Pursat!

Hello everyone!

Sorry that it has been so long since my last post, but things in Cambodia have been pretty crazy. Picking up where I left off.....

We visited Whitney in Pursat town. There was a group of us that took a ramourt (the best way to describe it is a motorcycle that pulls a big flatbed truck) There were about ten of us. The tricky part about traveling in Cambodia is that there are hardly any fixed prices, so travel isn’t just getting on a bus and that’s that. You need to fight for it. We laugh because that’s how eating is too. To eat anything, you need to cook it thoroughly enough, soak it in bleach or find something that can be peeled. That is how travel is. We met at the Tela at 6:00 am and spent at least 20 minutes arguing with the tuk tuk drivers because we refused to spend more than one dollar to get into Takeo. We finally got on a ramourt for 2,000 riehl, about 50 cents and went into Takeo. For the record, they use dollars and riehl in Cambodia, so either works. As we are on our ramourt, we picked up or dropped off many people along the way, so it took a little longer than usual to get into town. We met the Traing group at the Tela in Takeo and negotiated bus prices and found one for 5,000 riehl per person. The group split up and we headed off to Phnom Penh. We started out with 9 Americans and our driver, but Khmer drivers will go to great lengths to fit as many people as possible in the car. We picked up 5 or 6 more people, so there were 14 of us in a 9 passenger van. But that really wasn’t even bad at all- one group had 38 people in one bus, 8 were on the roof. When we finally made it to Phnom Penh, we split off and Jessica, Keiko and I negotiated a tuk tuk to the bus station. Our driver dropped us off at the wrong place, so we had to get another one. When we finally got to the bus station, we bought our tickets for $7, which we found out was way to much, but we didn’t know how to negotiate that because there was no way for us to prove that it was too much. If a fruit vendor pulls that, we just walk to the next stall, but when we have to take a bus to get to where we are going, we sort of have to deal with it. It was 9:30 when we bought our tickets for the 11:00 bus. We wanted a little time to walk around the big city- we ended up at a KFC and it was unreal. All the meat here is full of bones, so half of dinner is spent pulling bones out of my mouth because that is how you do it. If you try to remove the bones beforehand, it is weird. The boneless chicken sandwiches and fries were out of this world, even though it was 10:00. When we walked back to the bus station, the bus was basically waiting for us and we got front row. The trip was about 3 and a half hours and it was so great to see the north. We have been in the south for so long that we were eager to see what the rest of the country is like.
We met up with Whitney and Bri (another K2). Bri had two K3s coming to visit, but since her site is so far, they stayed with us at the guest house in Pursat town. We checked into the room (it was $5 per night and actually had a shower head and a sit down toilet, even though it didn’t flush!) We walked to the market and went to the Chinese drink shop and bought pasta and the makings for sauce (although the sauce was more Khmer than Italian). Whitney is friends with a girl who works for an Australian NGO (non-governmental organization) and lives at her own house with a kitchen. We made garlic bread and pasta- it may have been the worst pasta in America, but it tasted oh so good. We were so happy to just hang out with Whitney, Bri and Dani (the Australian) and just talk about what to expect in the first year. They helped us gain a lot of insight as to what we should say in our interviews for our site placement (which I will talk about later...)
We woke up the next morning, got breakfast and took a tuk tuk 40 minutes to a floating village in Pursat. We hired a man to give us a little one hour tour on his boat. It was pretty crazy to see some of the things- they had a floating gas station, one family was “moving” which meant that they pulled their house by boat to another place. It was incredibly sad to see because there were so many children there, but they have nothing to do. The water is so polluted and there is no where for them to run around and play. Their social interaction consisted of waving to us and saying hello. This village also has one of the biggest crime rates in the country because there is nowhere for people to retreat to. All in all, it was a very interesting aspect of Khmer culture to see.
That night, we went to dinner at a restaurant pretty close to the guest house. We had a good time just laughing and hanging out. It was enjoyable for all of us to have a break from training and I had to remind myself that we weren’t in America because it was the first time that we didn’t have to really guard what we were saying and how we were acting.
