Floods a Yearly Trial for Those Living Along Mekong

TBONG KHUM DISTRICT, Kompong Cham province – From November to May, the Mekong River is quiet. So is life for the hundreds of thousands of people who live along its banks, which in Cambodia forms a 155,000 square km basin covering six provinces and Phnom Penh. During these months, the river pro­vides nearby communities with food, an income and fertile land. … From July on, however, people watch vigilantly as the Mekong rises. And sometimes it doesn’t stop. When the water pushes through the doors of their elevated stilt houses, covers their floors and carries their belongings away, it is time to move, Sok Mayan, a 35-year-old mother of five, said yesterday. … Ms. Mayan, who has lived in the same village all her life, and her family have been evacuated about 10 times in the past, she said. They left in 2011—Cambodia’s worst flooding in a decade—when roughly 250 people were killed, as well as in 2009, when tropical typhoon Ketsana killed dozens. “Nothing ever happened to my family, I know the Mekong and I know how to prepare,” she said. … But Ms. Mayan would never think of moving away from the Mekong. “My house is here because the Mekong is here, because everything we have and own depends on the river,” she said. … Evacuating to a safer area for weeks at a time was nothing unusual, he [Prep Tauch village chief Sa Bora] said, although water and sanitation were always a struggle until aid and relief agencies come to help. “[Vice President of the National Committee for Disaster Management] Nhem Vanda came today for the first time, Caritas came for the first time yesterday and installed 11 water tanks and some toilets,” he said. For more than a week, however, people were defecating in the Me­kong, where they were also cooking and washing. Many children got sick with diarrhea, Mr. Bora said. Now, the situation has improved, he said.

 Aun Pheap and Denise Hruby
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/floods-a-yearly-trial-for-those-living-along-mekong-44143/