First, thanks for all the birthday wishes! It really did not feel like my birthday, maybe because the weather is still quite warm or maybe because I was not at Kip’s, but it was nice to hear from so many people!
No, this isn't really an audition to write for Lonely Planet... unless they are interested. In which case please, Lonely Planet editor or Human Resources person, read on.
I just returned from a three-day language training in Kampong Cham provincial town (each province has a provincial capitol city with the same name, which is usually the most bangin’ city in the province). Kampong Cham is the richest province and the difference was visible almost immediately (Siem Reap is the poorest province in Cambodia). Near the end of the five hour bus ride I began to notice the landscape changing. There were a lot more trees and a lot less rice paddies. Many of the houses were big concrete multiple-story houses, instead of the traditional wooden house on stilts that is the most common form of housing in my province. The city itself had paved roads. Siem Reap just paved one of their main roads hastily since someone important was coming into town and they realized they needed to get their crap together… Kampong Cham also has a beautiful bridge across the Tonle Sap that runs through town. It was built by the Japanese, as most nice looking things in Cambodia are if they aren’t built by the Belgians, and we took a walk across it after training and climbed up an old tower of some sort to get a really nice view of the whole area. The colonial influence is also much heavier in Kampong Cham; you can see a lot of French colonial style buildings.
I was pretty sad to not be able to have Thanksgiving dinner. There was a place doing a traditional Thanksgiving in Siem Reap but we had to be in Kampong Cham Thursday night, and so I couldn’t participate. However, I did have a delicious tofu burger at one of the three western restaurants in town. While I gave up being a vegetarian for my time here, in order to be more culturally assimilated and because vegetarian options are sometimes extremely limited or non-existent, I still appreciate being able to find a good vegetarian meal and the tofu burgers at Mekong Crossing Restaurant in Kampong Cham definitely qualified (no, I’m not getting paid for that little plug). Plus, it was nice to see some other volunteers. We are still not allowed to leave the province for another month, unless on Peace Corps approved travel like for training, so I rarely get to see other volunteers. It has been really weird after spending every waking moment with people for two months and growing to really know and like them, and then being strewn about the country not being able to see them. Soon, though, lockdown will be over and I cannot wait to see some more of the country!
I would definitely want to return to Kampong Cham province. It was just really beautiful and clean and developed. The volunteers there definitely face a different set of issues in some cases than I do, for example students being on the cell phones constantly and riding their motos around instead of being in class. I don’t think any of my students have motos (technically you have to be 18 to drive one but that law, like so many others, seems to be ignored) or flashy cell phones, which probably has to do with the disparity of wealth between the two provinces. It is far less westernized than Siem Reap, but we still saw a fair number of backpackers, most of whom seemed to be French. I am actually somewhat envious of the provincial town. Even though Siem Reap leaves little to be desired in the way of western options for eating, drinking, and replacing things that break or wear out, it is always a little bit of culture shock to go back to the village. The westernized part of the city is so wealthy and busy, and even right across the bridge on the Khmer side of town it is much quieter, the buildings are smaller, and the roads are dusty and unpaved. It has really gotten to the point where by the end of a weekend in Siem Reap I am ready to go back and just lay in my bed or hammock and read! I swear I will have no normal social skills to speak of by the time I am done here…
Side note: I coughed up the cash to get an internet phone and figured out how to hook it up to my laptop as a modem, so I can get online in the village! Look for me on skype.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Cheaters never prosper. Then again most people in Cambodia don't regardless...
This Wednesday, I had probably the most depressing day of teaching yet. Near the end of each month teachers administer monthly tests. Each teacher puts together their own test, and it seems mostly to consist of activities directly out of the book, meaning they are activities students have already completed in class and have the answers to. For example, the grade ten exam had a paragraph where students had to circle the correct verb form, a crossword the answers to which came from filling in the blanks in sentences and all of which were vocabulary words, a section of sentences with the words scrambled, and a word search. Students did not understand the concept of the crossword, and many could not even copy the words of the scrambled sentences correctly. Some could not do the word search so they just wrote some words next to it that they remembered from the past month. The word search was from the unit on going to the market, so it contained words like cabbage and vegetables. Official and manager were not in the crossword and yet I had several tests all in a row with those words written in.
