My first few weeks in Kpando I was introduced to loads of people and almost every time I met someone new they would say "You're welcome." Immediately I thought, "Oh no I didn't say 'Thank you', was I supposed to say thank you?? Am I being rude? Why are they telling me you're welcome when I didn't say thank you" As these panicky thoughts ran through my mind at every instance I would just awkwardly smile and giggle. About a week ago I realized that they are saying, "You are welcome." As in, "you are welcome here in Africa, here in Ghana, here in Kpando, you are welcome here in this community, my community." In which the proper response would be a smile and a thank you. I guess I am so used to the exchange of "Thank you and You're welcome" back in the states that it threw me off every time I heard some one say "you are welcome" after meeting me. I never really sat back and pondered the meaning of the exchange, but now that I have, I think it makes more sense the way the Ghanaian people do it...
You are welcome.
Thank you!
So this weekend I found out that Ghanaians really LOVE to party! Funerals here are a big deal, tons and tons of people attend, the family saves for months and they last 4 days! This particular funeral was for a woman and her mother in the compound across the dirt path from my home and it was quite the affair! They were close friends of Mary and Peter. The girl was 35, finishing up her masters at Cape Coast University and complained of chest pains, she went to the hospital they gave her an injection and she went into a coma, I think she was probably allergic to the medicine. Her mother, who lived across the road from where I live was told the news and collapsed a week later.
The funeral for both of them was held last weekend and was a full on celebration. There were probably 800 people in town for it! Cars and vans and buses lined both sides of the street. On Friday afternoon, the family and friend pick up the bodies from the hospital and play drums and trumpets as they caravan down the main street in Kpando, dancing, crying and shouting praises the whole while. During this part of the ceremony is also when the friends and family mourn, and boy they REALLY mourn...outbursts of sobbing, murderous screams, wailing and flailing, they don't hold anything back, which I think is healthy..."Get it all out girl, get it all out," I thought to myself while witnessing one woman mourn. But during the funeral ceremony there is a great deal of celebration as well. They were playing drums and doing the traditional bo bo bo dance until the better part of 5am Saturday morning. They had at least three bands and everyone, the men especially were DRUNK! I pulled out my trusty CVS first aid kit (which I have used at least three times every day here) and patched up several cuts and scrapes on drunk mens faces. Where almost every time there was a marriage proposal.
My bed time around here is usually 8pm. I am SO TIRED everyday I just pass out. When I tried to go to sleep Friday night it never happened because of the blaring music (my door and window face directly where the celebration was happening.) SO I decided that I would join the fun!I went to the shop to help Patience (my sister) serve alcohol. At about 1am Peter, my cute sweet dad around 57 years old, (who was also hammered) insisted that he take me "downtown" to get a drink with his brother who had just arrived from the Northern region (a 12 hour journey). Downtown was all of a two minute walk to a shack with a blue light. We chatted about Barrack Obama, Ghanaian royalty (my family is the royal family here...which I like to think makes me a princess!) and stole chairs from a drunk who passed out at the table next to us.
After we drank our huge beers Peter grabbed my hand as we stumbled back to the party. They tried to teach me to bo bo bo dance (specific to Kpando), which is basically bending over and shaking your booty while in a moving circle around men playing the drums and trumpet. Then we paid our respects to the bodies and viewed the corpses. This, for me, was by far the most strange part of the ceremony. Mainly because everyone who went into that room to pay their respects was at least four sheets to the wind! After viewing the corpses you take a shot of palm wine (so gross and like 100% alcohol) and continue to dance. I went back to helping patience in the store until about 3am then called it a night, but they were still going!
At about 6am they transported all of the chairs and tents to the church of the deceased, which must have been a lot of work because there were tons of chairs and at least six tents. I went to the actual funeral mass Saturday morning with Mary...it was very sad, they are survived by one brother. I thought I was going to pass out because I was under the noon sun, dressed in black and I thought hungover! But I later found out it was because I had Malaria.
Don't freak out, because I am fine now, but being sick is never fun, whether you are in Texas, Ghana or Switzerland. It just brings out the worst in you and you never really feel yourself when you are sick! That is the reason this post is so late because I have been ill this past week. So I went to the hospital on Monday when I had an on and off fever, headaches, chills and terrible stomach pains. (I am taking anti-malaria meds and sleeping under a mosquito net, but there is nothing that 100% guarantees you won't get Malaria.) I am friends with Jones, one of the Pharmacists at the hospital and he made it his job to make sure I was O.K. and taken care of properly. I think I got faster treatment here than I have anywhere back home.
There were several people waiting on the benches to be seen. I told Jones and James that I wanted to wait in line because it wasn't fair that I cut in front just because I was white. They looked at me like I was stupid and completely ignored my request. Next thing I know I am ushered into a room with a nurse taking my temperature and blood pressure. I tell my symptoms to a nice Cuban woman doctor and then she ordered a blood test. I go to the lab, they take a sample and it turns up negative for Malaria. They take me back to the Cuban woman and she says that I have all the symptoms of Malaria, so the bacteria must be premature and not showing up on the lab work and she wants to treat me anyway.
Off to the injection room we go, which is no bigger than a small pantry. Again I asked to wait in line, but another Cuban doctor, took my hand, told me he was paying for my medicines and took me into the injection room. In the room there was another nurse, a mother and two little girls. One girl screaming as the nurse administered a shot right in her buttocks! I was thankful it wasn't me because injections in the ass hurt the most!
The Cuban doctor fills up the syringe with the meds and as I start to roll up my shirt sleeve he gives me a smile and says, "Around, its for your butt." UGH I think, but if it will make me feel better its worth it. I didn't get one injection, but two...one in each cheek. I was so glad it was over, but little did I know that there were two more of those I had to take for the next two days. Painful? yes. Worth it? Hell yes! I finished my treatment on Wednesday and feel like a new woman today! No more stomach pains, headaches or fevers! TAKE THAT Malaria!!!!!
Sorry it was long!
Peace and Love from Africa
Friday, February 12, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
THIS is Africa
I feel at home.
My host family is amazing! My father's name is Peter, he is precious, always listening to the radio with his shirt off and feeding the goats. My brother is James, he is 22 and has become a very good friend!! My mom's name is Rose Mary (crazy right), but every one calls her Mary or Mama. She is the matriarch of the neighborhood. They have a shop in front of the compound, where she sells everything; ice cream and booze being the top sellers! For many kids in Kpando, her shop is the first stop on the way home from school, where they pick up the delicious ice cream she makes sometimes for free and sometimes for 5 peshwas (equivalent to 3.5 cents). I love Mary, she is so sweet and has taught me how to do many things the way Ghanaians do. I think the feeling is mutual because whenever I run into some of Mary's friends on the street they all say, "Mary loves you too too much!" She has already told me that even though it is a long way away, she is sad that I have to leave.
I love my living situation! My accommodations are extremely nice by Ghanaian standards. The nicest and biggest room is given to their guests. I have a queen size bed, a fan, a table, two chairs AND a freezer! The toilet is an outhouse consisting of a concrete slab with a hole in it...that took some getting used to, but its all good now. This might be hard to picture...to get to the shower I walk down a path usually accompanied by goats and chickens. We have a spout where I fill up my bucket, that is when the water is running. The families who don't have a spout have to fetch their own water, they get it from the police station, which is miles from many homes. It takes several trips to get enough water for the family to bathe, cook and clean for one day. It has made me appreciate water sooo much and not take it for granted. Now don't get me wrong, if I had a choice between my shower at home or my bucket shower here I would pick my shower at home. But I don't have that option, so...when in Rome, do as the Romans do! I don't hate the bucket shower by any means, I actually like it, especially at night. There is no ceiling on the shower so I get to bathe under the moon and the stars...it is really neat and spiritual. It was a full moon the other night and I didn't even need a flashlight to bathe.
There are several kids who live in the compound. The ones who are around the most are Prince, 12, Freddy (Edem's youngest brother), 13, Paulo, 3 and Rachel and Ester,11. Rachel and Ester are always together! They help Mary and their older cousin, Patience, with everything. The other night I watched Ester, Rachel and Patience cook Banku, a local dish made of Cassava and corn crushed and mixed together until its mushy, its my FAVORITE thing I've eaten here. Little Ester had her feet on the iron stems of the pot which was about 6 inches away from the hot, burning charcoal. She muscled the huge wooden stick in the pot and would touch the pot with her bare hands moving it around several times to get the right angle so she could continue stirring the thick substance. I asked Patience if the pot was hot (I was thinking surely its not too hot because she doesn't make a peep when she grabs hold of it). But I was wrong. Patience answered, "Ooo yes, es very hot, but Ester here is a strong strong girl. Here in Africa we teach the girls to cook at a very young age." When the Banku became thicker and too hard for Ester to muscle around, Patience didn't say a word, she just gave Ester a tender look, Ester popped up and Patience took the reigns. Patience mumbled something in Ewe to Rachel and then asked me, "Do you want to go with Rachel to my auntie's house." I said of course, so off I went through the village, hand in hand with Rachel and Prince. It was during this moment I felt...THIS is Africa. The sun had set and it was dark, my eyes had to adjust so I didn't trip on the rocks jutting out of the dirt path. Families were crowded around an orange flame as they cooked their dinner. Silhouettes of babies were laughing and running around trees as their mothers were chasing them. I was not a tourist, I was part of this family, part of this community. I was so thankful in this moment as I felt the heart beat of my tiny neighborhood.
We finally got to Auntie's house and she and her son were sharing a bowl of Fufu (another local dish) eating under the dim light coming from the kitchen. The little boy, Francis, was taken aback when he saw me! "Yovo?" he blurted as he nearly fell off his stool. I just laughed and said yes. They immediately pulled up a chair for me to sit and offered me some food...here they say, "You are invited." if they are offering you some of their food. We picked up some things for Mary to make her famous ice cream and headed back home.
UNiTED is going well. I am working on the framework right now, which consists of getting everything down on paper and defining what UNiTED is, its goals, who it will serve, etc. I am also preparing for some interns who will be coming in late March. They are getting their masters in International Public Health from a university in the Netherlands and have come to help identify the health problems that are most taxing in Kpando. I am reading a really good book right now! Its called "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder. I found it at the children's home, just lying in a corner and something told me that I should read it. Its about Paul Farmer, a brilliant doctor from America who does work in Haiti. He witnesses a huge amount of poverty and the book details his feelings about it and how he helps. It really is the perfect book for me to be reading right now, not only because he is trying to improve the quality of life of those living in poverty, but also because
there are a lot of cultural similarities between Haiti and Ghana. The people of Haiti originated from West Africa, primarily Ghana, as a result of the slave trade 200 years ago. So they kept many of their traditions and beliefs. The way he identifies the problems in Haiti has a lot more to it than just taking everything he observes for face value! He understands the culture, the religion, the language and then starts to make some conclusions! I LOVE this book and feel that God placed it in my hands right now to keep on inspiring me to do his will, sort of like hinting to me that there is a right way to go about the research in this town for this project...from the bottom up.
