Cambodia so far

I just spent the past half hour writing out an awesome post, but Mozilla shut down and now I have to restart it. I guess that is the price you pay for paying around 10 cents a minute for internet. We are in the Takeo province right now, which is about 2 hours from Phnom Penh. Our time is Phnom Penh was really short lived, since we got there at 11 on Friday night and left Saturday afternoon. From what I have seen so far of this country, the people are unbelievably warm and welcoming and the landscape is unlike anything that I have seen. Whenever we are walking to or from training, we stop for a second and just take in just how unreal this experience is.

To pick up from my last blog, we went to the guest house after getting in from Bangkok. Keiko and I were too tired to do anything, so we just went to sleep. We were so thrown off and ended up walking up at 4 and convinced ourselves to go back to bed until 6. At breakfast that morning, we were approached by everyone and we really had no problem rubbing in how great Bangkok is. We missed out on the first day in Cambodia, but I am pretty sure we got the better end of the deal.

We spent that day at our first day of orientation, which consisted of getting shots, our cell phones, taking pictures, etc. The orientation ended with the Undersecretary for the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports welcoming us to the country. It was a Saturday and the three representatives took time out of their weekend to meet with us, which was a great honor for us.
After the session with the MOEYS, we got into the vans and made the trip to Takeo. We are right in the middle of town and we are in walking distance to everything. Just to give you a little insight into Cambodian lifestyle, almost everyone has a bike or moto, either brand new or looks like it is from the 80s. Needless to say, traffic is INSANE!

The food is unbelievable. I have been getting a coconut a day, which is so refreshing and tasty. There also are fruit smoothies, called tuk a luks. We drink a lot of those. Just to give you an idea of how poor this country is, we went out to dinner our first night in Takeo with our Khmer instructors to dinner a few blocks away from our guest house, which seems more like a hostel than a hotel. My dinner was $2,which included a soup, veggie dish and fish dish, plus bananas for dessert and a Sprite. When we asked Kim Kong, one of our instructors, he told us that this was a pricey meal. We spend around we spent $1.25 this morning for breakfast and had more than our fill. The food is very different and not what I was expecting. Everything is really hot and there is not such thing as breakfast food. We ate chicken porridge for breakfast the first day. Another suprise is how much they put cilantro and mint in the dishes. We are trying to learn portion control and take it easy during our meals, but the food is so damn good, it is really difficult not to. I was suprised to find that cilantro and mint are in many of the dishes here.

The next 9 weeks will start tomorrow with our departure for the two towns in the province of Takeo, which is pronounced ta kay o. We will be meeting our host families tomorrow and begin living with them tomorrow night. We are all really nervous about this because we only know a few things to say. We know how to say hello, jim rap sua. My name translates to kim yon chimua Kealan and how are you is Gneck soke sa bye tay. The only other thing I know how to say is I am from America, kim yon mock bee Americk. Besides that, there will be a lot of pointing, sign language and motions. The volunteers ahead of us said that it will be the most awkward thing of our lives. If it really is the most awkward thing of my life,I really scared because I have been in some really awkward situations. More on that after I meet them.

Here is what a typical day is for me over the next 9 weeks:
-530 wake up and run with the running crew- I know, I know, this is very unlike me, but it is a great way to explore the city, bond with my volunteers and just a great way to start the day
-from 530 until 8 I will be getting ready for the day, so showering, eating breakfast, maybe some laundry, who knows.
-8-12 is when we have our language courses in our cluster classes. We are divided into 2 towns and in those towns, there are 4 groups, which are our cluster groups. There will be 3 to 4 of us
-12-1 is lunch
-1-5 is other culture/teaching/tradition classes
-5 go to host family and eat dinner
-530 dinner with host family and gates lock, so I am not allowed to leave
-730 ish is time for bed. The time before bed will be time with my family, time to read and write in my journal and general alone time.

In general, I am so happy. I called home last night and talked to my mom and Maura. I was bummed my dad wasn't there, but I was so happy to touch base. Keiko and I were talking about how great it is to call home and not stop talking about how this is the best experience and we are so happy. The group is really fun and we are getting along really well.

Well, I am going to head to dinner at the only Western place in the city- a burger place, so typical. We are going to be ultra American and drink some beers and play music in the courtyard at the guest house. There are plenty of stories, but now that I am a teacher, this 7 cents a minute for internet is going to get to me. I will tell all these stories once things settle down, because these days are jam packed, physically and emotionally.

I don't have much internet access, so please pass the link onto your family members and such. It is really difficult to send emails because the internet is so slow and the computers all are teeming with viruses. I enjoy the comments so much, so please keep them coming!

This blog purely reflects my own thoughts and opinions and does not reflect the thoughts and opinions of the Peace Corps or the U.S. government