the end of the year

Today is the last day of the school year at the Bible school- so bye bye students! Over the last week we have also said goodbye to a few expat friends, and to the tree outside our house. It fell down in a big storm as you can see here.
So we spent last Saturday cleaning up bits of branch and tiles, then got a student to help a few days later.

How many bananas can fit on one motorbike?

Freshwater dophins

Mekong dolphins "almost extinct"

Dig Deeper

Kimsoeun has finished translating the book. It will be published soon. Have a look on the Fount of Wisdom web site.

Snail eating

This is how my husband likes to eat snails: pulling them out of their shells one by one and dipping them in sauce.

What am I doing?

More about what we are doing on Kronicle Extra and Kronicle Twitter.

I'm a grandma

“Da” is what a 17-year-old girl calls my husband. It’s the Khmer word for “grandfather” – so that means if she addressed me I would be “yiyay” (grandma).
So how can we be grandparents when we don’t even have children? I guess in this case the relationship is actually some sort of great uncle, as the girl is a descendant of Kimsoeun’s mum’s brother or something, rather than directly from our (non existent) children. But I find it amazing there is already that many generations younger than us in our family. Kimsoeun is only in his early 30s and people from his generation have already had kids… and their kids have already had kids…

(Soeun’s mum is the youngest of many siblings, and they all got married young, so by the time Soeun was born I think he already had cousins that were more than 13 years old. So if those cousins got married at age 16 too and started having kids, that would mean there would have already been a generation below him before he finished school.)

Killing Fields Museum- Choeung Ek

We thought it was ironic that our tuk tuk driver's name was Duch. We were going to visit a mass grave museum and the guy taking us there had the same name as one of the people who are on trial for their part in the genocide. I'll let these pictures speak for themselves, or you can find out more from the links.



The start of Pol Pot time : April 17th 1975
The end of it: Jan 7 1979
A prison from that time that has been turned into a museum: Toul Sleng
I also put some more of my photos on my other blog.

Visit to Preah Vihear Province

We left Phnom Penh at 5am, bright at early on Saturday(11th). No wait- it wasn’t bright yet, it was quite dark.

We spent the next few days with a small group of Christians who Soeun met last month (as mentioned here). Evenings and Sunday morning we spent sitting on the floor of someone’s houses singing and reciting Bible verses. On Sunday morning Soeun preached (although it was a much more informal sermon than he would preach in Phnom Penh).
We also ate most of our meals there as well- my back got pretty tired of sitting on the floor.




For Soeun the trip was a fun time, to see the people again. It was a break for him in between being at places where he has responsibility. We came from Phnom Penh where he works at the Bible school, then afterwards went to visit his family in their province.

For me it was an interesting and exhausting cross cultural experience. Everything was so different.


This type of transport is called a mechanical cow. Can you see why?

On the Monday we went out for the day to visit Koh Ker, I put some photos from that day, which turned out to be quite an adventure over here.
Preah Vihear province

Surreal

I had been walking around thestreets that afternon and noticed most people had set out a table with flowers, food and incense sticks. Cambodian households and offices usually have a Spirit house but this was something extra special and bigger. Just after 6pm I was standing outside my mother-in-laws house. It was starting to get dark and people had turned on coloured fairy lights. It looked like all the houses were decorated for Christmas.


Then I heard some strange music and a voice. It seemed to be coming from everywhere. It was so weird standing in the middle of the road, in the dark, looking at all the tables and lights and hearing all that weird stuff. My in-laws houses was the only one quiet and dark, as they are Christians. Later Soeun told me that at a certain time everyone turns on their radios to listen to the angel arriving. They broadcast some royal processional music and the voice of the outgoing angel updating the incoming angel. There are seven angels that take turns each year to look after Cambodia. I think they are daughters of a king who had his head cut off- I can't remember exactly.


That was last year, when the angel came just before 6.30pm, but this year she came around 1am. We slept through the music bit but woke up when they were setting off firecrackers. It would have been a bit scary if we haden't known what it was, especially as we were in Preah Vihear province, there was some fighting at the border the friday before last.
The angel tables are everywhere this week, can you spot them in the photos below?

Happy Khmer New Year!!!!

Around this time of year people are celebrating New Year by throwing powder at each other!
Also there are lots of games and dancing. On Kronicle extra I wrote about the Bible school Khmer New year celebrations (see: Overwhelmed)

Can you help?

Do you have management skills? A group of missionaries here is in need of some help ASAP, click here to find out more.
Spoken Khmer is not a pre- requisite. By doing this job as team leader you would be supporting a variety of activities such as bible training, poor families, education, vocational training, families with HIV, peace building plus much, much more!

