Just a quick note to say we are safe, sound, and celebrating Thanksgiving the best way we can: by driving into Phnom Penh from the countryside, and celebrating at Freebirds—deep fried turkey buffet, anyone?  We love and miss you all, and thank you for the masses of birthday emails and packages.  Have a wonderful day, and please eat some pie for us. 

PS-We have finally started teaching!  Our students are wonderful, and they wish you all a happy Thanksgiving as well! 

Right now we do not have access to the Internet where we live, so our posts will be infrequent until we can find a better solution.  Take care; we will write more soon.       

getting started...

Things are slowly starting to take shape here. We returned from Siem Reap to find NPIC just as we left it only with a little more gecko poop on the floor.  We were told to report to teach on Monday morning, but given no time or location.  We tried to be there early and to find our way, but there was no need to stress. We arranged desks and were sent away, told to return to teach Wednesday morning, Tuesday for schedules.  Then a text comes on Monday night telling us to be in the office by 8am Tuesday morning cause we will have classes Tuesday(still we have seen no schedule).  How students know when to show up to this fiasco is beyond me.  We get there early since we haven't seen any classrooms or made any copies yet, but they say, no maybe tomorrow.  I sit here on Tuesday night and all my American sensibilities are violated.  I never would have been able to sleep the night before teaching my first class in Colorado.  It still was hard for me to sleep every Sunday night, even if I had the up coming week well planned, copies sitting in my classroom.  I have come so far. Or something like that. I am learning a hard lesson in patience and flexibility. 

In other news, we borrowed a car from a couple who is in Japan delivering their baby and Ben has been driving to and from NPIC the past few days. Braving the roads here is stressful to say the least. Motobikes and cars pop out everywhere and you have to have your head constantly on a swivel. He is doing very well though, I have no intention of driving the duration of the time we are here. 

Finally, to update you all, I am 29 weeks pregnant which means I leave for Thailand BY MYSELF in five weeks, maybe six if I am lucky. It will be an adventure, and to be honest, I am not in the mood for an adventure right now. They always make good stories later but they really suck at the time. 

Siem Reap

We are currently discovering the wonders of Siem Reap.  It has been so fun to get out of Phnom Penh and see this site that is truly amazing.  Siem Reap is a very different town than PP. It is much smaller, and it is full of tourists, people just coming through to move on in a few days.  I somehow don’t feel like we fit that category because we aren’t leaving Cambodia any time soon.  I think the most significant difference is that we know a little bit of Khmer.  When someone asks me about being pregnant or we ask their name in Khmer they smile from ear to ear.  Not many tourists do that here.

Angkor is unbelievable. Our pictures aren’t all that great cause the weather was very gray, but it was well worth choosing an overcast day to walk around for 8 hours, especially being nearly 7 months pregnant.  We went into the day thinking we would be in and out much faster than that, but the hours kept ticking by and we were still curious about what we might find in the next temple.  I wish there was a better way to describe these temples. I am still in awe at the architecture.  Some of them were built over 1200 years ago.  

The builders had to make little rivers and rafts to float the massive stones to the building sites, as there are no mountains near by; or they would use elephants to carry the stones.  It must have been such a massive undertaking.  The detail on each stone is mind-boggling too. 

The three main temples we visited were very different. We saw other smaller ones, but these are the most famous and hopefully I will be able to get the pictures to match what I write. The first was Angkor Wat and it was the most impressive simply because of its magnitude. 

This is the temple that usually shows up when you google Cambodia.  It is also the background of our blog page. It was originally built as a Hindu temple but later converted to a Buddhist temple. 

The second temple is called Bayon and it is famous for the massive and serene faces on each of the towers.  There used to stand 54 towers, but only 39 remain (I think), and most of them are only partially standing.  Each tower has four faces, pieced together with huge stones. It is also famous for its bas-reliefs that show scenes of mundane everyday life but also mythological and historical scenes.

The final temple is Ta Prohm, which is familiar to anyone who has seen Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, as a few scenes are shot on these grounds.  This was probably my favorite temple, although it is hard to choose.  It is unique because when the temples were starting to be restored at the beginning of the 20^th century this one was left in its natural state, which is quickly becoming part of the jungle. Huge trees are growing out of the walls surrounding the temple and over the top of it.  It is truly beautiful.

We miss you all, and look forward to hearing from you.  We will put more pictures up soon, and write again when we can.

 

The lost images of Sihanouk Ville

Our First Visitor...

