... of the rich and the poor

A floating village. Houses on bamboo rafts. This one even has potted flowers for decoration.
This is a Catholic Church and is adjoined by a school for the floating children.
A school for the floating kids of the floating villages.
This is a gathering points for the floating villagers. On the day Y S visited an organization came to distribute some handouts.

Y S noted a lop sided demography where there are many adults, aged and young children. The youths have moved to the cities for employment.

Have a basin can travel. Danger? What danger when you are born in the midst of danger.

Do these kids have a future ? Are their parents worried about their future? " Do they go for tuition classes?" " Ballet classes?" "Piano lessons?" " Mental Arithmetic classes?" DO THEY HAVE ENOUGH TO EAT? This is a realistic question.
Note a pig farm on a raft.

This is home for the floating people on Tongle Sap.


Yours Sincerely visited Tongle Sap, a great versatile lake in Cambodia, which expands and shrinks according to the season. Here you can see several crowded floating villages with houses of many shapes and sizes, shops of sorts, a Catholic Church, two schools on rafts, several fish and pig farms, and lots of POVERTY.


Life when lived at survival level is very basic and simple. There are very few needs and almost no wants. Surviving from "hand to mouth" makes life very plain and Y S asks himself whether life is intended to be such !

The inhabitants have no permanent address and their floating houses moves about according to the level of the water in the lake. It seems that the schools and shops also moves up or down the lake accordingly. There is no water bills to pay and bed time follows the sun.

From the noise and faces Y S observed at one gathering point for the inhabitants, they were oblivious to the tourists' presence and conducted their lives as usual. " Are they happy and contented?" When life is emptied of wants, there are in fact few needs. Perhaps the real measure of your wealth is how much you would be worth if you lost all your wealth ! Sometimes adversity makes a man, and prosperity makes monsters.


This is a mini bridge that joins Canada and U.S.A.

A giant castle on one of the Thousand islands. Only occupied in summer when the owner comes for his holidays.
These are all individually owned houses which are practically empty most of the time.

On the contrary, Y S was at "Thousand islands" that straddles the US and Canadian border on the St Lawrence River.. Here you can be amazed by the huge gigantic private mansions and castles of the super rich, all built on individually owned islands of all sizes. There is a myriad of architectural wonders which baffles the mind, not so much on the construction technology but rather on the immense wealth the owners possess ! It seems that each property has its own "Indah Water" / waste disposal facility. It has to be contained and transported to the mainland to be discarded. You can imagine the cost !

To signify Y S' comparison to the floating "huts" and "coops" on Tongle Sap, these mansions and castles are only used as get-away summer homes once a year !!! Sometimes, wealth exalts and poverty downgrades a man by three degrees !!! Poverty is no sin and the poor may sleep soundly but still being poor can be terribly inconvenient!!!

What a world we live in ? The rich man worries over his last meal and the poor over where his next meal to come.

Y S is contemplating voluntary work in Cambodia.