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.