We had a friend come this last week to visit. It was so great to see a familiar face and to be able to show someone around our new home. Tom was a fantastic guest, the lowest of maintenance required. I think he only brought a few changes of clothes, but had no desire to do laundry. He didn’t complain about the makeshift bed he had to use on the floor, and he asked all sorts of questions about life and politics and history of Cambodia. Tom Haines went to high school and college with me, but our real bond began when we studied in New Zealand together. Tom is a world traveler and was in Nepal so he took a detour and visited us. He is a dedicated friend- the journey took him way too long. He had to skip between bus, moto, and taxi to get into the country, and do the same leaving; very long journeys both directions.

Our gratitude goes out to Tom for going to the effort to see us, as well as all those who are supporting him in his work, which allowed for his visit as well. We needed the encouragement.

Frustration...

i have no idea what is going on with our blog. i have tried too many times to fix it. i am sorry some of the pictures aren't working and the text is getting all screwed up. i really wanted to share some of those pics. maybe they will work next time. i am getting to frustrated to mess with it any more today. thanks for reading, on to the next adventure...Angkor Wat.

Sihanouk Ville

We had the great experience of teaching in Sihanouk Ville last week.  It was a nice break to work.  (Yes, that is what I said.) We drove into the city after four hours on the Mekong Express, the nicest of Cambodia’s bus systems.  It was air conditioned, they provided snacks, and only a few seats had leaks over them.  The Koreans who run Life University met us at the bus stop and took us to lunch at a very nice, very vacant hotel.  We had a lovely meal, and truly enjoyed the company.  The Koreans spoke beautiful English and made us feel welcome from the beginning. 

They took us then to a hotel where we were to stay for the week.  We were intending to stay on their campus but it filled up more than they expected so they paid for our hotel, which was directly on the beach.  I have included some pictures of our hotel, because although it was more than I expected, I don’t think we can communicate the weirdness of it unless you see pictures.  I could never tell if it was being put together or taken down, but there was almost no furniture in the whole place, and although we were their only four guests we were on the third floor, away from the ocean.  The beach was virtually unusable, as there were no chairs or tables outside, and it was covered with trash and had a concrete beam was running through it.  If you walked down a ways it was usable, but the beachfront property was wasted on our hotel. 

We spent one day on the popular Serendipity Beach.  Tourism is the main draw for this city, but they are seriously lacking on major fronts.  Don’t get me wrong, I would love to live and teach here next year, but things are just not what I know you may be picturing.  The tuk-tuk dropped us off at Serendipity at the top of a long steep hill that he could not drive down with his moto and tuk-tuk because it was so rutted out.  We gladly walked down the hill, but I was shocked that their main beach was so inaccessible.  There were some little shops on the side of the road, and many guesthouses to choose from.  The entrance to the beach was unclear.  You had to go around this little stand selling all sorts of random wares, to the right or the left, climbing down a concrete wall or over dilapidated stairs.  Both directions on the beach were lined with restaurants and bars, some belonging to guesthouses, some standing alone. They all had chairs set up to enjoy the ocean view, but the cushions on the chairs were wet and I am pretty sure never moved out of the elements. 

Sitting on this beach is tiring.  We came down mid-morning and until we left at 4 we were constantly surrounded my women offering manicures and pedicures on the beach, or massages, or a strange form of hair removal I didn’t want to know anything about.  Some were friendly, some pushy, but it was constant. There were others selling fruit, or seafood along with tons of kids selling all sorts of things, crafts they had made, bookmarks, bracelets, etc… Their goal seemed to be to get you to say, “Maybe later,” and then they make you pinkie promise that you will buy from them later, and no one else. They will remember you too, so don’t think you are getting out of it for one second.  It only took me one pinkie promise to learn this lesson. 

Before heading to Sihanouk Ville I read about how to treat the kids who sell stuff on the beach. It is understood that they don’t get to keep their money and they are sort of pimped out.  They all say they are paying for school but that is hard to believe since they are there everyday.  I tried talking to one little girl about the truth of this. She didn’t try to sell me anything, she just kept touching my tummy and asking questions about my family and telling me about hers’ when I asked in return.  She said she gets to keep most of her money, but sometimes bullies take it. She also told me about some other kids who sell on the beach who are her enemies because they are not nice. I don’t know the truth but it is hard to ignore all of them, and that somehow doesn’t seem helpful either.

All in all, our time in Sihanouk Ville was too short. I would have loved to stay another week and teach another course.  Our students were excellent.  They loved having us too.  When they finished their test we told them they could leave, but they all stayed until we absolutely forced them to go, which was 45 minutes longer than class was supposed to run.  They even gave us a gift when we left and they all put notes in it.  I am excited about the prospect of teaching there in the future, even if it is in small spurts like this last week was.