Help keep a Cambodian Music and Dance School open

Poverty has made human beings miserable, a large number of families divorced, made children suffer severely, and children have no knowledge because of their parents’ divorce. Most Cambodian families rely solely on their husbands when they decide to divorce, those who mostly suffer are women. For instance, in the Chin family, when his parents divorced, his mother raised five children alone. Chin, the eldest child in the widow's family, is now 21 years old. He decided to drop out of school by the sixth grade because his family had severe difficulty in living, such as having no money to go to school, lacking money to pay for daily living, his family being in debt, and living from hand to mouth. Chin's purpose in dropping out of school was to help his mother earn money to pay off her debts by raising five children, three of whom were girls. What is even sadder is that the other four children in this family dropped out of school at very young ages, if they were not educated at an early age, what would their future be like? This is a very pity for the Chin families’ difficult situation. Living under the same sky but with different fates. Seeing the hard situation of Chin's family, SCC promptly decided to select Chin to study Khmer traditional music from 2017 until today. 

Today, Chin can perform Khmer traditional music well and can play many songs. He goes to play music at ceremonies and hotels at least two to three times a month. With this performing music, he can earn 20 US dollars each time, but sometimes there is no demand from any clients and then he does not work. At the Khmer traditional music school, Chin was working as the music teacher's assistant, while the teacher was absent. He taught Khmer traditional music to other young classmates who had come to practice and learn. He taught these students good lessons and habits such as practicing daily, recording key lessons, studying hard, and practicing with classmates. He told them how important it is to listen to the teacher very carefully, to stick to clear goals, and to follow their dreams. "These are methods that I have practiced and found to be useful and effective ways to practice such traditional music," he added. Moreover, because he has enough ability, Chin gets the opportunity to play music in a hotel in Siem Reap regularly, earns an additional 3.75 US dollars each time, and this amount the hotel owner pays Chin monthly. Through this income, Chin saved to help pay off his mother's debt. Chin is happier now because he specializes in Khmer traditional music, and has friends, teachers, and SCC staff to help him.

In the future, he wants to become a professional Khmer traditional musician so he studies and practices very hard with the music. Finally, we would like to appeal to all philanthropists to join us to make other poor youths' dreams come true as well as to maintain Khmer traditional music. Thank you for your generous kindness of yours through SCC.