So we are still on the In Country Training in Kampong Cham and wishing it would end so we can get on with actually doing something constructive. The Khmer lessons continue every morning although the level of proficiency does not seem to be increasing accordingly. We now know useful things like that the word for pink “por pka chhook” is the same as that for lotus flower and shower head. The word for tri-mester is the same as gold fish! The potential for making some very big blunders with the language is huge but as yet we have not got further than “2 bottles of beer and a plate of chips please.”

Last week was one of the many, many religious holidays. This one was in honour of the ancestors, an extended “day of the dead” when everyone returns to their family village – a bit like Christmas without the Queen on the tele. The tradition is to visit the pagoda (wat) and make offerings of food or money to the monks. About 95% of the population is Buddhist and the golden roofs of the Wats dominate the landscape. Many of them are quite spectacular considering that most were damaged or destroyed during the Pol Pot era. The shaven headed, saffron robed monks are deeply respected although its difficult to show deep reverence to a very attractive young man hammering along on the back of a moto, smoking a ciggie and chatting on his mobile phone.

A surreal Cambodian moment occurred during a visit to a local Wat. A very frail and elderly monk is lying sleeping on the floor while a large monkey was gently and lovingly grooming him. When Maraid stepped forward to take their photo the monkey went ape(?) lunging at her and screaming with bared teeth. Perhaps the reaction to this insensitive intrusion into an intimate ritual was justified but it also rather disturbingly resembled a moment from “The Omen”.

Taking advantage of the holiday we went on a little trip to Krattie to see the famous, freshwater, Irrawaddy dolphins. We took a long tailed boat out on to the river and the dolphins obliged us by putting on a show. We tracked them for an hour or so until the magic was complete when they broke the surface against the backdrop of a beautiful Mekong sunset.

There was a little bit of drama on Sunday when some of us went out for a bicycle trip into the

country to visit The Man Mountain and The Woman Mountain. As Jean is a cycle phobic Jon took her as a pillion passenger on one of the motos. As we pootled down a country lane three lads on a moto cruised past and lifted 800 quids worth of camera out of his front basket. Outraged, Jon chucked Jean off the back and set off in hot pursuit of the little buggers. The rest of us puffed and pedalled along behind occasionally coming across huddles of excited villagers who pointed and said “they went that’a’way”. In high dudgeon Jon chased them down the muddy lanes for about 20 minutes yelling Anglo-Saxon abuse and threatening castration when he caught them (whether they understood all of this clearly is in question). Eventually, having the advantage of one against three on the bikes, he started to gain on them. Faced by the prospect of a big, bearded, roaring red-faced Barrang (Khmer for foreigner) they ditched the camera. As he victoriously drove back through the villages triumphantly waving the camera he was greeted by clapping and cheers. This heroic exploit has gone down in the annals of VSO legend but it is also universally denounced as a very, very, very stupid thing to do. However Jon is now quite confident of his ability to ride across the muddy wasteland that is the Cambodian road system.

Travelling through Cambodia you become aware that it is a place of huge inconsistencies and contrasts. The countryside is so beautiful, verdant and fertile producing wonderful images like a huge black water buffalo wandering through the paddy fields with a tiny child sitting cross-legged on its back. The towns’ streets, however, are lined with mud and rubbish. Some families live in little more than grass shacks, which they share with their livestock while their more privileged neighbours have acquired massive gated and guarded palaces. Despite the wealth suggested by the huge Landcruisers and majestic housing the poverty of some was brought home to us one evening in Battambang. Having eaten our fill in a pavement restaurant we were humbled when a small boy asked us to fill his plastic bag with our leftover rice so he could feed his family. We are under no illusions that we can solve the problems created by

over 30 years of genocide, war and corruption but increasingly we see the need for us to do our tiny bit.

Hello from Cambodia 4

So we have been in Cambodia for a month now and we are no closer to understanding this country and its people .In fact the longer we stay here the more confusing it becomes.

On the culinary front It seems that if it moves or grows you can eat it .We have now sampled curried frog, stewed eel and Jon has eaten a spiders leg, although he drew the line at munching into its body.Generally we are eating very well although the dominance of rice to the diet is reflected in the language, e.g. a restaurant is hang bai meaning a rice shop, A dinning room is bantop gnam bai, the room where you eat rice, and breakfast is gnam bai preuk, to eat rice in the morning. As you travel about the country , which we have being doing a lot recently, the vivid green of the rice paddy fields dominates the landscape. We were invited to lunch with the British ambassador at the residency which was extremely pleasant especially as the menu did not include rice, (or Ferrero Roche).