Which brings me to the real reason I had such a horrible day. Usually I excuse myself for monthly tests. I have heard horror stories about the cheating that goes on and I know I cannot just stand by and watch students cheat, but it is very ingrained into students that there is pressure to get the correct answers at any cost. I am not really sure why because I don’t think students fail a grade ever, and their grades do not determine University acceptance. Somehow I ended up getting wrangled into watching students during a monthly test while my co-teacher ran to grab some papers for me. Before I could really argue he basically tossed the tests to the students and they began. As the tests were being passed around I asked everyone to put away their text books. The students either did not understand me or were shocked that I would ask them to do this, so they did not. I had to go around and physically touch each book that was sitting on the students’ desks and motion for them to put the books away. The students were still talking though, and I assume they were chatting about the test. I asked them repeatedly to be quiet, as they were taking a test, until finally I raised my voice which always gets results since Khmer teachers rarely do it. Plus most of the students are terrified of me anyway. I cannot imagine why.
The students were finally quiet but kept blatantly looking at each others’ papers and copying answers! One boy was turned all the way around in his desk scanning the paper behind him to get the answers. I asked him what he was doing. He did not respond. I asked him why he was cheating. He did not respond. I told him to turn around (he was still facing the students behind him). He did not move. I demonstrated that I wanted him to rotate his body and look only AT HIS OWN TEST. He turned around but looked completely confused.
There were two girls sitting next to each other who were blatantly copying. I kept walking by and tapping on the desk and telling them to stop, but after about 30 seconds they would return to copying. I finally stood directly in front of them, watching them take their tests. They stopped cheating for maybe a minute, and then kept cheating! I slammed my hand down on the desk and said, “What are you doing?! I am standing in front of you because you are cheating. STOP CHEATING!” I left at the end of the hour, my first of the day, and told my co-teacher I had a migraine and needed to go home.
I am sure some of my students just don’t understand what I am saying, but I am pretty sure they get the gist of the fact that I want them to not cheat on their tests. I would like for them to not cheat, but I don’t know if I have the energy to explain that they need to not cheat and that if I catch them I will rip up their test in front of the whole class. And possibly call them names. There are so many problems with the Cambodian educational system, cheating being just one of them, that I feel like I just don’t have the energy to change things. Also, even if I can convince my students that cheating is wrong and they should have personal integrity and want to achieve good grades of their own accord, cheating happens all the way through the system, even on national exams. So if they aren’t cheating are they at a disadvantage to the rest of the students who are? In the long run am I hurting their chances of scoring high enough on the national exam to qualify for a university scholarship since the rest of the students in the country are cheating their pants off? I am about ready to throw in the towel on the whole teaching thing today, and just run my own class with only the students who can understand me… if only that were possible.
Which brings me to the real reason I had such a horrible day. Usually I excuse myself for monthly tests. I have heard horror stories about the cheating that goes on and I know I cannot just stand by and watch students cheat, but it is very ingrained into students that there is pressure to get the correct answers at any cost. I am not really sure why because I don’t think students fail a grade ever, and their grades do not determine University acceptance. Somehow I ended up getting wrangled into watching students during a monthly test while my co-teacher ran to grab some papers for me. Before I could really argue he basically tossed the tests to the students and they began. As the tests were being passed around I asked everyone to put away their text books. The students either did not understand me or were shocked that I would ask them to do this, so they did not. I had to go around and physically touch each book that was sitting on the students’ desks and motion for them to put the books away. The students were still talking though, and I assume they were chatting about the test. I asked them repeatedly to be quiet, as they were taking a test, until finally I raised my voice which always gets results since Khmer teachers rarely do it. Plus most of the students are terrified of me anyway. I cannot imagine why.
