"a strange thing happened on the way to elysia..."

the three month mark

2006-12-02T02:52:00.000+07:00

i cannot believe that it is already the 1st of December.
we arrived 3 months ago today....how surreal is that. even more mind boggling is how much and yet how little has happened/changed over the past 12weeks. the horizon's changed, the housemates have changed, our relationships with ourselves have changed. and yet somethings have, or could, not.
gerbrand and oystein will not be returning to cambodia after christmas. they've both found it too emotionally draining living here, at this age, at this time, with these people. i wish them all the best and yet somehow, in some way, i can't help feel both frustration and regret. i think it is fair to say that neither let us help them, and that when it really comes to it, hardly helped themselves. i guess thats the magic of this place, those that complete their stay, who stay the full course, they manage to seek and create the help they need to see it through, while those who can't may not have been able to. i wrote about failure and the instinctive lessons that can so meaningfully educate ourselves about who we are and why we do what it is we do. and i still stick to it. but i'd like to reiterate if not add a thought or two. to fail is to learn, provided we give ourselves the time we need to participate in that lesson, no matter the discomfort. without that time, the lesson is as lost as a pop quiz on a friday afternoon 10 mins before the bell. we need to accept this lesson, accept our failure and accept ourselves before we can ever hope to properly move on. to run is to physically change our settings, the people and objects that surround us. yet we still remain and that is the one thing, the one person that you can never run from.
it will always always be that self, YOURself, that has the last laugh. no matter what corner you call home.

[november 14th, 2006]

2006-11-14T14:18:00.000+07:00

It is in the ability to fail oneself that a person can truly find strength. In that failure are pieces of ourselves, spices of our personality, our emotions, our energies, and our motives, and when it confronts us we can be overwhelmed. When faced with this turbulent kaleidoscope of ourselves, the ability to overcome the discomfort, the doubt, the defense we’ve spent years building to achieve a superficial infallibility, to allow ourselves to admit who we are and why we fail, can be the single greatest step in gaining strength. And this strength does not render us ‘untouchable’ or ‘unbreakable’, the reality is quite the opposite. To gain that strength of person is to leave one defenseless, open, even happy, adjectives society would associate with what is seen as the negative quality of vulnerability. Yet to fail is to learn and in learning we build strength. Like any lesson, it takes time and effort and the commitment to let this new knowledge in and become part of what shapes us. Without failure, we fail to learn about who we are, fail to recognize, address, and understand what it is that makes us ‘us’.

'ya...well....you shoulda seen da otha cat...'

2006-11-08T08:59:00.000+07:00

cus it was totally unharmed haha.
after a jam-packed weekend of cat and house sitting , the score was cat one, me zero

[unless you count a face full of cat-claw fury...oh ya, and black eye from where it BIT me...as point-age...in that case i KICKED this weekend lol]

I DID borrow/steal mikes camera to take some pics of the water festival so those WILL be posted. [this ev-en-ing]

in the meantime, feel free to chuckle over these lovely pics of my cat-tagged face! it was painfully hilarious, just fingers crossed humans cant pick up feline HIV [dont worry mom, i'm at least 80 % certain that we cant.....i think.....jk]

2months

2006-11-02T17:51:00.000+07:00

the sky just turned purple all over.

6 minutes ago it was entirely pink. no clouds. just soft, dusty pink. i'm sure if i'd gone outside it would have reflected just as colourfully off the dust that has settled rather permanently onto every exposed surface of my body [...and other areas one could consider 'less' exposed....]

yesterday was our two month mark. i'm 1/4 of the way into this. made me realise how much more i could be doing. i've got TIME and i'm damn lucky to have it. i need to start using it more effectively.

come november 15th at least i'll be able to get my head firmly out of north america for a while. well, at least for 4 weeks, when the acceptance/rejection letter will grace my parents mailbox. me, i will be in lao, sleeping in treehouses connected by ziplines set in the canopy of a rainforest near the thai border. so fingers crossed that its one of those yes/no sort of letters lol. though i guess nothing is truly isolated anylonger, praise ye o internet land.

water festival is this weekend. jen and i are set with keys we've been armed with to house/cat sit for the next week. stories and past experiences keep getting increasingly ridiculous/alarming, all corroborating on the undeniable fact that phnom penh is total madness every year when the boat races come to tonle sap.

sorry for the lack of photos, my camera is out of commission. but i will get it fixed and there will be photos, absolutely.

much peace, much love,
el.

:D !

2006-10-30T00:29:00.000+07:00

[my lovely jen is back :) ]

p.s.

2006-10-28T23:07:00.000+07:00

man.

sitting on the roof, trying to ignore the drunk khmer guys in the half-built building across the street making stupid kiss-face noises at anything moving on two legs, attempting to write postcards and letters to people back home.

actually thats a lie. i havent even picked up a pen. because each time i do i decide i will start with the most meaningful letters first, the ones that wont end up on the fridge or under the front seat of the car. but its always those letters that i just cant write.

i said this to someone a few weeks ago but i think i'll say it to everyone. its not that i'm not writing you. its just that each time i do i come to conclusions i have to go back and make sense of.

so if you never receive a single letter from me, its not because i'm not writing.

i am writing you.
just not the sort of thing that should wear a stamp.

