3 Days to the End of the World... Oh Wait that's Not Right...

So in 3 days time the world will come to an end and I spent today making paper snowflakes to put on my door in the hottest holiday season that I have ever experienced and biking around to 7 different villages in my commune on outreach to promote IUDs. (Needless to say I can tell you A LOT about birth spacing methods!) But what is the point of telling women about a device that can prevent them from having children for up to 10 years if the world as we know it is fleeting? Well because the Mayan calendar got it wrong... instead it looks like we are just going to have a worldwide blackout. (And I am not talking about something like the Kenyon College blackout of fall 2008...)

According to my host family, people in my village, Cambodian pop culture magazines, and other such reliable sources, starting on Sunday December 23rd the sun will not rise for 3 straight days. That's right folks, the saying "the sun still rises if the rooster doesn't crow..." will be proved dead wrong. When I first heard about this phenomenon, I thought that it was just not understanding the Khmer and that they were telling me that an eclipse was scheduled to occur. But after more of the same conversations and some investigative research, I found that my ears did not deceive me: the sun would be taking a vacation. It gets better. My 12 year old host sister explained to me that I should, in essence, hibernate for 3 days. I was planning to visit fellow PCV friends to celebrate Christmas, but my sister logically pointed out that I will not be able to see anything and was thus adamant about me not leaving the house (despite that electricity and flashlights will still function...). 

So buckle up folks. Start hoarding food and enjoy the sunlight while we have it (sorry to those in the polar regions who don't have much anyway right now... then again you are probably better prepared than the rest of us...), because our stamina, survival skills, and tolerance for adversity will be tested in 3 days time. I will report back after the 3 day blackout, when the sun has risen again and we can all go about our lives. Good luck to all. Happy holidays and happy hibernation!

Keep the land safe!

Yesterday, marked the 15th anniversary of the Mine Ban Treaty (also known as the Ottawa Convention - signed in Canada). This anti-personnel mine ban resulted from collaboration of NGOs, INGOs, and governments and has been signed by over 158 countries to-date. The treaty prohibits the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of anti-personnel mines and their destruction. Weeks after the document was signed in December 1997, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and its spokesperson, Jody Williams, won the Nobel Peace Prize. The treaty went into force on March 1, 1999 and was signed by the Cambodian government that summer. Work to clear Cambodia of mines and other unexploded ordinance (UXO) began in ernest January 1, 2000 however mine clearance in Cambodia has been happening since late 1992 and the near end of the civil war.

The Mines Advisory Group in Battanbang -
one of the main mine clearing INGOs in Cambodia. 

"MAG’s clearance and Mine Risk Education activities helps local populations reclaim ownership of their land and provides them with the knowledge to help reduce accidents in the future."

After a long history of war, Cambodia is still recovering. People hear call 1993 "Year Zero" - as in the year that they started from scratch. The scars from that history emotional and physical, individual and infrastructural. The work being done by the government, INGOs, and NGOs, to help those affected by landmines and to ensure that more are not affected is apparent. There are plenty of stories of people who have lost limbs because of landmines and/or UXO. (I have been told to avoid specific areas and how there were four or five deaths or accidents in my village as a result of contact with these dangerous objects.) And there are numerous rehabilitation centers and landmine clearing teams. I hope that these efforts to clear Cambodia of mines and UXO continue so that the next generations will be safer than their predecessors - playing, living, learning, and thriving in areas where those before them could not.

A good friend (thanks Mike!) passed this article and video along to me before I set foot in Cambodia. The article gives a good account of Cambodian landmine history and the video is pretty neat too. Be inspired.

Chasing History

This morning I ran in the 17th Angkor Wat International Half Marathon (http://www.angkormarathon.org/?lang=en). At the 6:30am start, it was announced that 58 countries were represented by over 5300 runners (38 of whom took potty breaks along the trail - yes I was counting! - and a good many more were running with cameras, myself included).

Me at the start with part of Angkor Wat at sunrise behind me

Waiting for go time!

