Elia, Raphaël and Thibault 

Hello,

We are three French volunteers, Elia, Raphaël, and Thibault, coming from Toulouse, France, where we’ve known each other for a long time.

Thibault had already been to Happyland in 2017 and 2019, and he convinced the other two to join him this time, as he wanted to spend more time here.

Elia works in contemporary art back in France. She’s 26 years old, and this was her first time outside Europe. She’s a very social person, though sometimes a bit afraid of the unknown. She really enjoyed her stay here, as the kids almost instantly loved her and were always asking for her attention, especially the younger girls. She played many card games, helped put on countless pairs of inline skates, and gave lots of hugs!

Raphaël is a 28-year-old school psychologist. He had already travelled far from home before, but never to Asia. Like the others, he stayed for three weeks, but returned at the end of his trip to spend one more week at Happyland with the kids. He became very attached to them, spending a lot of time learning from them, especially how to ride the ramp with inline skates. He really appreciated being in an environment where he could observe the big differences between the European kids he knows and the Happyland children. He truly enjoyed his time here and is even thinking about coming back someday.

This was Thibault’s third time at Happyland (fourth if you count his second stay in 2017). It’s no surprise that he loves this place, the kids, and the whole community. He’s a 29-year-old computer engineer who left his job earlier this year to hopefully become a teacher. As always, he loved being here and spent much of his stay trying to learn as much Khmer as he could.

In summary, the three of us really enjoyed our time here and hope to come back again one day!