The students were finally quiet but kept blatantly looking at each others’ papers and copying answers! One boy was turned all the way around in his desk scanning the paper behind him to get the answers. I asked him what he was doing. He did not respond. I asked him why he was cheating. He did not respond. I told him to turn around (he was still facing the students behind him). He did not move. I demonstrated that I wanted him to rotate his body and look only AT HIS OWN TEST. He turned around but looked completely confused.
There were two girls sitting next to each other who were blatantly copying. I kept walking by and tapping on the desk and telling them to stop, but after about 30 seconds they would return to copying. I finally stood directly in front of them, watching them take their tests. They stopped cheating for maybe a minute, and then kept cheating! I slammed my hand down on the desk and said, “What are you doing?! I am standing in front of you because you are cheating. STOP CHEATING!” I left at the end of the hour, my first of the day, and told my co-teacher I had a migraine and needed to go home.
I am sure some of my students just don’t understand what I am saying, but I am pretty sure they get the gist of the fact that I want them to not cheat on their tests. I would like for them to not cheat, but I don’t know if I have the energy to explain that they need to not cheat and that if I catch them I will rip up their test in front of the whole class. And possibly call them names. There are so many problems with the Cambodian educational system, cheating being just one of them, that I feel like I just don’t have the energy to change things. Also, even if I can convince my students that cheating is wrong and they should have personal integrity and want to achieve good grades of their own accord, cheating happens all the way through the system, even on national exams. So if they aren’t cheating are they at a disadvantage to the rest of the students who are? In the long run am I hurting their chances of scoring high enough on the national exam to qualify for a university scholarship since the rest of the students in the country are cheating their pants off? I am about ready to throw in the towel on the whole teaching thing today, and just run my own class with only the students who can understand me… if only that were possible.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Mythbusters
Bad Advice
In my what feels like an eternity but is actually only four months in Cambodia, I have received a lot of horrible advice and misinformation which the givers believe to be truth. You could call these myths. I have examined these myths, and attempted to determine their validity. I will now pass the results of my research on to you, with the goal of hopefully entertaining. (Clearly, I have done nothing interesting or meaningful in the last month, so I’m stretching for blog content. I swear one of these days I’ll actually write something about the meaningful and interesting work I am doing, but mostly right now it consists of convincing the students not to be scared of me, planning for things that haven’t happened yet, and searching for a space where I can have clubs.)
Myth #1: Eat rice until you are full, or else you will get sick.
After experimenting with this one I can conclude based on both scientific logic and pure personal experience that this myth is busted. I ate rice until I was full several nights in a row, and not only did I still become sick, but I also became fat.
Myth #2: You should not eat a large breakfast or you will become fat.
In some sense this may be true. I guess if you eat huge portions of rice several times a day and do not exercise your caloric intake will simply overwhelm your energy expenditure and you will gain weight. However, the whole kick starting your metabolism thing seemed to be lost in translation.
Myth #3: If you only drink coffee in the morning you will be a bad teacher.
My former co-teacher, who I decided it was best not to work with because he has a bad attitude and has already worked with a Peace Corps volunteer, so he knows all the tricks I have up my sleeve, asked what I was drinking in my travel mug this morning. As always, I told him it was coffee. He responded, “Ah, you drink only coffee and you are a bad teacher, but I eat bread with coffee so I will be a good teacher.” He knows all the secrets of good teaching…
Myth #4: If you eat mangosteen dipped in sugar it becomes poisonous and you will die.
We busted this one during training by doing it. However, I have now heard it from three different sources, so I wonder if in high volumes there is some truth to this. It sounds a little like the pop rocks and coke debate to me.
Myth #5: Tiger balm cures all.
Definitely not true. It is really good if you have itchy mosquito bites, and smelling it helped clear up swollen nasal passages when I had a bad cold and laryngitis, but I definitely do not recommend rubbing it on the outside of your nose. I got tired of holding the jar in front of my face so I could breathe and thought if I just rubbed it outside my nostrils I could rest my arms… bad idea. I also do not recommend it for open wounds and doubt that it cures broken bones or serious genetically predetermined afflictions.