The course took us around and through a number of the famous temple complexes including: Angkor Wat, Prasat Kravan, Banteay Kdei, Ta Prohm, Sarah Srang, Ta Keo, Bayon, Angkor Thom, and Phnom Bakheng. The temples are currently in varying states of disrepair (they are temple ruins after all), having been completed anywhere from 900 to 1218. My favorite temple views as I sped by - well kind of - were of Ta Keo and Bayon near the end of the race.

Ta Keo Temple
a sand stone temple dedicated to Branmanish and built from 960-1000 under Jayavarman V's rule

Bayon Temple in Angkor Thom complex
a 3-story high sand stone temple mountain of giant sculptures of Jayavarman VII's divine face built from 1181-1218

The temples together made up a vast city until the Jayavarman dynasty before the decline of Khmer Empire and now are popular tourist attractions. We ran by souvenir shops and monkeys along the trail all the while dodging between tuk-tuks, motos, and on one occasion I had to give an elephant a wide berth. It was a beautiful run that I highly recommend no matter the level of training, because really it is about being with friends and seeing the sites, absorbing the history as you chug along.

3 PCVs nearing the East Gate of Angkor Thom complex

Me and my friend Sam after the race :)

Traveling to Cambodia

No, this is not a post about me traveling back to Cambodia after being out of the country (until last week I was in what PCVs like to call "lockdown" where you are not supposed to leave your province - the PC staff does not approve of the term...) nor is it advice on the best way to get here (although if you want to come visit, let's talk!). Instead I want to discuss some notable and quite newsworthy events that have happened in Cambodia over the last month about which you may not be aware. (I will be backtracking quite a bit and I apologize - I hope to be more timely with my posts in the future, pending internet issues.)

My last blog post was about my experience(s) throwing balls of rice and candy into wicker baskets to fed the ancestors at 4:30AM at the local wat as part of Bai Ben (October 1st-14th this year), the 15 days leading up the the Cambodian Buddhist festival P'chum Ben. On October 15th, while I was preparing to leave for a boat tour of the Tonle Sap (the largest lake in the country and the source of water for the river system known as the Mekong), I got word that the King Father of Cambodia, Norodom Sihanouk, passed away just over two weeks shy of his 90th birthday. Although he ceded the throne to his son Norodom Sihanmoni in 2004 and his declining health forced him to seek care in China, the ceremonies and response to the King Father's death showed that he was loved by the vast majority of his people. (King Sihanouk's reputation internationally is a bit more complicated as explained in this article.) His body traveled back to Cambodia from China, ending up in the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh where it will be on display for the public for 3 months. The processional from the airport to the resting place at the palace was well televised and over the course of the week I saw the same documentary segment about the King Father's life on a continuous loop on many of the TV stations. The framed photograph and memorial at the high school, the black ribbons pinned to white shirts, the 261 Cambodian flags that I counted lining the national highway from my site to the nearest volunteer 15K away, and the fact that everyone (except me) could clearly see the face of the King in the moon every night are examples of how devoted the Cambodian people are to the memory and honor of their late King.

While Cambodia was and continues to mourn the King Father, back in America there was this little thing called an election. As you probably know President Obama will be serving a second term (if this is the first source that you have heard this from, you should probably read some real news sources...), "boon ch'naam howee nung boon ch'naam tiet." Translation: four years already done, four more years to go... very similar to my explanation of my service: "boon kai howee nung bee ch'naam tiet." Anyway, today was a history-making day for those of us with ties to both America and Cambodia, as President Obama became the first acting US President to visit Cambodia. For the next couple of days, he and Secretary of State Clinton will be attending the 2012 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit at the Peace Palace in Phnom Penh. (For more on the Summit and for a perspective on the diplomatic relations or tensions because of issues related to human rights read this.) Unfortunately PC has informed us all that we will not be able to meet the President because his tight schedule will not allow for a 2 hour detour to Takeo - where we are staying for two weeks for in-service training - nor are we allowed to make the trip into Phnom Penh because of a travel ban. Maybe next time when the stars align...