IF YA CANT TAKE DA HEAT............find friends with aircon...

2006-10-28T19:20:00.000+07:00

according to the thermometer, it is currently 34 degrees outside.

that means its closer to 38 inside. oh, and did i mention the sun went down 2.5 hrs ago?

i actually dont feel that hot. i dont really even notice it much anymore actually. i think i can thank running mid-day in singapore for a year for that.

my skin on the other hand is protesting loudly. since this morning, it has decided to break itself into a heat rash that is currently covering my ENTIRE BODY. its incredibly attractive and comfortable.

maybe i should have gone to that halloween party tonight.

[so just in case you were worried things were getting too glamourous....haha]

other updates:
jen is in angkor wat with her parents this weekend [and, get this, NEARLY FORGOT HER CAMERA when she left this morning....gasp!shock!horror!.....lol.]

tomorrow is a fundraiser, pumpkin-carving bash for a group of street kids our friends work with....50 kids with knives, should be interesting, haha....nah, its going to be a fun afternoon, its raising funds for a street dancing organization that just recently got up and running, providing street kids with a positive creative outlet....its been going awesomely, so i cant wait to see these kids do their thing,

tuesday is the 'adult' halloween fundraiser ball, that one raising funds for a couple of other projects [haha sry, i'm losing track].

the 31st is also King Sihanouk's Birthday so phnom penh is about to turn into one crazy town as it is also the start of the water festival. apparently what looks to be the entire country crowds into the streets of phnom penh to watch the dragon boat races and all traffic stops for the 4 days or so that is lasts. all i know is that all of our khmer friends are excited and all our barahng [foreign] friends are gettin the heck out of dawson....its going to be an interesting week haha.

funny though, I keep forgetting this is the 'KINGDOM' of cambodia....

but i must STOP WASTING TIME.

miss you all muchly. other than this, we're all safe and sound....actually got passed by three different monks while riding a motodop today so if thats any indication of us taking care, i dont know what is.

would love to hear from you, feel free to leave messages/comments/curses/blessings.

love. el.

[guess you could call these 'b-sides' ...]

2006-10-24T12:31:00.000+07:00

[el&jen]

2006-10-21T17:36:00.000+07:00

our daily commute

2006-10-20T16:44:00.000+07:00

this is the road outside the centre jen, gerbrand and ulrika teach at everyday. on tuesday it was completely flooded [hence the venice reference in the last post]. but this is what it looks like most days. i was tempted to post the pics as-is [without fiddling with the saturation, etc] but i didnt feel they gave a good enough reflection of what these streets are truly like without the filter of a lense. [though not that these do much better].

slightly less profound [but equally catchy...]

2006-10-19T22:02:00.000+07:00

alright, so, here are the silly lyrics of the song that WILL NOT LEAVE jen and I's head resulting in random outbursts of song at restaurants, on the backs of motos, and in the middle of class. i'm just postin it so you can FEEL OUR PAIN ...ha.

THE FEELING
"Kettle's On"
I turn on the tap and run some water
Flick a little switch on the wall
I'm hoping you remember what I taught ya
Hoping you remember me at all
I'm strong but I feel like a mouse when you're gone
I'm weak but I'll take on the world when you're here
With me, with me

Can't you see you're in the wrong place
Will you please face it and come home
When I think about you're sweet face
I can't wait for you to come home
I can see you got a real taste but that champaigne but its all gone
Come home, the kettles on

I've got a little something on my mind
To keep it to myself isn't really very kind
Pouring out my heart isn't usually my style
But you gave me an inch so I'm gonna take a mile
You see
I'm strong but I feel like a mouse when you're gone
I'm weak but I'll take on the world when you're here
With me, with me
Can't you see you're in the wrong place
Will you please face it and come home
When I think about you're sweet face I can't wait for you to come home
I can see you got a real taste but that champaigne but its all gone
So come home, the kettles on

...and thats more than enough. gah!

in other news: no longer necessary to take a boat to work [i will post pictures tomorrow...hoooly man]. it was like venice....but with red mud....and chickens....and no body who speaks italian.....never mind.

[better than a thousand: from chapter 8 in the dhammapada]

2006-10-17T22:48:00.000+07:00

'better than a thousand useless words is one single word that gives peace.
better than a thousand useless verses is one single verse that gives peace.
better than a hundred useless poems is one single poem that gives peace.

better than a hundred years lived in ignorance, without contemplation, is one single day of life lived in wisdom and in deep contemplation.

better than a hundred years lived in idleness and in weakness is one single day of life lived with courage and powerful striving.

if a man should conquer in battle a thousand and a thousand more, and another man should conquer himself, his would be the greater victory, because the greatest of victories is the victory over oneself'

AHHHHHHHHHH

2006-10-14T00:22:00.000+07:00

SAT 2s in the a.m.

AHH. ok. i'm done.

lets here it for my lack of anything resembling organisation. man.

did 2xs better on the world history practice SAT that i did for a laugh than i did on the french one i trudged through as its one i've actually signed up for ......[this does not bode well].

