| Monday, September 29, 2008 |
| Happiest Place on Earth/Thailand! |
 Beautiful Baan Unrak, in Sangkhlaburi town, Thailand! After leaving Cambodia in a rush of sangria and Japanese food, and going alone across the border on a long long bus ride to BKK, and running around for a few crazy days at MBK Shopping Wonderland, I made it home to BU on a long long minibus ride. This was trip #3, but my first one without other Go-MAD buddies. It was more chill, much more chilly, more lonely, but still nice to visit the kids and hang out in town. It rained every day in August this year, and the sticky red mud ruined my pedicure.
 Smile! Most of the kids are Burmese refugees, but some are Karen or Mon tribal minorities. I should have done the sketchy border crossing trip last December! The Myanmar border, only a few kilometres away, is locked down now. Unsurprisingly enough.
 Highlight: three mornings in the nursery! It wasn't finished during our last Christmas trip, but we devoted some of our fundraising towards it, and a university group from Japan painted and decked out the room with books and toys. I also met the uber-hippy volunteers, and ran into Gillian from IHS, randomly working in Burmese refugee camps for the summer. I didn't make it out of my P Guesthouse bed and out into the cold rain in time for yoga, but ate my weight in BU cafe curries and cheezy bread and vegan chocochip cookies, and even managed to do my statistics exam at the one internet spot in town! No international phones in sight, but Sangkhlaburi is now wired.
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posted by Raychaa @ 2:17 PM  |
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| Saturday, August 02, 2008 |
| Hell's Angel goes to the ocean and nearly 'Nam |
 Loveliest thing about this stop-off in a nowhere village along the potholed road to Vietnam was the borderline-crazy man who wanted to practice English and buy us coffee. Anyone hankering for a touch of Type II diabetes should try this Khmer recipe: 1 part strong coffee, one part crushed ice from an unwashed bucket, a scoop or 5 of white sugar, 5 parts sweetened condensed milk. Add straw. Drink. Feel giddy. Immediately crave another one. Feel like you can take on the whole world. Begin shaking at minute 10. Feel comatose at 30. Anyone who says you can't drink crack through a straw hasn't been to this coffee shack.
 My abbreviated motorcycle-diaries trip with Tim was heading to Kep-by-the-sea, where crabs are famous and lightning storms rolling off the mountain are freaking terrifying. The road from Phnom Penh to Kep goes from paved and wide, to paved and terrifying, to bumpy and rocky, and back again. The amount of cars and buses doesn't vary much, but the width of the road does significantly. Today's SE Asian language lesson: honking means "I'm here, and it's time for YOU to move out of MY way." Alternately, "Meeeeeeeeeeeee!" This shouldn't be confused with American horns, which can be translated as wingdings and exclamations and pound signs to cover up vocal cussing. Or the Japanese horn, which says "Arigato!" while bowing and cowering along the side of the road in guilt. Thank you for driving on my road! It's been a pleasure!
 Here's the pretty young thing I rented for $4 per day and a passport. But no, I still haven't learned to drive. My personal helmet is black with blue flames on the side, and is a style worn by many-a-motodop man in Cambodge. I only bought it because the pink ones at the shop (with or without Hello Kitty decals) are sized for miniature-headed Khmer women. Buffalo Girls, won't you come out tonight wearing your manly manly helmet? Don't mind if I do.
  The way back, we took the long way around for 8 hours, motoing to hidden swimming caves that were mostly dry (from the drought), and over railroad tracks, unused and leading nowhere, and past endless stretches of rice fields, water buffalos, and curious farmers. After a 3 hour detour on a rocky road, we were within throwing distance from Vietnam, but headed north to get home in the midst of a downpour. The next morning at work, I wondered if Hell's Angels had the same kinds of problems sitting down after being on their choppers for so many hours. |
| posted by Raychaa @ 5:28 PM |
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| Monday, July 28, 2008 |
| SMC |
 Even being in a building with electricity, a few blocks from this (Steung Meanchey), can feel like an ivory tower. I don't spend much time this close to the burning mountains of rubbish, but any visit is enough to haunt you. Nearly all our day care kids were either following their parents here to pick garbage, or waiting in their tiny homes for their family to return each day. Some university students that volunteer with us are doing a documentary, following several families during their working days at the dump and traveling back with them to their first-glance-idyllic countryside homelands, where most people live on less than 45 cents a day, and many families are starving. Perspective... still trying to find it.