Thank you to everyone for your support and prayers!
Peace and love from Africa
Rosie
My host family is amazing! My father's name is Peter, he is precious, always listening to the radio with his shirt off and feeding the goats. My brother is James, he is 22 and has become a very good friend!! My mom's name is Rose Mary (crazy right), but every one calls her Mary or Mama. She is the matriarch of the neighborhood. They have a shop in front of the compound, where she sells everything; ice cream and booze being the top sellers! For many kids in Kpando, her shop is the first stop on the way home from school, where they pick up the delicious ice cream she makes sometimes for free and sometimes for 5 peshwas (equivalent to 3.5 cents). I love Mary, she is so sweet and has taught me how to do many things the way Ghanaians do. I think the feeling is mutual because whenever I run into some of Mary's friends on the street they all say, "Mary loves you too too much!" She has already told me that even though it is a long way away, she is sad that I have to leave.
I love my living situation! My accommodations are extremely nice by Ghanaian standards. The nicest and biggest room is given to their guests. I have a queen size bed, a fan, a table, two chairs AND a freezer! The toilet is an outhouse consisting of a concrete slab with a hole in it...that took some getting used to, but its all good now. This might be hard to picture...to get to the shower I walk down a path usually accompanied by goats and chickens. We have a spout where I fill up my bucket, that is when the water is running. The families who don't have a spout have to fetch their own water, they get it from the police station, which is miles from many homes. It takes several trips to get enough water for the family to bathe, cook and clean for one day. It has made me appreciate water sooo much and not take it for granted. Now don't get me wrong, if I had a choice between my shower at home or my bucket shower here I would pick my shower at home. But I don't have that option, so...when in Rome, do as the Romans do! I don't hate the bucket shower by any means, I actually like it, especially at night. There is no ceiling on the shower so I get to bathe under the moon and the stars...it is really neat and spiritual. It was a full moon the other night and I didn't even need a flashlight to bathe.
There are several kids who live in the compound. The ones who are around the most are Prince, 12, Freddy (Edem's youngest brother), 13, Paulo, 3 and Rachel and Ester,11. Rachel and Ester are always together! They help Mary and their older cousin, Patience, with everything. The other night I watched Ester, Rachel and Patience cook Banku, a local dish made of Cassava and corn crushed and mixed together until its mushy, its my FAVORITE thing I've eaten here. Little Ester had her feet on the iron stems of the pot which was about 6 inches away from the hot, burning charcoal. She muscled the huge wooden stick in the pot and would touch the pot with her bare hands moving it around several times to get the right angle so she could continue stirring the thick substance. I asked Patience if the pot was hot (I was thinking surely its not too hot because she doesn't make a peep when she grabs hold of it). But I was wrong. Patience answered, "Ooo yes, es very hot, but Ester here is a strong strong girl. Here in Africa we teach the girls to cook at a very young age." When the Banku became thicker and too hard for Ester to muscle around, Patience didn't say a word, she just gave Ester a tender look, Ester popped up and Patience took the reigns. Patience mumbled something in Ewe to Rachel and then asked me, "Do you want to go with Rachel to my auntie's house." I said of course, so off I went through the village, hand in hand with Rachel and Prince. It was during this moment I felt...THIS is Africa. The sun had set and it was dark, my eyes had to adjust so I didn't trip on the rocks jutting out of the dirt path. Families were crowded around an orange flame as they cooked their dinner. Silhouettes of babies were laughing and running around trees as their mothers were chasing them. I was not a tourist, I was part of this family, part of this community. I was so thankful in this moment as I felt the heart beat of my tiny neighborhood.
We finally got to Auntie's house and she and her son were sharing a bowl of Fufu (another local dish) eating under the dim light coming from the kitchen. The little boy, Francis, was taken aback when he saw me! "Yovo?" he blurted as he nearly fell off his stool. I just laughed and said yes. They immediately pulled up a chair for me to sit and offered me some food...here they say, "You are invited." if they are offering you some of their food. We picked up some things for Mary to make her famous ice cream and headed back home.
UNiTED is going well. I am working on the framework right now, which consists of getting everything down on paper and defining what UNiTED is, its goals, who it will serve, etc. I am also preparing for some interns who will be coming in late March. They are getting their masters in International Public Health from a university in the Netherlands and have come to help identify the health problems that are most taxing in Kpando. I am reading a really good book right now! Its called "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder. I found it at the children's home, just lying in a corner and something told me that I should read it. Its about Paul Farmer, a brilliant doctor from America who does work in Haiti. He witnesses a huge amount of poverty and the book details his feelings about it and how he helps. It really is the perfect book for me to be reading right now, not only because he is trying to improve the quality of life of those living in poverty, but also because
there are a lot of cultural similarities between Haiti and Ghana. The people of Haiti originated from West Africa, primarily Ghana, as a result of the slave trade 200 years ago. So they kept many of their traditions and beliefs. The way he identifies the problems in Haiti has a lot more to it than just taking everything he observes for face value! He understands the culture, the religion, the language and then starts to make some conclusions! I LOVE this book and feel that God placed it in my hands right now to keep on inspiring me to do his will, sort of like hinting to me that there is a right way to go about the research in this town for this project...from the bottom up.
Thank you to everyone for your support and prayers!
Peace and love from Africa
Rosie
Sunday, January 24, 2010
I understand captain planet today
I have finally made it to Kpando! Internet is going to be a bit of an issue here. There is only one internet cafe and slow does not even begin to describe the speed at this place! It seems the server does not like gmail very much, it takes a while to do stuff so I won't be responding to emails as much as Id like! Please do send letters, packages or whatever you'd like to the address to the left.
We ended up having to stay in Accra for an extra night because Edems car had issues and he was very ill with malaria (once you get it it comes back in waves). It actually worked out well because I was able to take time to adjust to the time difference, 6 hours ahead of Dallas. Arriving in Accra at 1030pm was a little bit scary, mainly because I was by myself. I didn't get off the plane and immediately feel like I had returned home to mother Africa. There was no grandeur moment reassuring me that I was supposed to be there. I was HOT, nervous (mostly about my bags) and a bit scared! I wanted to get my bags, find Edem and the the H outta the airport!
My first impression of Edem was that he is the strong and silent type. Boy oh boy was I wrong! When I first met him he wasn't saying much because he felt like crap due to the malaria, he wasn't complaining, he just wasnt speaking. On the way to Kpando, I got to see the true Edem, the giggling, talkative and extremely goofy Edem! We talked about UNiTED a lot on the way here and he is just full of ideas, never thought I could meet someone more idealistic than myself. I have my work cut out for me! I am essentially assisting with getting this organization off the ground, more details to come! He asked me if I had ever seen the cartoon Captain Planet. OF COURSE!!!, I enthusiastically answered. He continued to say how much he adored the cartoon as a child, it was his favorite show and he never missed it. In my head I was thinking about the random selection of Western entertainment that catches on in Africa (Texas Walker Ranger, Celine Deon and Phil Collins just to name a few) and giggled to myself. Anyway he said, AS A CHILD I MISSED THE MESSAGE OF CAPTAIN PLANET, but that I UNDERSTAND CAPTAIN PLANET TODAY. Next thing I know I am belting out the theme song of Captain Planet with my new Ghanaian friend as we wind through the potholed roads of the Volta Region...
One of his ideas is to create a cartoon about HIV/AIDS, inspired by Captain Planet, of course! A cartoon that kids will like to watch so education about HIV and AIDS can begin at an early age therefore reducing the stigma associated with it. The stigmas here are unbelievable. No one in Kpando (except a few people at the hospital) know that Hardthaven helps children who are HIV positive. Edem said if people knew, they might not sell food to them and completely shun them! I am actually really nervous writing this because I am in the internet cafe and don't want any nosy characters peeking over my shoulder reading it. I think the cartoon is a great idea, but it probably will not happen right away...baby steps I keep telling him, baby steps.
We arrived in Kpando at 530 pm on Thursday. It was market day in Kpando and we drove right through the city center. The street was filled with people! Several women balancing metal tubs, cages, or sheets of fabrics on their head and walking like it was nothing. Music was blaring from the shacks, Edem was shouting warm greetings to his friends and children were running up to his car yelling, YOVO YOVO (means white person in Ewe...the other language they speak here)with big smiles spread across their faces! I loved everything about this moment. I have arrived in this strange African town, which is now going to become my new home.
Peace and Love from Africa!
We ended up having to stay in Accra for an extra night because Edems car had issues and he was very ill with malaria (once you get it it comes back in waves). It actually worked out well because I was able to take time to adjust to the time difference, 6 hours ahead of Dallas. Arriving in Accra at 1030pm was a little bit scary, mainly because I was by myself. I didn't get off the plane and immediately feel like I had returned home to mother Africa. There was no grandeur moment reassuring me that I was supposed to be there. I was HOT, nervous (mostly about my bags) and a bit scared! I wanted to get my bags, find Edem and the the H outta the airport!
My first impression of Edem was that he is the strong and silent type. Boy oh boy was I wrong! When I first met him he wasn't saying much because he felt like crap due to the malaria, he wasn't complaining, he just wasnt speaking. On the way to Kpando, I got to see the true Edem, the giggling, talkative and extremely goofy Edem! We talked about UNiTED a lot on the way here and he is just full of ideas, never thought I could meet someone more idealistic than myself. I have my work cut out for me! I am essentially assisting with getting this organization off the ground, more details to come! He asked me if I had ever seen the cartoon Captain Planet. OF COURSE!!!, I enthusiastically answered. He continued to say how much he adored the cartoon as a child, it was his favorite show and he never missed it. In my head I was thinking about the random selection of Western entertainment that catches on in Africa (Texas Walker Ranger, Celine Deon and Phil Collins just to name a few) and giggled to myself. Anyway he said, AS A CHILD I MISSED THE MESSAGE OF CAPTAIN PLANET, but that I UNDERSTAND CAPTAIN PLANET TODAY. Next thing I know I am belting out the theme song of Captain Planet with my new Ghanaian friend as we wind through the potholed roads of the Volta Region...
Captain Planet he's our hero, gonna take pollution down to ZERO...
One of his ideas is to create a cartoon about HIV/AIDS, inspired by Captain Planet, of course! A cartoon that kids will like to watch so education about HIV and AIDS can begin at an early age therefore reducing the stigma associated with it. The stigmas here are unbelievable. No one in Kpando (except a few people at the hospital) know that Hardthaven helps children who are HIV positive. Edem said if people knew, they might not sell food to them and completely shun them! I am actually really nervous writing this because I am in the internet cafe and don't want any nosy characters peeking over my shoulder reading it. I think the cartoon is a great idea, but it probably will not happen right away...baby steps I keep telling him, baby steps.
We arrived in Kpando at 530 pm on Thursday. It was market day in Kpando and we drove right through the city center. The street was filled with people! Several women balancing metal tubs, cages, or sheets of fabrics on their head and walking like it was nothing. Music was blaring from the shacks, Edem was shouting warm greetings to his friends and children were running up to his car yelling, YOVO YOVO (means white person in Ewe...the other language they speak here)with big smiles spread across their faces! I loved everything about this moment. I have arrived in this strange African town, which is now going to become my new home.
