Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Do Not Befriend the Livestock


It was a lesson hard-learned, though, to be fair, I’ve had ample opportunity to learn it. Some of you may remember the tale of the mouse I rescued from the cistern during training only to find it dead less than 24 hours later. This time is was a duck.
Some Cambodian ducks are ugly. They have a weird red bumpy growth on their beak and face that looks like an awful case of acne, but not Norbert the duck. Norbert appeared one day in front of my host family’s house. He was a beautiful and friendly looking duck with a thin blue plastic string tying his feet together at one end and attached to a table at the other.
Clearly the beginning of our relationship was, well, less than ideal. Nonetheless, I had pictures of a long and happy life together with Norbert. He was ferociously feeding on some rice grains that someone had put in front of him; if you’re going to kill and eat a duck, why would you feed it? No point in wasting the rice, the aqua vitae of Cambodia, and no sense putting poop into its intestines. Better to let the poop be voided and thereby avoid later removing it oneself before enjoying the intestines. Plus, you can’t plump an animal up overnight (despite my host family’s comments on my girth after being gone for only a day or two), so if they were plumping Norbert he’d be my companion for at least a while.
I got quite used to seeing Norby on my way to school, and of course greeted him when coming and going. Then a few short days into our relationship the rice disappeared, and so did Norbert. This is how I know Norbert was a male duck. After his needs were satiated he was gone from my life.
At dinner that night I sprinkled a few pieces of roasted meat onto my rice. It could have been anything since it was cut up into pieces and my eye is far from discerning when it comes to meat. I bit into it and it was juicy, tasted similar to chicken, but was a little chewier. I believe I ate a little bit of my Norbert the duck. I guess I got my just desserts: Norbert broke my heart with his devilish good looks and always being there for me – I knew it was more than the rope around his legs keeping him there – until he suddenly took off, but I know I really got under his skin in the end.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

This Little Piggie Went to Market...

The last few days have been pretty busy up here in Siem Reap. On Thursday my friend Kara came to my site to visit. She lives in Siem Reap province also and had a meeting in town, so rather than kill time in town for one day or go back to site for one day she came to my village to hang out. Thursday evening we had some tuk-a-luks (fruit smoothies with condensed milk) and watched a movie before having dinner with my host family. They were very excited to meet Kara and ask her all about her more rural site, pointing out that she does not have electricity and asking if she has to manually draw water from the well.
Friday morning after teaching we went to the market to pick up some odds and ends to make lunch and to explore. I bought the remaining ingredients I needed for my culinary adventures that day and found a whole section of the market laden with vegetables that I hadn’t been able to locate consistently. Since many of the stalls in the market look the same I sometimes get confused as to where I found things I liked so I can pick them up again later, so having an excuse to wander the market aimlessly was beneficial and a good way to spend a morning!
Upon returning from the market we decided to read for awhile before making lunch; this actually meant we fell asleep for about an hour an a half. It was a rare cool day and when reading under the mosquito net it is hard to not doze off. After our naps we got down to cooking and tried two new recipes: one for a cheesey morning glory dip that another volunteer had written up in our newsletter, and one I pulled off the internet for beer battered onion rings! Both dishes were a hugely delicious success. The cheesey dip was made with laughing cow cheese, garlic, milk, and morning glory and we ate it with my favorite cracked pepper crackers. Even my host family let their curiosity overcome their fear and dip in, and they loved it! My host father finished off the remaining onion rings with hot sauce at dinner and was clearly pro-onion ring. In the past it has been a challenge to convince anyone to try my “American food” but I found that just leaving it on the table and walking away for a while is a good strategy to get people interested enough to try things.
Saturday morning Kara and I headed into Siem Reap town to meet some other volunteers to bid Katie adieu on her last weekend in country. Due to some issues which I will not elaborate on here because it makes me angry and might result in me saying things that will get me in trouble, Katie decided to head back to the states but came to see Angkor Wat before she left. Luckily we also got to see her one more time and spend a day swimming and enjoying the company. Katie was a great volunteer and is a good friend and her presence will definitely be missed here.
I also ran a few errands in town, including dropping off an easy reader book to be copied for my first meeting of my Advanced English Reading Club on Sunday. However, when I returned to pick up the copies the next morning the copy shop was still closed and locked up. I decided I could wait a bit before heading back to site, so I tried again two hours later on my way out of town but the store was still not open. At least I hadn’t paid for the copies ahead of time.
I was a little irritated since I had lesson planned for the club based on having those books, but I decided I would just photocopy a short story I had on hand when I got back to site. Unfortunately the photo copy place in town was also closed when I got back. I had to try and think quickly to come up with a back-up lesson plan. It wasn’t ideal to kick off my reading club without a text, and to not have any homework to send with the students so they could read something before next Sunday, but as with most things here I just had to accept that it did not work out ideally and move on. I had the 15 students tell me a little about themselves, and I told them about what the club was all about, and they all seemed really excited and best of all they could understand everything! Almost all the students are tenth graders too, which is fantastic because it means I could work with them for both years I am here and if they are already this good I can only imagine how good they could be next June.
To wrap up the club meeting I played a game having each of the students say their name and “I’m going to the market and I’m buying…” finishing the sentence with something that starts with the same letter as their name, and then saying everyone else’s answers as well. The students caught on much more quickly than I thought they would and they really liked it. Plus I think I learned most of their names fairly quickly. I had visions of this game tanking, which would not have started the club off on a high note, so I was so excited when they understood. After so much anticipation I finally get to start working with a small group of students who have the basic skills to work with me and the ability to absorb information; I can’t wait to see how it develops.
I have also been spending A LOT of time grading homework lately. Some of the students unknowingly have some very entertaining answers to simple questions, which makes the whole thing a little less tedious. Here are a few funny ones from the past week:
1. “If I had a boyfriend, I could love her.” There is either a little gender confusion going on here or that pronoun is vaguer than the author had hoped for. Or maybe not…
2. “Will there be a beautiful girl to confess with you that she will love you? Yes, there will be next month.” Believe it or not the assignment was not to write a horoscope.
3. “Cambodia people don’t understand about healthy.” No kidding. That is why I have had giardia, food poisoning, and any other number of G.I. upset issues.
4. “If I travel to America I will be able to see Sahara area.” This kid is on Sarah Palin’s speech writing team actually. He can see Russia from his house also.
5. “If I could travel anywhere in the world I will go to the United Stad because it’s luxury for all seasons.” It surely is. Someone has a future in tourism, if they improve their spelling a little.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Kam-what? Kampot.


