24 hrs Homeless from Nicolas Axelrod on Vimeo.
September 4, 2010By Nicolas Axelrod
Ten years ago Soeurn had to leave her homeland of Prey Veng province for the capital because she could not earn a living in the countryside. Ever since then, she has been living near the public toilets in front of the Phnom Penh National Museum and works as a toilet sweeper.
Working as a sweeper, Soeurn also does laundry, cooks and sells drinks along the popular riverside where foreigners and locals gather in the evenings. With the help of her daughter Soeurn, she walks up and down the riverside in the afternoon with a plastic bag of canned drinks; her son is still too young to help, so he plays nearby.
Life is hard for Soeurn, she will start work at sun rise and after a short nap around lunch time will work through to mid-night and some times later. Though she can earn up to seven dollars a day, Soeurn not only provides for her children as well as her alcoholic husband, but also for another homeless lady and her two sons, ‘It doesn’t look good to eat when the neighbor’s children have no food’ she says.
The toilets attract many different kinds of people; customers are varied from passer-byes and occasional foreigners to homeless motor-taxi drivers and trishaw drivers. It is also a hangout for drug addicts. Soeurn has to keep her belongings in such a public space. ‘Often people try to steal stuff’, she says, but the manager of the toilets has a dog ‘he is aggressive and scares thieves’ and anybody who comes too close to her belongings.
In the evenings after work Soeurn and her family are allowed to sleep on the floor of the near by art shop that she also cleans every morning.
Working as a sweeper, Soeurn also does laundry, cooks and sells drinks along the popular riverside where foreigners and locals gather in the evenings. With the help of her daughter Soeurn, she walks up and down the riverside in the afternoon with a plastic bag of canned drinks; her son is still too young to help, so he plays nearby.
Life is hard for Soeurn, she will start work at sun rise and after a short nap around lunch time will work through to mid-night and some times later. Though she can earn up to seven dollars a day, Soeurn not only provides for her children as well as her alcoholic husband, but also for another homeless lady and her two sons, ‘It doesn’t look good to eat when the neighbor’s children have no food’ she says.
The toilets attract many different kinds of people; customers are varied from passer-byes and occasional foreigners to homeless motor-taxi drivers and trishaw drivers. It is also a hangout for drug addicts. Soeurn has to keep her belongings in such a public space. ‘Often people try to steal stuff’, she says, but the manager of the toilets has a dog ‘he is aggressive and scares thieves’ and anybody who comes too close to her belongings.
In the evenings after work Soeurn and her family are allowed to sleep on the floor of the near by art shop that she also cleans every morning.
2 comments:
Hun Sen is really blink!
at least she pick herself up to work,rather than bagging. Great moral and value.
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