Front loading Esky- previously known as Fridge

Hot season means more power cuts than usual. Our area of town has had no power for the last few days! As we live on campus we benefit from the school generator. They turn it on around 6pm so we have lights and power in the evenings. I think it goes off around 4 or 5 in the morning. So the rest of the day is hot, no fans at this time of year is not fun.

This morning Soeun and some students were supposed to practise music from Khmer New year celebrations and for Good Friday, but no power!

Road work

There is always lots of construction going on around here. The last few months our roads have been full of earth movers and different detours each week. Always made sure I had my helmet on in case I got hit on the head with something!
If you saw the flood photos I was posting here around August- November last year, you will have seen photos of our watery roads.

A few of these roads are being fixed. They have been using cement and iron rods, it looks pretty strong! They have been doing one part of the road at a time, so for awhile one lane was cement, about 15cm higher than the other side.

Noise

Wedding marquees are often set up on a road, as I mentioned before. The other Sunday there was one right outside our church! We had to walk through someone's wedding to get to church.

The wedding caters set up their kitchen on the road near by too. The photo below I took from inside church- you can see how close the speakers were to us. So noisy!

More photos from this on Kronicle Clicks (ask me for password).(album 2009-03 church/wedding)

Quick renovations

We mentioned in a previous post that the church at Preach Vihear was meeting in someone's house. Unfortunately that can't happen anymore, but another lady who has a much smaller house hosted their meeting yesterday. Her house is too small to fit everyone, but they took all her things out, except for her bed, then cut the wall near the window to make it bigger.

Soeun and the students walked up to the temples, most people hire a moto I think. It took them an hour and a half!

Temple on the cliff- Preah Vihear!

Recently Soeun and some students went to Preah Vihear Province and visited Preah Vihear temple. In July last year UNESCO declared it World Heritage.

Since then this entrance has been blocked. There are troops on both the Thai and Cambodia side of the border here. Both countries claim it as their own. Else where on this blog you can read about the Khmer/thai relations and the tensions that were at their height in October last year.





Cambodians here worship DaDy, a local spirit to ask for protection. He was a General who lived here many years ago.




The photo above is taken from the edge of the cliff that the temple is built on. You can see the roads and the village at the bottom of the hill on the Khmer side.

If you have read about Pol Pot time you may have read about some Khmer refugees being pushed back into Cambodia by Thai people. I think this is the area where these Khmer people who had fled their country to the safety of Thailand were taken back and pushed off a cliff.


Want to know more? See Journey to the top of Cambodia

Cambodians go cross cultural in the comfort of their own country.

Recently Soeun and a group of Bible school students spent a few days in Preah Vihear province. Visiting this remote location was a cross cultural experience for Soeun- even though he is Khmer.

A church in Preah Vihear province
A lady about 27 years old makes multiple trips on her motorbike each Sunday to pick up kids from all around her village in Preah Vihear province. She takes them to her house, where she lives with her 2 children, the eldest is 11 years old. (Someone younger than me has an 11 year old! They tend to get married young in villages. Her husband is a farmer and often has to live out in the fields so she is home alone with the kids.)

Each week they sing Christian songs and memorize some parts of the Bible. There were only about 5 Bibles for around 20 people. They don’t have a pastor (or a church building), so their meetings are different from what I know as a “church service”.

Even though they don’t have the plans and strategies that a Phnom Penh church might have, they have continued meeting each week for years. Soeun was really struck by this. So much human effort and planning goes into church as we know it. In contrast this church is planned and held together by God, in a way that is more obvious than it might be in a city church.

When Soeun preaches in Phnom Penh, the church members sit and listen. But when he tried to preach in Preah Vihear it was a whole different experience. When they understood something or were excited it was obvious by their body language and comments. So it was obvious to him when they didn’t understand what he was saying as they sat their looking confused. He had to work hard at using language they can understand easily, rather than the sort of language used in a Bible school.
One sermon was on a passage they knew by heart so he got them to recite bits of it though out his talk.

Currently there are two students at the Bible school from Preah Vihear. They are planning to go back when they have finished their study. Soeun is really excited about this, there is so much need for them there. Generally in the Cambodian church leaders and church members with a good Bible knowledge are needed.

When it was time for the team to leave, the children had already gone to school. Soeun was sad the kids couldn’t see them off as they had so much fun together.


Remote, unexpected, different.

Until recently Preah Vihear was ‘cut off’ from the rest of the country as there was no road access. Also it was one of the last strong holds of the Khmer Rouge so it was known as a place of fighting.