In my what feels like an eternity but is actually only four months in Cambodia, I have received a lot of horrible advice and misinformation which the givers believe to be truth. You could call these myths. I have examined these myths, and attempted to determine their validity. I will now pass the results of my research on to you, with the goal of hopefully entertaining. (Clearly, I have done nothing interesting or meaningful in the last month, so I’m stretching for blog content. I swear one of these days I’ll actually write something about the meaningful and interesting work I am doing, but mostly right now it consists of convincing the students not to be scared of me, planning for things that haven’t happened yet, and searching for a space where I can have clubs.)
Myth #1: Eat rice until you are full, or else you will get sick.
After experimenting with this one I can conclude based on both scientific logic and pure personal experience that this myth is busted. I ate rice until I was full several nights in a row, and not only did I still become sick, but I also became fat.
Myth #2: You should not eat a large breakfast or you will become fat.
In some sense this may be true. I guess if you eat huge portions of rice several times a day and do not exercise your caloric intake will simply overwhelm your energy expenditure and you will gain weight. However, the whole kick starting your metabolism thing seemed to be lost in translation.
Myth #3: If you only drink coffee in the morning you will be a bad teacher.
My former co-teacher, who I decided it was best not to work with because he has a bad attitude and has already worked with a Peace Corps volunteer, so he knows all the tricks I have up my sleeve, asked what I was drinking in my travel mug this morning. As always, I told him it was coffee. He responded, “Ah, you drink only coffee and you are a bad teacher, but I eat bread with coffee so I will be a good teacher.” He knows all the secrets of good teaching…
Myth #4: If you eat mangosteen dipped in sugar it becomes poisonous and you will die.
We busted this one during training by doing it. However, I have now heard it from three different sources, so I wonder if in high volumes there is some truth to this. It sounds a little like the pop rocks and coke debate to me.
Myth #5: Tiger balm cures all.
Definitely not true. It is really good if you have itchy mosquito bites, and smelling it helped clear up swollen nasal passages when I had a bad cold and laryngitis, but I definitely do not recommend rubbing it on the outside of your nose. I got tired of holding the jar in front of my face so I could breathe and thought if I just rubbed it outside my nostrils I could rest my arms… bad idea. I also do not recommend it for open wounds and doubt that it cures broken bones or serious genetically predetermined afflictions.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Ticket to Ride
I just got out of a taxi. But unlike a taxi in San Francisco, where you pay the driver some probably really expensive fair plus tip, and then slide out the door, I had to wake up the man in front of me, say over and over again, “I stop here” because that is the only Khmer phrase I know that could convey I needed him to move, and clamber out the door. A Cambodian taxi is what I ride to get back from Siem Reap town to my village. Luckily I am along the main highway so tracking down a taxi isn’t usually difficult. We just hail a tuk tuk and tell them we are going to the taxi stand to catch a taxi to our districts, negotiate the price, and the tuk tuk driver takes us to the edge of town. There is almost always a broke-down old pick-up truck waiting there, half full of people. Today I sat in the back seat of the cab, with three other women and a small child while two other passengers sat in the front seat next to the driver. The driver somehow got us back to my site safely, despite the feet dangling over the windshield right in his field of vision because the area on top of the cab had five or so men sitting on it along with several bags. The bed of the pick-up was full too of course. Last time I counted 22 people in the bed of the taxi when we were at capacity.
