Battambang, KH – Bicycle loan speeds up journey to school – 31 Oct 2017

Lai and his wife work very hard to support their children’s education and study habits. All of their children perform very well in class to repay their parents for their efforts, and all five children have made their parents proud by receiving many awards from their school and soccer clubs.

Danoch, their oldest daughter, and son Danang have both received gold medals from their soccer club. Danoch has played for CFI girls’ soccer team and also for the Cambodian national young girls’ team. She played in many countries and many times brought back a medal. Danang has played for young boys’ teams and has also received many medals.

They are now going to high school, which is about 7 km from where they live making it impossible for them to walk. Despite playing for soccer clubs for a long time, they have been unable to earn money from their sport. So their father applied for a US$100 loan to buy a bicycle for them to use for going to school.

The loan was needed because the income from Lai’s garden shop job and his wife’s small business was not enough to save money after paying all the living expenses of  house rent, electricity, water, food, petrol, general expenses and especially the children’s school expenses.

This is very worrying because the children are now reaching higher grade levels at school, which means that education costs are increasing.

Lai and his wife dream of supporting their children’s further education, and Lai says that he would walk and even crawl to work if it meant helping his children to receive a good education.