Siem reap province is known for Angkor Wat, Kompong Cham is known for rubber trees, Battambang is known for rice and oranges but Soeun doesn’t remember hearing anything special about Preah Vihear province.

It now boasts a World Heritage site- the temple on the border with Thailand. The Bible school team went to visit; there are photos elsewhere on my blogs.

Before the team headed up there they made a program of events. They knew they would probably need to be flexible as they didn’t know what to expect. This was true- even more than they thought. Lots of surprises.

Some of the things Soeun wasn’t expecting included the fact that there were schools and markets and the crime rate seemed to be less than in other parts of Cambodia. We don’t know any official stats on this, but from the way people live it seems to be the case. Parents were happy for groups of girls to walk home in the dark, and it must be really dark as there is no electricity (apart from people’s generators which they turn on at certain times). Surrounded by thick jungle too. There didn’t seem to be gangs there as there are in other places.

One of the boys got a nail in his foot. When this happened Soeun was surprised to find the community didn’t seem to have access to medical care.

Lots of jungle and dust, like in R’kiri we visited at Christmas.

That’s just some of the things that Soeun told me within the first few hours of getting back to Phnom Penh, plus the fact that the team had brought back a boy. Buts that’s a story for another day… maybe an email rather than a blog.

Spirit houses, "neak da"

One of my first impressions of Phnom Penh, when I arrived three years ago, was that there were so many religious things everywhere. In many ways it looked the same as another Asian city I’ve lived in, apart from the monks, temples and “spirit houses”.


Almost every shop and house has one of these spirit houses you can see in these photos. These mini houses are used for offering candles, incense, food and drink to local spirits called “neak da”

Officially a Buddhist country, Cambodians actually practice spiritualality that is a mixture of Buddhism, Hinduism and animisim.

Ice

Red-orange esky/iceboxes/chilly bins seem to be everywhere in Cambodia. I often see people buying and selling these huge blocks of ice to use with them. They are so common that when some Aussie travellers who were here in July for only 2 weeks seemed to have forgotton that that there are other ways to keep drinks cold. They gave us their left over milk and said “Do you have one of those red eskys you can put this in?” I told her no we don’t, but we do have a fridge. This conversation took place in our kitchen, right next to the fridge!

Phnom Penh streets

Our news

This year we started going to a new church. Soeun has already begun helping with music and preaching. Its nice to go somewhere together and fairly close to our home. I'm pleasantly surprised at the amount of Khmer I can understand. Although maybe I shouldn't be surprised as the main thing I've been doing is studying the language! And there is still so much I don't understand. I've been writing about it under the topic of church on our other blog if you want to know more.

I have started helping some Khmer people teach English. Khmer teachers, Khmer kids, but all in English- they are amazing! My role is to help the teachers with their English and with class activities. My only training and experience in English language teaching is with adults, so I'm finding it challenging to think of learning activities for kids. Five year olds are quite different to adults! I'm blogging about it on the other blog under Bilingual school.

So I have been getting to know lots of new people which is both exciting and exhausting. It has been hard as I have had a cold on and off all for about a month. I keep thinking I'm better but then I get sick again. Very frustrating!

Second semester at the Bible school is beginning this week, so the students are back after a week holiday and Soeun is back teaching again. He was marking papers most of last week- one of his least favourite parts of the job. 

This semester Teacher Soeun is teaching two subjects: Intro to Preaching and Observation (as in observing the Bible)

Oh, and the project evaluation is underway!

Cambodian Pancake

Fun for you

To my regular readers/fellow bloggers here is some fun for you on Kronicle Extra.

Most deadly part 2

Thankfully the danger is mostly over now. But the loss is huge!

If you want to donate money try the Salvation Army or Red Cross

BBC and CNN- both have eye witness accounts, maps, videos, photos and other stories

Fireupdates has a map, twitter updates, photos and more.

Google fire updates

has a map and links to news updates

Most deadly ever

An unusually bad drought, unusually high temperatures and some wind. Even without the suspected arsonists it is a bad situation.

An sms I got from a friend in Victoria, Australia:

" 46 C (114.8F) in the shade. Really dry and windy." (Saturday)

As we've listened to Radio Australia over the last few days we were shocked to hear the death toll on Saturday from the fires was in the 40s, on Sunday in the 80s. Monday morning it was 108, by the time we went to bed it was 171. Its now at least 181 with people still missing.

That's more than double the death toll than what we used to call "the worst bush fires" when around 70 died.

I can't imagine what it would be like to be one of the survivors from one to the two townships that were destroyed.  Marysville and a community near Kingslake lost so much. Their family, their house, their neighbour and neighbours houses. Here is one families escape story: Terror Run

 Kinglake resident Christopher Hardy says he is devastated.