[and yes mom, dont worry, i am remembering to breathe... buuut that seems about all i CAN remember, ha.]

in other news: our coordinator arrived tonight, we're having a US-CANADA thanksgiving dinner on sunday and phnom penh is holding a CRITICAL MASS sunday arvo...[OH YA].

quit the tears.

2006-10-11T23:53:00.000+07:00

this week has made me realise some things. some uncomfortable, unromantic, but incredibly real things.

it doesnt matter where you are, what you do, or how many live-aid concerts MTV may air on your country of origin. the west fascinates and pacifies itself with HBK projects and monetary blessings in the belief that they will bring happiness to whoever it trickles down to, and that in doing so, they will receive, in some abstract way, good karma, a lighter conscience, or some other pat-on-the-back still allowed by a society so drenched in guilt.

and while i fully appreciate the importance of financial investment, whatever the motive, in projects like the one in Kep or Pursat or the funds that keep the centres we're working at running, it really is only one part of the equation.

to bring happiness, to be able to find or inspire true happiness in yourself or in others, has little to do with the material. neither does it really matter what part of the world you live in. the truth is, once we figure out how to meet our basic needs, whether you're in phnom penh, victoria, russia, new york, to be truthfully happy is entirely up to you.

you cant rely on the kindness of others. you cant rely on material wealth. you cant even rely on doing the 'selfless' to appease your nagging guilt for being born too rich or too poor or too smart or too healthy. and no child or adult, no matter how horrific a slum or violent a past or broken a family they may come from, are going to derive much from your half-baked efforts.

until you can be happy with yourself, and entirely happy with what it means to be yourself, regardless of race or language or wealth or religion, until you can stop relying on others to get what you need to keep you honest and content and in the moment, you've got a hell of a chance of inspiring that in someone else.

the past couple days have exposed maybe more than is really needed right now but thats the reality of this place. and what keeps surfacing out of all the turmoil, both inner and outer, is this. you cant hide from yourself. you cant fake a smile, you cant rely on others, you cant 'lose yourself' in some foreign country, and you certainly cant cry and feel bad for someone and feel better for feeling guilty. until you learn to find humanity for yourself, how can you possibly share it. humanity is the one thing that links every single one of us on this planet and yet it seems to be the first thing to be forgotten. to be human is to be an individual, and unless that individual can learn to love themselves, then this frantic, hap-hazard quest to bring 'happiness to all' will undoubtably fail.

quit the tears. please. they're not going to help anyone. save that energy and help yourself.

child rights in denim, polite instructions, today's class, a hallway. [wednesday afternoons at CCH]

2006-10-11T17:41:00.000+07:00

2006-10-10T20:21:00.000+07:00

woodhuts, kampot pepper, chamka bei, khmer rouge, 'simon says...'

2006-10-09T22:43:00.000+07:00

as i am kinda exhausted and have yet to plan tomorrow's lesson, i'm just going to put up the pics from this weekend.

jen and i wound up back on the south coast in Kampot province, first on the coast in a fishing village, then inland a bit in chamka bei for a development plan workshop our organisation held with a number of the villagers in that area [all ex-khmer rouge].
as soon as i finish the report i'll post all about it but at the moment all i can say is that it was surreal and exhausting and beautiful and i learnt more than i think i am aware of at this moment.

and i really need to start learning khmer. seriously.

oh, and who needs coffee when you can just walk into one classroom in a three room building built by unesco in the middle of rice paddies and cow fields to the raucous laughter of 30 ex-khmer rouge villagers playing 'simon says'. [SURREAL.]

anyway, here are a few pics i managed to salvage. my camera was being a pain the entire weekend.

[and the post before is the centre we were at all weekend.]

the others are from the drive there and the drive home [which i fondly/accurately title 'southern cambodia through the lense of a tempermental camera mid-monsoon dodging cows and people and bikes at 60miles an hour']

[but maaan. its weird to come back from something like that and have to study for SATIIs.]

the desks were stenciled 'UNESCO'...

2006-10-09T22:25:00.000+07:00

...but we'll be the ones to fill them.

hell ya. workin for the little guy is so damn cool.

['after surviving a double-blind-date...']

2006-10-06T00:09:00.000+07:00

i love this job.

seaside in the a.m.
knee-deep and scrubbing the hell out of a concrete cistern tomorrow afternoon.
rabbit island. fresh crab. 1/3 of a film crew, 1/4 of a dev workshop team. jade. blue. grey. brown.
friends. real ones. just three.

'hows my khmer?....'
;)

credits

2006-10-04T23:08:00.000+07:00

it was rightly pointed out by jen, my wicked-awesome-roomie-sister-in-arms that i forgot to put up photo credit for a couple of the pics on here.

seeing as a few of them were a joint effort [ie one of us took it, the other played with the colours...], i leave those out... but ones of note, like the two most recent of the kids through the banister, those were taken by the j-macs herself. mind you she didnt LIKE them....but i did so they're up there.

the sunset one of our silhouettes...that was taken by our friend alana [obviously not me...i'm the second shadow from the left...] and so were a couple of the pagoda ones [though i had altered them quite a bit before i put them up].

if there are any others i've missed, i'm sorry. if i ever did randomly receive royalties for any pic that wasnt mine ...[?].....do know they'd go straight to the artist themselves.