Until then, let me leave you with this photo of 3 turkeys wandering around my site oblivious to the fate of there cousins in America because of a holiday that is just around the corner...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

All Quiet on the Southeastern Front (or not)

Over a month ago I was plopped down in the middle of Siem Reap province and told to get to know my community. So what does that really mean?? Well a lot of unexpected things. Taking people up on offers to visit their homes, walking around and just chatting, and saying sure to invitations to events I have not the slightest idea what they will entail. Getting to know a community is about doing, participating, observing, and asking a lot of questions. As I look back on the past 5 weeks I can see progress and also a long long way to go. 

At the health center things are starting to pick up for me. I have attended a staff meeting, a village health volunteer workshop, and a meeting at the operational district (OD) health office. Since I have observed (and my observation have been confirmed by reports from the OD's office) that antenatal care and birth control services are being utilize effectively due in part to financial incentives and good staff counseling, I have started to turn my attention more to new mothers. I make sure that they weigh their children and then look at the child's growth chart with them and talk a bit about nutrition. It has been nice to establish my niche in the health center with this type of work. I am hoping to get some videos about various health topics to show in the waiting room and to bring coloring book pages about the body and healthy behaviors and start coloring with the children who come in. 

In the ANC room 

Our Country Director, Penny, came to do a site visit last week and snapped this shot of me explaining the antenatal care books that all the pregnant women are given to Cynthia, the Director of the Office of Innovation in Washington, DC. It was nice to show them around my health center with  the newly renovated delivery and post-delivery rooms and to spend time with them at my house.

Me and Penny outside of my house

I spent last weekend in Siem Reap proper with the other 7 PCVs in the province, celebrating our first month at site - eating ice cream and pizza and swapping stories. It was nice to explore the city and to hang out. When I got back I found my house was full. My host father had returned, my host sister is home for the month and now I have two adopted sisters who live with my family during the school year so that they can go to school - they are from one of the floating villages in the Tonle Sap. There is a new energy and enthusiasm that runs through the house. In my free time I draw, color, sing, dance, learn the Khmer alphabet (with all 23 vowels, 32 consonants, and don't forget the 11 independent vowels and consonant subscripts!), and hang out with my sisters. It has been exhausting but in the best possible way. 

Unfortunately there is no fall foliage here. Instead, October in Cambodia is marked by the start of the school year and one of bigger holidays, Pchum Ben (* see the page on the right for an explanation from one of the Peace Corps staff members).  In essence it is a 15-day festival for the ancestors and I have the last 5 days off from work at the health center. For different people Pchum Ben is celebrated differently. For me it has meant 3 dinners at the Wat and 3 Wat ceremonies at 4:30 in the morning. Here is a picture of the children in my extended family with the offering plates for our trip to the Wat (across the street) in the morning. 

Ready to go to the Wat in a few hours!

There was a lot of confusion the first time that I was invited by a friend to go to the morning ceremony. She kept saying tonight ("yoop neh") which I assumed was 4PM, however if the sun hasn't risen, it is still considered night. Needless to say I missed the first ceremony (I showed up at her house 12 hours late!). For the morning (or rather pre-dawn or drag-me-out-of-bed) ceremonies you have to sit with your feet positioned behind you or in a flat-footed squat which is supposedly a cinch for Khmer people. While everyone from old women to infants look like they could stay in these positions comfortably for hours, after five minutes my legs are asleep or tingling and I am praying to the dead ancestors and the monks in front of us to end the pain. (A little over-dramatic, but when I can't understand what they monks are chanting anyway, I like to add my own dialogue.) After a half hour or so, the over 200 people (mostly kids) get up and we walk barefoot in circles around the temple throwing money, sweets, and balls of sticky rice into wicker baskets for the ancestors. There are a few youngsters wearing giant headlamps who crouch over the baskets and intercept the sweets as they are thrown in. No one tells them not to, but I think maybe the ancestors aren't too happy with them. Or maybe it is just me... 

