Determined to Win
Friday, March 14, 2008 - by seiha
The yellow monthly report book lists all the students’ names and on every page Kong Srey Leak’s name ranks top. Every month, she is the champion.
Class teacher Mr. Men Vannak, 54, says that Srey Leak is a good student, comes to school on time and focuses on the teacher’s explanations. During class activities she helps her classmates and the teacher: For him, Srey Leak divides the students into groups for the study club. “Srey Leak is a very serious student. She never misses her homework or disappoints the teacher,” he says.
Only 130 centimeters tall and 13 years old, Srey Leak has yellow skin, long curly hair and an oval face. She is the youngest daughter in her family. Now, she is in sixth grade primary school of Bunteay Trav in Takeo province’s Batie district, but she has been the best student at school since grade one.
Srey Leak explains that her attention is the factor which makes her the strongest in her class. "I listen to everything the teacher explains." She says with conviction: “I like to beat all the other students.” Mathematics is her favorite subject. "I love doing the exercises."
Besides going to public school, she takes time to learn English, spending 100 Riel for two hours from 5 to 7 p.m. There, she has finally met a student as clever as herself. But she says: “I do not let the student beat me.”
Srey Leak lives in poverty. She says sadly: “I have no father, but have a mother.” But without an education and not able to write, her mother finds it hard to make enough money to support her daughter's studies and to feed her. Not always can her mother cook breakfast, sometimes Srey Leak must go to school with an empty stomach. Still, on most days the mother gives her 100 to 200 Riel. When she has no money, she borrows it with interest, to pay for school.
Srey Leak’s great aunt Nguoch Neen is 49 years old and says hat she is a peasant, but doesn't have cows or buffaloes. Every rainy season, she hires a man to plough and rake her field. During dry season, she has a second job as a palm tree leaf sewer, helping to cover the roofs of houses. Seeing how difficult it was for the family, Srey Leak once asked for permission to go to work at a garment factory. But the mother refused to let her go. Of her five children, only Srey Leak, the youngest of four daughters, still goes to school.
"Even if Srey Leak does not find a big job in the future, she will survive," says her mother and recounts how the daughter studies, even when ill. "Once, she went to school with a fever because she was afraid of losing her place at the top."
Without money to support Srey Leak, the mother encourages the girl with words: “My daughter, study hard to be someone.” Meanwhile the daughter taught her mother how to write her name. Srey Leak says: “Had mother been able to study, she would know it all.”
"Times were different back then", says the older. "My mother thought that a daughter who studied would not work and instead write love letters to sweethearts. She did not let me go to school."
Neighbor Say Lin is convinced that Srey Leak one day will enter business and make good money by selling water melons, or transplanting seedlings. The Author: Kuy Mengheang