....but in case you wondering....all the rest WERE taken by me....

words.

2006-10-03T19:24:00.000+07:00

words words words. english language lacking
proverbs.
utilitarian visions, prompting laughter.
she said i had eyes like
sunflowers. the petals.

wanting to run, waiting to spin on the
dented-tin wheels that carry us so softly through these shaded streets.
ring a bell and smile.
i've been in love once. i've been hit by love, once. love without need or sense or circumstance.

songs songs songs. hum the wrong bridge and you'll be on to the next.

[oh sweet beauty in ambiguity, thou smile in font 10.]

'i love my country, i just think we should see other people'

2006-10-02T00:01:00.000+07:00

would someone please tell me

whats

happening

to

my

country.

"from 1970s to the early of the 1990's, this area was the hot fighting battle between Khmer Rough'

2006-10-01T17:02:00.000+07:00

hahaha...oh man...
alright so while i did make a promise to myself to post LESS....i HAD to share that with y'all.

its sunday, the suns about to drop, i'm sitting on my floor drinking an iced espresso in a ridiculously large mug ATTEMPTING to edit a preliminary development report Bridges had done on Chamka Bei, a village we're headin out to next week to hold an open dev strategy workshop between us and the community [aka the KEP project...fast becomin my new baby...]

anyway, i'm not getting very far because i keep BURSTING out laughing. and i realise that for those who know me, i guess it isnt much of a surprise to hear i'm findin agricultural analysis HILARIOUS.... haha but the bad thing is the fact that i'm only catchin these little 'lost-in-translation- gems the 2nd or 3rd read-through...ooops.

ha. ah dear. sry.

in other news, i have eaten waaay too much tom yam soup today. ugh.

oh, and the clouds painted a highlighter-pink upside down exclamation point at sundown tonight.

and theres a massive baby shower banquet taking place on the sidewalk outside our house as i write this. the yellow satin tents went up this morning and now our front door opens into the makeshift kitchen that seems to be catering enough food to keep the 100-odd khmer sitting outside on plastic chairs at full banquet tables in their most formal dress full for at least the next 4 days. this country is awesome.

anyway, tis all. miss you. love you. please write.

4our.

2006-10-01T10:25:00.000+07:00

[i've been reading]

2006-10-01T01:31:00.000+07:00

HUMILITY AND COMPASSION

Can true humility and compassion exist in our words in our eyes

unless we know we too are capable of

any act?

St. John of the Cross

2006-09-30T17:55:00.000+07:00

IF YOU LOVE

You might quiet the world for a second

if you pray.

And if you love, if you

really love,

our guns will

wilt.

pagoda pics.

2006-09-30T10:23:00.000+07:00

from oudong. sorry, they're a bit of a mess. not reeeally happy with them but i figured i should get them up before i forgot them.

one month

2006-09-29T08:55:00.000+07:00

8:30 tonight will be the one month mark.

i guess these are the milestones, anniversaires, knotches on the clock that are meant to induce pause and reflection and a dose of unashamed navel-gazing as we take stock of where we are, what we've done, who we were and what we're quickly [or not so quickly] becoming.

some things never change. i'm still stubborn as hell. outspoken. a little distant but passionate as ever [and no, not in any 'interesting' sense...this place knocks that out of you pretty quickly...]

but what i realised last night is this: that i am learning to love. and not the individual. spending 7 hours a day with these kids, i am learning to love, openly, to trust openly, and to listen. things are getting quieter and i dont quite know what to do with the change. scarier is the reality that with this change inevitably comes something i have yet to ever truthfully do: learn to love myself.

i'm also a little saddened by the fact that those who are with me while i figure this all out are going to be so incredibly distant one year from now.

but more frustrating is the reality that those who deserve more than anyone else in my life to finally have reciprocated that which they have always given so freely to me, arent here now to experience this change.

everyone in this house, in this city, seems to looking for something. i think i've written this before but it still surprises me that in a country so raw, so real, so black and white in so many ways....i still find myself and the people around me to be so full of this strange, unmistakable loneliness that no one seems to know how to handle. i'm not trying to be all emo and 'oh my life sucks, people are sad'-bs. i'm just trying to capture the sort of colour i cant post in photographs. it tints our daily lives here.

to those of you who know i love you, trust me.
to those of you who have yet to know that, trust me that you will.

kep'd

2006-09-29T04:13:00.000+07:00

coconuts.

