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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
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I met him at Chong Kneas Catholic Church in March 2005. Without the then interview he gave me, I hadn’t been able to gather the in-depth info about the miserable status of Vietnamese people living in this floating village over Tonle Sap Great Lake. The invaluable info from this person who manages the property and activities of floating church and floating classroom became the most important source for my theme ”Floating Misery”. At the end of the interview, I told thanks, and “if I could do anything for the community, it must be through the help of my camera”. I didn’t promise, but said I wish I could return in two years.
His name is Tuan Bui, born 1963 in Phat Diem, Vietnam. Adrift to South Vietnam then to Tonle Sap Great Lake, he resettled and married a local girl. Now they have two boys. He works for the Diocese of Siem Reab to live on site (at the back of the classroom) and to manage the church and the classroom. He is responsible to navigate the diocese’s boat to pick up and drop off the Cambodian teacher who comes daily to teach. He also gives the boat ride on Sundays when the priest arrives to say the weekly mass.
With the combined donation’s value equivalence of nearly two tons of rice that friends asked me to put directly into the hands of the poorest families in this village, I plotted to be under his help, for a place to stay overnight, and a platform to distribute such amount of rice. I telephoned Sang, giving him directions on how to, and asked him to travel to Chong Kneas to inform my proposed return and obtain Tuan’s telephone number so I can talk directly. What they knew about my return is a pure photographic trek with an overnight stay for sunset and sunrise pictures. For my own safety, they hadn’t been told about the donation.
Then I arrived during the Sunday mass. After the mass, he explained my real purpose to the priest, who indirectly denied my stay. Why? — There were bad precedents in the past. Some so-called humanitarian groups came here to borrow the church as place to distribute some tiny donations and filmed their activities with full "propaganda" posters placed on these premises as if they were on behalf of Siem Reab Diocese. They later published the footage and beg for more and more money that finally ended up in their pockets. And it was the office of diocese to receive interrogations from donors.
At his departure to Siem Reab, the priest didn’t tell me to get out of his church, but he instructed Tuan that I will not have his approval or authorization to operate the church platform for my distribution of rice. That was when I felt like I slammed my head into a concrete wall. There is no guessroom, no motel, no hotel within the lake surface. And I didn’t want to give up by just bringing the money back and returning to donors. I knew I was confronting a challenge of myself. I sat in the floating church with my young nephew, wordless. I was so desperate to pray. I looked straight to the crucifix and asked, ”God, what did we do wrong with the millions of riel in my possession?”. Besides, my arrival has caused this man a big problem that may become ground to termination of his current job.
- The date that Cambodian Immgration stamped on my Visa Entry is March 17, 2007.
- The date when I was denied the stay at Chong Kneas is March 18, 2007—Fourth Sunday of Lent.
- The date of this photo is March 19, as Tuan helped me distributing rice on the platform of the rice dealer's boat.
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If you want an update or current weather for your arrival, you can call his cellphone at (855) 012-306-144 and talk in Vietnamese language.
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