Chapter 4

4 HER WORK

Her motorbike stopped along Monivong Boulevard and parked inside of a fence of a small dark creamed-colored two-storied building whose doorplate written in English “Hope Org.” underlain by Khmer title. She was just in time as usual. Morning greetings were exchanged to one another as the girl was walking toward her desk, passing her colleagues. 
“Please check the new files on your desk,” a man with dark complexion in his 40s said, “they were filed away by our local agent in Preah Vihea province,” said so, he walked into his office. He must have been her boss, if not the directing manager of the organization.
“New files coming fast,” she said, a little sad somehow.
“Yes, things are getting worse lately. You might need to do fieldwork, meeting the victims over there,” the man spoke louder, afraid she could not hear.
“Tell me you’re amplifying the actual situations, actually aren’t that bad,” she always wished it was not so bad, as it happened, but nothing could change the truth, though; there were lots of HIV’s victims found in remote areas of Cambodia-Thailand border reported every single month. Mostly they crossed the border to work in Thailand with their determination to help the living of their family left in Cambodia, but it turned out that they usually ended up in doing drugs or getting infected with HIV without realizing it. To make the matter worse, it was too late before they knew they passed those infectious viruses onto their wives and newly born children. 

The girl studied each file carefully. There were victims’ photos attached on it, some of them including a few small children’s inserted between the papers, which striking her like a knife into the heart. Every time she looked at it, she sobbed herself out, and blaming everybody until there was no one else to blame, but her own, who seemed impotent to help those victims out of poverty, unemployment, and the contagious diseases. There were fifteen files, more than 22 victims in Preah Vihea province, desperately waiting for financial and medical aids. Her manager’s perception of the matter was right; his idea of sending her to visit them personally as to make things easier for her organization to decide whom they would select due to Hope’s financial competence. At work, Lina was a reliable person, and appointed to decide which HIV victims’ qualification met Hope’s requirements. It was the hardest decision to elect between the sufferers, but someone had to take over it and Linas was just the person for it. What she always put on her mind was to austerely take everything into account as to make her selection fair and square.

A female colleague came to her table with a stem of orchid, laying it on her desk on the papers.
“Happy belated birthday,” echoed the woman. Lina smiled with joy, but did not say a thing and got back to work. The plump woman flared a straight smile on her lips, standing there still.
“Bong Khar, please wipe that smile off,” burst into laughing, the girl pinched the woman’s chubby cheek, “what’s so funny, Bong?”
The amiable woman passed an envelope and a note to her. She told Lina that it was an invitation to an interchange of AIDS issues in Cambodia between NGOs and related agencies, which was held under the presidency of WHO’s regional agency in Cambodia. It would be held at Intercontinental Hotel, on the last Friday of the month. “And why do you take it to me?” she asked with doubt.
“’Coz our manager will be meeting one of our sponsors’ representatives from America that day. He strongly suggest you should go.” again, the smile flared up on her face.
“Do you think you can torture me with that ironic smile?” the girl opened the invitation card, and read it quietly.
The woman patted Lina upon her shoulder, and joyfully returned to her desk.
“Bong, does it count into my overtime?” though not loud, the girl hilariously burst in laughing again. She knew it, attending a conference or a party, though on an account of Hope’s representative, generally does not consider as working overtime. But, then something happened; the girl heard a faint voice flowing into her mind, with that, three hours overtime would be added. 
“My goodness, what’s happened to the man with a heart of stove?” surprisingly echoed in return. 
“I thought you knew it, a-Na, that they put him in the lion cage."
They heard a burst of laughter spread throughout the room. The plumb woman saw it was about five thirty in the evening. She told Lina to call it a day, and got ready to attend a birthday party their colleagues'd prepared for her. 

Before leaving, she looked out over the office with a thought of thankfulness and the decision to have chosen to work for Hope at the beginning. The main reason she picked Hope, was to help her people who were weak and poor along the borders of the country, who had been ignored by whose eyes being shut. It went without saying that an outstanding student like her, without fail, was offered some well-paid jobs by private companies which directly came to take bright students into employment. She refused them, though. She used to take work shadow program in her second at a bank following by a voluntarily work at NGO in her third year, and what came clear to her mind, was that she enjoyed working for the NGO, rather than at the bank. She thought she was lucky when she applied for Hope Org. and was informed that she was accepted one week later. Her parents could not agree where she would be sending to remote areas and doing research, so she decided to take on office job instead. The girl, however, did not seem to have given in and quietly hoped some day or other she would be approved to engage with those people in person.