Peace and Love from Africa!
Monday, January 18, 2010
Ghaana go to GHANA
Well the blog is back and I promise to keep it more concise this time around! First off I want to say thank you thank you thank you to all of my friends, friends of friends and family who have supported me on this decision to do work in Ghana and to all of my parent's friends who hired me to work for them in exchange for a donation! It meant more to me than you will ever know and your generosity will change lives in Ghana!
Today is the day of the 21 hour journey to Africa. I am extremely excited and a bit afraid of the unknown, as it is my first trip to Africa. I have always felt a strong pull to Africa, I'm not sure why but I'll find out sooner than later. Edem, the co-founder of the organization I am working for, is going to pick me up at the airport in Accra and then we drive 3 hours to Kpando. I will be living with Edem's family for the first couple of months and I cannot wait to meet them! I've stocked my bags with bubbles, nail polish and puzzles for the children at the orphanage, even more excited to meet those kids. If you want to check out the orphanage you can visit www.hardthaven.org and for you facebook users, they have a facebook page which has a lot of great pictures. I'm not sure what to expect upon my arrival except a huge sensory overload and a lot of people offering to help me with my bags, which I definitely will need!
Things have been a little crazy the past couple of days as we had a family emergency. Most of my family is out of town and mom has helped me pack and get organized for the trip, and will be the one to send me off at the airport. I LOVE YOU MOM! I am going to miss everyone back home, especially my family, VISITS ARE ALWAYS WELCOMED.
E-mails are enthusiastically encouraged. In Cambodia, getting an e-mail about life back in the states paralleled with the excitement of opening presents at Christmastime. I am not sure what my internet access will be like, so letters in good ole snail mail are welcomed too. My address is at the top of the blog, so if you get the urge, send an old fashioned letter my way!
Everything about this opportunity has just unfolded before me and it all feels so right. The people I have met, connections I have made and information I have received about Ghana within the past 2 weeks are little signs from God reassuring me that I am on the right path and supposed to be doing this! I would appreciate it if yall can keep me, the project and the people of Kpando in your thoughts and prayers.
Thank you again to everyone, the next time I post will be from Africa!
Today is the day of the 21 hour journey to Africa. I am extremely excited and a bit afraid of the unknown, as it is my first trip to Africa. I have always felt a strong pull to Africa, I'm not sure why but I'll find out sooner than later. Edem, the co-founder of the organization I am working for, is going to pick me up at the airport in Accra and then we drive 3 hours to Kpando. I will be living with Edem's family for the first couple of months and I cannot wait to meet them! I've stocked my bags with bubbles, nail polish and puzzles for the children at the orphanage, even more excited to meet those kids. If you want to check out the orphanage you can visit www.hardthaven.org and for you facebook users, they have a facebook page which has a lot of great pictures. I'm not sure what to expect upon my arrival except a huge sensory overload and a lot of people offering to help me with my bags, which I definitely will need!
Things have been a little crazy the past couple of days as we had a family emergency. Most of my family is out of town and mom has helped me pack and get organized for the trip, and will be the one to send me off at the airport. I LOVE YOU MOM! I am going to miss everyone back home, especially my family, VISITS ARE ALWAYS WELCOMED.
E-mails are enthusiastically encouraged. In Cambodia, getting an e-mail about life back in the states paralleled with the excitement of opening presents at Christmastime. I am not sure what my internet access will be like, so letters in good ole snail mail are welcomed too. My address is at the top of the blog, so if you get the urge, send an old fashioned letter my way!
Everything about this opportunity has just unfolded before me and it all feels so right. The people I have met, connections I have made and information I have received about Ghana within the past 2 weeks are little signs from God reassuring me that I am on the right path and supposed to be doing this! I would appreciate it if yall can keep me, the project and the people of Kpando in your thoughts and prayers.
Thank you again to everyone, the next time I post will be from Africa!
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
A wonderful weekend
Chum Reap Sour Neak T'haing Ok'niea (That means "Hello Everyone" in Khmer)!!!!!
I am sorry about being MIA from the blog lately. I have been super super busy with preparing lesson plans, teaching, evaluating lesson plans, thinking of art projects, reading for class, preparing workshops for teachers and administration at PIO and taking a language class for Khmer. The past week has been great, but also a lot of work.
I taught kindergarten again on Tuesday, (my class is pictured to the left) but it was at the other school, Borey Santhepeap, the school that is on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. I used the same lesson and we did another hand print rainbow. Teacing was SO much easier this time, I had 2 RUPP students with me and the teacher who usually teaches the class. Thins went a lot smoother this time around. At Borey Santhepeap, there is much more space to move around than in Borey Keilah. The children loved the art activity and as expected were soo soo sweet! During the break they picked flowers and gave them to me, it was SO cute! One little boy made me some sort of instrument by weaving vines together. They would say, "Teacha, teacha, this for you" and shyly hand me a flower or a weed. At the end of class I was saying good bye and a swarm of kids ran up to the front of the classroom, they put their hands in the praying position and said, "Saaunk You Teacha, Good luck to you." and they dropped their hands and gave me a HUGE hug, a squatted down to get on their level so I could hug them back, and about 45 kids swarmed me to try and get a hug in and I fell over, hahahaha!!! It was pretty embarrassing yet so funny! They were all laughing and trying to help me up. On Thursday I was supposed to teach level 4 at Borey Santhepeap, but Kristin got sick so I had to take over for her last minute. I ended up having to teach levels 3 and 4 at Borey Keilah (they are on a totally different section that level 4 at Borey Santhepeap and I had to create 2 separate lesson plans for the two sections. They are in the same classroom, but learning different materials...complicated, I know) so I had to totally re-do the lesson plan, it ended up working out, but it was a little stressful at first. Level 4 made flags and learned about the different countries that spoke English: Scotland, Australia, America, New Zealand, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain and South Africa. They loved this activity and were so proud of their flags after they finished! 
Level 3 was learning about directions (turn left, turn right, go straight, make a U turn) and about places (super market, cinema, hotel, restaurant, internet cafe, temple). For this art activity I had them make buildings with construction paper, after they made the building I made a small city on the white board with roads and taped their places on the board and had them give me directions of how to get from one place to the next. It was successful and again they were proud of their artwork. This class is very bright. They could read and write a limited amount of English very well. I did not have an RUPP student with me at all on Thursday, the teacher helped a little bit, but the students understood most of what I was saying. I enjoyed teacing the older kids, Pictured above is 3 girls from the 2 classes so proud of their artwork! Thursday night a couple of us went out on the town for the first time since I've been here! It was pretty fun, we went to this place called the FCC and had a couple of beers and split a pizza! The FCC overlooked the MeKong river; it was full of foreigners enjoying the plesant night.
We just got back from Siem Reap, also called Angkor Village, where all of the beautiful temples are! We saw 7 temples this weekend, they are all so magnificent and absolutely stunning!
Friday morning we left Phnom Penh, via bus at 8am. The drive through the Cambodia countryside was a treat! I never got tired of looking at the houses on stilts the entire 7 hour drive to Siem Reap. I loved seeing daily country life. We saw everything from rice paddy fields to cricket catchers to children moving oxen across the land to cows grazing along the side of the deep orange colored dirt roads. The bumpy and scenic bus ride put us in Siem Reap at 4pm. We checked into our hotel and then went to a buffet and dance performance, the dancers were SO cool, it was APSARA dancing where they wear really cool costumes and dance in the traditional ways that they used to dance during Angkorian time. Apsara means a celestial being.
Saturday we woke up at 4:30am to see the sunrise at the sacred waterfall but missed it because the drive took too long, but we saw the sunrise from the bus; pictured to the left is the sunrise over the Cambodian jungle. This waterfall (I forget the name) in Cambodian history, supposedly is where "life began." We hiked through the jungle for an hour and finally arrived upon the stream where the ancient people carved religious statues into the bed of the stream, so as the water runs over these statues, it becomes sacred, we followed the stream all the way to a waterfall where the water is most sacred, a few people in the group, including Dr. Lewis, went underneath the waterfall to get drenched in sacred water. I sat on top of a rock and took it all in. There were butterflies everywhere at this site. One of which landed on my finger and stayed on me for a solid 5 minutes, it was really cool. After we climed down from the waterfall, we went on to see 2 more temples, Banteay Srei and Banteay Samrei, they too were amazingly beautiful. Banteay Srei is a temple that was dedicated to women. It is small in comparison to the others, but extremely intracite. Banteay Samrei was my favorite. It is pictured to the right! 
This temple is off the beaten path, so there were no tourists there except for us. It was so peacful and very idyllic at this temple. I sat inside a doorframe and reflected for about 30 minutes, something I have never done before. After 7 hours of touring temples, we went back to the villa, kicked it poolside and ate some banana pancakes! It was so nice to relax under the sun. It was my first time to be in a pool all summer!
Saturday night we went to a concert at one of the childrens hospital in Siem Reap, called Kantha Bopha/Jayavarmmann VII. OH MY WORD, this was my favorite thing we did all weekend. The concert is an effort this man, named Dr. Beat Richner, pictured below, does to raise money and awareness for the hospitals he has built in Cambodia.
I am sorry about being MIA from the blog lately. I have been super super busy with preparing lesson plans, teaching, evaluating lesson plans, thinking of art projects, reading for class, preparing workshops for teachers and administration at PIO and taking a language class for Khmer. The past week has been great, but also a lot of work.
I taught kindergarten again on Tuesday, (my class is pictured to the left) but it was at the other school, Borey Santhepeap, the school that is on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. I used the same lesson and we did another hand print rainbow. Teacing was SO much easier this time, I had 2 RUPP students with me and the teacher who usually teaches the class. Thins went a lot smoother this time around. At Borey Santhepeap, there is much more space to move around than in Borey Keilah. The children loved the art activity and as expected were soo soo sweet! During the break they picked flowers and gave them to me, it was SO cute! One little boy made me some sort of instrument by weaving vines together. They would say, "Teacha, teacha, this for you" and shyly hand me a flower or a weed. At the end of class I was saying good bye and a swarm of kids ran up to the front of the classroom, they put their hands in the praying position and said, "Saaunk You Teacha, Good luck to you." and they dropped their hands and gave me a HUGE hug, a squatted down to get on their level so I could hug them back, and about 45 kids swarmed me to try and get a hug in and I fell over, hahahaha!!! It was pretty embarrassing yet so funny! They were all laughing and trying to help me up. On Thursday I was supposed to teach level 4 at Borey Santhepeap, but Kristin got sick so I had to take over for her last minute. I ended up having to teach levels 3 and 4 at Borey Keilah (they are on a totally different section that level 4 at Borey Santhepeap and I had to create 2 separate lesson plans for the two sections. They are in the same classroom, but learning different materials...complicated, I know) so I had to totally re-do the lesson plan, it ended up working out, but it was a little stressful at first. Level 4 made flags and learned about the different countries that spoke English: Scotland, Australia, America, New Zealand, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain and South Africa. They loved this activity and were so proud of their flags after they finished! Level 3 was learning about directions (turn left, turn right, go straight, make a U turn) and about places (super market, cinema, hotel, restaurant, internet cafe, temple). For this art activity I had them make buildings with construction paper, after they made the building I made a small city on the white board with roads and taped their places on the board and had them give me directions of how to get from one place to the next. It was successful and again they were proud of their artwork. This class is very bright. They could read and write a limited amount of English very well. I did not have an RUPP student with me at all on Thursday, the teacher helped a little bit, but the students understood most of what I was saying. I enjoyed teacing the older kids, Pictured above is 3 girls from the 2 classes so proud of their artwork! Thursday night a couple of us went out on the town for the first time since I've been here! It was pretty fun, we went to this place called the FCC and had a couple of beers and split a pizza! The FCC overlooked the MeKong river; it was full of foreigners enjoying the plesant night.We just got back from Siem Reap, also called Angkor Village, where all of the beautiful temples are! We saw 7 temples this weekend, they are all so magnificent and absolutely stunning!
