Spent the last two weeks in PP and vietnam. It was a great two weeks. Northern vietnam is unbelievable, Hanoi, Sapa, and Halong Bay. I couldnt recommend Sapa and Hanoi enough, they were amazing. Halong Bay was take it or leave it. Beautiful but overrun with tourists.
Leaving Cambodia came too suddenly, even though I knew it was coming. I had an amazing summer and learned so much. It is a beautiful country. I hope to return. But for now... end. of. blog.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Monday, August 13, 2007
One Month Later
It has been almost a month since I updated this. Busy month. It is also three months today since I arrived in Cambodia. The internship at BAB ended on the 27th. It was a very busy last couple of weeks trying to wrap everything up and have a final product completed. It was also many weeks of goodbyes and goodbye parties, and doing things one last time. Speaking of last times - the Fair, the enchanting alluring evil wonderful Fair... has been torn down. It was a sad day when I heard about it. No warning and no notice, the government just tore it down. Only one lonely ferris wheel still stands amidst a pile of debris. Shed a tear for the Fair.
I am back in PP for the next three days - I got back on Friday from Thailand. I was in Thailand for about 10 days with Grace. We flew into Bangkok on the 30th. It was a shock to arrive in a huge city, and get in an actual car, and drive through traffic on freeways. There is still an element of otherness - tons of motorbikes, some tuktuks, and pad thai in the street, but for the most part it is a huge major city and has everything that huge cities have.
We left Bangkok after only a day and took a bus and boat to Koh Tao, an island on the East coast of Thailand. The island itself was beautiful, but the area I stayed in was ruined by over development and overrun with tourists. We stayed there for four days to do an Open Water Diver Certification scuba course. The four days of the course ended up being the highlight of my time in Thailand by far. It is a very unreal experience breathing underwater. Very calming. The day after the course ended we got on a boat and headed to Koh Phangan, one island South of Koh Tao. This was much more what I expected Thailand to be. We stayed at a resort away from the main town/beach on the island. Beautiful. Left there on thursday morning at 10am and traveled for 23 hours to get back to PP. Went from truck to boat to bus to taxi to plane to tuk tuk.
24 hours after that I rented a dirt bike and drove 3 hours to the coast of Cambodia. Stayed overnight and spent Sunday touring through a town of ruined French colonial mansions. They were overgrown and abandoned, crumbling. Haunted looking. Leaving for Hanoi on Thursday..
I am back in PP for the next three days - I got back on Friday from Thailand. I was in Thailand for about 10 days with Grace. We flew into Bangkok on the 30th. It was a shock to arrive in a huge city, and get in an actual car, and drive through traffic on freeways. There is still an element of otherness - tons of motorbikes, some tuktuks, and pad thai in the street, but for the most part it is a huge major city and has everything that huge cities have.
We left Bangkok after only a day and took a bus and boat to Koh Tao, an island on the East coast of Thailand. The island itself was beautiful, but the area I stayed in was ruined by over development and overrun with tourists. We stayed there for four days to do an Open Water Diver Certification scuba course. The four days of the course ended up being the highlight of my time in Thailand by far. It is a very unreal experience breathing underwater. Very calming. The day after the course ended we got on a boat and headed to Koh Phangan, one island South of Koh Tao. This was much more what I expected Thailand to be. We stayed at a resort away from the main town/beach on the island. Beautiful. Left there on thursday morning at 10am and traveled for 23 hours to get back to PP. Went from truck to boat to bus to taxi to plane to tuk tuk.
24 hours after that I rented a dirt bike and drove 3 hours to the coast of Cambodia. Stayed overnight and spent Sunday touring through a town of ruined French colonial mansions. They were overgrown and abandoned, crumbling. Haunted looking. Leaving for Hanoi on Thursday..
Monday, July 16, 2007
Vietnam
this weekend i went to ho chi minh city with my friend grace. its a 6 hour bus ride from phnom penh but it was surprisingly quick and painless - and very cheap. we arrived on thursday afternoon, found a guest house, and headed out to wander around the city. the first place we went was the central marketplace. its huge but a lot like the markets in pp. slightly cleaner. we bought some fruit to have with wine on the balcony of our guesthouse, and continued wandering. after 3 hours of roaming around we headed back to the guesthouse and had bread and cheese (which is sold on the street for 25 cents) with fruit for dinner. we were staying in the backpacker neighbourhood so after dinner we went out and played pool with other travelers.