2006-09-27T21:23:00.000+07:00

these coconuts were a gift from the head monk at the pagoda we were invited to celebrate pchum benh with last week.

it was a theraveda buddhist pagoda, the most common form of buddhism in cambodia, one that seems to be a utilitarian mix of buddhist, hindu and local beliefs and traditions. there are many large 'wats' [as they're called in khmer] in phnom penh but the ones in the countryside seem to be far more significant [as phnom penh literally empties every major holiday as people return to their home villages to be with family]. so left the city and drove out to oudong, about 2hours north east of phnom penh, to the home village and pagoda of one of our khmer friends who also works for bridges. he had actually spent a number of years studying as a monk there after the death of his parents and wanted to show us where he came from.

it was definately one of the stranger days we've had. the pagoda we went to had obviously been of some stature pre-wartime. now it was a faded, dusty, sadly beautiful shell of what it used to be, with bullet holes and mortar shell marks poc-marking most of the statues and mausoleums. the ceremony itself was interesting though, the villagers were happy to include us in their rituals, eagerly taking us to the front of the line when it came to making the offerings, laughing at our confusion when it became plain obvious that we had no idea what to do. the festival of pchum benh is a two week period in which family members visit the pagoda as many days as they can spare, bringing food and lighting incense in exchange for the monks helping them pray for the souls of those family members caught on earth as spirits [and not reincarnated as is the buddhist belief]. it was a little overwhelming praying for the dead in a country who knows so many ghosts.

so thats my coconut story. i came home after work today to crashing and loud laughter/shouting as mike and savette busted the lot open. and it reminded me. so there you go.

2006-09-27T19:12:00.000+07:00

[xx.el]

2006-09-27T00:00:00.000+07:00

alright.

so i sat down, wrote a 'deepandmeaningful' about how things were going, my philosophy on learning curves and egos, our weekend on the coast, all peppered with my pathetic attempts at poetic depiction and humour [hah].

and then i ran out the door to get to a meeting, forgetting to post it. and now its lost.

so as i am not in the mood to try and rewrite what i so carefully typed out....

heres this weeks random photo selection.

i heart kep. [and i have never meant that more.]

2006-09-24T21:12:00.000+07:00

b&w shadows and monsoons [...what, he kept gettin in the way]

2006-09-21T20:20:00.000+07:00

me and ma homies [or 'when all else fails, bring your camera']

2006-09-19T07:13:00.000+07:00

[111 years of inner conflict and confusion]

2006-09-19T00:26:00.000+07:00

today was tough.

not tough in any physically demanding sort of way. just exhausting in the mental, emotional, pyschological sense. the sky was heavy, the kids were distracted, and our heads were a nasty combination of both. and then to multiply it all by 6 and stick us under one roof, with personal doubts, frustrations, illness, and conflicts flaring like potshots over a no-mans land, well, it makes you want to cry, scream, run, laugh, or just sleep.

i held two people today, both broken down to tears and i know its just a matter of time for the third. but what i dont understand is why, of everyone here, i seem to be the one who brings out this vulnerability. at least it seems to be that i've become the one person that people finally break down around as soon as they find themselves one on one with me. and its not like i'm prying. i simple 'hows it going', even a smile and they just seem to crack.

ah...who would have thought i'd feel so emotionally isolated in such a full house.

there just doesnt seem to be enough room left for my own frustrations or doubts or fears. everyones filled it with their own.

i'm looking forward to getting to the coast this weekend. i am in serious need of the ocean.

i think i understand now why bruce took up running marathons.

[one bird+rooftop-anchored skyline]

2006-09-17T01:06:00.000+07:00

where

is

my

head.

[i think its time to land my mind.]

mai.

2006-09-16T19:35:00.000+07:00

if you were here i would walk us down the dirt road by this house and sit and watch the evening sun blend the gold, red, brown, and laughter into a delicately laid warmth, woven with the comfort and human fragility that so become one hug from you.

[i love you mom.]

'juxtapose THIS!'

2006-09-16T11:25:00.000+07:00

[i'll just let you peice what you'd like from this little suite o randoms]

jail-break and some clouds i met.[this is ma' hood]

2006-09-16T07:42:00.000+07:00

after a second solo afternoon at the CCH i grabbed my camera and broke out of the compound [alright, i walked out the open frontdoor] and went for a walk around a block in ma neighbo-hood.

oystein was still bed ridden and mike had tried to come but couldnt last the day. he made a fabulous transition from grey to ashen white around 1030 am and i sent him home perched, half-swaying on the back of a moto. [dont worry, he will be fine. its just a flu.] so after playing postwoman after i combining the intermediate and advanced classes and improv-ing a lesson on letter writing [to be sent to the boys... ] i put on my sandles and WALKED....something i have not been able to do for more than 30 seconds at a time since my back peaced last saturday. i only went around the block and it was more than enough but i wanted to give y'all a better idea as to what my neighbourhood looks like. it was also a brilliant night for the Cloud Appreciation Club, haha so please bear with me :)

*note on the letters: it was funny, they were incredibly dramatic/romantic/cheesy and i finally made the connection between the bad english pop songs that they knew all the lyrics to and the english phrases they were most comfortable saying/writing....starting to think i should expose them to some tom waits or tori amos, add a couple of layers of depth to their lyric bank :P]

moto solo

2006-09-14T22:54:00.000+07:00

so it happened.

after joking to people in emails last night about our team dropping like flies and my taking on the 35 kids solo with one lesson plan and a broken back mike came upstairs this morning looking a rather spectacular shade of grey.