Our In Country Training has continued in PP.This has mainly involved the admin part of the job. The VSO project we are working on is funded by the World Bank and the EU but because corruption is rife here at all levels every dollar/ euro has to be accounted for.This requires a huge amount of form filling and report writing. I thought we had left the education system to get away from all that.

Last Sunday we at last left PP to visit our placements. The intrepid little family who are going to be based in Battambang Province are Jean (Mummy), Ally (baby), Onno (Dutch Uncle) and us 2 , the embarrassing country cousins. Onno, who is based in a district about 100 km away will be our nearest neighbour. It takes about 6 hours by bus to get from PP to Battambang town, which will become our haven for R and R and peanut butter. From there we travelled with Vantha, the boss of VSO Education, on to our placement in a 4x4 truck with no suspension in the back seats .As the most direct route is impassable at the moment the first part of the journey was on the main highway which links Siem Riep to the Thai border at Poipet. Considering this is the main tourist route into the country the road was truly appalling. As we were shaken from Pothole to pot hole the inertia in the seat belts ratcheted back until we pinned unable to move or breathe against the back seats.

And then we turned onto the dirt roads........... and in fact they were not too bad by comparison, if you avoid the wandering cows , dogs, chickens and children all of whom seem to have suicidal tendencies. Overall it took about 5 and a half hours from BB town, but it should be faster in the dry season.

So what about Phnom Preuk, our home for the next 2 years?
The area is very unlike any other we have seen in Cambodia so far, it has mountains. It reminds us a bit of the Puys of the Massif Central in France - well a little bit- or the valleys of the Alps. I found myself thinking "" I wonder what it is like here when it snows? Duh!!! It is however very beautiful scenery.

The town itself is like something out of a Western movie. A frontier town with a main street which is either dust or mud depending on the season. "The theme tune to "the Good , the Bad and the Ugly kept running through my head. Also it appears to be far more Western than other areas with less people wearing the traditional costumes and more tractors. The influence of Thailand.

Vantha was on a mission to find us a nice house. He was working on the principle that being as we were based in the back of beyond unless we were happy where we lived we wouldn't last 2 days let alone 2 years. We traipsed from site to site which varied from the top floor of a palace owned by the local army chief to a delapidated beach hut that overlooked the local rubbish tip. Running out of options, Vantha resorted to knocking on the doors of likely looking houses and asking the owners if they would move out so we could move in. This tactic proved successful as we found our dream home.

It is a concrete house rather than the traditional wood built on sticks, based on the outskirts of town with beautiful views of the mountains and the Wat (pagoda). 2 bed., 2 bath / shower, 2 reception, study, kitchen , balcony and roof terrace for $250 per month. Vantha negotiated an amazing deal which included beautiful carved wooden furniture, a fridge, cable TV and a cleaner. This voluntary life is tough you know! The landlord and his family live next door and they have a teenage daughter who is learning English. They are our new best friends.

We also visited the local Education Office to meet our new boss and work mates. The office is open plan, in so far as it doesn't have a front wall, and it closely resembles a barn. While we were there a group of bedraggled NQT teachers arrived for a training session. They all looked about 14 and one had been travelling for 3 days to get there! They were staying overnight sleeping in a wooden shack behind the office. NQTs don't you ever, ever, ever complain again about how hard it is becoming a teacher.

While we were there we heard several very loud explosions in the near distance which no one else seemed to react to. Turns out the de-mining units were detonating their daily find!

So we are reserving our judgement on the placement, Every time we mentioned to the Khmer staff in the BB education office that we were going to Phnom Preuk there were little squeaks of amused surprise and a jolly "Good Luck"" as we left. What do they know???
So its back to Kampon Chan for another 3 weeks of language training, oh joy ,oh bliss, then off to start our new lives in the Wild West. SCAREY>

Hello from Cambodia 3

We have been here 2 weeks, it seems like so much longer. Already so much which we originally found strange we take for granted. Pigs on motor bikes, torrential rain, lizards on the bed room wall, flooded streets…. All these things now seem normal and not worthy of comment. We are almost becoming used to the heat and humidity, almost.

We have fallen into a gentle daily routine. Up at 6.30 am, cycle to the market, buy bread, fruit and Laughing Cow (the only form of cheese that is edible) then cycle across the town to the VSO house, braving the terrors of the round about on the way. I will not describe the mayhem that occurs when Cambodians in every form of transport imaginable (and some that are not imaginable) meet at a 5 road intersection. It’s a case of close your eyes and pray. After eating breakfast we cycle to the “university” for our Khmer lesson until noon. More comments on that later. After lunch, more bread, salad and Laughing Cow (it is a staple food with VSOs here) we do our home work on the terrace or more usually fall asleep in the comfy chairs. Then depending on what time the afternoon deluge arrives we either spend an hour or so in the Internet shop battling with computers which compete with Parmiter’s school for being the slowest in the world, or exploring the local area by bike before going back to sleep. At 6pm we eat in a local restaurant very, very cheaply, about 75p each for a beef and veggie dish with rice and then retire to one of the 2 bars which are run by ex pats for a beer or 2. Unfortunately, the beer is relatively expensive, about 2 dollars a bottle, which makes a hefty dent in our VSO allowance, so we have been forced cut our alcohol consumption (pause for gasps of amazement). By 9pm we are dropping asleep again so we are usually in bed by 10pm.