on friday we did all the main tourist sights in ho chi minh. first was the fine arts museum, which is in a striking old colonial mansion. it was surprising how unsupervised it was, we just walked in... roamed around.. and left. no one seemed to be in charge of the place at all. next we went to the war remnants museum, which was just horrific. some of the most disturbing pictures i have ever seem. especially the pictures of victims of the chemical weapons during the vietnam war. there was also photos of groups of civilians (women and children) looking absolutely terrified, and the caption under the photo would read something like: as soon as i walked away from taking this picture the soldiers opened fire. i heard screams and bodies falling but i didnt look back. after the war museum we stopped and had pho - a famous vietnamese noodle soup. it was delicious. after lunch we walked to the nicer, ritzy part of ho chi minh and checked out the malls and upscale hotels.
aside from the rich area (which was small) ho chi minh seemed like a bigger, slightly cleaner, more chaotic version of phnom penh. the traffic and lack of road rules is much worse - to the point where it is sometimes impossible to cross the street, and the city itself is many times bigger, but the general look of it was not that different.
after our day of touring around we went to dinner at a jazz bar called Sax n Art, relaxed and listening to live jazz. very nice place.
saturday we signed up to do a one day tour of the mekong delta. the tour started at 8am with a bus trip 2 hours to a village called mythos. there we got on a bus and toured around a few islands, saw local villagers making coconut candy (which is delicious), had lunch, listened to traditional vietnamese music, and took a ride on row boats through the narrow canals of the delta. it was a totally new landscape - something i had never seen before. its just all water really... the foliage is dense and huts and small homes just appear our of nowhere barely visible through the trees. the people travel by boat along canals that are lined with tall grasses/trees.
saturday night we went out for sushi dinner - sushi is not popular and probably not a smart idea in pp so it was great to eat it again. then we went to an expat bar and hung out with a large group of german people who were having a private party that they nicely included us in. sunday morning we got back on the bus and headed home. overall it was a great trip. i plan on going back to vietnam in august - to the northern part to see hanoi, and i cant wait...
on friday we did all the main tourist sights in ho chi minh. first was the fine arts museum, which is in a striking old colonial mansion. it was surprising how unsupervised it was, we just walked in... roamed around.. and left. no one seemed to be in charge of the place at all. next we went to the war remnants museum, which was just horrific. some of the most disturbing pictures i have ever seem. especially the pictures of victims of the chemical weapons during the vietnam war. there was also photos of groups of civilians (women and children) looking absolutely terrified, and the caption under the photo would read something like: as soon as i walked away from taking this picture the soldiers opened fire. i heard screams and bodies falling but i didnt look back. after the war museum we stopped and had pho - a famous vietnamese noodle soup. it was delicious. after lunch we walked to the nicer, ritzy part of ho chi minh and checked out the malls and upscale hotels.
aside from the rich area (which was small) ho chi minh seemed like a bigger, slightly cleaner, more chaotic version of phnom penh. the traffic and lack of road rules is much worse - to the point where it is sometimes impossible to cross the street, and the city itself is many times bigger, but the general look of it was not that different.
after our day of touring around we went to dinner at a jazz bar called Sax n Art, relaxed and listening to live jazz. very nice place.
saturday we signed up to do a one day tour of the mekong delta. the tour started at 8am with a bus trip 2 hours to a village called mythos. there we got on a bus and toured around a few islands, saw local villagers making coconut candy (which is delicious), had lunch, listened to traditional vietnamese music, and took a ride on row boats through the narrow canals of the delta. it was a totally new landscape - something i had never seen before. its just all water really... the foliage is dense and huts and small homes just appear our of nowhere barely visible through the trees. the people travel by boat along canals that are lined with tall grasses/trees.
saturday night we went out for sushi dinner - sushi is not popular and probably not a smart idea in pp so it was great to eat it again. then we went to an expat bar and hung out with a large group of german people who were having a private party that they nicely included us in. sunday morning we got back on the bus and headed home. overall it was a great trip. i plan on going back to vietnam in august - to the northern part to see hanoi, and i cant wait...
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
random
for the last couple of weeks i have been in phnom penh working and hanging out with the other interns. i definitely know the city pretty well now. there are some great restaurants, used book stores and shops which make it feel fairly quaint and friendly. but there is still an edge to it. and no mcdonalds:) did some tourist things last weekend - went to the killing fields, which is an area outside pp where the khmer rouge executed thousands of people and buried them in mass graves. it was pretty disturbing/horrific/incomprehensible. about half of the graves still have not been excavated.
on a lighter note, last saturday i went to my first khmer hip hop show. it was surreal. it was in a dive bar/club that they charged $2 admission to get into (first time ive ever paid cover in cambodia, and likely the last). they took songs like sexyback and changed the words to khmer. and yelled "khmer" a lot (except they pronounce it "khmai"). and the only beer they were serving was budweiser.
on sunday a group of us went to the phnom penh hotel and paid $5 to spend the day swimming. it started to pour rain about an hour after we got there and we decided to wait it out and ended up in the pool in torrential rain for two hours. it got really cold but they were going to charge us another $8 each to go into the hottub so we were stuck.