The upside of this form of travel is that it costs only 5000 riehl (1.25 USD) to get home. Buses run all morning from Siem Reap down the main highway to Phnom Penh and many other cities, all passing through my village. To take a nice air conditioned bus, however, would mean paying the fare for the whole ride (more or less $5 from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh) which is pretty expensive for a 30 kilometer trip. On the way into town, however, I can easily hail a bus since ones with empty seats stop frequently at the edge of my market in town. I just hop on and it is smooth sailing into town! There is, of course, a downside to this form of transportation which is the unpredictability of the price. The first time I rode into town this way they didn’t charge me at all, whereas the second time it cost me $2, which is much more than the 3000 riehl it costs to take a taxi. I am not sure why it is cheaper to get into Siem Reap than out of it in a taxi, but then again I understand as close to nothing as possible about Cambodian logic. I do really enjoy having such easy access to Siem Reap town, as I have heard horror stories about other people’s journeys to and from their sites. Plus I am willing to pay a little extra if it means not waiting for hours in the cab of a hot truck with 7 other people sweating and breathing and using up the much valued oxygen all around me.
Another interesting form of transportation I’ve used in Cambodia is the bamboo train. I guess it runs all over the country, but I took it in Pursat province out to a smaller village. We rode the train during health training when we went to visit this village because it was rainy season and the road had washed away. The train consisted of a bamboo platform atop two sets of wheels on the track with a motor. It was pretty exciting for about ten minutes until my butt fell asleep. However, it was cool to cruise right by water buffalo and watch my feet dangle over the tracks as we crossed bridges spanning the little rivers that we came to. It was really exciting when we had to stop because a huge train was coming in the other direction. We had to stop and jump off, then the men took apart the train so that the tracks would be clear for the big train to roll through. Normally I would want to help disassemble the train for the sake of feminism and prove I can carry as much bamboo train as any man… or at least any relatively small man who works out infrequently, but in this case I was fine standing safely away from the tracks watching. At one of these stops I wandered off into the forest because I needed to pee, until I remembered what a bad idea that is because of land mines that are still unexploded all over Cambodia. I decided to squat where I was and follow my exact footsteps back to the group. The bamboo train took about an hour and a half in one direction, and only 45 minutes on the return because our only stop was to slow down enough to push another car that had run out of whatever powers these “trains” versus the three near death experiences on the way to the village.
Most people do their moving on motos. Unfortunately Peace Corps volunteers worldwide are not allowed to operate motorized vehicles, nor are we allowed to ride on motorbikes. I did not really know about this rule when I signed up for Peace Corps since I read very old material that was written when some volunteers were still issued dirt bikes or motorcycles to get around. Obviously my dreams were crushed when I heard about it, but I am glad it exits. Despite the prevalence of motorbikes, which makes them the most convenient, easiest and often cheapest mode of transport, traffic accidents are the number one cause of death in Cambodia, many of these involving motos. I am very happy to say no to the moto if it means I get to go home to America in one piece.
In any case, transportation says a lot about a place so hopefully I’ve conveyed a little piece of Cambodia to you!
The upside of this form of travel is that it costs only 5000 riehl (1.25 USD) to get home. Buses run all morning from Siem Reap down the main highway to Phnom Penh and many other cities, all passing through my village. To take a nice air conditioned bus, however, would mean paying the fare for the whole ride (more or less $5 from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh) which is pretty expensive for a 30 kilometer trip. On the way into town, however, I can easily hail a bus since ones with empty seats stop frequently at the edge of my market in town. I just hop on and it is smooth sailing into town! There is, of course, a downside to this form of transportation which is the unpredictability of the price. The first time I rode into town this way they didn’t charge me at all, whereas the second time it cost me $2, which is much more than the 3000 riehl it costs to take a taxi. I am not sure why it is cheaper to get into Siem Reap than out of it in a taxi, but then again I understand as close to nothing as possible about Cambodian logic. I do really enjoy having such easy access to Siem Reap town, as I have heard horror stories about other people’s journeys to and from their sites. Plus I am willing to pay a little extra if it means not waiting for hours in the cab of a hot truck with 7 other people sweating and breathing and using up the much valued oxygen all around me.