A view of the Mekong

This delightful life style is about to change next Tuesday when we are all going to visit or placements for a week. The more we hear about Phnom Preuk (which means Morning Mountain) the more excited / intrigued / terrified we get. When the serving VSOs learn where we are going there is a lot of sniggering, eye rolling and “that will be interesting” going on. But we will reserve our judgement until we have been there to see for ourselves.

Chris after she fell into the Mekong!

Learning Khmer is proving an interesting experience. It is the first time in over 30 years that we have had to study in a class room situation, and it isn’t much fun the other side of the desk. If we ever go back into teaching in England we will have far more sympathy for our pupils. Being the only kid in the class who has absolutely no idea what the hell is going on is a very frustrating experience. (Chris) We are struggling to master the structure of the sentences without much luck and end up speaking like Yoda, “the language of Khmer learning we have been”. The worst thing about it is that after 7 days of slogging away for 4 hours a day plus homework, no Cambodian understands what we say. They just giggle.

We had to go to back to Phnom Phen yesterday to get our second Rabies jab. Up at 6am to catch the 7pm bus, 3 hours drive to PP, 5 minutes injections, then back on the bus for the 3 hour return journey, home at 5 pm. It takes along time to get anything done in this country!!!! While we were in PP we got spectacularly lost and a friendly chap offered to show us the way. He greeted us in English, “hello Grandfather, hello Grandmother, can I help you”, this has made Chris think its about time she got her hair re dyed!

A few more impressions of Cambodia.
Smiling children shouting “hello, how are you” as you cycle pass them, ladies wearing pyjamas as day wear, printed with bunnies and kittens, big white cows wondering along in the middle of the road, big black Lexus 4 by 4s with tinted windows speeding down the middle of the road oblivious to any other road user, amazing thunder storms and wet feet.

We are still happy here. Miss you all.

Hello from Cambodia 2

Saturday 15th September.
Suarsadei

Here we are in the real Cambodia. We have left Phnom Phen and travelled 3 hours by bus to the town of Kompong Cham. On the journey we passed through some beautiful scenery of rice paddy fields, palm trees and banana groves. It is a very rural country with stuff being grown on every inch. The one thing there appears no shortage of is food. The markets are full of every type of exotic, fruit, fowl, fish and things we cant work out yet. When the bus stopped mid journey, we were besieged by hoards of little girls selling giant roasted spiders on trays. Thankfully we have yet to meet their living sisters.

Kompong Cham is apparently Cambodia’s third town but is smaller than St Albans. It used to be a major port during the days of French imperialism and some of the architecture still reflects its former glory. Nowadays however it is rather jaded, its main point of interest is a huge bridge which the Japanese have built over the Mekong. The river itself is very wide and grey with surprisingly little traffic on it although rather beautiful at sunset. We have also been told that the sunrise is spectacular but seeing as this takes place at 5.30 am we have yet to confirm this.

The VSO have a big villa here where volunteers are put up while they are doing their in country training. Unfortunately there is not enough room for all of us so we, and the American couple have been put up in the Hotel Mekong. This is a huge place overlooking the river which, although initially impressive, has seen better days. There are huge marble lined corridors, which are slightly scary if you have ever seen The Shining, but the rooms are a little shabby. We have our own miniature zoo including hot and cold running geckos who sing to each other at night. The main asset is the cable telly which has BBC world, CNN and HBO films. So we are able to follow England’s sports successes, and watch truly awful films.

We spend from 8 till 12 every morning learning Khmer form the lovely Mr Khamdey in the local FE college. Jon is finding this less of a challenge than Chris although when we try out our new found vocabulary in the local restaurants and markets we find that they don’t understand a word and burst out laughing at us. Hopefully our language skills will improve before we go to our placement or we’re going to have a very non communicative two years.

The word for bottle is Dob and the word for 10 is Dob can’t wait to learn the word for green!

Our first impressions of Cambodia:

Everyone and everything is very young and very small. No one seems over 20 and there are tiny children playing and laughing everywhere. Even the ants are tiny, we have a column of them marching up our bathroom wall.