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| posted by Raychaa @ 8:48 PM |
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| Friday, June 20, 2008 |
| Cruising |
 Holiday number 65 of the year (Queen's Birthday Celebration... for the elderly... and the water harvest) was my first escape from central Phnom Penh in weeks, but we didn't get that far. Loaded up some PEPY bikes, set off into the 30C heat, and cruised around on red dirt roads towards Choeung Ek, aka the Killing Fields. Not a good destination for a lazy holiday ride, you say? You'd be right. Just a touch of Deepresso is how we roll in Cambodge.
 House on a lake where they grow morning glory and other water vegetables.
 Good clean water! Yum.
 Kids at a temple or pagoda-- not sure the difference. Widows and extremely poor children, usually abandoned or orphaned, can live on pagoda grounds in exchange for washing dishes, taking care of the grounds, and the like. The monks accept food from community members, and in exchange, the people living there can eat their leftovers. |
| posted by Raychaa @ 8:24 PM |
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| Tuesday, June 17, 2008 |
| Cambo (House) Five and Cambo Six |
 As requested: I have a house, the fifth place I've lived in five months. Sometimes, it's filled with mod, blurry people. They are awfully nice, and they did like our Mexican cooking, though I had to explain a few times to our Khmer neighbors that Lauren and I weren't actually from Mexico.
 Not requested, but here are a few staples of Phnom Penh life in an unassuming snapshot:
1) Taken from a tuk-tuk (motorcycle driven cart or vehicle)
2) Lots of rain, which floods the streets and makes the rats living in the sewers angry enough to run out and riot, and shake their little paws into the gray afternoon air
3) Cambo Six-- a popular chain-shop for gambling on British football teams
4) Motorcycles, which are at a higher risk of being stolen during football championships (Seriously.) Motos can generally be started with any key or piece of metal, so it's a wonder that more don't get knicked. Moto owner, beware. If the rat gangs don't drive away with it, a losing gambler just might. |
| posted by Raychaa @ 8:18 PM |
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| Wednesday, June 04, 2008 |
| Things that are famous |
 After the scenic bus ride, Mister Potato, Timmy and I arrived in Kep. It's a small town, famous for an amazing crab and seafood market along the coast. I'm not a huge fan of crustaceans, but they're *famous*. It was unofficially rainy season, which means most of the town was a shade of mud, but we at least made it out on a attempted hike or two up into the hills before getting drenched and/or attacked by cows. The wild cows with horns? Some say they're domesticated. Don't believe them.
