1997

As promised, Dickon Verey has returned to Cambodia. I wrote a few months ago that Dickon left London in 2002 to spend a year traveling the world. He spent four months in Cambodia, volunteering at a charity in the Battambang Province that cares for people affected by HIV/AIDS, and their orphans.

Dickon returned to London last summer to work at a hedge fund and raise money for his return trip to Cambodia. Dickons now back in Cambodia and plans to spend all of 2004 there. He's teaching English in the small village of Ksach Poy, and hopes to build a community/youth center there.

"The poverty in Ksach Poy is pretty intense from a Western perspective," Dickon writes. He describes a student named Satya, whose parents' small plot of land cannot be farmed.

"Consequently, the whole family is forced to do odd jobs to get enough money for food. Satya does not have enough money to buy food at school so she is forced to drink a few cups of rainwater to fill her stomach in the morning. Her growth has been stunted; a cruel testament to growing up in poverty. Despite this hardship she works very hard and is always a bundle of smiles and laughter. She is one of our cleverest students." To reach Dickon, e-mail hdverey@hotmail.com.

Thanks to Janene (Ashford) Ward and Abby Cohen for answering my plea for news to fill out this column.

Janene is living in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, with her husband, lan, and daughter, Olivia, who is nearly 2 years old. Janene and lan are expecting their second child in August. She writes, "We were married in 2002 and Pamela Saunders came all the way from New York to join us. She sang the most incredible version of Ave Maria' during our ceremony. People were looking around for a CD player because it sounded too good to be coming from a real person!"

Janene teaches sixth grade as well as profes- sional development classes in math through UCLA. She hopes to take next year off to stay home with her children. Janene says she saw Mar- via Campbell and Nadine (Haig) Laurent last sum- mer and both are doing well. Abby is teaching English at a boarding school in Connecticut, Suffield Academy. Abby "teaches four sections of English, coaches the cross-country team, directs the dance program and works in a dorm.

422 E.89th ST.7a, New York,NY 10128; (212) 427-6117; abby.klingbeil@alum.dartmouth.org