I will start with what we done yesterday. We woke late as I had'nt had much sleep due to a gout attack like no other. We had originally planned to go volunteer at the CCPP in the morning but decided to do the afternoon shift once the swelling in my foot had gone down and could actually walk. So what is CCPP I hear you say? It stands for Cambodian Childrens Painting Project. It's a great organisation set up to help and support under privlilaged kids with activities and English lessons that ensure that they are not on the street begging or having to walk the beaches selling fruit, bracelets and other things. They have painting sessions and each child's name is added to the work they do and their paintings and postcards are sold outside of the CCPP main building which was right next door to where we were staying and the money goes to the family of said child that has sold the work they have created.

So we voluntered to do the afternoon shift that started at 2pm and we got into a waggon with the workers of CCPP and some of the kids which was great as the kids were laughing and singing and generally looking forward to an afternoon with something to do. We were told by the CCPP workers that the afternoons were rather quiet as most of the kids went to school on the afternoon's but the kids that remained did not attend school at all. With them saying is would be quiet we did not expect to still see about 30-40 kids all running about once we arrived. I would say the age range was from as young as 2 years upto 15 years. It was brilliant just to watch the kids running about and just generally being kids which we havent seen since we left home. We both sat and watched two boys playing with a paper aeroplane for about 10 minutes and the enjoyment they got out of somthing so simple was phanominal.

After a while the CCPP workers started to prep the materials for the painting session and we asked if we could help with anything and were asked just to walk round the class room and check the kids and encourage them to keep working on their drawings and help them any way we could. Some of the things these kids were drawing were fab and there was some great tallent there. Some even put my drawing to shame, needless to say that I didnt even pick up a pencil as I didnt want to be shown up. One little girl who Ashleigh sat with was super cute and had the biggest brown eyes I have ever seen and even longer lashes to go with them. She could not have been any older that 2 maybe 3 and just staired at Ashleigh as she drew around the little girls hand. We carried on helping the kids in the class room and got them paints and pencils as and when they needed them. I then found Ashleigh sitting with another little girl about 5 years old helping her paint a picture of a rabbit whilst singing 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' that was brilliant. We wanted to get a bit more hands on with the things that the CCPP workers were doing and help a bit more with sorting out the pictures once complete and things like that but I suppose they have a system to follow. We left at 4pm feeling that we did not contribute too much but understood that they had a job to do at the end of the day. It was still a great feeling just to watch these kids getting so excited about some pencils and paints and just being able to be kids for a few hours of the day.

We had a short walk down the road and stoped at a place called $1 Noodles. It done exactly what it said on the tin. Andy would love it here, noodles everywhere and even cheaper than chips. We had read about a cinema that was just up the road from where we were staying and walked up to catch the 7pm showing of 'Machete'. The cinema was called Top Cat cinema (as in the cartoon) with a large painting of Top Cat on the wall near the entrance. Walking in we sat down in a fairly lage room with about 25 large bamboo double chairs with massive cushions that were super comfy. Turned out we were the only two people that actually went to see the 7pm showing which was great as we had the place to ourselves. The owner told us to "help yourself to drinks and snacks and we will settle up at the end" so we did. You get a lot of power cuts in Cambodia and there had been four already that day but our man was prepared and had a generator so our film experienced would not be stopped in such an event. It took about 30 minutes and a power cut kicked in and the sound went out but the film kept rolling. The bloke hit pause, fired up the generator and we were off in Machete action again. If you have seen the film Planet Terror, Machete is a short film at the start and has been made into a full lenght film. It's a good laugh and a great film so we gave it 4 out of 5!

After paying the guy at Top Cat we walked back to our hotel to find it was their 1 year anniversary and a free spread had been put on for friends and guests at the hotel. The pigs that we are we filled our plate and chowd down even though we were not hungry in the slightest but you cant turn down a free bit of grub.

Today we got a bus from our hotel at 11.45am to Kampot that took about 2 hours. Our bus was great as they told us that they would drop us off at any hotel or guest house that we wanted. We were originally going to stay at the Bodhi Villa as it is out of the way and cool for a few days to chill out. As we could not pre-book we had to turn up and chance it but unfortunetly they were full for the night. We have booked the next 2 days there as it still looks great. The place we are staying in tonight is called the Kampot Guest house and it will do the job nicely for a night. We are heading down to the river soon to have some cheap supper and maybe, just maybe a few drinks.

Love Peter and Ashleigh x