Thanks for taking the time to visit my

My name is Suzanne Hirst, I am 23 years old and an adult Girl Guide leader in Edinburgh, I volunteer every friday night, where we run a varied programme such as tee-shirt tie dye, baking, craft and working on Guide badge attainment. The Girl Guide movement is a safe environment for girls between the ages of 10-14 years to enjoy themselves, learn new skills and serve their community.

As a Girl Guide and an Adult Leader, I have always had a great passion for traveling. In June 2017, I applied to take part in Adults INTOPS (International Opportunities). Fortunately, I have been granted a place to attend this service project in Cambodia, in Asia, during summer 2018 along with 7 other adult leaders from Scotland.

The 8 adult guide leaders will be flying to Treak, it is a typical Cambodian village, 4 kilometres south of Siem Reap; a larger town. Currently there are around 330 families living in the village with 20% of the families on the government poverty list with individuals earning less than 50 cents per day. 30 families live in extreme poverty with no land, job, savings or help from family members. Very poor families struggle to cover the costs of their children’s education and the children cannot get good jobs when they grow up; thus, the cycle of poverty starts all over again.

What villagers deal with every day:

 No piped water supply (families share water from wells)

 30% of families have no water filter (water shouldn’t be consumed unfiltered)

 No sewage system

 50% of families have no toilet

 No gas supply or telephone landlines

 Dirty roads

As a team, we are taking part in a service project over 14 days that will benefit the village to address some of the above deprivation.  Also, we will be establishing and developing Guiding links with the local community to encourage girls into the movement. 

Each individual taking part in the project needs to raise a total of approximately £2,000 to cover the cost of this trip (food, flights, accommodation, vaccinations etc).