From there, a van took us to Sihanoukville, one of the slimiest tourist destinations in Cambodia. There isn't anything special about Snookville, other than it has a ridiculous number of international restaurants and domestic taxi-girls to choose from. Take your pick! (We just went for NGO-helping-abused-women-cafe delicious brownies and muffins and some great Italian food, and passed on the other option.) I tried to knock a life goal off my list by learning the art of motorcycle driving. Not successful. Think you have to actually surpass 1st gear to get that accomplishment.  The last stop was an eco-lodge in Koh Kong province, near the Thai border. Check out that boat! We rode on one just like it, only not sunken. The cabins were classy and fancy, apart from one small mouse friend in the shower. We went for several kayak rides, but were severely drenched each time from rainshowers. Not sure if it was actually that eco-friendly, besides being in a jungle and using mostly solar panels... until, that is, the solar power ran out and we listened to the rumble of generators all evening. Eco!  |
| posted by Raychaa @ 8:50 PM |
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| Tuesday, May 27, 2008 |
| Mister Potato Goes to the Coast |
 My good friend Mister Potato is a Malaysian Pringle man, but he looks suspiciously Mexican. That mustache? That sombrero? Please. That's Senor Potato to you. The trip from Phnom Penh to the ocean only takes a few hours, along one of the deadliest roads in Cambodia. The path is narrow and full of speeding buses and trucks, which means that crashes are as good a form of entertainment as the ridiculous Khmer comedy videos. Charlie Chaplin allegedly came through these parts back in the day, and taught his form of humor to the people in charge. Now, all comedy is derived from that. It involves a lot of slapstick, and people getting hit in head with funny objects. Put this type of humor in language you don't understand, on blaring speakers, on several TV monitors throughout the bus, and it's good times. Hmm. Improvement or not over semi-sadistic Japanese game shows? That said, Mister Potato and I spent the journey looking out the window, watching the scenery, cows, and car crashes race past. I didn't yet abandon this blog, but have a habit of working too many hours, and not posting. Also, have no other internet besides web cafes full of super-sketch Nigerian email scam artists. That is a broad generalization, but if you lived here, you'd know there's a fair bit of truth there. So. I have bunches of pretty pictures, but allow one to assure you for now that I'm alive and well, and full of crisps. |
| posted by Raychaa @ 11:57 PM |
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| Wednesday, April 30, 2008 |
| Gingerbread houses |
 Gingerbread! Actually, someone probably stuck Brite-Lites into the shape of a palace, but it does look romantic.
 Sayonara MisterV... at the best Japanese restaurant in town, with the worst service. This night, the city was having power cuts, so the whole place went pitch-dark every 7 minutes. It was bloody hot, because of the weather outside and the burning (yakiniku!) coal pits inside, and then the lack of fans/aircon. Cold beer, hot nights--ah the joys of endless summer. All the girls keep asking me if she's really gone, and if she will pleeease have a baby soon and bring it back to CCF.
My newest roommie is Lauren from Boston, and she will hopefully be inspiring/forcing me into half-marathon shape, especially if I'm still here to run at Angkor Wat in December. With my sublet expiring, and having several options for apartments swept away out of our reach in matter of hours, we jumped on an offer for a beautiful apartment and moved within 2 days. Out of the ant-n-gecko-n-spider oasis, and into the shiny new flat! (No, it's not the royal gingerbread palace pictured above...) It's a few blocks from Tuol Sleng--the high school turned torture chamber turned Genocide Museum-- which at first made me not want to even see it. Lauren's observation is that when living in a death-torn country that is so different from what your reality is, you inevitably end up weaving nightmares into your daily life... and making them better.
So, now my house is 2 blocks from where 17000 people were interrogated under a brutal regime, and my happiest days are working near the garbage dump, which is one of the most apocolyptically bad places you can imagine. I am not saying I don't miss my clean green other lives... I do. A lot! But maybe acknowledging the nightmares keeps you grounded, keeps you humble, keeps you thinking about life, keeps you aware of the proximity to death, keeps you remembering how important it is to have a safe home and a good family. I always thought it odd in Japan that their cemetaries (for ashes?) were snuggled up right next to houses and combinis and schools. But perhaps no more strange than placing death into beautiful, lacquered coffins and burying it far, far away. No matter where you are here, you can't escape the poverty and disease and crime and desperation, but it's easy enough to find the great things -- happy kids, helpful grandmas, and icy sugarcane juice make the world go round. |
| posted by Raychaa @ 8:23 PM |
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| So wrong it's right. And then wrong. And then wrong again... welcome to the inaka. |
| About Me |
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Name: Raychaa
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About Me: “No man, not even a doctor, ever gives any other definition of what a nurse should be than this - 'devoted and obedient'. This definition would do just as well for a porter. It might even do for a horse. It would not do for a policeman.” (Florence Nightingale)
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