and the day went spectacularily. it wasnt 'spectacle-worthy' but i just sort of exhaled and went with every conversation, meal, class, smile and moto the day threw at me. the only proper class that took place was my afternoon class with my intermediates, 6 lovely, lovely, girls who like to ask questions, work hard and laugh at my hilarious attempts at khmai. and despite my rant on the way out the door reminiscent of edward nortons 'f-new york' monologue in the '25th hour' [and my quick english lesson introducing the words 'tough' and 'lame' ie, 'girls are tough, boys are lame'....hehe], it was kinda nice to have a chance to just sit down and chat with some of the students one on one.

i have made an effort, and so have the others, to not press the kids for their histories. we're not here to pity them, we're not here to shower them with misplaced, alienated sympathy. we're here to work with the kids as we know them and as they know us, in the present.

so when one of the girls who, at 14, has been through more than many of us could even comprehend surviving with a fraction of the intelligence and grace and unconditional warmth this young woman possesses, decided to sit me down and tell me her story during the break at lunch today, i was caught a little off guard. i am still trying to digest how this girl and her brother, who right from day one adopted me as their 'sister', could just calmly sit in front of me and rationalise with such a rare maturity the violence, abuse, and exploitation that she has experienced with the simple practicality of a repeated 'everyone's life is difficult.'

i have never met so many old souls in so many young faces.

riding home on the back of a moto as clouds to the left threw their fat raindrops horizontally, trying to catch us unawares as we rode under deceptively blue sky, my mind finally felt at home amongst the red mud, stray dogs, broken pavement and woven traffic.

and tonight held a beautiful, modest sunset.
[and i finally counted stars].

me+rain+no roommate+3hrs of bbc =

2006-09-13T18:47:00.000+07:00

so its raining....and dark out....and half the house is sick/working/out....

so here is me :)

[please laugh. i certainly was.]

weatherproofed

2006-09-12T17:17:00.000+07:00

i.luv.rain.

2006-09-12T15:42:00.000+07:00

what a fun day.

managed to wake up at 630, on the dot, get downstairs and make two perfect glasses of iced coffee for jen and i without spilling/melting/setting fire to gerbrands mini 'italian' [thats what he calls it...its just a metal coffee maker]....all before the rest got up. planned the mornings lesson on the drive to the centre, the usual commute full of horrific dance-inspiring pop music and over-tired panic/hysterics while flipping through all 5 english grammar and lesson books trying discover the difference between the past and present continuous tenses of action verbs before i was to convincingly teach a table of 6 intelligent girls the distinction. [ha...and while i did figure out...we had a lesson on journaling in the end.]
so it was a brilliant morning.

and then it POURED

ah i love monsoon season. everything just seems to exhale. its just a beautifully healthy thing for pysche.

so when i came back to start the afternoon lesson and found only 2 girls, we had an impromptu ballet lesson. and once they mastered the pencil turn and plie, we moved on to swimming, holding a oh-so-SILLY individual medley race amidst the tables and chairs in the kitchen/dining room as soon as they mastered all four strokes.... [which i lost haha].

and just as we were about to hold the race again, but this time outside in what seemed like enough water to fill a pool, the other four suddenly woke up/stopped playing/undisappeared and we spent the last 20 minutes learning the lyrics to 'amazing grace' for what will be one of the first songs the girls are going to sing in our new singing group [i wouldnt call us a choir quite yet haha].

so it has been a goofy, balanced and oh so beautifully drenched tuesday.

and now if you'll excuse me,

i have a date with the rain.

[wish you were here.]

[neighbours]

2006-09-12T00:17:00.000+07:00

this is the view of the kitchen balcony [if you squint you can see our neighbours through the bars...]. if they can afford it, people tend to make grated and spiked cages of their houses, barbed-wire and steel gated refuges to lock themselves into. the compound we're living in has double padlocking on its main doors to the street. at first it seemed so odd to not only lock others out but to double-y lock myself IN against the outside and whoever it is that inspires so much fear.
though that said, far scarier was how quickly i accepted it.

and this i took leaning through one of the grates on our window in our bedroom. [jen and i have got the sweetest pad in the house, without a doubt :) its slowly turnin into the chill out spot...well, not really chill....this country is TOO hot to have anythin to do with chill...haha. its going to be weird going back to sleeping with blankets again...]

[dispatch]

2006-09-11T00:40:00.000+07:00

listening to: internet feed of dispatch, my new fall sound...they're unreal.

mood: anxious. actually no. restless. bedrest has left too much space for thoughts too far away from here. i've been in a mode of constant re-think about things not relevant to now. uneasy. i think i'm going to have to start travelling a little lighter than i have been. damnit.

'you are young man, uou must be living
go now you are forgiven

[....this fight is not worth fighting.']

[ha. wow for lyrical ambiguity]

thoughts: heading into week two feels like standing at the edge of another wave about to break. due to the back i'm switching classes with mike [there is no way i can take on my 30-odd tickle-prone beginner class this week, ha.]. a little anxious but definately excited to put myself out there with another group. strangely sad to not see my little guys this week [i was getting all protective about them trying to plan tomorrows lessons with mike haha] but i know mike will be absolutely excellent :) i'm really proud of him, oystein too. we're a neat team [and ironically all with equally unruly brown curly hair ...wonder if we planned that].

tomorrow night we're going to be broken into our mini task teams to help Michael, Bruce and Wendy [BAB coordinators] finish up the Cambodian Paralegal Project they've been working incredibly hard on over the past two years. Its a really cool project thats main focus is to educate literate cambodians about their legal rights so they can hopefully improve the situations of themselves and their communities. I'll post more about it once I understand it better myself.

ah dear.

i will learn to let go. i will.
thank god for new music.
i am learning to listen.

good night.

why do i always look west?