That's just a little Bay Area love in the title. Shout out to Richmond. Watch Coach Carter if you are confused.
Sorry I have failed to update over the past few weeks. I turned off my internet for awhile to save money. Also, I was away from site for Christmas and New Year’s Eve!
For Christmas I went to Phnom Penh. Our three-month long “lockdown” period was over, so we were all allowed to leave our provinces for the first time, outside of Peace Corps training. I cannot tell you the weight I feel lifted off my chest just knowing I’m not trapped in my province, even though it is a pretty good place to be trapped. One of my friends was staying with some other friends who have a flat in Phnom Penh, so a few of us made use of the kitchen for Christmas dinner. It was so nice to have control over what I ate! We made some potatoes and stir fried veggies and bratwurst. Not exactly what I think of when I think of Christmas, but it was delicious none-the-less. I was just happy to be eating after surviving the worst bout of food poisoning I have ever experienced in my life. I cannot, not would you want me to, explain the pain and misery involved in horrible food poisoning, in Cambodia, in the middle of the night. I still get nervous at dinner time because the contaminated food definitely came from my host family’s dinner table. I guess it happens, but I was more than a little irritated when they laughed and told me maybe I shouldn’t eat at the market. Firstly, I had not eaten at the market for two days prior to getting sick, and secondly, food poisoning onsets within hours after eating whatever makes you sick so it was definitely dinner, which I ate at home. I think that was a run-on sentence. I’m done ranting now.
     The weekend was fairly uneventful as everyone was busy running around trying to take care of everything they needed to do in Phnom Penh, which for me basically just meant eating as much western food as possible and buying season one of Glee. I watched the whole thing in a day and a half (working hard or hardly working?) and I am now very bitter my high school did not have a show choir. But also somewhat thankful since high school was hard enough as it was, I definitely didn’t need any slushie facials added to my high school memories.
     For New Year’s Eve I was planning to stay in Siem Reap, but I decided I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to travel down to Kampot. My boyfriend is located there and I decided I really wanted to spend New Year’s Eve with him (make fun of me all you want, haters) and he has been hyping Kampot so much I was dying to check it out. The 11 hour journey by bus turned out to be worth it! Kampot is a nice little sleepy river town, with several great western restaurants tucked away (we all know food is a first priority for me) but without the overwhelming tourist presence and general bustle of Siem Reap. On New Year’s Day (notice how I just glanced over whatever happened New Year’s Eve? I’m a smooth operator.) a bunch of us went on a boat “tour” of the river, or tributary, or whatever it is. We cruised around on the water and saw some of Kampot from the water, and eventually made it out to where the ocean begins. There was a sand bar where the boat docked and we all got to hop off the boat and hang out on a little strip of beach surrounded by the ocean. It was a really cool place to watch the sun go down over Cambodia.
I was definitely sad to say goodbye to Kampot. I think it was one of the first times in, well, six months, that I’ve felt really away from work and just the constant stress of being a foreigner in Cambodia and a Peace Corps Volunteer. I don’t mean to complain, oh boo hoo my life is so hard, but the day to day difficulties do start to get me, and I think all of us, down after a while.
     When I returned to site I had a boost of productivity. I cleaned my room, organized my bookshelf and bought a fold up table to act as a desk since I haven’t been terribly effective or comfortable working in my bed. I also spend almost two hours doing laundry. When you don’t stay on top of it laundry can really add up and become a huge pain in the butt, and being away for a few days always causes trouble. I finally finished it and hung it outside, and feeling pretty good about my accomplishments, retreated to my room to read Where the Wild Things Are, a Christmas gift from my big sister :). Only about 20 minutes later my host father said something about my clothes and a cow. Obviously I had no idea what he was talking about, because I still cannot understand half of what the man says, so I walked outside to see my host mother and sister helping me by rinsing the dirt off all my freshly laundered clothes. Turns out a cow knocked over my laundry. It was so funny and so Cambodia I couldn’t even really be frustrated. How often can you say a cow knocked over your laundry? After a nice relaxing break away, I’m right back in the village, and the village doesn’t give you much time to transition back before it knocks over your laundry or puts a chicken foot in your curry. (That happened also my first night back. Yum.)