otherwise work has been good. we are starting to wrap thing up a little bit but everything takes longer than you think it will and there are a lot of editing things that need to get finished. some of the interns are leaving as early as next week.
on a lighter note, last saturday i went to my first khmer hip hop show. it was surreal. it was in a dive bar/club that they charged $2 admission to get into (first time ive ever paid cover in cambodia, and likely the last). they took songs like sexyback and changed the words to khmer. and yelled "khmer" a lot (except they pronounce it "khmai"). and the only beer they were serving was budweiser.
on sunday a group of us went to the phnom penh hotel and paid $5 to spend the day swimming. it started to pour rain about an hour after we got there and we decided to wait it out and ended up in the pool in torrential rain for two hours. it got really cold but they were going to charge us another $8 each to go into the hottub so we were stuck.
otherwise work has been good. we are starting to wrap thing up a little bit but everything takes longer than you think it will and there are a lot of editing things that need to get finished. some of the interns are leaving as early as next week.
Monday, July 2, 2007
update
not too much has been going on, i was sick for the week after i got back from kep and didnt really get out of bed. since then i have been catching up on work, we just finished our rough draft of our children's rights manual. im doing a lot of reading - am trying to read a bunch of kurt vonnegut books (so far: breakfast of champions, cats cradle, mother night and player piano), and also tom robbins books. am currently distracted by the poisonwood bible though. all of which has nothing to do with cambodia.
phnom penh is feeling like home now, as much as it still gets exhausting to be constantly harassed by moto drivers... "moto" "moto" "moto"... its a constant chorus as i walk down the street. just the general staring is still off-putting. saw a kid on the back of a moto attached to an IV which was interesting. its raining almost every day now, on and off, but its much cooler which i like.
we had a guest speaker last week who works with the defense support section of the united nations assistance to the khmer rouge tribunals. it was very interesting, definitely the kind of work that i would like to get involved in - but as the guest speaker said - international criminal law is very in and glamorous right now in the legal world so its hard to get into.
went out on canada day and sang karaoke. cambodians love karaoke. for some reason we were hanging out with a cambodian movie star and he was very into it. every other song was khmer pop music. having a bbq tomorrow for july 4th. otherwise the office is quiet this week because the other half of the interns is in Kep doing what we were doing two weeks ago.
phnom penh is feeling like home now, as much as it still gets exhausting to be constantly harassed by moto drivers... "moto" "moto" "moto"... its a constant chorus as i walk down the street. just the general staring is still off-putting. saw a kid on the back of a moto attached to an IV which was interesting. its raining almost every day now, on and off, but its much cooler which i like.
we had a guest speaker last week who works with the defense support section of the united nations assistance to the khmer rouge tribunals. it was very interesting, definitely the kind of work that i would like to get involved in - but as the guest speaker said - international criminal law is very in and glamorous right now in the legal world so its hard to get into.
went out on canada day and sang karaoke. cambodians love karaoke. for some reason we were hanging out with a cambodian movie star and he was very into it. every other song was khmer pop music. having a bbq tomorrow for july 4th. otherwise the office is quiet this week because the other half of the interns is in Kep doing what we were doing two weeks ago.
Friday, June 22, 2007
trip to Kep
this week i went with a group of interns to a small village on the coast of cambodia near the border of vietnam. the drive down on monday morning was terrible - the bus was old, the roads were terrible, and the AC was broken. after 5 sweaty, bumpy hours in a cramped bus with blaring khmer karoake music we finally arrived. it was quickly apparent that the drive was worth it. our guesthouse was on a hill overlooking the ocean. it was beautiful, lush and green. i shared a bungalow with my bff here - grace - and we had an ocean view and hammocks on the balcony. the first day we had the afternoon off, so i spent it reading in the hammock. later on we all had dinner and played cards.
tuesday morning we headed out to the village where we were going to be working. the village is made up of a group of families who had been active khmer rouge until the mid 90s. when they defected they were relocated to the south and formed a village. BAB set up a center to help them out. the center offers classes for the kids, and is also working on establishing a farm on the surrounding land to provide food for the village. our job for the week was to help with the farming and teaching.
after orientation on tuesday grace and i headed to the kampot caves, which is a small rocky mountain with caves all through it. when we arrived we were met by two enthusiastic young men who wanted to be our guides. we accepted their offer and headed into the mountain. it ended up being an amazing afternoon. they took us into some really out of the way caves. near the end of the tour we came out of the back of the mountain and they asked us if we wanted to climb up and over it to get back to our moto driver. we decided to go for it and while it was quite treacherous it was definitely worth it.
