Be the Change Network

Chrauk Tiek Primary School, Cambodia. We will soon have a new building to house our library and music class. A huge thank you to the parents and grandparents of Peter Pisey who have donated the funds for the building in his name! Like our son Grady, Peter was born in Cambodia and adopted by a family in the United States. He is 6 years old and a fellow first-grader in Ms. Gimmlet’s class at Dunn Elementary in Fort Collins, Colorado. Thank you to Peter and his big sister Maya for donating their soccer cleats and over $100 worth of art supplies. The kids are really enjoying these. In honor of their commitment to help us build a new library we are dedicating this post to Peter and Mrs. Gimlet’s class.

Life at the Grady Grossman School

( as written by Grady Grossman and typed by his mom)

This is Riat and he is one of my new friends. He is blind. I am very caring to him. He is really good at playing instruments. He smiles when I chase the other kids around. He always carries a piece of wood that is brown and shaped like a rectangle. He uses it to feel things. We like to walk around together but Riat can do it by himself. Even though he can’t see, he can feel his way very well. Now he’s learning English at our school.

This is the swimming hole where we take a bath everyday and wash our clothes. I have fun with my sister Shanti. There is a beach on the other side where I like to dig. One time it rained very hard and the river got higher. My mom is wearing a sarong, that’s what ladies in Cambodia use for a bathing suit. It’s very hot in the daytime and we go swimming to cool off.

Playing with tires is extremely fun. Some other kids included me to come in and play. I went up the ramp and the other kids did the same. Then we chased them down. Then we did it again.

I am helping my friend Theary pick up briquettes and take them to the sun to dry. Briquettes are made from dead stuff you get from the ground and mix with newspaper and water. Briquettes are used for cooking fuel. We are teaching families how to make them so that they don’t have to destroy their environment to cook. A lot of kids miss school to chop firewood.

This is where I sleep under a mosquito net. The mosquitoes in Cambodia that come out in the evening cause diseases like malaria. It is fun to sleep under a mosquito net. Sometimes I have a stomach ache but I don’t think it is malaria. If we get malaria we have to leave for America right away. To stay healthy I always have to drink a lot of water and wash my hands and sleep under the net.

We went to a wedding for teacher Srey Mau. It was fun. I got carried on the shoulders of someone kind. I had fun touching the roof and scaring the bugs. They play loud music and give us a lot of food. I like the little meatballs in the soup. The sound was so loud that I could hear it from the Grady Grossman School. In Cambodia people like to sing karaoke very loud.

They have not much transportation in Cambodia. This is an original oxcart. I had fun riding on it. It was a bumpy ride. People use it a lot for transporting wood from the forest to their home.

This is the water well that was in the movie. We can get fresh water here. I clean my feet in it. The pump has very hot metal in the daytime.

This is the library we are going to put in Peter’s new building. Then this room can be a classroom again. I went to first grade one day. There were a lot of kids in the class (60+). I tried to study Khmer language but is was very difficult to understand their writing and language. It was loud and I had to share a desk with 2 other kids. One of them was my friend Hong Leng. He is great. He doesn’t have a kneecap so he limps most of the time. I learned that they repeat the writing on the board after the teacher says the words. It was kind of boring.

This is where we eat on a straw mat on the floor. They don’t have a table. My sister and I are eating breakfast. We usually have rice. I always ask for soy sauce like this, “som duk see ewou.” When we are eating the cat comes in. I think the cat is cute, but I’m not supposed to play with him when I’m eating. They have different foods like jack fruit. My mom really likes it. I have a loose tooth. When you loose your tooth in Cambodia you throw it on the roof, so the new one will grow in straight. I know the tooth fairy can find me with a jet-powered vehicle.

I miss you all. I am coming home to Colorado soon.

My son Grady, Cambodian born American raised, the inspiration for both a book and a school, has a dream. He’s been studying Martin Luther King this month at his new International Baccalaureate school in Ft. Collins Colorado, where part of the first grade curriculum involves identifying inspiring “risk-takers.” Dr. King is his pick. His impersonation of “little black boys and girls holding hands with little white boys and girls” is quite dramatic, making skin color a hot topic of conversation around our house.

Grady loves to read and normally hates to write. But this assignment to write his own “I have a dream” speech flowed with uncommon ease. Here it is:

“I have a dream that…..

I could be a inventor and a astronot. I wold make a mountain top exploder. When I be a astronot I wold fix satlites and be a IB World Student and have a happy life.”

- Eric Ratanak Grady Grossman, age 7 , Nov. 14, 2007.

A happy life. A simple dream. Utterly unthinkable for the majority of Cambodia’s children, certainly for those born into the situation that Grady was, fatherless and hungry. For the rest of the story one must read Bones That Float and then you will know why this book is dedicated to the children of Cambodia.

Grady’s dream reminds me daily why I am doing this. Simply put, I believe that every child on this planet has the right to dream and to a happy life.

This is all of our responsibility.