The next morning, we woke up at 5:30 and bought our tickets for the trip back to Phnom Penh. All of the K2s made plans to head back into PP (as we call it) to spend a little time there. Whitney knows a lot about PP, so when she told us about the place where she gets massages, we were all over it. First, we got pizza and it was so good. Cheese doesn’t really exist in Cambodia because refrigeration doesn’t really exist, so having cheese was unreal. We took our time eating our pizzas and enjoyed every bite. After pizza, Keiko, Jessica andI took a tuk tuk to the spa Whitney told us about. We all opted for the hour long massages and it was worth the $12 we spent. We all decided that when we swear-in as volunteers, we are going to treat ourselves to a spa day (which will be less than $40).
When we left the spa, we wanted to meet up with some other trainees to head back to site. We had trouble negotiating a tuk tuk and then a car back to Takeo. When we finally loaded 6 people plus a driver into a compact little car, we headed off for Takeo, for about a block then we were stuck in traffic for 2 hours. There was a bus in front of us and motos and tuk tuks all around- traffic jams in the US are NOTHING compared to traffic jams here. Oh another thing- traffic laws (and signs for that matter) simply do not exist here. We think that the unspoken rule is to honk when you pass someone. It is pretty rare to see street lines and way too common to see people driving on the other side of the road.
We started practicum this week and I am halfway through it. Since I do not have any formal experience with a real class, I was very nervous. I spent the past three days teaching 10th graders English for 45 minutes. I was shocked when my lessons didn’t crash and burn. I know that I have a lot to improve on, but that will come with experience. I actually really enjoy teaching. It is very different here though. Peace Corps and the K2s really prepped us on how Khmer students are, but it is very different when there are 30 Khmer students sitting in front of you. When you think of American classrooms, I think of a classroom that is buzzing with noise, students speaking with confidence, asking questions and maybe even some disagreement or argument. Well, Khmer classrooms have none of those qualities. Getting students to answer a question is a task in itself. They all know the answers and are incredibly smart, they are just so reluctant to put their hands up. They are also really cute when they answer a question because they stand up to address you. Just a quick note: Cambodia is all about titles. In the U.S., we refer to people as Mr., Mrs. and sometimes Dr. Well here, everyone has a title- anyone older is bong, younger is pa-own, teacher is lo crew for men and net crew for women, etc. So while I am teaching, the students call me Teacher or Cher for short (not pronounced like Cher the singer, more like how it is spelled). They are very shy and it was rare when a student asked me to explain something to the class that he was unsure about. Those students are rare and they are usually boys- the girls are very reserved. I will just have to learn the culture and norms as I go along. I will be teaching with a co-teacher tomorrow, so we will see how that goes.
Yesterday, we had our permanent site placement interviews and I took Whitney’s advice and told the two people who interviewed me exactly what I wanted and didn’t want. They make no guarantees but I am sure that they want to place people where they are going to be happy. Basically what I told them is this:
-I want to be at a big school because secondary projects (such as sports teams) are more likely to happen because funding is not as difficult.
-I want to be able to travel the country and not be confined to my site. So, I basically do not want a rural site. I do not need a provincial town, but something like Tramkak would make me very happy.
-I enjoyed having electricity and the internet. Because the internet has become the main form of communication in the US, those people from home who want to help me will most easily be reached through the internet. That doesn’t mean that I need to have internet, but I want to be able to go somewhere close and spend an hour a week at the internet cafe.
We will see how that goes, but that is what I told them. The rest of this week consists of finishing up student teaching. Next week is the mack daddy of all weeks- we are traveling to Takeo on Tuesday for an overnight seminar until Wednesday. We will spend Wednesday night with our host families and then we will head out to PP to meet with our co-teachers and then visit our permanent sites. That trip will take us into week 6, which is nuts to think about. I will be blogging once I found out where I am going next week, which should be Tuesday or Wednesday!

Hope all is well, miss you all!

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