Cambodia Land Mine Museum Support
We Work and support the essential work done by the Museum and send a large percentage of our profits to help this vital organisation and the great work that they do.
My late Grandfather served on the HMAS Australia during World War 2. He was a stoker working in the depths of the ship making sure the engines had enough coal in them to make sure the ship had the power to move fast through the water. He used to say to me that when he was on shore leave on the Solomon Islands "That there is not a more beautiful sound in the whole world than the laughter of native children at play on the beach"
I never really knew what this meant until I lived in Cambodia and Vietnam. Listening to the laughter of the kids kicking a ball round, chasing each other playing tag it finally hit me. This is what my Grandfather told me about. The sound is intoxicating and bought me a smile and so much joy. I can only think of my Grandfather coming from the depths of the ship and land on the beach to the sound of children playing. From one extreme to another.
This is what drives me to work my hardest to bring joy and laughter back to the children in Cambodia. It's my mission to do the best I can to help the kids that need all the help they can get. By people supporting my website it enables me to provide the resources needed the most.
Landmines in Cambodia
Cambodia remains one of the most heavily mined countries in the world as a result of decades of conflict, including a civil war, the brutal Khmer Rouge regime and genocide, American bombings, and Vietnamese occupation.
Dozens of civilians are still injured or killed every year by landmines and other unexploded ordnance that have been left over from all the fighting. Landmines and UXOs are found in backyards, in the rice fields where people work, and on the roads where children walk to school. Millions of the country’s landmines have now been cleared, but there is still a lot of work to be done; it is estimated Cambodia will not be entirely free of landmines for several decades to come.
OUR MISSION
The Cambodia Landmine Museum and Relief Center serves to educate the public on the dangers of landmines, and in addition it supports education for Cambodian youth. This home was created so that it might serve as a place of healing for bodies, hearts and minds. We believe that love, support and education are the essential means to secure a better future for the children that live here and our visitors.
GOALS
- To tell the story of landmines in Cambodia through the perspective of Aki Ra, our founder, who was conscripted into the Khmer Rouge Army as a child soldier, and spent his youth fighting in the wars that ravaged his country for nearly 35 years. Landmines impact the country’s past, present, and future.
- To show the world that, no matter who you are, whatever your background, your education, you can make a difference.
- To support a Relief Center and School for at-risk village children so that they can have access to education, food, and shelter.
The idea for a Landmine Museum and Relief Facility came from Aki Ra, an ex-child soldier. After years of fighting, he returned to the villages in which he had planted thousands of mines as a soldier and began removing them, by hand, and defusing them with homemade tools. In his home, he displayed some of the items he had made safe and charged the tourists $1 to view them. He used the money to support the children in his care. This first makeshift museum opened in 1997.
In the villages where Aki Ra cleared mines, he found many children wounded by landmines, orphaned or abandoned by their families. He brought them home where he and his wife Hourt cared for them along side their own children.
The original Landmine Museum was near the ticket booth for Angkor Wat Park, along the Siem Reap River. In 2006 it was ordered closed. A Canadian charity, the Cambodian Landmine Museum Relief Fund, founded by Canadian filmmaker Richard Fitoussi had been raising money to build a new facility. Land was found near Banteay Srey Temple and with the help of donors across the globe the CLMMRF built the current Landmine Museum. It opened in 2007.
The Relief Facility housed over twenty children from small villages in Cambodia. The children were enrolled in public government school to continue their education. The Facility also has its own school building to enrich the children’s education with a computer lab, a library, English language classes, a playground, and a staff of 14. Originally, all of the children at the facility were landmine victims. The last landmine victim left the facility in 2013 when he finished high school. The rest of the children left the museum in 2018 to live in the main town.
In 2008, with the help of the Landmine Relief Fund, a US charity, Aki Ra established a formal demining NGO, Cambodian Self Help Demining (CSHD). CSHD is a separate NGO and apart from the Museum. They clear landmines throughout the country.
www.CambodianSelfHelpDemining.org
www.CambodiaLandmineMuseum.org
The LMRF Raises Money For:
1. Cambodian Self Help Demining (CSHD), which has cleared over 177 minefields and 5,742,187 meters squared land in Cambodia and assisted tens of thousands of people to live a safer life.
2. CSHD’s bomb squads, the EOD teams (Explosive Ordnance Disposal). They have destroyed thousands of landmines and UXOs found by villagers. They also give Mine Risk Education classes to schools and villages.
3. Rural School Village Program (RSVP) which has built 22 schools as of 2019 and is supporting 3,000 children every month.
4. The LMRF supports the Cambodia Landmine Museum Relief Center and its university scholarship program.
5. The LMRF has provided emergency medical assistance to those who cannot afford medical care.
NONE OF THIS IS DONE ALONE.
We can do this because you have become part of the solution.