"Everybody's gone. Everybody's gone. They're all dead in their houses there, everybody's dead."

(from ABC news)

Its also been flooding in northern Australia, one family was effected by both! Dad stuck in floods, mum caught up in fires.

The Age is Melbourne's newspaper, and there is also lots of videos, photos, maps etc else where on the web. You can also find ways to help such as donating to the Red Cross.

Interact with Khmer kids online!(in English)

Rachael, an expat living here in Phnom Penh went to visit a garbage dump where people live and work, have a look at her photos here. Now she is helping kids of the dump families to learn how to use computers. 

As part of that they have a blog called A New Life.

If you would like to read what Khmer kids write about themselves, have a look! And they'd love it if you left a message too.

She is helping A New Day in Cambodia, and here is her blog post about how she got started.

Sorry, thats a lot of links. If you just look at one make it the kid's blog. If you want to find the link to it in the future I put it on Kronicle Extra, in the sidebar under "Cambodian Links".

On Kronicle Extra....

How do you say “obstetrician” in Khmer?

Harvest and Feast in our front yard! (lots of photos)

 

Forced eviction

Here is a video of something that happened here in Phnom Penh the other day: Development of "Red Earth"community

A slum community was evicted using bulldozers and other violent means. Land rights issues are always in the news it seems.

Here is another video with an article about it:

Govt, developer forcibly remove Dey Krahorm holdouts

One final offer is what today's paper said about it.

And this is about the people behind it.

KI Media has many other articles about the Dey Khrahorm issues.

Baptism

On Saturday three churches got together about an hour or so outside Phnom Penh to baptise about 24 people in a river (the Mekong I think). The church we just started going to went, but I wasn't feeling well. Soeun went though and here are some of his photos.

Above is a pile of noodle type things that go in a dish of food I really like. Its kind of like a salad, they often have it at weddings.
And here are some fish being grilled. Below is a photo of some boys using a banana tree as a boat! It had nothing to do with the church day out, Soeun just thought it was interesting.
Here is the table set for lunch.

And here are some of the people getting baptised!

Shower or Sarong?

I was talking to a Khmer girl about whether or not I would go with Soeun to visit a remote village. I'd like to see more of Cambodia but I think I'll find it hard, and as he is going with a team to do a job I'm worried I'll get in the way. I'm not sure if there are toilets and bathrooms there. I'm pretty sure that my back will be sore as the roads aren't paved, and I can't imagine how it will be after sleeping on a bamboo floor for four nights.

She used to live in a village when she was young, the jungle was her toilet and the river was her bathroom. I think also people wash by pouring water over them while wearing a sarong, so you can do it in your front yard rather than in a private room. She has since lived in a town so she is not used to doing that anymore. When she goes back to the village she finds it really hard.

She told me some Cambodians see expats here and wonder why they live in the way they do, with washing machines, hot water showers etc. She said some Cambodians think this isn't good. But from her experience (going back to the village) she said she knows that once you are used to something it is hard to live without it.

That reminded me of what Soeun said when he was living in Australia. Coming to Australia and seeing how easy life was like made him realise why it is hard for Australians to go and live in Cambodia. 

Wedding in Kampot province

On Saturday we went to a wedding far far away. Find out more here.

January 7th

On January 7th thirty years ago the Khmer Rouge regime officially ended.

It was the end of about 4 years of horror for Cambodia. (I mentioned the beginning of it here,

and the genocide museum here.)

It is a controversial holiday as the saviours of Cambodia were the Vietnamese thought of as

"traditional enemies"of Cambodia. In the lead up to Victory day there was a foiled bomb plot, 

talk of tighten security and various people giving their opinion about whether Cambodia 

should celebrate this day 

or not (Were Cambodians liberated from the Khmer Rouge or invaded by another power?), 

and a cartoon. Some photos from the days celebrations

are here: Celebration of Vietnamese Invasion and Occupation. And more about today here:

The Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975 and is accused of killing millions through overwork, execution or starvation before it was ousted by a Hanoi-backed military force in January 1979.

(the KI media site has more, I took the photo in R'kiri)

Aid money in Africa

I watched a BBC thing on aid to Africa. An African was looking at how aid money was being used and found it wasn't getting to where its supposed to be mostly because of corruption. You can read about it here.

Then recently I saw this 

As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God

Missionaries, not aid money, are the solution to Africa's biggest problem - the crushing passivity of the people's mindset

Matthew Parris

Crater Lake

On Boxing day we went to "Yeak Laom" lake.