Friday morning we left Phnom Penh, via bus at 8am. The drive through the Cambodia countryside was a treat! I never got tired of looking at the houses on stilts the entire 7 hour drive to Siem Reap. I loved seeing daily country life. We saw everything from rice paddy fields to cricket catchers to children moving oxen across the land to cows grazing along the side of the deep orange colored dirt roads. The bumpy and scenic bus ride put us in Siem Reap at 4pm. We checked into our hotel and then went to a buffet and dance performance, the dancers were SO cool, it was APSARA dancing where they wear really cool costumes and dance in the traditional ways that they used to dance during Angkorian time. Apsara means a celestial being.
Saturday we woke up at 4:30am to see the sunrise at the sacred waterfall but missed it because the drive took too long, but we saw the sunrise from the bus; pictured to the left is the sunrise over the Cambodian jungle. This waterfall (I forget the name) in Cambodian history, supposedly is where "life began." We hiked through the jungle for an hour and finally arrived upon the stream where the ancient people carved religious statues into the bed of the stream, so as the water runs over these statues, it becomes sacred, we followed the stream all the way to a waterfall where the water is most sacred, a few people in the group, including Dr. Lewis, went underneath the waterfall to get drenched in sacred water. I sat on top of a rock and took it all in. There were butterflies everywhere at this site. One of which landed on my finger and stayed on me for a solid 5 minutes, it was really cool. After we climed down from the waterfall, we went on to see 2 more temples, Banteay Srei and Banteay Samrei, they too were amazingly beautiful. Banteay Srei is a temple that was dedicated to women. It is small in comparison to the others, but extremely intracite. Banteay Samrei was my favorite. It is pictured to the right! This temple is off the beaten path, so there were no tourists there except for us. It was so peacful and very idyllic at this temple. I sat inside a doorframe and reflected for about 30 minutes, something I have never done before. After 7 hours of touring temples, we went back to the villa, kicked it poolside and ate some banana pancakes! It was so nice to relax under the sun. It was my first time to be in a pool all summer!Saturday night we went to a concert at one of the childrens hospital in Siem Reap, called Kantha Bopha/Jayavarmmann VII. OH MY WORD, this was my favorite thing we did all weekend. The concert is an effort this man, named Dr. Beat Richner, pictured below, does to raise money and awareness for the hospitals he has built in Cambodia.
He is very talented at playing the Cello; he is also a truly amazing man. I feel honored to have heard him play and speak. I was so moved by this cause and his concert that I bought his book and have already read it! I am considering e-mailing him and telling him how great and noble I think his works are and how we need more people like him on this earth. The reason this is such an amazing hospital is because the Cambodian government and the Ministry of Health are EXTREMELY corrupt and Dr. Beat Richner runs his hospitals (Kantha Bopha I, II and III) as corruption free organizations. Corruption of the Cambodian government is causing a "passive genocide" of Cambodian children. In Cambodia, you can only receive medical treatment if you have money. The Cambodian government and well as international Health organizations (such as World Health Organization, UNICEF and others) have set up the Cambodian Health system this way. Well 95% of the population is poor, so 95% of the Cambodian people either go without medical help or recieve the wrong treatment. Let's say that a poor family has no money to get medical treatment from an NGO children's hospital in Camboida, which follows the rules of WHO and the Ministry of Health. The hospital diagnosis the child with tuberculousis and thells the family that they must pay $200 in order for their child to be treated. So this poor farming family sells their oxen and half of their belongings to get money so their child can be treated. At an NGO hospital overseen by the Cambodian Ministry of Health, they are only allowed to use "cheap medicine," because Cambodia is a "poor country with poor people." This cheap medicine in turn makes the child treated even more ill and in most cases the child dies. The medicine this hospital uses to treat tuberculosis in Cambodia is with a treatment that is outlawed to use even on CHICKENS in Western states. So now this family has sold their oxen and half of their belongings and has also lost a child to a disease which could be treatable with the correct ( a little more expensive) but correct medicine. Dr. Beat Richner thinks this concept of cheap medicine for a poor country with poor people is ridiculous and inhumane. So his hospitals are free of charge for anyone and serves all of the poor families in Cambodia. He carries the correct vaccines and medicines for the diseases that plague thsi country. The Cambodian government and international health organizations are trying to shut him down even though the statistics for this hospital are astoundingly successful, especially when it deals with cost to healing ratio. They want to shut him down because his hospital is not corrupt, therefore they are not reaping the benefits of the success of his hospitals. The hospitals run solely on private donations, which is why he holds a free concert every Saturday in the training center at the Jayavarmann VII hosptial in Siem Reap, in hopes to get more donations from tourists. The Cambodia government does not give him any money to run these hospitals. I want to tell you the whole story about his hospitals and the history of Cambodia within the context of the hospitals, but its way too long to type right now. If you are interested please visit their website http://www.beat-richner.ch/ Dr. Richner is talking about starting a children's hospital in Africa, so I am thinking about e-mailing him my resume and asking for a job, no joke!! I was truly moved by his words and the amazing and meaningful work he does for the poor children of Cambodia.
On Sunday we woke up at the crack of dawn (4:45am) so we could make it to see sunrise at Angkor Wat. When the sun rises over Angkor Wat, it looks like the temple is floating on a sea of gold because there is a reflecting pool in front of it. Angkor Wat is HUGE, it took us 4 hours to go through it, although it was at a leisurely pace. Two children are looking at taking in the beauty of Angkor Wat in the picture to the left. Angkor Wat is the largest temple in all of Siem Reap-Angkor Village. After Angkor Wat we went to another temple called Bayon. Bayon is a temple that has huge faces on all sides of the large pilars. We were invited to eat lunch at a friend of Dr. Lewis' village. The village was an hour away from Siem Reap. Dr. Lewis' best friend from home is a Cambodian man and he wanted her to see his village and meet his family who still lives in Cambodia. The man's sister hosted Dr. Lewis and all of us to their village. She made this huge delicious meal and I think the whole entire village came to meet us ( and by that I mean watch us eat...it was strange having 70+ people watch me eat, but it is normal for their culture, so I just went with it). I am SO glad we did this, it was one of the coolest experiences I have ever had!!!!!!!!!!!! So we had this delicious noodle meal with vegetables and a special green sauce that was to die for!! The niece of the woman who cooked all of this was so nice and chatty, her name is Sophea (pronounced Soapy), she is 19 years old and goes to school in Siem Reap on the weekdays and volunteer teaches English to 152 children in her village on the weekends, she is an amazing girl. So she told some of her students that Americans were coming for lunch and there were about 40 kids there wanting to practice their English with us. They were some of the most precious children i have ever met. They were so happy that we were there and they meant every word of praise and thanks that came out of their mouths. They would say, "I will miss you." or "I will never forget you, good luck and all happiness to you." We played a game with them called Zip Zap Bong, it was pretty fun and easy to play with such a huge language barrier. During our visit we also were invited to the village temple to be blessed by the monks. This was so neat. We drove down the road from the woman's house and turned down a road with heavy wooded forests on each side and at the end of the road was a small pavilion made out of tin and concrete, in the middle of the pavilion was a beautifully painted Buddha carving and a monk was sitting on a raised platform, we met the grandmothers of the village, who all have shaved heads (it is part of a traditional Buddhist belief for grandmothers to shave their heads as a sign of letting go of worldly possesions). 
They are so beautiful and look so wise. We hung out with some kids for a bit while we were waiting for the monks to come. They were looking at us like we were so strange... (You can see pictured above, one of the village children and on the right of the photograph the monks are arriving to give us the blessing). Dr. Lewis isa practicing Buddhist so she did the whole bowing to Buddah. THEY LOVE HER AT THIS VILLAGE!!! The monks finally arrive and we take our shoes off, walk into the pavilion. There were 5 monks total, 1 king monk and 4 of his proteges, they took their seat on the platform next to the other monks. We chum reap soured the monks and knelt in front of them. The monks start chanting the blessing, where again I felt so surreal. I felt a very peaceful presence during the blessing, I can't really explain it other than that. The king monk had kind eyes, and an extremely sincere expression the entire time. I really wanted to hug him, but you aren't supposed to touch monks, not sure why, I'll look into that though. After the blessing we went back to the village and played with the children some more. We taught them the song, you are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skies are grey, you never know dear, how much I love you, please don't take my sunshine away. They were so adorable and I was so sad to leave! After the village we went to see Sunset at Phnom Bakkheng, another temple; it is on the biggest hill in Angkor Village. I rode an elephant up to the temple with Lisa and Brittney, 2 other girls on the program; it was a really cool experience. Sunset from the temple was breathtakingly beautiful; you have to climb up extremely steep steps to get to the roof of the temple; it was kind of scary (because the steps are SO narrow) but fun! When I made it to the top a couple of monks started asking me questions, they wanted to practice their English with me. So I paid my respects to them, with a Chum reap sour and a bow and sat next to them.
This morning, Monday, we woke up early and saw one last temple called Ta Phrom. This was an amazing temple, the jungle is "overtaking it" i.e. tree roots have started to crumble the temple and it makes for an amazing sight. I took so many pictures this weekend and when I upload them I will send yall a few. After the temple, we checked out of the hotel and went to the silk center on the way out. This place was SO cool, they show you exactly how silk is made, from growing the mulberry trees to feed the silk worms the mulberry leaves, to how the silk worms spin spools of silk as a cocoon, to how the people turn the silk in to spools of thread to how they die it and weave it. It was amazing. I got a log of presents there for my grandmother, mom and aunts! My favorite temples were Banteay Samrei (which was the last one we went to on Saturday) it was so peaceful, nobody except for us was there, Phnom Bakkheng (Where we saw the sunset) and Ta Prohm (the one the jungle is overtaking). All in all I LOVED Siem Reap, I like it more than Phnom Penh because it is a lot more open and breezy, not as rushed and crowded, it is not as congested is a lot cleaner and a bit more touristy spots. I still love Phnom Penh, but Siem Reap was absolutely wonderful.