Other moments of note from the past month: 

- wearing bright yellow Angry Bird pajamas to the Wat for one of the morning ceremonies

- playing hand-badminton with the neighborhood kids - picture a birdie, no net, no rackets, and hours of entertainment

- seeing a full double-rainbow before getting caught in a downpour biking home from a spaghetti lunch and visit at a fellow PCVs house (22K away)

- talking with my host grandfather about the history of the community - "are there landmines here?"

- having a tour of the edible plants around my house conducted by my cousins 

- more play-dates with my little friends

- eating rice with BBQed crickets

- Khmer dance parties

Both rain and sunshine are needed to make a rainbow.

One of nature's little reminders that there is so much to be thankful for when the going gets tough. 

Singing in the Monsoon

Two weeks have passed at site and my new home. It is raining a lot, but we don't have the flooding here that they are experiencing farther north. Each day I am reminded that it rains because the pile of laundry that I have to do gets bigger and bigger because I have have the excuse that it just won't dry. "Maybe tomorrow" is my motto for now. 

Living with a different host family had been a bit of an adjustment, but we are starting to get one another. I live with a host mom and dad. Their kids are away studying in Phnom Penh and the dad is traveling a lot because he is a soldier. So basically it is a lot of alone time when I am at home which has been good for studying Khmer on my own - although I have a tutor now and he is wonderful! I live in a block of three houses that includes the extended family and each day I piece together another part of the family tree. My host mom teaches 5th grade but school doesn't start until October so she sells frogs and snakes in the mornings and has private lessons in the afternoons. (I have yet to try barbecued snake, but I can tell you that frog on a stick is not too shabby...) 

I work at the health center Monday through Friday in the mornings and spend the afternoons networking around town. At the health center I talk to some patients, especially the pregnant women in for their check-ups, and do a lot of observing to get a better sense of how the health center operates. Observing is an ongoing process. Last week I spent three days attending birth control distribution workshops for village health volunteers (VHVs) at three different health centers in the district. My brain felt fried by the end because it was entirely in Khmer, but the presenters were absolutely wonderful and by the end of it I was understanding a good portion. Here is a picture from one of the workshops. 

In my free time, these are some of the things I have done thus far: 

- gone on exploration runs and bike rides

- chatted up too many people in the community to count (remembering all the names is a struggle!) 

- "dao layng"(ed) in the market (in essence strolling without purpose) 

- visited a fellow volunteer in her district town (35K round-trip bike)  

- been visited by a fellow volunteer (48K round-trip bike)

- taught an English class to eleven high school girls

- had three play-dates with the neighborhood kids in the local Wat

Let me explain the last one in more detail. My best friend in my town is a girl who claims that she is eleven years old. I say "claims" because most Cambodians will say that you are one year old on the day you were born and when asked when their birthday is many will say that they don't remember. Plus this girl is tiny and looks like she might be pushing nine - at 5'7" I am constantly told that I am very tall and my friend comes up to my hip bone. I met her the second day I was here when I was having a rough day and she sat with me and held my hand and invited me to her home. She lives behind the Wat (pagoda) in a house that is in the middle of a major renovation. So logically we play games in the Wat complex. (Yes, I have asked everyone and their grandmother or "yeay" if this is culturally acceptable and everyone has given me the okay. Yet it still surprises me that the rough-housing and running is okay...) We play variations of Tag, Red-Light-Green-Light, Heads-Up-7-Up, and Simon Says. Good thing I am a quick learner because the group of kids are pretty bad at explaining the games in simple enough Khmer for me to understand. Decisions for who is IT are made exclusively by a quick round-robin-loser-moves-on variation on Rock-Paper-Scissors. I can't seem to tell if it is a democratic process or just based on pure dumb luck - I like to think it is a combination. Here is a picture of the kids and another of me with a bunch of them. 

