Halfway

Yesterday marked the halfway point of our trip (somewhere in there. I did the math and it was sometime Weds but I may have screwed it up due to time change).

We have been getting breakfast every day at the cafe under the hotel. Greg is a creature of habit. Same breafast every day: continental breakfast. The highlight, from his POV, is the dragonfruit and the chocolate croissants. We have already discussed the chocolate croissants... mmm chocolate croissants. Dragonfruit reminds me a little of kiwi taste and texture-wise (dotted with little black seeds), but the flesh is white, kinda like the consistency of melon.

And every day *I* can't decide what to get. I realized it is better to get their pre-rolled breakfasts (e.g. the Cambodian breakfast) because I can't communicate with the waitress very well so a la carte ordering is confusing. Yesterday I got "Cambodian Rice" which I thought would be like fried rice with stuff in it but was actually a pile or rice with two (very tasty) pork spareribs on top.

We went to see the Goldstone School, another HOPE-related project. Grades K-10. The 10th graders are the pioneers for the school so next year it'll be K-11, etc. It's in an old house where they basically use every available space for classroom and it's about what you'd expect. Imagine a big old country house where they set up a classroom in the living room, one in the garage, one in the upstairs hallway, etc. Tiny, cramped, packed with kids. Super hot (our host, Molly, kept referring to 'the hot season', which I am really glad I missed). The kids are all great, wearing their uniforms, super cheerful and energetic.

I got to teach them some improv games, which was *so cool*. First a group of 16 9th graders, then 24 5th graders. I had to adjust the games a bit to deal with language (they speak english but not well), and for age (5th graders are not mature enough to do some of the things without getting completely overstimulated and going buck wild). But they got it, and had fun. And it was especially rewarding because the culture there is very buttoned-down for the kids: they are used to school being a place where you sit still, say nothing, learn by rote, etc. Molly has been working hard, with both the kids and the staff, to help them operate more through relationships, to express themselves, etc. So they were so delighted with all these games that were just completely silly and creative. One of the games has each person, in turn, make up some silly action and sound, then we all do it together. One little 5th grade boy had us all swearing in Khmer, I suspect, because I know the look of a little kid doing something ribald, and I know the reaction of said kid's flunkies being delighted with his antics, and that was what I was seeing.

Went out to lunch afterwards. Kinda surreal experience, this one. A beautiful home, recently remodeled, all hardword and stuff, ponds and waterfalls outside, giant shuttered windows open to the breeze. A bunch of guys who looked like construction guys hanging out and doing not much. But no customers, no restaurant staff. We finally had one guy show up, and that was the only guy we saw. Menu was really small, but we all got something to eat. It just felt like I was eating in a restaurant that hadn't even opened to the public yet, but when they saw us wander in they were just like "why not feed them?"

Gerlinda took us to the Russian Market. I am not one for shopping, and was kinda dragging my heels at this one, but Oh My God. It has to be seen to be believed. Imagine a little kiosk stuffed with piles, literally piles, of merchandise (shirts, trinkets, whatever). Now imagine thousands of these kiosks all pushed together so they're flush up against each other on the sides, with like a 2.5 foot space in between to walk through. Now fill up a large city block with that. Now put a tin roof on top of that. So you're walking through a shopping mall, but hot and sweaty and cramped. But just like a mall there's everything in there (clothes, electronics, food). And so much more. Like feral cats.

But the other thing is the prices. Insanely low. One there's just the exchange rate (I have been eating like a king here for no more than $5 per meal). But also, many things we like in the states (e.g. Abercrombie and Fitch, Gap, Polo, etc) are made in Cambodia. So things were dirt cheap, literally 10x less than what you'd pay in the states. At first I suspected they were just knockoffs, but no it's the real deal. It's not in a swanky store staffed by sullen teens in an air conditioned mall. It's in a wrinkled pile under garbage bags full of other clothes run by what looks like a 12 year old.

AND you can bargain. I was going to spend $38 on something, Gerlinda talked them down to $30. Greg was determined to get a hiking hat that would go for ~40 in the states for 2 dollars. He and Gerlinda tried some ruse where they both went by the booth, pretending not to know each other (not sure how that was supposed to help), but the lady wouldn't budge. So he got it for $3, boo hoo.

After that Greg got a shampoo/massage from some salon run for women who are coming out of bad situations (sex trade) to learn legit skills. He seemed a little traumatized afterwards. Evidently a mix of very nice massage and very awkward pounding/poking. And it was all only a dollar.

I got to see Gerlinda's house, it's a beautiful 3 story French Villa, gated and all. She lives there with 3 other sisters from church. Pretty but it did not feel home-like to me. I find that in a lot of the residences here (and India too). Home to me is about soft stuff: carpeting, a big fluffy couch, comfy chairs. These houses, even the very nice ones, all have stone/marble floors, and most furniture is pretty-but-uncomfortable wooden chairs.

We went to a midweek service in the evening. Cesar Lopez spoke, did a great job. They were singing this song in the beginning in Khmer, I could not recognize it at all. I decided this was some new song I had never heard before. But then the singer switched to English and it was "Take the Lord With You", a song I have known for years. The timing was just so different I couldn't hear it, at all, without the words. I gave Cesar the blender I had dragged halfway around the world, very glad to be rid of that blender.

Cesar took Greg and I out to dinner after, Kevin O'Brien also came (director of the hospital here). Indian food, same place we ate the first night. I expected to get the hard sell about moving to Cambodia. Yes that was on their mind but no it was not pushy or all we talked about or Amway Sales-ish.