rights,” he says. “It shows them their worth.”

Giving Kids a Childhood

At the end of the process, some of the members go on to become professional coaches, teaching football skills to children. One of the organisations that employs former-SALT children is the Indochina Starfish Foundation. Initially set up by Peter Slater and Thin Theary in 2006 as a school, teaching some 10 children in the Tuol Sleng area, Indochina Starfish now has some 1,200 children benefiting from their programme.
Coming to the country as a tourist Peter was struck by the state of the young children he saw working on the streets collecting rubbish. He first employed Theary as his interpreter, but when Peter left the country he left her with some money to teach the children and provide them with an opportunity of climbing out of their cycle of poverty.

Returning six months later, he was struck by how much Theary had achieved in such a short period of time. Now the organisation supports two schools, one in Boeung Salang and the other in Stung Meanchay. The centres have children ranging from 7 to 17. Many of them, especially in Stung Meanchay, come from the poorest of families.

“Some of the kids who come to school don’t have any clothes,” says Kate Griffin, who started volunteering for the organisation three months ago and has become de facto country manager. In addition to their schooling and one good meal a day, the children receive a food parcel – rice, vegetables, MSG, etc – for their families, in lieu of the loss of income caused by the children attending school. The sole proviso is that the children’s attendance rate has to be satisfactory. The football programme started as an attempt to give the children an outlet. “We try to give the children a bit of a childhood,” explains Kate, adding that life tends to be very serious for them, especially those that are working on the streets. What motivates Kate the most is seeing “all the smiles on the faces of the kids.”

It is football that seems to make the children smile the most, as they gather outside their centre at 4.45am in eager anticipation, even though the truck does not leave until 5.30am. Although officially the scheme is set up as an under-14 league, in reality all are welcome. The youngest player is two-years old.

Indochina Starfish works with 10 organisations in Phnom Penh as well as two in Battambang and another couple in Siem Reap. These provide US$3,500 per year to sponsor a team, with a minimum commitment of three years. Working in conjunction with the Cambodian Football Federation, the organisation provides kit, boots, transport, coaches and pitches. The latter is currently the main stumbling block, with a suitable pitch desperately needed for Indochina to set up an under-14 competition in September. In addition to teaching children how to work together, the programme has very tangible benefits for some of the older children. The organisation pays for them to gain a ‘D’ coaching licence, which allows them to coach children. Though this is limited to those 17 and over. If they prove good enough then Indochina Starfish will then pay for them to become professional coaches.

A Bright Future

Teamwork, discipline, self-esteem and the ability to lose, these are virtues that young sportsmen and women are learning from the various sporting programmes within the country. They are key to their personal development. Cambodia’s individual athletes might not return with any medal from Beijing, but maybe in four years’ time if Chris Minko can manage to persuade the Paralympic Committee, the country’s standing volleyball team might just bring a medal home. Even if they don’t, does it really matter? As in Cambodia, sport really isn’t a matter of winning or losing – at least not on the field or the track.

Further information about the organisations featured in this article, can be found at the following websites:

Cambodia National Volleyball League Disabled (CNVLD)
www.standupcambodia.net

Cambodian Federation of Rugby
www.cambodiarugby.org

SALT Academy
www.saltacademy.net

Indochina Starfish Foundation
www.indochinastarfish.org