Sorry for the long blog-post, I got a little carried away, but I had a lot to tell!! I must go to sleep soon, we have been invited to the ribbon cutting ceremony for PIOs orphanage (just built), which has been built on the trash cite of Stung Mean Chey. I am SO excited because I thought we were never going back there since they already have volunteers. They have invited us as their "distinguished international guests," (hahah there is nothing distinguished about me so I think its pretty funny). The children at this school were my favorites during the tour of the 3 schools, they were so personable and had such a lively spirit. The ribbon cutting ceremony supposedly is a pretty big deal, papers are coming and everything! Dr. Lewis said that PIO built this orphanage with the money they received from CNN Heroes, so it is causing a lot of media attention! After the ribbon cutting ceremony we will come back to the villa, have lunch and then go to Tiny Toones, they are doing a performance for us!! check out this article to read more about them and watch the video! Tomorrow is a big day and I've got to get my sleep. BTW June 1st is Children's Day in Cambodia, so HAPPY CHILDREN'S DAY TODAY!!! I am having a great time in Cambodia. The longer I stay the more I love it, I discover something new and exciting about Cambodia each day, she is slowly revealing to me all of her wonders, Mom you might loose me to the beautiful Kingdom of Cambodia...
until next time!!!! Liahiii (Bye in Khmer)
Rosie
On Sunday we woke up at the crack of dawn (4:45am) so we could make it to see sunrise at Angkor Wat. When the sun rises over Angkor Wat, it looks like the temple is floating on a sea of gold because there is a reflecting pool in front of it. Angkor Wat is HUGE, it took us 4 hours to go through it, although it was at a leisurely pace. Two children are looking at taking in the beauty of Angkor Wat in the picture to the left. Angkor Wat is the largest temple in all of Siem Reap-Angkor Village. After Angkor Wat we went to another temple called Bayon. Bayon is a temple that has huge faces on all sides of the large pilars. We were invited to eat lunch at a friend of Dr. Lewis' village. The village was an hour away from Siem Reap. Dr. Lewis' best friend from home is a Cambodian man and he wanted her to see his village and meet his family who still lives in Cambodia. The man's sister hosted Dr. Lewis and all of us to their village. She made this huge delicious meal and I think the whole entire village came to meet us ( and by that I mean watch us eat...it was strange having 70+ people watch me eat, but it is normal for their culture, so I just went with it). I am SO glad we did this, it was one of the coolest experiences I have ever had!!!!!!!!!!!! So we had this delicious noodle meal with vegetables and a special green sauce that was to die for!! The niece of the woman who cooked all of this was so nice and chatty, her name is Sophea (pronounced Soapy), she is 19 years old and goes to school in Siem Reap on the weekdays and volunteer teaches English to 152 children in her village on the weekends, she is an amazing girl. So she told some of her students that Americans were coming for lunch and there were about 40 kids there wanting to practice their English with us. They were some of the most precious children i have ever met. They were so happy that we were there and they meant every word of praise and thanks that came out of their mouths. They would say, "I will miss you." or "I will never forget you, good luck and all happiness to you." We played a game with them called Zip Zap Bong, it was pretty fun and easy to play with such a huge language barrier. During our visit we also were invited to the village temple to be blessed by the monks. This was so neat. We drove down the road from the woman's house and turned down a road with heavy wooded forests on each side and at the end of the road was a small pavilion made out of tin and concrete, in the middle of the pavilion was a beautifully painted Buddha carving and a monk was sitting on a raised platform, we met the grandmothers of the village, who all have shaved heads (it is part of a traditional Buddhist belief for grandmothers to shave their heads as a sign of letting go of worldly possesions). They are so beautiful and look so wise. We hung out with some kids for a bit while we were waiting for the monks to come. They were looking at us like we were so strange... (You can see pictured above, one of the village children and on the right of the photograph the monks are arriving to give us the blessing). Dr. Lewis isa practicing Buddhist so she did the whole bowing to Buddah. THEY LOVE HER AT THIS VILLAGE!!! The monks finally arrive and we take our shoes off, walk into the pavilion. There were 5 monks total, 1 king monk and 4 of his proteges, they took their seat on the platform next to the other monks. We chum reap soured the monks and knelt in front of them. The monks start chanting the blessing, where again I felt so surreal. I felt a very peaceful presence during the blessing, I can't really explain it other than that. The king monk had kind eyes, and an extremely sincere expression the entire time. I really wanted to hug him, but you aren't supposed to touch monks, not sure why, I'll look into that though. After the blessing we went back to the village and played with the children some more. We taught them the song, you are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skies are grey, you never know dear, how much I love you, please don't take my sunshine away. They were so adorable and I was so sad to leave! After the village we went to see Sunset at Phnom Bakkheng, another temple; it is on the biggest hill in Angkor Village. I rode an elephant up to the temple with Lisa and Brittney, 2 other girls on the program; it was a really cool experience. Sunset from the temple was breathtakingly beautiful; you have to climb up extremely steep steps to get to the roof of the temple; it was kind of scary (because the steps are SO narrow) but fun! When I made it to the top a couple of monks started asking me questions, they wanted to practice their English with me. So I paid my respects to them, with a Chum reap sour and a bow and sat next to them. As I was talking to the 4 of them (orange robes and all) I was thinking to myself, "Who the hell do I think I am just sitting on the top of a temple in Cambodia talking to 4 monks at sunset... it was definitely surreal. The sunset was gorgeous, there were clouds in the shape of Angkor Wat, which is the biggest temple in Siem Reap-Angkor Village. There was also a lightning storm the the left of the sunset, so every couple of minutes a lightning strike would accompany the setting the sun. (The picture above is from the top of Phnom Bakkheng temple, you can see the city of Siem Reap in the distance.)
This morning, Monday, we woke up early and saw one last temple called Ta Phrom. This was an amazing temple, the jungle is "overtaking it" i.e. tree roots have started to crumble the temple and it makes for an amazing sight. I took so many pictures this weekend and when I upload them I will send yall a few. After the temple, we checked out of the hotel and went to the silk center on the way out. This place was SO cool, they show you exactly how silk is made, from growing the mulberry trees to feed the silk worms the mulberry leaves, to how the silk worms spin spools of silk as a cocoon, to how the people turn the silk in to spools of thread to how they die it and weave it. It was amazing. I got a log of presents there for my grandmother, mom and aunts! My favorite temples were Banteay Samrei (which was the last one we went to on Saturday) it was so peaceful, nobody except for us was there, Phnom Bakkheng (Where we saw the sunset) and Ta Prohm (the one the jungle is overtaking). All in all I LOVED Siem Reap, I like it more than Phnom Penh because it is a lot more open and breezy, not as rushed and crowded, it is not as congested is a lot cleaner and a bit more touristy spots. I still love Phnom Penh, but Siem Reap was absolutely wonderful.
Sorry for the long blog-post, I got a little carried away, but I had a lot to tell!! I must go to sleep soon, we have been invited to the ribbon cutting ceremony for PIOs orphanage (just built), which has been built on the trash cite of Stung Mean Chey. I am SO excited because I thought we were never going back there since they already have volunteers. They have invited us as their "distinguished international guests," (hahah there is nothing distinguished about me so I think its pretty funny). The children at this school were my favorites during the tour of the 3 schools, they were so personable and had such a lively spirit. The ribbon cutting ceremony supposedly is a pretty big deal, papers are coming and everything! Dr. Lewis said that PIO built this orphanage with the money they received from CNN Heroes, so it is causing a lot of media attention! After the ribbon cutting ceremony we will come back to the villa, have lunch and then go to Tiny Toones, they are doing a performance for us!! check out this article to read more about them and watch the video! Tomorrow is a big day and I've got to get my sleep. BTW June 1st is Children's Day in Cambodia, so HAPPY CHILDREN'S DAY TODAY!!! I am having a great time in Cambodia. The longer I stay the more I love it, I discover something new and exciting about Cambodia each day, she is slowly revealing to me all of her wonders, Mom you might loose me to the beautiful Kingdom of Cambodia...
until next time!!!! Liahiii (Bye in Khmer)
Rosie
Friday, May 22, 2009
First day of teaching...Oh Shi* (literally)
I just got back from my first day teaching. I was assigned to the Kindergarten classroom at Borey Keilah this afternoon. Borey Keilah is the school that is in the slums of Phnom Penh. The picture to the above is a picture of a child who lives in those slums. I was pretty nervous about teaching there because that entailed walking through the village, aka peoples’ homes. I was not sure how the community would view these foreign girls walking in their homes and taking over as teachers to their children. Well my fears were alleviated this afternoon when we were standing outside of the slum under the blistering sun. The bus had just dropped us off to teach and we were waiting outside of the school for the RUPP students who had gotten lost. An older, weathered woman with a shaved head, a couple of teeth and scarred arms came up to me, Dr. Lewis, Lisa and Brittney and started pointing and talking to us in Khmer. I could not understand if she was asking for money or yelling at us. Dr. Lewis was on the phone at the time (giving directions to the lost RUPP students), so she could not talk to the woman or translate what she was saying. I used all the Khmer I knew and told her we were neakkroo (teachers). She kept on talking and pointing, first to us and then to a place across the street. It seemed like forever until Dr. Lewis got off the phone. Finally Dr. Lewis translated what the woman was saying to us. It turns out she was inviting us into the shade of her home, which was a piece of tarp attached to the building and held up with 2 poles…wow! I felt like such a jerk. It is scenarios like this that I have experienced from this culture. No matter how little these people have, they have offered it to me with a smile. Here I am thinking she is asking for money or cursing at us in Khmer, while she is only trying to provide some shade to a few sweaty American strangers. It really touched my heart and has made me love and respect Cambodian people even more than I already do.
We gave up waiting for the RUPP students and walked through the village to the classroom. Just to paint the picture for you, when I was creating my lesson plan, I took into consideration that I would have a Khmer teacher who would help me translate and learn the students’ names and that I would also have 2 or 3 RUPP students teaching with me to help translate and settle down the 50+ rambunctious children in the Kindergarten class. So I walk into the extremely small classroom expecting to have at least 3 to 4 translators and there is all but zero. Suddenly this lesson plan is going to have to work with me flying solo. No teacher, no RUPP students and 50 or so students in my class…yikes!! We teach English in the afternoons on Thursdays. Needless to say, it was hot, it smelled terrible and I was so nervous. But none of those things could have held back or kept away the smile that emerged on my face when the students started to greet me with their angelic voices. They start every class with the cutest chant that they have memorized; they stand up with their hands in the praying position belting at the top of their lungs. After they welcomed me, I walked to the front of the room, so nervous, because I now knew that I was in charge and responsible for these kids. I unloaded my bag of goodies that I brought along to assist me in teaching the colors of the rainbow,which was my lesson plan for the day. For whatever reason, their regular teacher just didn’t come to class that day, I guess she figured I was going to be there so she didn’t need to come (I’ve found out that in Cambodia, a lot of things get lost in translation).