Another interesting form of transportation I’ve used in Cambodia is the bamboo train. I guess it runs all over the country, but I took it in Pursat province out to a smaller village. We rode the train during health training when we went to visit this village because it was rainy season and the road had washed away. The train consisted of a bamboo platform atop two sets of wheels on the track with a motor. It was pretty exciting for about ten minutes until my butt fell asleep. However, it was cool to cruise right by water buffalo and watch my feet dangle over the tracks as we crossed bridges spanning the little rivers that we came to. It was really exciting when we had to stop because a huge train was coming in the other direction. We had to stop and jump off, then the men took apart the train so that the tracks would be clear for the big train to roll through. Normally I would want to help disassemble the train for the sake of feminism and prove I can carry as much bamboo train as any man… or at least any relatively small man who works out infrequently, but in this case I was fine standing safely away from the tracks watching. At one of these stops I wandered off into the forest because I needed to pee, until I remembered what a bad idea that is because of land mines that are still unexploded all over Cambodia. I decided to squat where I was and follow my exact footsteps back to the group. The bamboo train took about an hour and a half in one direction, and only 45 minutes on the return because our only stop was to slow down enough to push another car that had run out of whatever powers these “trains” versus the three near death experiences on the way to the village.
Most people do their moving on motos. Unfortunately Peace Corps volunteers worldwide are not allowed to operate motorized vehicles, nor are we allowed to ride on motorbikes. I did not really know about this rule when I signed up for Peace Corps since I read very old material that was written when some volunteers were still issued dirt bikes or motorcycles to get around. Obviously my dreams were crushed when I heard about it, but I am glad it exits. Despite the prevalence of motorbikes, which makes them the most convenient, easiest and often cheapest mode of transport, traffic accidents are the number one cause of death in Cambodia, many of these involving motos. I am very happy to say no to the moto if it means I get to go home to America in one piece.
In any case, transportation says a lot about a place so hopefully I’ve conveyed a little piece of Cambodia to you!
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
A Day in the Life
After a few months here my sense of exciting vs. boring has been severely warped, and I have little sense of what is interesting and relevant for people to read, so I thought I’d just write about what a typical day here is like and see how that goes.
I usually wake up a little before six or seven depending on what time I have to teach. It has started to cool down so I don’t have to shower in the morning because I am not drenched in sweat at night, so I wash my face and put on my Khmer teaching clothes. We have to wear traditional Khmer skirts, which are ankle length and made out of fabric that feels like a couch. It is heavy, itchy, upholstery fabric basically, worn with a collared shirt. During training we kept hearing that appearance is very important in Khmer culture, and I find that to be true among the teachers at my school. If I run out of the house and my collar is a little askew my co-workers are quick to point it out. Also, popping your collar is not an option. I went to school one day with my collar popped without even thinking about it because that is just how I roll, and my teachers came up to me within minutes very confused and “fixed” my collar for me. I guess it is frowned upon to be awesome here.
I teach a few hours a day. High school is in the morning from 7:00am to noon. In the afternoon the younger students have class, so I am free to do other things. I teach with co-teachers, so depending on what day and what hour I am teaching with one of three Cambodian teachers. We work together to cover the material in the text book, although since I am still starting out I basically just fill in where they ask me to and sometimes throw in an activity I think up. As I get more into my role we will lesson plan together and I can try to integrate more student-centered learning techniques and activities into the classroom. Two of my co-teachers are actually great teachers and studied educational science so they know a lot of good teaching techniques. Unfortunately, they have told me they are under pressure to get through the text book so they don’t really have time to use many of these techniques. I think the students will learn more if my teachers can ease up from the grind to get through the book and just focus on learning fewer things more thoroughly and more accurately. A lot of the vocabulary is pretty useless and the students get about ten new vocab words every other hour of classes, which they are never really tested on and which are not reviewed so there is little point. To be fair I do not know what private classes for English look like, so maybe they review the words there.