wednesday morning we left really early to get to the village to do some farming. grace and i arrived before everyone else and were met by a stern looking man who silently handed us each a hoe and started walking out into the fields. we followed behind apprehensively. he demonstrated what he wanted us to do and then stood sternly watching us as we dug at this field. it was slightly unnerving. the others arrived about half an hour later and we finally figured out what we were supposed to be doing - which was not aimlessly digging at a field. we were meant to plant a corn field. once we got started it only took the group of us about 3 hours. 3 hours of farming in the heat was enough for us though. i was feeling pretty terrible from what i thought was sunstroke.
i spent the next two days in bed with a fever, vomiting etc. decided to try to get up on friday morning to teach. i made it through the class but then felt worse than ever and was eventually sent back to phnom penh in the back of a taxi. so im back now, in bed, feeling somewhat better but still pretty terrible. the trip overall was great when i wasnt sick. i was upset to have to miss out on the last few days. the country side is just beautiful. it really became clear how most of the country really lives. phnom penh is the only really urban area and even saying that feels like a bit of a stretch considering what most people feel is urban.
working with the kids is what effected me the most. they are so enthusiastic, energetic, and very motivated to learn. the problem is that there are about 30 or 40 of them in a tiny class, with very little resources and the age range is from about 4 to 12 or older in one room. it is a difficult environment to teach anything in. they are all desperate for any kind of individual attention and learn quickly when you can take the time to sit down with them in a small group of 2 or 3.
tuesday morning we headed out to the village where we were going to be working. the village is made up of a group of families who had been active khmer rouge until the mid 90s. when they defected they were relocated to the south and formed a village. BAB set up a center to help them out. the center offers classes for the kids, and is also working on establishing a farm on the surrounding land to provide food for the village. our job for the week was to help with the farming and teaching.
after orientation on tuesday grace and i headed to the kampot caves, which is a small rocky mountain with caves all through it. when we arrived we were met by two enthusiastic young men who wanted to be our guides. we accepted their offer and headed into the mountain. it ended up being an amazing afternoon. they took us into some really out of the way caves. near the end of the tour we came out of the back of the mountain and they asked us if we wanted to climb up and over it to get back to our moto driver. we decided to go for it and while it was quite treacherous it was definitely worth it.
wednesday morning we left really early to get to the village to do some farming. grace and i arrived before everyone else and were met by a stern looking man who silently handed us each a hoe and started walking out into the fields. we followed behind apprehensively. he demonstrated what he wanted us to do and then stood sternly watching us as we dug at this field. it was slightly unnerving. the others arrived about half an hour later and we finally figured out what we were supposed to be doing - which was not aimlessly digging at a field. we were meant to plant a corn field. once we got started it only took the group of us about 3 hours. 3 hours of farming in the heat was enough for us though. i was feeling pretty terrible from what i thought was sunstroke.
i spent the next two days in bed with a fever, vomiting etc. decided to try to get up on friday morning to teach. i made it through the class but then felt worse than ever and was eventually sent back to phnom penh in the back of a taxi. so im back now, in bed, feeling somewhat better but still pretty terrible. the trip overall was great when i wasnt sick. i was upset to have to miss out on the last few days. the country side is just beautiful. it really became clear how most of the country really lives. phnom penh is the only really urban area and even saying that feels like a bit of a stretch considering what most people feel is urban.
working with the kids is what effected me the most. they are so enthusiastic, energetic, and very motivated to learn. the problem is that there are about 30 or 40 of them in a tiny class, with very little resources and the age range is from about 4 to 12 or older in one room. it is a difficult environment to teach anything in. they are all desperate for any kind of individual attention and learn quickly when you can take the time to sit down with them in a small group of 2 or 3.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
more ferris wheel and the beach
Went to the beach last weekend - Sihanoukville. It was beautiful. Not totally developed although getting there. Lots of hut type bars on the beach, then our bungalow/hotel was right on the water. It was a great time. Lots of reading, sleeping and relaxing. The water was warm and it was sunny the whole weekend.
Also went back to that fair with the ferris wheel. Rode a different ferris wheel, this one was smaller and equally sketchy. the fair is just so hilarious. it is something that just would not happen back home. its more a random collection of old rides on the field. you just ride your motorbike right up to the ride and pay about 25 cents, they stop the ride and you get on. and usually you are the only one on the ride. i think i wrote about this before but everytime i am there i just find it eerily delightful.
Also went back to that fair with the ferris wheel. Rode a different ferris wheel, this one was smaller and equally sketchy. the fair is just so hilarious. it is something that just would not happen back home. its more a random collection of old rides on the field. you just ride your motorbike right up to the ride and pay about 25 cents, they stop the ride and you get on. and usually you are the only one on the ride. i think i wrote about this before but everytime i am there i just find it eerily delightful.
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