The room is tiny, stifling hot and smells pretty bad, a little like sewer. I look over at the 3 boys in the front row of class and they are trying to tell me something in Khmer and are pointing to a corner, I glanced at it, didn't see anything and obviously couldn’t understand them so I went on introducing myself and the lesson. Finally the RUPP students arrive, or should I say student, only one RUPP student made it and she had to leave early. Her name is Kalyan, I was relieved I had her, even if it was only for one hour, because her English is very good. I asked her to help me figure out what the little boys were trying to tell me. She conversed with them for a while, looked over at me and said, “Shit,” I looked at her confused (and wondering why she is saying shit). Kalyan then pointed to the same corner and sure enough there it was, a piece of shit in the corner, yes I mean human feces, and it wasn’t from a child either, it was adult poop. Since this school is in the slums there are very few, if any, restrooms, so I am thinking either someone wandered in at night and used the classroom as a toilet, or some one thought the window of the classroom was a sewer, used it has a bathroom and their business dropped into the classroom. (the class is kind of underground, so the window looks out to the “pavement” of the street). Who knows how it got there, but it was definitely there. I looked up at the boys and they were holding their nose and waving their hand in front of their face, the universal sign for peeeeeee- uu! I mean these poor kids are having to learn with shit on the floor. I almost lost it and freaked out but I kept telling myself to stay calm and ignore it but it did smell AWFUL! Unfortunately I think my nose got used to the smell because it didn't bother me after about 10 minutes, mind over matter, right…I just ignored it and went on with my lesson. The children were fabulous, the language barrier was difficult but smiles and clapping can transcend that very easily, so that’s basically all we did. Kalyan taught me how to say “What color do you want?” in Khmer, so I could finish the art project after she left. (Above is a picture of the children I taught while they are on their break).
For the art project I wanted to make something that involved the whole class and something that could be left in their classroom after we leave, unlike Kindergarten classrooms in America, the classrooms at this school do not have much color or posters that decorate the walls. Studies have shown that young children love color and animals on the wall, and a room with educational value on the walls is conducive to a better learning environment. Since they are learning colors today, I came up with the idea of a handprint rainbow. The first part of class we went over all of the different colors, they knew them pretty well. I had flashcards with a Red circle and the word Red, and the same for all of the other colors. When I was going over the colors, I went out of order to see if they could still identify the colors and they could! They could say them and spell them, which really surprised me. I wish I could have engaged the students who sat in the back more, they did not know how to say the colors as well as the children in the front, but this was hard to do with just me in the classroom. If I went to the back of the classroom all hell would break loose in the front, so I had stay at the front and try to give them extra attention, practice and directions when they came up to put their handprint on the rainbow. The handprint rainbow was a HUGE success.
Here is a picture of the finished rainbow! And also pictured here is the corner that had poop in it, the bottom right corner of the photo.
Before class, I taped 16 pieces of paper together (they don’t have poster board or butcher paper in Cambodia) to make one big piece of paper and drew a rainbow on it. During class I taped it to the board and had the kids line up one by one. I then asked them in Khmer and in English “What color do you want?” They usually just pointed to the color on the rainbow, so I would ask them to say the color in English, if they said it in English correctly then I painted their hand that color and they stuck it on that color in the rainbow! The children loved being able to pick a color, have their hand painted and create art with their handprint! I lost track of who had already gone and they were already trampling one another to try to get to the front of the classroom, so I had to be firm with the sneaky ones and tell them to sit because they have already had a turn. The art project was a little messy, but that’s part of what made it so fun! I struggled a little bit because I didn't have a translator, but when I felt overwhelmed I would just teach them a song. They LOVE the Itsy Bitsy Spider and I’m a Little Teapot. Overall my first teaching experience went pretty well, I have major respect for teachers, it truly is a gift to be able to teach and especially teach to kindergarteners. I barely got by and I doubt the kids learned much that they can remember. I thought it would be a breeze because I am goofy and silly and at the very least I knew I could make them laugh, but it takes a lot of work, patience, and in my case a pretty strong gag reflex to teach children!!
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Reality
My internet has not been working so I am just now posting this...
These last two days, Monday and Tuesday, have been the best so far! This has been my favorite day because we FINALLY got to do and see the reason I came to Cambodia in the first place, to teach/hang out with vulnerable and underprivileged children. Seeing the schools has further inspired me to do a fantastic job and has also provided me a peace within about being here. Its about 6pm on Tuesday and we just got back to the Villa from touring the 3 schools where we will be teaching with the RUPP students. I should not have been so nervous about meeting them on Monday, they were just as enthusiastic if not more about meeting us. There are 17 of them and 6 of us, so I have many new Khmer friends.
They are so nice and have VERY good English. Its cool to be with my peers who are from another country. We have so much in common, yet we are also so very different. Monday we went to the Royal University of Phnom Penh, it was an expansive campus with students all over the place. The class we are working with at PIO are all 2nd year psychology students. Dr. Lewis and their teacher (Neakkroo Hema) have been working together on research projects and such for the past couple of years so that’s how this is all working out. We basically had a meet and greet with them; found out about their families, their studies, their favorite hobbies, favorite foods, dreams, aspirations etc.
After the meet and greet with the RUPP students, which was so fun, we went back to the villa for lunch then we ventured off into our neighborhood and shopped around in a cute part of Phnom Penh, there were so many cute cafes that catered to foreigners. A coffee shop or cafe, Cambodian style, on every corner filled with ex-pats on their computers or enjoying a meal. I felt completely safe in that area. There were also several NGO shops that sold cute arts and craftsy type items. After exploring that part of town we took about a 3 mile walk to and from the river front. I was so excited to do this because I have felt like a caged bird in the villa lately; we did not leave the villa at all on Sunday and I was just rearing to go and get out and see the city via foot. I think walking around in a new place is the best way to get to know it. You can see the sights, hear the sounds and smell the air and scents of daily life. It was a beautiful day and started getting cooler, so the walk to the Mekong River was nice. We snapped lots of pictures and enjoyed the scenery. Cambodians, especially children, love having their photo taken, which is great for me because I love taking pictures. This is a video of some precious children who LOVED the camera, I gave them a quick English lesson.
Tuesday morning (this morning) came early, we woke up at 5:45 am, ate breakfast and were off to pick up the RUPP students to tour the schools. It was so wonderful getting to know them a little more. I talked to three of them for most of the time on the bus their names are Keam, Malen, and Rattanak Ly. They are helping me with my Khmer, I’m trying to get to the point where Khmer people don't laugh their ass off after every time I attempt to say something in Khmer...that's a good goal right? It was almost all of the RUPP students’ first time to visit these parts of Phnom Penh as well. This took me by surprise. I just assumed that the educated and/or wealthy knew about the poverty and underprivileged in their own country, but I have found out that it is not the case. Phymean Noun, the founder of PIO, is actually a revolutionary. Most organizations in Cambodia that serve the poor are Western NGOs, which is not a bad thing, but it contributes to the problem of this ignorance or turn a blind eye approach by other Khmers. Since Phymean Noun is a Khmer woman who started an organization helping other underprivileged and poor Khmer people, I am hoping and praying that her work will inspire other Khmer people, like RUPP students, to get involved with PIO or even have a dream to start their own organization similar to PIO.
The first school we visited was Borei Santhipheap II, it was about a 30 minute drive. It is located in the outskirts of Phnom Penh. It was an absolutely BEAUTIFUL drive, the Cambodian countryside is breathtaking. It is so lush with beautiful flowers of fushia and lavender blooming from Lilly pads, houses on stilts and cream-colored cows grazing the pastures. Borei Santhipheap is a small, extremely poor agricultural community. It is filled with simple homes storing just the items a family needs to get by , yet the village is still very colorful and alive. The drive to the school was an experience in and of itself. We got to the school and the children greeted us with THE most adorable song, it went something like "Gooooood Mooorniiiing Teeeacherrrrr, How are yooou today?" (teacher would answer) "I am fine, Thank you, teacher" But its much cuter when you hear it! The children are so full of life and so eager to learn! They showed off their English to us. Almost every conversation I had with a child went like this, I would ask. "What is your name?" They would answer, "My name is..." then they would ask, "What is your name?" then I would answer. Then they would ask "How old are you?" followed by "Where do you come from?" It was so fun hanging out with the kids, I was so in my element, teaching them songs, and laughing with them. 
I must say, I am so so so so so happy that the RUPP students are teaching with us because they are phenomenal translators, we can make MUCH more progress working side by side than alone. I have so many cute pictures; my finger just could not stop pressing the button. At the end of our tour it was lunchtime for them, so we took a big group picture. If you can't tell I have made 2 new friends, they just jumped into my arms. The little boy is holding up his money hahaha
Sorry this is getting lengthy so I will end it quick. Every school had its own personality. The second school we went to is called Borey Keliah, it is the school that is in the middle of the slums. A family's only possession might be a hammock, which doubles as their living room. It is quite a sight to see, there is one room, split up by tin into 3 different classrooms... There are SO MANY students packed into 1 room, Mary and I got up in the front of the Kindergarten classroom and sang the itsy bitsy spider, they LOVED it, we had to do it like 5 times hahaha. We finally made it to Stung Mean Chey, the school that is in the dump. This is the place that affected me the most. As we drove into the village, or community you could begin to detect the stench of garbage. There were heaps and heaps of garbage that went on and on and on. We kept drivin
g down the street which was lined with homes and a few vendors, women covered from head to toe scavenging through the trash. There were children running next to the bus and when we got out and walked into the school, amidst all of the trash, we were greeted with the biggest brightest smiles. We met a few of the classes and then they performed traditional Khmer dancing for us, its was ADORABLE! I made friends with two little girls and taught them the hand/clapping game Mrs. Mary Mack. We became great friends. After the show, Pryth, one of the boys who performed the dance wanted to show us where he lived. We walked about 40 steps down the “road” to a freshly painted building. We walked into a big room that had nothing in it except for a few murals on the wall and a poster with about 40 pictures of individual children on it. Pryth had just taken us to PIOs orphanage. He gave us a tour of the orphanage, the first room we saw was the boys’ room, I’ve posted a picture of it below. Pryth was SO proud and boasting at the fact that everyone had THEIR OWN toothbrush and toothpaste. The platform is their bed and the shelf against the wall holds each boy’s belongings, ALL of his belongings. Lisa, one of the girls also in the program, said is perfectly, the room where the children slept and kept all of their things was a perfect visual to the excess that we have. This is so true! I mean you should have seen the suitcases I packed to come over here. Upstairs was the girls’ room, same thing but no platform for a bed. 
Stung Men Chey was my favorite of all the schools because the children were extremely lively since they’re so used to interacting with foreigners and also because the dump, filthy as it was, made for a great sight to see. Unfortunately that was my first and most likely my last visit to Stung Men Chey while I am here. It is for an extremely great reason though. Since Phymean Noun won the CNN award, the Stung Men Chey school has gotten a great deal of publicity and is already full with volunteer teachers. Dr. Lewis told us that we are desperately needed at the other 2 schools because no foreigners have ever volunteered there.