Aren't they beautiful?! I tell them that everyday, but they say "no, white skin is better." Then I proceed to explain that in America many people will sit in the sun for hours in order to get tan or darker skin. This is met with confusion in a place where you get out of the sun and where soap without bleach in it is difficult to find. I hope to someday be able to show them how truly beautiful people they are inside and out. 

Ready, Set... Siem Reap!

After saying "good-bye" to my training host family on Wednesday morning- well actually "see you in November," because we are having 2 weeks of training then and will be staying with our same families - we traveled to Takeo via tuk-tuk to get some last minute training and await site placement and swearing in. On Thursday, we walked into a large conference room that had a map of Cambodia ducktaped to the floor with the provinces outlined and X's to show the spots where each PCT would be going. After a long build-up it was announced that I will be in Siem Reap Province! This is a large province well-known for Angkor Wat (or as some of the K5 PCVs say "Wat Disney"). Siem Reap has an airport (hint: come visit!) and there is a half-marathon being held there in December. I will be a good bike ride away from the provincial and district towns, so away from the real touristy areas, and will be working in a health center that serves more than 18,000 people. I am really looking forward to meeting my new host family with whom I will be living for the next 2 years.

Even though we received our site placements, we did not officially become Volunteers until yesterday afternoon. Our swear-in was a beautiful ceremony that consisted of the Khmer and American National Anthems, speeches from our country director, Takeo's governor, and 2 fellow K6s, and an unbelievable amount of photos. Here is one of me:

wearing tradition Khmer attire

So here's to another chapter of this adventure! Rooich howee knom dtao. (And here I go.)

Weekend Excursions

Most people if they know one thing about Cambodia they typically know about the Khmer Rouge (pronounced K’mai Rouge). I encourage anyone interested to explore the events that led to the 1975-79 genocide and the reconstruction of the education and health systems after nearly 3 million Khmer people were killed in the name of a completely agrarian society. I do not pretend to be an expert on Cambodia, Cambodian history or the Pol Pot regime in particular. That being said, let me tell you about my personal encounters with the aftermath of Khmer Rouge while living in Cambodia some 33 years later.

Since arriving in Cambodia I have been wary of bringing up the past, however I have found that the people with whom I have interacted with thus far have been willing to talk openly about the late ‘70s and often bring it up first. My host family is made up of 4 generations and each has a different perspective on “Pol Pot time.” They left Phnom Penh during the forced evacuation in 1975. Their home is only a 45-minute bike ride from the nearest marked killing field. Two weekends ago I took a trip to the killing field in Krang Tacham. The site was exhumed, restored and made into a memorial site with a small pagoda and spirit houses in 2010 - a project spearheaded by the youth in the surrounding community who asked their parents and grandparents to share stories from the time. A library, resource room, and painted murals help piece together a collective memory bank for this particular site. Very little is translated into English; a good reminder that this was (and still is) a Cambodian memorial. A way for the Khmer people, and particularly that community, to never forget and to continue forward together. 

One of my friend’s host brothers accompanied us on the trip to this regional killing field (he said that nearly 150,000 people perished there), and expressed how most people still don’t understand what the regime stood for and what it was doing. He brought up the uniqueness of Cambodia’s genocide - Khmer people of the same race, ethnicity, religion, education and socioeconomic levels indiscriminately being killed by their own. “It was a time when it was hard to live and easy to die.” 

The site almost seamlessly blurs into the rice paddies beyond in where cows roam nonchalantly, except for rope and fences that mark the exhumed pits. In the middle stands a giant white monument where offerings have been placed in front of the glass panels that encase the countless skulls and bones of all the people who met their end in this place. Walking around is indescribable - knowing that I will be forever incapable of understanding or imagining the horrors of this place’s history. And yet, the hope and ability to continue on with a smile is something I see every day spanning the generations. It is a constant reminder that “the sun still rises if the rooster doesn’t crow and it’s a chance to live another day.”