2006-09-10T00:01:00.000+07:00

as soon as the painkillers bruce slipped me kicked in i stole away and crawled to the roof to escape the white tiles of my room for a little bit.

this is a strange city at night.

not sure how i feel about just how public all the discoveries, unpleasant or otherwise, that i will be making about myself over the next 7 months are going to be.

not even sure on how i feel about the ones i've already made.

honestly though. who decides how much they know about someone. north america is the land of the invisible barriers of personality.

theres very little freedom to decide what people see here. we are all naked.

'look mom! no tracks!'

2006-09-09T10:59:00.000+07:00

me and the lovely jen [yes, on the roof]. not looking too bad after the hardest week of our liiiives :)

my medicinal beer-lao experience was interesting. locked myself into not one, but four different in-depth conversations covering topics from heroin addicts and social justice in the slums of phnom penh to the comparitive cruelty of mental vs. physical torture to the trippyness factor of yellow fire hydrants in toronto. by the end of the night [and 4 beer later], i cornered a UN development advisor at the end of our table and grilled him on the reality of the sustainability of the NATO efforts in afghanistan [he was on his way back to kabul]. i wont retype his answer here but for anyone interested i can always save it for later.

ANYWAY. woke up at 7. back still in paaain. i hate going back to the 'walking-half-a-mile-an-hour' mode. agh. its like going back to square bloody one.

haha BUT HEY! no more complaining. hope y'all are doin brilliantly.

miss you.

cheers.xx.

Courtesy of last nights evening-ly meeting of the Phnom Penh Cloud Appreciation Club:

2006-09-09T10:44:00.000+07:00

[now you know what we see every night from the top floor of our house. please note the lack of grass huts and water buffalo [HA meghan...]...they're all by the river ;)]

[the first 163.5 hours]

2006-09-08T16:29:00.000+07:00

7 days. we arrived one week ago. this time last week i was standing in the foyer of senior house, saying goodbye to singapore and all the people who'd shaped my life for the past year. but now, only 7 days later, like oystein and i agreed last night, this place has already become 'home' and the people that fill it are already the extended family, hate em or love em, that manage to weave themselves into every new translation 'home'. [ha, i can't WAIT for uni.]

i am proud to say that i have semi-successfully created, planned and taught 4 proper beginner english lessons in the past 2 days [thank you, thank you...haha]. none have been as hard as that head-first dive the three of us had to take on our own the first day we arrived as a proper group and showed up with no intention of teaching to three classes sitting eagerly at their desks and tables, waiting for their lesson to start [AH!]. haha...ah WOW... to all the drama teachers i have ever had, i will for ever be in debt to each and every unit we ever did on improv, it was probably never more useful as it was that first fateful morning.

but tonight is friday which = the weekend. two days to pull it all together. and to drink beer [because YAY. my back went out WICKEDLY today. and i cant move. seriously. this really sucks.]

i'm off. late for our evening-ly 'cloud appreciation club' meeting on the roof. will post some pics for you all [haha i have a feeling you are all going to have a great idea of what the roofs of phnom penh look like at dusk by the time i leave this place :)]

miss you. love to hear from you.
take care.

[sitting ontop of phnom penh...our roof]

2006-09-07T20:08:00.000+07:00

[the last 24hrs...i'm too tired to think straight]

2006-09-07T16:14:00.000+07:00

yoga on the roof with two frighteningly flexible europeans.
sudden addiction to my nightly sun salutation [go figure]
salted-cake, khmer style
banana leaves
salted bodies, dust, exhaust, red, gold, brown, green, richly coloured poverty
dusk
rue 113
clothes that need to be peeled at night
the cloud appreciation association, collective appreciat-ors of phnom penh blue purple rose and gold.
the sounds of so many living. louder punctuated sounds of death.
us dollar. wat. bhat. riel.
[those thoughts of individuals that comfort most in rooms, vans, streets of groups. a much-loved pause in all this crowded noise.]
running at dusk
cycling at dark
tears, sweat, smolder, sunset, solitude. breeze.
orange, black, blue, grey, brown
i am waiting to arrive.

'alright.so, you mean we have to TEACH?'