So much for that short ending… I guess I just had a lot I wanted to talk about.
Aah I am tired of typing! I didn't read it over, so sorry in advance for all of the errors..haha
Much love!
Rosie
These last two days, Monday and Tuesday, have been the best so far! This has been my favorite day because we FINALLY got to do and see the reason I came to Cambodia in the first place, to teach/hang out with vulnerable and underprivileged children. Seeing the schools has further inspired me to do a fantastic job and has also provided me a peace within about being here. Its about 6pm on Tuesday and we just got back to the Villa from touring the 3 schools where we will be teaching with the RUPP students. I should not have been so nervous about meeting them on Monday, they were just as enthusiastic if not more about meeting us. There are 17 of them and 6 of us, so I have many new Khmer friends.
They are so nice and have VERY good English. Its cool to be with my peers who are from another country. We have so much in common, yet we are also so very different. Monday we went to the Royal University of Phnom Penh, it was an expansive campus with students all over the place. The class we are working with at PIO are all 2nd year psychology students. Dr. Lewis and their teacher (Neakkroo Hema) have been working together on research projects and such for the past couple of years so that’s how this is all working out. We basically had a meet and greet with them; found out about their families, their studies, their favorite hobbies, favorite foods, dreams, aspirations etc.After the meet and greet with the RUPP students, which was so fun, we went back to the villa for lunch then we ventured off into our neighborhood and shopped around in a cute part of Phnom Penh, there were so many cute cafes that catered to foreigners. A coffee shop or cafe, Cambodian style, on every corner filled with ex-pats on their computers or enjoying a meal. I felt completely safe in that area. There were also several NGO shops that sold cute arts and craftsy type items. After exploring that part of town we took about a 3 mile walk to and from the river front. I was so excited to do this because I have felt like a caged bird in the villa lately; we did not leave the villa at all on Sunday and I was just rearing to go and get out and see the city via foot. I think walking around in a new place is the best way to get to know it. You can see the sights, hear the sounds and smell the air and scents of daily life. It was a beautiful day and started getting cooler, so the walk to the Mekong River was nice. We snapped lots of pictures and enjoyed the scenery. Cambodians, especially children, love having their photo taken, which is great for me because I love taking pictures. This is a video of some precious children who LOVED the camera, I gave them a quick English lesson.
Tuesday morning (this morning) came early, we woke up at 5:45 am, ate breakfast and were off to pick up the RUPP students to tour the schools. It was so wonderful getting to know them a little more. I talked to three of them for most of the time on the bus their names are Keam, Malen, and Rattanak Ly. They are helping me with my Khmer, I’m trying to get to the point where Khmer people don't laugh their ass off after every time I attempt to say something in Khmer...that's a good goal right? It was almost all of the RUPP students’ first time to visit these parts of Phnom Penh as well. This took me by surprise. I just assumed that the educated and/or wealthy knew about the poverty and underprivileged in their own country, but I have found out that it is not the case. Phymean Noun, the founder of PIO, is actually a revolutionary. Most organizations in Cambodia that serve the poor are Western NGOs, which is not a bad thing, but it contributes to the problem of this ignorance or turn a blind eye approach by other Khmers. Since Phymean Noun is a Khmer woman who started an organization helping other underprivileged and poor Khmer people, I am hoping and praying that her work will inspire other Khmer people, like RUPP students, to get involved with PIO or even have a dream to start their own organization similar to PIO.
The first school we visited was Borei Santhipheap II, it was about a 30 minute drive. It is located in the outskirts of Phnom Penh. It was an absolutely BEAUTIFUL drive, the Cambodian countryside is breathtaking. It is so lush with beautiful flowers of fushia and lavender blooming from Lilly pads, houses on stilts and cream-colored cows grazing the pastures. Borei Santhipheap is a small, extremely poor agricultural community. It is filled with simple homes storing just the items a family needs to get by , yet the village is still very colorful and alive. The drive to the school was an experience in and of itself. We got to the school and the children greeted us with THE most adorable song, it went something like "Gooooood Mooorniiiing Teeeacherrrrr, How are yooou today?" (teacher would answer) "I am fine, Thank you, teacher" But its much cuter when you hear it! The children are so full of life and so eager to learn! They showed off their English to us. Almost every conversation I had with a child went like this, I would ask. "What is your name?" They would answer, "My name is..." then they would ask, "What is your name?" then I would answer. Then they would ask "How old are you?" followed by "Where do you come from?" It was so fun hanging out with the kids, I was so in my element, teaching them songs, and laughing with them. 
I must say, I am so so so so so happy that the RUPP students are teaching with us because they are phenomenal translators, we can make MUCH more progress working side by side than alone. I have so many cute pictures; my finger just could not stop pressing the button. At the end of our tour it was lunchtime for them, so we took a big group picture. If you can't tell I have made 2 new friends, they just jumped into my arms. The little boy is holding up his money hahahaSorry this is getting lengthy so I will end it quick. Every school had its own personality. The second school we went to is called Borey Keliah, it is the school that is in the middle of the slums. A family's only possession might be a hammock, which doubles as their living room. It is quite a sight to see, there is one room, split up by tin into 3 different classrooms... There are SO MANY students packed into 1 room, Mary and I got up in the front of the Kindergarten classroom and sang the itsy bitsy spider, they LOVED it, we had to do it like 5 times hahaha. We finally made it to Stung Mean Chey, the school that is in the dump. This is the place that affected me the most. As we drove into the village, or community you could begin to detect the stench of garbage. There were heaps and heaps of garbage that went on and on and on. We kept drivin
g down the street which was lined with homes and a few vendors, women covered from head to toe scavenging through the trash. There were children running next to the bus and when we got out and walked into the school, amidst all of the trash, we were greeted with the biggest brightest smiles. We met a few of the classes and then they performed traditional Khmer dancing for us, its was ADORABLE! I made friends with two little girls and taught them the hand/clapping game Mrs. Mary Mack. We became great friends. After the show, Pryth, one of the boys who performed the dance wanted to show us where he lived. We walked about 40 steps down the “road” to a freshly painted building. We walked into a big room that had nothing in it except for a few murals on the wall and a poster with about 40 pictures of individual children on it. Pryth had just taken us to PIOs orphanage. He gave us a tour of the orphanage, the first room we saw was the boys’ room, I’ve posted a picture of it below. Pryth was SO proud and boasting at the fact that everyone had THEIR OWN toothbrush and toothpaste. The platform is their bed and the shelf against the wall holds each boy’s belongings, ALL of his belongings. Lisa, one of the girls also in the program, said is perfectly, the room where the children slept and kept all of their things was a perfect visual to the excess that we have. This is so true! I mean you should have seen the suitcases I packed to come over here. Upstairs was the girls’ room, same thing but no platform for a bed. 
Stung Men Chey was my favorite of all the schools because the children were extremely lively since they’re so used to interacting with foreigners and also because the dump, filthy as it was, made for a great sight to see. Unfortunately that was my first and most likely my last visit to Stung Men Chey while I am here. It is for an extremely great reason though. Since Phymean Noun won the CNN award, the Stung Men Chey school has gotten a great deal of publicity and is already full with volunteer teachers. Dr. Lewis told us that we are desperately needed at the other 2 schools because no foreigners have ever volunteered there.So much for that short ending… I guess I just had a lot I wanted to talk about.
Aah I am tired of typing! I didn't read it over, so sorry in advance for all of the errors..haha
Much love!
Rosie
Monday, May 18, 2009
I've had my first experience of getting sick
It was bound to happen, getting sick just comes with the territory here in Cambodia. Saturday afternoon we went to the modern market, called Psar Sovonar, it was more like a mall than a market. It was several stories (I would say 5 or 6). We weren't there but 45 minutes when I started to feel sick!! I almost fainted on the escalator, Lisa, one of the girls also in the program walked me to a corner and I sat down, then I started sweating profusely, my stomach was in sooo much pain; the worst pain ever!! I don't remember much, but I do remeber thinking that I wanted people to stop asking me questions because I couldn't answer them I also remembered this sweet Cambodian man bringing me a portable fan. My face was so pale, I was literally pouring out sweat. I finally was able to stand up and get to the bathroom, there was no toilet paper or soap, luckily I packed some toilet paper and had hand sanitizer in my bag! We left immediately after my episode and when we got home I got sick again, we realized that it was something I ate, but we do not know what yet. It came on so suddenly. I took some medicine and a long nap and I was better in 4 hours.
That night we went to a puppet show, it was a silk screen with leather puppets, so it was like a shadow puppet show. It was really neat. There were lots of little kids running around, and the theater was really cool! It was very small, when you walked through the gates there was a shop full of leather puppets in front of you, to left was the stage, which was risen, there was a place for the band and then a curtain with a silk screen in the middle. The best way I can describe the audience seating is as Khmer style stadium seating. There were about 6 rows of benches. The first row of benches had very small legs and were fairly close to the ground, the second row of benches' legs were taller than the first rows' legs but shorter than the third rows' legs etc, etc. 
There were quite a few westerners attending the puppet show, some of them had adopted Khmer children and others had a Cambodian mother and an American father. They were so cute, one of them was dancing to the music before the show started and I started talking to her and asked her where she learned to dance like that and she said, in a British accent, "I learned at my school, I know, don't I just have the most beautiful dancing?" haha it was so funny! The puppet show was really cool. It was all in Khmer so I didn't really follow it, but I could look at those puppets all day because they are so beautifully intricate! The picture above is from after the show, the puppeteers invited the audience back stage to play with the puppets behind the screen! The loved doing it!!
Sunday was a chill day, we didn't leave the villa at all. We had breakfast and then went straight to work on the lesson plans! We are teaching at 3 different schools, one is in the slums called Borey Keila School, the second one is outside the dump called Stung Mean Chey and the third one is about 45 minutes outside of the city and its called Borei Santhipheap. All of these schools are opperated by People Improvement Organization (PIO). Here is their Website if you are interested in taking a look. So the purpose of my time here in Cambodia is to teach art lessons and English to these children, we also train the teachers of the PIO schools to have better strategies with classroom management, and better understand child development. We also have workshops for teachers on issues such as childhood nutrition, health and hygiene and positive discipline strategies. In addition to teaching the children and training the teachers, we have been partnered up with local Univeristy students from Royal University, Phnom Penh (RUPP)! They are middle class Cambodians who will be in the classrooms with us and will carry on our volunteer work after we leave.
Much to my surprise, the upper and middle class Cambodians do not have much contact with or even knowledge about the poorest of the poor in this country; they have never been inside the slums or even to the dump to see what it is like. I think partnering with these RUPP students is going to be wonderful! We will learn so much from them as they will learn so much from us, we are also introducing social responsibility into these students way of life, which I could not be more happy about! I think everyone should give back in whatever little way they can, it does not have to be a huge gesture, just a small one done with great love. Anywhoo, those are the new developments for this trip! We are meeting the RUPP students in about an hour! I can't wait to see what they will be like, I hope I don't scare them off with my over enthusiasm...