This past weekend - after passing my practice Language Proficiency Interview (LPI), yay! - all 57 PCTs took a trip to Kep, a small province in the southwest up against the Gulf of Thailand. We spent the day eating anything BUT rice and swimming in the Gulf. There is a great brunch buffet and pizza place near the water and an open-air market where I tried squid on a stick and watched crabs pulled right out of the water and served fresh. I had a little incident with monkeys stealing fried bananas out of my hands as we were exploring the shoreline - no harm except that I lost my tasty snack. 

I came home tried but content with my glowing tan (well maybe more “sun-kissed” skin) and spent the evening chatting with my host mom, older sister, and aunt who lives next door. It was a cooler evening and we sat on the front yard/cement patio listening to the wind. Looking up at the moon (lo-khae) my aunt asked if we had the moon in America. I responded that we did and that when I look up at the moon I think of my family and friends in the States and how only a few hours later they will be looking at the same moon. My host mom chimed in that my parents must miss me very much and that she would too when I left for a new host family in less than 2 weeks. I told her to look up the moon and think of me because I would be doing the same and thinking of her where-ever in Cambodia I will be very soon. 

Gone with the Monsoon

August 1^st was supposed to mark the beginning of the rainy season, however, it wasn’t until about 4 days ago that the rains really started. I am officially doing reverse triathlon most day now; running in the mornings, biking to language class or technical sessions, and then swimming in my sweat (and the rain storms) all afternoon. Whenever there is a lapse in conversation with my host family (or really anyone) I just say “Kampuchea k’dao nas!” - which means “Cambodia is very hot!” - and then we talk about how we need rain and so does the rice (*see previous post to understand the importance of rice here). When it doesn’t rain the signs are everywhere: empty cisterns, dry fields for those not fortunate enough to have the means to irrigate, dusty roads, etc.

In other news, training is winding down, which means that a lot is being packed in to the last couple of weeks. This week is our “practicum,” so we are working in small groups with high school students to do a health outreach activity in the community. My group will be spending a day doing a trash pick-up and sorting demo while talking with local store owners and market sellers to spread the word about how to reduce, reuse, and recycle and why it is important. We came up with the topic of trash through a community needs assessment. In addition to the health center visits, focused group discussions, and household surveys that we have been doing, this community activity with the high schoolers should be a good way of connecting what we have been talking about in technical sessions all along.

No expectations going into the last weeks of training, and especially none in terms of my site placement. So much is up in the air that the best thing I can do is adapt to what is given me. If it starts to downpour I wait out the storm working on my Rubiks Cube as my family looks on. Or if I have a “jok poo-awh” (stomach ache) I take an hour nap in a hammock. It’s all about working with what you have. 

I will post again soon about my trip to an old Khmer Rouge killing field and other observations. 

One month for the history books!

The self-crafted calendar posted on the wall above my desk tells me that a month has passed since this adventure began. So what have I been up to? I am beginning to get a grasp of it myself. I will try my best to sum up what I have been doing and the incredible people I am meeting and engaging with along the way.

Back in the States, I felt like the token Peace Corps girl amongst friends and family. Here - at least when I am with the other PCTs - that identity is stripped away and I have the chance to define myself in different and multiple ways.  And yet at the same time, by all going through and experiencing the ups and downs together, the Peace Corps identity remains intact while still allowing us each to find a niche in the work we will ultimately be doing. I really enjoy the group we have. Being a big group in a medium-sized town, we often (and by often, I mean always)stand out. We end up taking restaurants by storm and overwhelming the local smoothie, fruit stands, and the only place in town with AC, the gas station by the name of Tela. “Meet up at the Tela for ice cream?” is a common question amongst the group. One of the only places in town where you can kind of get swallowed up is the market. It is open-air and despite numerous trips, navigating the place can still be a challenge. I hope to post some pictures later of the array of fruits and veggies of which I could only identify a few when I first got here. Now sraw-gaa-niek (dragonfruit) and sao-mao  (have no idea the English name) are my go-to snacks. Oh and don’t forget the fresh chilled doungs (coconuts) that I have every day. I will buy one with a straw and quickly finish the juice and ask the seller if she will take a machete to it so that I can eat the fleshy interior with the spoon that I now carry around with me in my backpack specifically for this purpose. The word for eat here is nam, as in nom nom…