After class I return home and change into normal clothes. It is about noon so I make lunch. I eat dinner with my host family but I make my own breakfast and lunch. I am not totally comfortable using my host family’s kitchen because I don’t want to use up too much of their propane and they still won’t let me do the dishes so I don’t want to make too much of a mess (they think I don’t know how to wash dishes, which is a fair assumption since it is quite different than in America but it is not like its brain surgery…). I usually just boil some water for oatmeal and coffee in the morning and make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch. It is like fourth grade all over again. I am lucky to have bread in my market and I stock up on the peanut butter and jelly in Siem Reap town at the Lucky Market, which is like an American supermarket except that the products from America are wildly expensive. A box of Special K cereal costs about seven dollars! Sometimes in the morning I take my coffee to school with me. Teachers are very confused as to why I drink coffee in the morning. A few of them joked that it is probably beer in the mug; they were speaking Khmer and thought I couldn’t piece together what they were saying. They make me wish it was beer. But that is beside the point…
After lunch I have relatively little to do. I haven’t started doing clubs yet because I don’t really know my students that well and think it will be better when my Khmer improves and they get used to my accent more. Some of them are really smart, but most still have problems understanding me since they have only ever heard a Khmer person speaking English. Until I start clubs I pretty much just read all afternoon. I have an hour of Khmer lessons at 3:00pm which is a nice break and helps me feel like I’m accomplishing something. The teacher who agreed to tutor me is really nice and has almost finished teaching me the consonants, and then we will do the vowels so I can learn to read. I think that will be really helpful so I can use a Khmer-English dictionary when I don’t know a word I need, and it will help with my pronunciation a lot. I have also learned some new vocabulary.
I usually go for a bike ride in the late afternoon, once it has cooled down a bit. Even though it will be cool season soon it is still ridiculously hot and often humid during the day. It gets to be much nicer around 4:00pm though. After about an hour of riding I take a shower and read some more, just to try something new, until dinner time. Khmer food at my host family’s house is always rice, usually with some stir fried meat and vegetables. Occasionally we have curry, which is really tasty. It is very difficult to explain American food to Khmer people, because they ask what we eat instead of rice. It is almost impossible to explain the range of possibilities because that kind of variety doesn’t exist in rural Cambodia. Usually I think I end up conveying that we eat bread, which people take to mean we eat bread three times a day with varying things on it. In the same way it is extremely difficult to explain what people do in America. Several people have asked what the most common job is in America, and it is so hard to explain that there are more options than I even know of or could imagine. Most people in my village either work in the rice paddies, sell something in the market, or teach. Some work for NGOs as well. The part of my job that is teaching about American culture and society has proved to be somewhat more complicated than I anticipated in that many people I have tried to talk to cannot even fathom the things I describe. Not all people are so limited, but many are.
After the awkward dinner discussion I usually just head to bed. I read for awhile or write some letters, and then tuck in my mosquito net and hit the hay. Then it is off to dream about America… The sweet land of opportunity and running water and cable TV and salads and paved roads and minimal parasites in my food.
I hope I answered some of the questions about what I’m doing over here! Hopefully soon I’ll have some more interesting and enlightening information to relay about my wonderful world-changing side projects, but for the moment I’m really just trying to make each day pass as quickly as possible. I miss you America!
I usually wake up a little before six or seven depending on what time I have to teach. It has started to cool down so I don’t have to shower in the morning because I am not drenched in sweat at night, so I wash my face and put on my Khmer teaching clothes. We have to wear traditional Khmer skirts, which are ankle length and made out of fabric that feels like a couch. It is heavy, itchy, upholstery fabric basically, worn with a collared shirt. During training we kept hearing that appearance is very important in Khmer culture, and I find that to be true among the teachers at my school. If I run out of the house and my collar is a little askew my co-workers are quick to point it out. Also, popping your collar is not an option. I went to school one day with my collar popped without even thinking about it because that is just how I roll, and my teachers came up to me within minutes very confused and “fixed” my collar for me. I guess it is frowned upon to be awesome here.