Im off, lots of love and prayers,
Rosie
That night we went to a puppet show, it was a silk screen with leather puppets, so it was like a shadow puppet show. It was really neat. There were lots of little kids running around, and the theater was really cool! It was very small, when you walked through the gates there was a shop full of leather puppets in front of you, to left was the stage, which was risen, there was a place for the band and then a curtain with a silk screen in the middle. The best way I can describe the audience seating is as Khmer style stadium seating. There were about 6 rows of benches. The first row of benches had very small legs and were fairly close to the ground, the second row of benches' legs were taller than the first rows' legs but shorter than the third rows' legs etc, etc. 
There were quite a few westerners attending the puppet show, some of them had adopted Khmer children and others had a Cambodian mother and an American father. They were so cute, one of them was dancing to the music before the show started and I started talking to her and asked her where she learned to dance like that and she said, in a British accent, "I learned at my school, I know, don't I just have the most beautiful dancing?" haha it was so funny! The puppet show was really cool. It was all in Khmer so I didn't really follow it, but I could look at those puppets all day because they are so beautifully intricate! The picture above is from after the show, the puppeteers invited the audience back stage to play with the puppets behind the screen! The loved doing it!!Sunday was a chill day, we didn't leave the villa at all. We had breakfast and then went straight to work on the lesson plans! We are teaching at 3 different schools, one is in the slums called Borey Keila School, the second one is outside the dump called Stung Mean Chey and the third one is about 45 minutes outside of the city and its called Borei Santhipheap. All of these schools are opperated by People Improvement Organization (PIO). Here is their Website if you are interested in taking a look. So the purpose of my time here in Cambodia is to teach art lessons and English to these children, we also train the teachers of the PIO schools to have better strategies with classroom management, and better understand child development. We also have workshops for teachers on issues such as childhood nutrition, health and hygiene and positive discipline strategies. In addition to teaching the children and training the teachers, we have been partnered up with local Univeristy students from Royal University, Phnom Penh (RUPP)! They are middle class Cambodians who will be in the classrooms with us and will carry on our volunteer work after we leave.
Much to my surprise, the upper and middle class Cambodians do not have much contact with or even knowledge about the poorest of the poor in this country; they have never been inside the slums or even to the dump to see what it is like. I think partnering with these RUPP students is going to be wonderful! We will learn so much from them as they will learn so much from us, we are also introducing social responsibility into these students way of life, which I could not be more happy about! I think everyone should give back in whatever little way they can, it does not have to be a huge gesture, just a small one done with great love. Anywhoo, those are the new developments for this trip! We are meeting the RUPP students in about an hour! I can't wait to see what they will be like, I hope I don't scare them off with my over enthusiasm...
Im off, lots of love and prayers,
Rosie
Getting to know Cambodia
Hello everybody!!
So its Sunday, May 17 and lots has happened since my last post. On Friday we were supposed to start teaching, but it was a national holiday in Cambodia so the schools were not in session.
Instead we went to "Psar Toul Tom Poung" (also called the Russian Market) in the morning and the Royal Palace in the afternoon. The Russian Market was amazing! There is so much stuff to look at, talk about sensory overload; everything there is beautiful, handmade, and dirt cheap. I've realized that I am not the best bargainer of the bunch. When I try to bargain they'd shoot back a sad face, saying "no too little," and then Id feel bad and give them the full price, this is something I am working on. But on the bright side, I did get 3 super comfortable t-shirts for 5 dollars. I'm not sure if yall know this, but elephants are my favorite animal. Elephants are very reverred in this culture so they are on everything. At the market there is gorgeous art, beautiful wood carvings and pottery, amazing silk scarfs and so much more! In Cambodia there are a lot of disabled people because there are so many land mines left over from the war that have blown off a limb or burned a face. These disabled people were walking around selling postcards, and small artwork at the market so I bought them out of postcards, needless to say, expect a few postcards from me! I also took some great pictures at the market. It was so colorful and made for a great backdrop. The people are beautiful, their eyes light up when they smile even if they have no material possessions, a burned face or a blown off leg, they always greet you with a smile.
After lunch we toured the Royal Palace, since it was a national holiday, there were lots of festivities going on . The Royal Palace was absolutely majestic, as my roommate Priya so poignantly put it! It was an absolutely beautiful day to take pictures, with the bluest sky and brightest sun! Visiting the Royal Palace is the same concept as going on a tour of the White House, but at the Royal Palace everything is so open, accessible and much more beautiful. The king actually lives there and people were free to romp around the estate, there were beautiful jewels and treasures and no security guards. I think that says something about the Khmer culture. In the states, you have to wait forever to try to get into the whitehouse and there are security gaurds everywhere. It was interesting to compare the two. In the Royal Palace, there are Buddhas and temples and courtyards sprinkled throughout the estate. Children, monks and every other type of person was visiting the Palace. There was this big family who was touring the palace at about the same pace we were and all of the children would pose for pictures holding up peace signs and boast huge smiles! We watched a woman make silk and men play instruments. After the Royal Palace we took a drive down the river front; this was truly something to see. It was definately the nicer part of the city, there were two large grassy areas, boardered by streets, where all sorts of fun activites were going on. Teens kicking the soccer ball around, older men playing bad mitten, young girls chasing balloons, a couple having a picnic, etc. I wanted to jump out and chill in the grassy knoll with the Cambodians!
Here is a picture of two children who were at the Royal Palace following us around. They don't look too happy in the picture, but they were adorable! The child wearing a flower behind his ear is a boy after my own heart, he can really rock that flower! This afternoon we are going to the modern market and then to a traditional Khmer puppet show. The theatre is a silk screen and the pupeteers hold up leather puppets and the audience sees the shadow of the puppets. Can't wait to tell yall about it!
Until next time with lots of Love,
Rosie
So its Sunday, May 17 and lots has happened since my last post. On Friday we were supposed to start teaching, but it was a national holiday in Cambodia so the schools were not in session.
Instead we went to "Psar Toul Tom Poung" (also called the Russian Market) in the morning and the Royal Palace in the afternoon. The Russian Market was amazing! There is so much stuff to look at, talk about sensory overload; everything there is beautiful, handmade, and dirt cheap. I've realized that I am not the best bargainer of the bunch. When I try to bargain they'd shoot back a sad face, saying "no too little," and then Id feel bad and give them the full price, this is something I am working on. But on the bright side, I did get 3 super comfortable t-shirts for 5 dollars. I'm not sure if yall know this, but elephants are my favorite animal. Elephants are very reverred in this culture so they are on everything. At the market there is gorgeous art, beautiful wood carvings and pottery, amazing silk scarfs and so much more! In Cambodia there are a lot of disabled people because there are so many land mines left over from the war that have blown off a limb or burned a face. These disabled people were walking around selling postcards, and small artwork at the market so I bought them out of postcards, needless to say, expect a few postcards from me! I also took some great pictures at the market. It was so colorful and made for a great backdrop. The people are beautiful, their eyes light up when they smile even if they have no material possessions, a burned face or a blown off leg, they always greet you with a smile.Food here has been absolutely fabulous! Breakfast is an American breakfast, we have a choice of an omelet, fried egg, or scrambled eggs and our choice of juice, a choice of coffee or tea, always toast and jam and fresh fruit!!! Saturday morning we had the freshest, tastiest mango and papaya...YUM!! For lunch and dinner we always have a soup, a traditional Khmer dish (of course always with rice) and a desert with every lunch and dinner! My favorite dessert so far has been these bananas cooked with very finely shredded coconut, sugar and some sort of molasses! It was soooo delicious! The staff here at the Frangipani Villa, where I am staying, are SO sweet, I was joking with them a while ago, they were practicing their English with me, asking me how old I was, what I was studying. They are all between 20 and 23 years old. One of the guys, his name is Seanon, hes my fav so far, when he works at the villa he stays here because he has nowhere else to live. When he is not working here he works at the frangipani villa 90s (there are 2 Frangipani Villas, we are staying in the frangipani 60s) and when he is working at neither he said his friend, who is also a staff member takes him in. But the thing is, I feel like he is happier than I am! Always smiling and always so kind and generous. I haven't been here for long, but the spirit of these people is unbelievable, almost indescribable.
After lunch we toured the Royal Palace, since it was a national holiday, there were lots of festivities going on . The Royal Palace was absolutely majestic, as my roommate Priya so poignantly put it! It was an absolutely beautiful day to take pictures, with the bluest sky and brightest sun! Visiting the Royal Palace is the same concept as going on a tour of the White House, but at the Royal Palace everything is so open, accessible and much more beautiful. The king actually lives there and people were free to romp around the estate, there were beautiful jewels and treasures and no security guards. I think that says something about the Khmer culture. In the states, you have to wait forever to try to get into the whitehouse and there are security gaurds everywhere. It was interesting to compare the two. In the Royal Palace, there are Buddhas and temples and courtyards sprinkled throughout the estate. Children, monks and every other type of person was visiting the Palace. There was this big family who was touring the palace at about the same pace we were and all of the children would pose for pictures holding up peace signs and boast huge smiles! We watched a woman make silk and men play instruments. After the Royal Palace we took a drive down the river front; this was truly something to see. It was definately the nicer part of the city, there were two large grassy areas, boardered by streets, where all sorts of fun activites were going on. Teens kicking the soccer ball around, older men playing bad mitten, young girls chasing balloons, a couple having a picnic, etc. I wanted to jump out and chill in the grassy knoll with the Cambodians!
Here is a picture of two children who were at the Royal Palace following us around. They don't look too happy in the picture, but they were adorable! The child wearing a flower behind his ear is a boy after my own heart, he can really rock that flower! This afternoon we are going to the modern market and then to a traditional Khmer puppet show. The theatre is a silk screen and the pupeteers hold up leather puppets and the audience sees the shadow of the puppets. Can't wait to tell yall about it!Until next time with lots of Love,
Rosie
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Jet lag is no fun
So I cannot sleep, it is 4:30 am here and I keep waking up hoping its time to be up! The good thing about jet lag is that hopefully I will get to see the sunrise this morning! Since I can't sleep I decided to put up a few pictures for your viewing pleasure! Enjoy!
We ventured out into the city today. It looks much different in the daylight. Mo-peds packed with 3 or 4 people, lots of tuk tuks and crowded streets with street vendors, begars and performers. I took this picture today when we walked to the Lucky's, the local western market. This boy was sitting on the median of one of the busiest streets in Phnom
Penh.
I took this picture on the street outside of our hotel. Its a Buddhist monk running a few errands I presume!
We ventured out into the city today. It looks much different in the daylight. Mo-peds packed with 3 or 4 people, lots of tuk tuks and crowded streets with street vendors, begars and performers. I took this picture today when we walked to the Lucky's, the local western market. This boy was sitting on the median of one of the busiest streets in Phnom
Penh.I took this picture on the street outside of our hotel. Its a Buddhist monk running a few errands I presume!
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