Andrew Turco - A year in Cambodia

Somehow, although there was nothing special about today, it just seemed like an action packed day with lots to do. It was one of those days in which I never really stopped sweating. Maybe it was because I switched from rotating between my two quick-dry khaki-looking pants to wearing legitimate khakis, which were probably purchased a little too close to the end of summer to still be able to get the lightweight ones ideal for warm weather. Or, maybe it was just hot today, and I was moving around a lot.

Classes were especially good today, which was very needed, since this morning I just had that feeling of not wanting to teaching. I was trying to get through my lesson plans all morning but just couldn’t focus. They weren’t interesting me. As I had forgotten that I had made lunch plans with someone around here, I went out to ask Buntha whether it would be possible to leave at 1:00 instead of 12:00. It was, of course, fine, but when I walked out, he was playing chess with one of the other moto drivers. I thought he asked if I wanted to play but now think that he really asked if I wanted to watch him play so that I could learn. Anyway, it was nice (and hot) sitting on the pavement outside of the guesthouse watching them play. I’ve never seen people move pieces so fast. They got through about three games in a half an hour and were also very good. They weren’t rushing because they didn’t know what they were doing. All in all, the rules are mostly the same, but there are, in fact, a few small differences between the rules I had always played by and theirs.

Amusingly, I was about to try to ask about/try to correct one of his moves when I thought back to one of the PiA orientation activities from two years ago. All of the PiAers were split up into groups of ten and given the rules to a game, in which the objective was to win as many points as possible. After a certain amount of time, each person had to tally his points, and the person with the lowest number of points had to move down a group while the person with the most moved up to a higher level group. The game then continued. The only thing is that we couldn’t talk the entire time, and we found out after the fact that each group had different directions, which then explained all of the intense hand-waving and angry looks across the circle of players. The purpose was to show that, when in Asia, people might be “playing by different rules” and that we’d have to recognize and accommodate or compromise on these difficult to understand differences. Anyway, I remembered this activity while playing, or really co-playing, chess this morning, except that I wasn’t experiencing the message of the activity. I was actually doing to activity again: playing a game in which we were playing by different rules and in which we had few ways to communicate those differences.

Anyway, the lunch was good. Rabia introduced me to Jean, a French student living in Phnom Penh for six months, whom she met last week. He’s interested in hanging out with not just Cambodians but also with expats from places other than France while he’s here in the interest of really taking advantage of being abroad. It was really nice to chat with him, and he seems like another good person to have around to hang out with. Plus, the three of us made a deal to go to outdoor aerobics at Olympic Stadium after work next week and possibly try to make it a regular activity. Additionally, one of his friends is allowed to use his Red Cross Land Cruiser on the weekends, so we also talked about some potential trips to otherwise more difficult to reach places.

After a speedy ride to school, I was pleasantly surprised that my warm-up vocabulary exercise using picture flashcards went so well that we actually just did that for most of the class. In fact, after some flatter classes, it was nice to have a new kind of activity to break the routine, and I again realized the importance of diverse types of activities. Also, having a hands-on activity, in the literal sense, was a nice change. Even bringing in props to look at helps. When I was talking about coin collecting and they didn’t know what coins were, I was happy to find that I had a whole stash of them in my backpack. We were talking about hobbies today, so I brought in some photos of mine to show them, which was a good way to have something visual and different in class and also a good excuse to try to incorporate a little more about what the US is like and some cross-cultural activities, which I’ve been trying to find ways of doing in class. I would like to teach more than just English and also about being abroad, cultural similarities and differences, different ways of thinking, and more. I only wish that I had actually brought my cameras or that I had a board of checkers to teach them how to play since they learned the word but didn’t know how to play the game. In my essay writing class that followed, I even taught myself the official difference between using “that” and “which.” And, for the first time, I went 15 minutes past the end of class and didn’t even realize until my students finally informed me.

Tonight, Brendan and I went to what’s become a somewhat regular trip to a Chinese dumpling place a ten minute ride away. It’s great, cheap, and really brings me back to last summer. I get to use my broken Chinese sentences, and they humor me. Plus, it’s a nice change to have Chinese tea rather than the flavor of tea that is common at all of the Khmer restaurants here. And they even make xi hong cher chow jidan (probably spelled completely incorrectly) for me, which isn’t even on the menu and which really brings me back to summer. Since this is in the seemingly Chinese section of town, there’s even a bubble tea place across the street.

Also, another random thing that took some time to get used to that I forgot to mention in the last post is that none of the phones here have voicemail. So if you don’t get someone when you call, you essentially have to text them your message. Why there’s no voicemail, I don’t know.

And that was my Tuesday.