Speaking of eating, a common greeting is “have you eaten rice already?” Why you might ask. All day everyday I eat rice. And so does most everyone else. Even the animals. At my house, the dogs get the leftovers (they must love me, because I never eat it all...) and the 4 pigs we have get a rice-water-corn mixture of some sort. Definitely not your Middle Ground leftovers that is for sure. The cows hang out in the rice paddies and thus eat it too. And anything can really go on the rice too - omelets, curry, veggies, meat, fish, ants and wasps. You name it, rice can take it.

In regards to training, the majority of this phase of service is about integrating, adjusting and exploring. Food and marketplaces are a great way to do cultural learning. For example, the other day I was asked to sit down with a family of four at a restaurant and was able to practice my limited Khmer and tell them about myself and ask after their health and family. My host family is also extremely helpful and patient as I struggle to tell them that I will go for a short run or won’t be home for lunch. As part of a specific training exercise, I and a few others facilitated a discussion (through translators) about water and sanitation (WASH) practices in a rural village 20Km from where we are living. Even just knowing a little Khmer and asking questions and expressing genuine interest in the community, I was able to connect with the women we met with even if only on a basic level. The experience got me excited  for when we are placed in a community and get to interact like that every day talking about health issues. It’s all about the relationship building and it is my jam. So is hiking in Kirivong (about 2 hours south of Takeo, right on the Vietnam border) and seeing Vietnam and the ocean all at once. That was our group’s weekend trip and it was beautiful and breezy. Although I can handle the heat and laying doing in the middle of the day under my mosquito net and drench my sheets in sweat despite not moving an inch, I do miss a good breeze, rolling hills, and stunning vistas from elevation. Anyway, I will post pictures from that excursions and others when my internet connection is better. 

Just Keep Biking...

Picture this: sitting in a sarong after a cold bucket shower listening to the geckos and beetles prey on mosquitoes and the flies run into the ceiling from the comfortable confines of your mosquito net... This is my life in Cambodia. Since arriving at my training host family’s home last Sunday, this is exactly how I spend my nights after dinner and following about an hour of extra-help language class with my younger sister. I go to bed between 9 and 10 and wake up to the dogs barking between 5 and 6. And then the day begins with 4 hours each of technical training and language training. This schedule means that the days are long, but the weeks fly by. Today marked the end of my 2^nd week since I met the other PCTs in DC for staging.

My host family is absolutely wonderful! I have a dad, mom, grandmother, and two sister (older and younger). My house is quite big with an open-air downstairs equipped with 3 hammocks, and upstairs bedrooms. My parents are farmers and my older sister teaches high school Khmer. We have 2 cows, 3 dogs, 4 pigs, and more chickens (here they have few feathers to speak of) than I can count. For the first few days I thought that I had a younger brother too, but it turns out that he is just a neighborhood kid that comes over all the time and likes to record me singing American pop songs with my sister on his phone without me knowing. Embarrassing…


I live about a 3 mile bike ride from the center of town - one of the, if not THE farthest CHE trainee houses. Definitely good exercise… Here is my beautiful mountain bike that helps with the dirt roads and washed out paths (because of the monsoon rains) between the rice paddies that I have to navigate on my way to language class at my Language and Cross-Culture Facilitator's (LCF) home everyday. 

Motor-bikes, taxis, and tuk-tuks got nothin' on me!

My Khmer is… coming along. The structure is not too bad (i.e. there are no verb conjugations!), but pronunciation has been hard to pick out thus far. Hopefully with time I will start to pick up more and more. My sister says that I am doing well, I say that I am trying…   

Until next time! Joom reap leah!
(I will post pictures later.)

"Pre-Service Training is like taking a drink from a fire hose."