2006-09-05T18:57:00.000+07:00

Lesson Planning Session #1, the first without the guiding wisdom of CCH's semi-resident yoda [ie. Kevin Morley].
Our team [less Oystein, our first casualty to khmer cleanliness] finally sat down and attempted our first hashing-out of how we were going to actually do what we were sent here to do: teach. It was like selection weekend but this time the pressure wasnt coming from the fact that failure would equal our not being selected. The real possibility of our failing the kids this time and not our past self-centered objectives, well, was a far scarier weight looming over at least my head at that oversized mahogony table this afternoon. I think out of everything, my greatest fear coming into this project is failing these kids. Failing to give them what they are asking for, failing to give them the tools that should be in my power to give, failing to help. And its strange that I would use that word, 'help', because until now [as many of you who've had to sit through at least one of my rants would know] it has been a firm belief of mine that as soon as one adopts the attitude that they can 'help' someone, then the condescention implied will always bar the way for a meaning dialogue between the two sides. And while that is still something i believe, meeting the individuals at CCH and the way that they so easily and freely opened up to as and included us as family not just teachers or visitors, I suddenly have this overwhelming drive to try and 'help' them as I would try and help any other close friend or member of my family. Maybe things will change once we start building the student-teacher relationship as we get more heavily into teaching. I hope so. But if not, then I may just burn out.

[menu wisdom]

2006-09-03T22:08:00.000+07:00

The group of us went out to this lovely little cafe/guesthouse for lunch today [situated immediately across from the Tuol Sleng Prison, scene of some of the most horrific genocidal attrocities that took place in Cambodia during the reign of the Khmer Rouge]. Flipping through the pages listing the smoothies and lunch and dinner specials, I found this quote written on the back cover of the menu.

'Humans are tuned for relationship. The eyes, the skin, the tongue, ears and nostrils are all gates where our body receives the nourishment of otherness. This landscape of shadowed voices, these feathered bodies and antlers and tumbling streams these breathing shapes are our family, the beings with whom we struggle and suffer and celebrate.'

I couldnt help but think how eerily appropriate the timing of finding this quote was.
[This has been the summer of strange and heavily meaningful timings...haha however lame and reflective that may sound].

The name of the place was the boddhitree [www.boddhitree.com] and apparently train their staff from disadvantaged families and situations. The food was brilliant and apparently the guesthouse is popular SO for any of you planning on COMING TO CAMBODIA, preferably in the next 8 months....;)

Today was overwhelming. This morning the lot of us [8 at the moment] piled into the back of a touk touk built for 5 and went to the "Olympic Stadium" [yes, we know that Cambodia has never hosted the Olympic games, but the cleaning lady wearing the uniform with the upside-down emblem of the rings was difficult to convince otherwise]. But we played [or the three scandinavian boys played] football [soccer] with 20 other boys from a slum on the otherside of town. It was way too hot and far too muddy for the score to amount to much in the way of accuracy but one look at how covered Gerbrand and the others where with this bright orange clay has convinced me to get in there next weekend.

In the afternoon we went to CDCC, the site of the second CCH for the younger children. This centre is larger and has nearly three times as many children, many of them having been there for as short a time as 3 or4 days. The children had created an entire performance for us, their new teachers [I've already been called 'teacher', haha, its so strange to hear!] and we're using the show as both a 'hello' to the 6 of us and a goodbye to JC Morley who has been heavily involved at the centre on and off since she graduated from UWCSEA a year ago. I'm not going to go into detail but I think its safe to say that each of us were blown away by the grace and energy and enthusiasm all of the children getting on the makeshift stage had. And not just attention seeking, the energy behind each child's getting up and performing their dance or their song was obviously driven by incredible energy and support by their peers. But it was overwhelming, without a doubt and at points a little surreal. It will be interesting to see how our team 'negotiations' will turn out this morning and we finally decide who is going to teach where. Will keep you all posted.

As for now, I'm going to attempt sleep though I have a feeling the 38 degrees that seem to be filling this house at 330 a.m. are going to be keeping me a little too close a company.

Much love and grace....[and this is the final time I will post this, but PLEASE email me! haha I have to be honest and say that my list of special email receivers is growing quickly shorter by the hour that nothing enters my inbox...consider yourself warned ! ;)...even you mom, haha]

the first 24

2006-09-02T23:52:00.000+07:00

CAMBODIA. you are real. your people, your streets, your barred windows, your touk-touks. all marked by that same honest moment of accidental beauty, coloured only slightly by the thin layer of brown-orange dust that seems to gently veil it all. [oh, and mom, i still want a water buffalo....].

ah wow, phnom penh is beautiful. horrifically poor in some areas but filled with this quiet, even calm sort of old-world ornateness that manages to shine through in the most subte of places and circumstance. haha now of course i've only been here 25 hours and so am still wearing my naive glasses of idealism but i think its safe to say that the beauty of the place is one thing any foreigjer could easily attest to. [yay!]

oy tho, this place is making me TIRED. morein the a.m.

elysia
ps. to all of you special enough to get an email from me, REPLY haha, i wanna hear about you.

[disclaimer]

2006-08-29T16:40:00.000+07:00

blame my love for the ironic but i thought there was no better way to open this blog.

'Theres something in the grammar and structure of the English language that lets people down gently. As Paul Scott wrote, it's an ambiguous language: there's plenty of room for deception and dissembling, even comfort, if that's what's called for; if that's what the speaker has in mind. It's the natural language of any peace treaty because it so encourages a sense of vae victus, woe to the defeated, without ever seeming to.' [Tia Wallman, "We Went to Saigon"]

ah, the ambiguous comfort of the internet. where would any of us be without it.
probably outside.