I teach a few hours a day. High school is in the morning from 7:00am to noon. In the afternoon the younger students have class, so I am free to do other things. I teach with co-teachers, so depending on what day and what hour I am teaching with one of three Cambodian teachers. We work together to cover the material in the text book, although since I am still starting out I basically just fill in where they ask me to and sometimes throw in an activity I think up. As I get more into my role we will lesson plan together and I can try to integrate more student-centered learning techniques and activities into the classroom. Two of my co-teachers are actually great teachers and studied educational science so they know a lot of good teaching techniques. Unfortunately, they have told me they are under pressure to get through the text book so they don’t really have time to use many of these techniques. I think the students will learn more if my teachers can ease up from the grind to get through the book and just focus on learning fewer things more thoroughly and more accurately. A lot of the vocabulary is pretty useless and the students get about ten new vocab words every other hour of classes, which they are never really tested on and which are not reviewed so there is little point. To be fair I do not know what private classes for English look like, so maybe they review the words there.
After class I return home and change into normal clothes. It is about noon so I make lunch. I eat dinner with my host family but I make my own breakfast and lunch. I am not totally comfortable using my host family’s kitchen because I don’t want to use up too much of their propane and they still won’t let me do the dishes so I don’t want to make too much of a mess (they think I don’t know how to wash dishes, which is a fair assumption since it is quite different than in America but it is not like its brain surgery…). I usually just boil some water for oatmeal and coffee in the morning and make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch. It is like fourth grade all over again. I am lucky to have bread in my market and I stock up on the peanut butter and jelly in Siem Reap town at the Lucky Market, which is like an American supermarket except that the products from America are wildly expensive. A box of Special K cereal costs about seven dollars! Sometimes in the morning I take my coffee to school with me. Teachers are very confused as to why I drink coffee in the morning. A few of them joked that it is probably beer in the mug; they were speaking Khmer and thought I couldn’t piece together what they were saying. They make me wish it was beer. But that is beside the point…
After lunch I have relatively little to do. I haven’t started doing clubs yet because I don’t really know my students that well and think it will be better when my Khmer improves and they get used to my accent more. Some of them are really smart, but most still have problems understanding me since they have only ever heard a Khmer person speaking English. Until I start clubs I pretty much just read all afternoon. I have an hour of Khmer lessons at 3:00pm which is a nice break and helps me feel like I’m accomplishing something. The teacher who agreed to tutor me is really nice and has almost finished teaching me the consonants, and then we will do the vowels so I can learn to read. I think that will be really helpful so I can use a Khmer-English dictionary when I don’t know a word I need, and it will help with my pronunciation a lot. I have also learned some new vocabulary.
I usually go for a bike ride in the late afternoon, once it has cooled down a bit. Even though it will be cool season soon it is still ridiculously hot and often humid during the day. It gets to be much nicer around 4:00pm though. After about an hour of riding I take a shower and read some more, just to try something new, until dinner time. Khmer food at my host family’s house is always rice, usually with some stir fried meat and vegetables. Occasionally we have curry, which is really tasty. It is very difficult to explain American food to Khmer people, because they ask what we eat instead of rice. It is almost impossible to explain the range of possibilities because that kind of variety doesn’t exist in rural Cambodia. Usually I think I end up conveying that we eat bread, which people take to mean we eat bread three times a day with varying things on it. In the same way it is extremely difficult to explain what people do in America. Several people have asked what the most common job is in America, and it is so hard to explain that there are more options than I even know of or could imagine. Most people in my village either work in the rice paddies, sell something in the market, or teach. Some work for NGOs as well. The part of my job that is teaching about American culture and society has proved to be somewhat more complicated than I anticipated in that many people I have tried to talk to cannot even fathom the things I describe. Not all people are so limited, but many are.
After the awkward dinner discussion I usually just head to bed. I read for awhile or write some letters, and then tuck in my mosquito net and hit the hay. Then it is off to dream about America… The sweet land of opportunity and running water and cable TV and salads and paved roads and minimal parasites in my food.
I hope I answered some of the questions about what I’m doing over here! Hopefully soon I’ll have some more interesting and enlightening information to relay about my wonderful world-changing side projects, but for the moment I’m really just trying to make each day pass as quickly as possible. I miss you America!
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