No one walks anywhere, mainly because the pavements are flooded, inhabited or nonexistent. Everyone travels by either motorbike or pushbike, usually multi occupied. We are now used to seeing entire families of mum, dad and four children on one bike. However it’s a little unnerving to realise that it’s the 3 year old up front who’s driving. We have been issued with VSO pushbikes the riding of which has proved a very interesting experience; some of them even have brakes. The golden rules while driving in Cambodia are a) never look back, like skiing assume the people behind will avoid you and b) never stop for anyone or anything.

One word to sum up Cambodia so far is DAMP! The high temperatures and humidity mean that we are continually melting. We have to shower at least twice a day and a shirt will only last a few hours before it has to be changed. This gives clothes a very short life and is going to prove rather labour intensive when we don’t have the benefit of the VSO washing machine. Also it rains very heavily every afternoon which means that exploring the local environs has become an even wetter experience. Thank goodness for English Simon and the Lazy Mekong Daze bar by the riverside.

Tomorrow is Sunday and we have the day off. As it is Anna’s birthday we are all going on a boat trip up the river to a wooden pagoda and silk weavers’ village. We’ll be listening out for strains of the Ride of the Valkyries and looking out for Hueys on the horizon (Francis Ford Copolla joke).

We have not yet taken many photos and we’re not sure the local computer technology is up to loading them in less than 5 hours so wait till we get back to PP for illustrations of the above. We are about to brave the deluge to send this out, hope it gets to you.

Love and miss you all very much but still no regrets, how is 9EH by the way?
Hee hee.

Chris and Jon.

Hello from Cambodia 1

Hello from Cambodia. Sunday Sept 9th

All settled in and beginning to acclimatise to the jet lag, heat and culture shock. The journey out was fine albeit sleepless, and the temperature (high 30s) and humidity (high 80s) means that we have not yet caught up on the zzzzzzzs.

There are 18 new VSOs here doing the In Country training ( all teachers) and we are all living in the accommodation above the VSO office in central Phnom Penh. There are 8 of us in the over 50s age range, made up of 2 couples and 3 ladies by themselves and an older American man. The others are under 30 and include 4 Dutch, an American couple, and a Spanish girl. As you can imagine it’s a bit like the Big Brother House although everyone is really nice and nothing has kicked off - yet. On Wednesday we are all making our own way out to the VSO training house in the sticks about 90 km away. I wonder how many of us will disappear into the jungle never to be seen again.

We have had a very gentle introduction to Phnom Penh, with a cyclo tour round the sites on Saturday and a free day today. This was spent shopping in the Russia market which is an experience that smacks every sense full in the face. With some vigorous bartering we came away with a wardrobe of loose cotton clothes for tuppence. After that we went for an hour long massage which was amazing. It makes you feel all floppy and mellow. Will be doing that again!!!!

Cambodian bars are cheap and pleasant .We went to Elsewhere which is an ex-pats hangout with reclining cushions set among banana trees and a swimming pool in the middle. It felt like being on an 18-30 holiday in Ibiza. Some of the younger of members of the House went to The Heart of Darkness which is a club that even the Rough Guide is wary of. Too scary for us

This afternoon we experienced a rainstorm that would have washed Gloustershire away. It reduced the roads to foot deep raging torrents, however no one seemed worried and all the water had disappeared within half an hour, no idea where it goes!

We have seen some interesting sites - two full sized mattresses being transported by motorbike, a bag of live pigs in a tuk tuk, and a bike on a bike, to name but a few. We have also been out to dinner twice, been invited to a house party and done lunch at the Foreign Correspondents Club, which is an amazing restaurant /bar that overlooks the Mekong. It’s like stepping back into a Graham Green novel.

To be quite honest it feels like we are on an Easy Jet city break. However the hard work starts tomorrow with the In Country training beginning at 8am.

Post can be sent to us at the VSO Programme Office, PO Box 912, Phnom Penh although we will only be able to pick it up when we are in the city or if they send it on to the Battembang Office which probably won’t happen too often. We were given our pigeon holes today and some people already had post. We felt all sad and neglected, so start writing to us now.

We will probably have access to the internet until the end of October when we are sent to our placement. We were looking for Phnom Preuk on a map in the VSO office, eventually we found it with the help of one of the Cambodian staff who said, “ here it is….. but how do you get there, there are no roads?” A little worrying! Still we will have our phones for emergencies and when we feel really lonely, but it is expensive to send and receive calls so we won’t be using them too often. Our mobile numbers are Chris 0085592149785 and Jon 0085592149790.

Ok so we will now try to send this to you, but does the internet café have the technology? If you receive this obviously it does.

Will write the next instalment from Kampong Cham, if we ever get there.

Much love to all

Jon and Chris

Jetting off!

Chris and Jon travel to Cambodia on the 5th September! Follow their travels here!