My Pre-Service Training (PST) technically started a few weeks after I accepted my placement and the submission of numerous pre-departure materials. However, when most people refer to PST they are talking about the 8 weeks after you step off the plane in the country. So after a long day of staging in D.C. and an even longer weekend of travel to Tokyo followed by an overnight in Bangkok, we finally arrived in Cambodia on Sunday. After stepping off the plane in Phnom Penh (PP), we carried our luggage through a tunnel of some 40 or so cheering current Peace Corps Volunteers (PCVs). I have never felt so immediately welcomed and/or reassured as I did walking out of that airport. And right then and there we took a picture: 

K6 fresh off the plane! See if you can find me...

Yesterday and today included a lot of introductions, policy overview, house-keeping, and exploring the city's markets. We travel to and from our guest house by tuk-tuk (motorcyles attacked to rickshaw-type things...) which dodge and weave in and out of traffic carrying as many as 7 crammed inside. To give you some idea of the organized chaos of the traffic in PP: no one follows the traffic laws/rules, so crossing the street is like playing a ginormous game of Frogger. However, when it rains - it is monsoon or rainy season so afternoon downpours that don't cool anything off are almost inevitably - the streets clear out a bit. Yesterday, the roof of the tuk-tuk I was in had a major leak so I was drenched within minutes. A shower in a tuk-tuk? It sure does save time. Although I am sweating so much due to the intense humidity that really I am soaked for most of the day...

It is hard to believe that tomorrow morning we leave for our training village and start the Khmer (pronounced Kha-my) language training. I can't wait to be able to start conversing more with shop keeper, tuk-tuk drivers, and the Khmer PC staff. During the past few days our group has had to rely heavily on the PCVs that have been assigned to help us transition. They are absolutely wonderful, patient people who I am sure are ready to get rid of us (I know I would!). 

I probably won't have much internet for the next 8 weeks, since as you can see from the blog post title, PST will probably be a bit overwhelming or a lot to digest... we shall see...

Live Curiously

While I was listening to the radio the other day, a 101 year old woman gave the advice, "live curiously." A good reminder to try new things and push the limits of my comfort zone.

It seems quite surreal that almost exactly a year ago, I began the process of applying for Peace Corps (PC) before my Senior year. At that time I was not convinced that PC was something that I wanted to do, and I was exploring a variety of options for post-grad. Then everything started falling into place and before I knew it, it was February and I was accepting a position as a Community Health Education Extension Agent (say that 5 times fast!) and 27 months of service in Cambodia. 

 
Cambodia (green) in relation to the rest of Southeast Asia.
population: 14.8 million people (65th most populous country)
area: 181,035 square km or 69,898 sq mi (88th) or roughly the size of Missouri
   
Basic map of Cambodia's major tourist sites, cities, and provinces.

Fast forward to now. In less than 12 hours I will be checking in for pre-orientation ("Staging") in Washington, DC and 24 hours later boarding a flight with a final destination of Phnom Penh (Cambodia's capital). I leave the US on Friday the 13th and arrive in Cambodia on Sunday the 15th - 11 hours ahead of Eastern Time (ET) and over 9,000 miles from home.

At a Thai restaurant called Indochine in Wrightsville, NC a few weeks ago. 

I will arrive in Cambodia for the rainy season (hot & humid!) with 57 other Peace Corps Trainees (PCTs) at my side -about  half in Community Health Education (CHE), half in English Teaching and Teacher Training (ETTT). We are the 6th PC group going to Cambodia so we are known as K6. After a few days in Phnom Penh (PP) we will head to our Pre-Service Training (PST) site for 8 weeks of training. If all goes well, I will receive my post and be sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) in early September. I don't know how much internet access I will have during PST, - and at my post for that matter! - but I will update this blog (and respond to emails) as often as I can.


Mail may take a couple of weeks,but if you love snail mail as much as I do... feel free to write to: 

Meghan Henshall

Peace Corps/Cambodia 

P.O. Box 2453
US Embassy
Phnom Penh 3
CAMBODIA
Asia

So here I go. Moving forward with excitement and curiosity. Thanks for all the love and support.