 "Yeak Laom Volcanic Lake is a 700,000 year old volcanic crater lake in a peaceful jungle setting in the Yeak Laom Commune Protected Area. The lake and the area are considered sacred by many of the Khmer Loeu peoples, and are steeped in local myth and legend. There are a couple of docks on the lakeside and swimming and picnicking are encouraged. The lake is 800 meters in diameter and 47 meters deep, and is ringed by a 2.5 km hiking trail. The Yeak Laom Cultural and Environmental Center on the lake trail displays Khmer Loeu handicrafts and fabrics. 4000 riel entrance fee to lake area. 5km from town." (from here)

In the picnic area Soeun bought some dried meat. He often eats dried beef and fish. He told me he was buying some deer meat. The Khmer word for duck is sounds like the English word for deer, and as we were near the lake I thought he meant duck. It wasn't until we got back to PP that I realised it was deer meat. You can see it drying here on the picnic table.
You could hire inner tubes to play with in the water.


See the brown pots to the left, and on the table below? Its some kind of instant alcohol drink made with roots.
There are lots more things for visitors to do such as jungle treks, elephants rides, visit gem mines, learn about different ethnic groups (most people in Cambodia are Khmer, but there are some smaller ethnic groups too and many live in this province.) For example Jungle Adventures

For more on our R'kiri trip see the last few posts- Red Dust, Road to R'kiri and Around Bunlung, also on Kronicle Extra see Christmas trip to the jungle for the full story and here for a few more photos.

Around Banlung, R'kiri

We stayed 3 nights in Banlung which is the provincial capital of the north eastern Rattanakiri. 

Our guest house had a view of  a lake. It was nice, esp at sunrise. The photo below we took out our window. The building in front was where we ate. It was so nice to eat outside and not feel too hot.


It was great to be away from Phnom Penh traffic- its so crazy and busy. Without the traffic and the heat its much easier to go for a walk.
Although it is a little dusty. I saw a truck spraying water, I guess to keep the dust down. People were out the front of their shops spraying water too.


On Dec 25 I saw these kids pumping water from a well to hand wash some clothes. So different to what most Aussie kids do on Christmas day.

Road to Rattankiri

Ten hours of driving across Cambodia we saw lots of different countryside and lots of different trucks/buses etc.

Below is a wedding, sitting in the middle of the road as they do.

We stopped when we saw this truck overturned, but no one was hurt badly.

Snack sellers.

See how dusty it is, even the banana leaves have turned red.

And look at all the dust sitting on the bridge rails. 


Lunch stop.
Nice smooth road, and less trees. In the photo below you might be able to see the overloaded motor bike on the left.

Red Dust

All these leaves are really green, they just look brown/red/orange cos of the dust.
The last 3 hours of our trip to the town in Rattankiri were spent bumping along a very dusty road. In the photo above you can see that it was so dusty there were times we couldn't see the road. In this photo you can see a mini van, well, you can see the load on top of the mini van.
The dust even came into the car- into our mouths and noses. When I blew my nose I thought of north China where your snot turns black because of the all pervasive coal dust. This time was snot was red! When we opened the boot all our bags were covered in dust too. Including the sound system and music equipment.

When Soeun washed the car later so much red water flowed out. I didn't have my camera at the time, but the red kept flowing for ages so I had time to  take a photo.
So much red dirt was in and on the car...here is some of it flowing down the street.

Learning Language Kronicle is a blog I just started. We are having ten people stay over tonight!

Recently on the other blog

Thanks for reading our main blog, if you are Extra interested have a look at Kronicle Extra where I tend to write more personally and more often. Recently I wrote about my language learning adventures, our church situation, food and more! Plus I added some new links and music.

Indoor BBQ

When Soeun told me his small group was coming over for a meal I got our big table ready. When I have people over I clear our table and move it into the middle of the room. But I forgot everything happens on the floor- they didn't use the table at all.

Here you can see one of the students making a fish sauce. He is mashing preserved fish with garlic, chili, lemongrass, basil and other herbs such as "Saw Herb", named so because it looks like a cutting implement.

A blue basin of squid, a red basket of shellfish and a plate of beef- ready to be cooked. It was a cook a you go meal. We ate these with raw veggies, and used the herb/spice/fish sauce for dipping, along with a lime and pepper sauce.

In previous years Soeun has had a couple of girls in his small group but this year he has none, so not as easy and fun for me to get involved as before.

Chilly December evening around the fire

After dinner tonight the students made a fire and cooked some sweet potatoes. Soeun and I joined them, singing Christian songs and silly songs and playing games. It was nice to have a warm fire cos it is quite cool at this time of year.