well i have calmed down slightly from my last blog... this blog is going to be a mixture of different thoughts i've been having the last few days...
1. at work i had been thinking something was missing... couldnt quite exactly put my finger on what tho! however on Monday I realised it was the ubiquitous picture of the old king, new king and Queen mother that are EVERYWHERE, especially in public buildings... there isnt actually a queen of cambodge although it is suspected that the new king is gay (i should say this could just be a malicious rumour, but he is 53, unmarried and used to be a ballet dancer in Paris).. the old king is still alive and mostly lives in a palace in North Korea... I suspect making random movies with Kim Jong il…i understand they both have a penchant for such activities... so my workplace doesnt have pictures of the royal family on the wall... or so i thought until i noticed the cleaning cupboard door was open... had a nose round, and there on the wall were the old king and queen smiling down on the mops and bottles of detol... the cleaner obviously isnt a fan of the new king...
2. rains continue... the last 2 days we have had heavy heavy rain and thunder and lightening at around 3.30 - 4.30 in the afternoon... it is so nice as everything just cools right down. however the drainage system in this place is crap. the last 2 days have seen me once more laughing aloud as i cycle through flooded streets (water covering almost the top of the wheel of my grannie bike)... calmly passing motos and cars which are flying everywhere... stalling... crashing into each other... i realised why these rich types drive round in their 4-by-4s they need them for the flash floods - some roads are impassable to all those not in 4x4, on grannie bikes or in boats. one rather large 4x4 drove past me too fast for my liking and created a wave of water that threatened to wobble me off my bike and into the murky waters... fortunately i stayed on!
3. my dad arrived on montag, and he has been touring PP... tomorrow we planned to cycle to Saigon/ Ho Chi Minh City... however today we went looking round the markets for some half decent bikes and could only find crappy ones designed for asian midgets... we decided that cycling 160miles on a dodgy bike designed for a 12 year old might not be fun... so we changed plans and are now busing it to Saigon ($6 - bargain)... and going to pick up some bikes there (im informed there is a much better range)... and then cycle home on saturday and sunday... i really hope we do get some half decent bikes cos it should be a good ride!
looking forward to going to 'nam... apparently as soon as you cross the boarder its like another world... lots busier, more developed etc... cycling back means that shopping will have to be kept to a minimum... no more Vietnamese tea sets for telfy then...
We might try and visit the viet cong tunnels... could be cool. Apparently there is also a shooting range where you can fire AK47s and other military hardware... i'm fairly anti guns etc at the moment, and cant see the attraction... although i guess i can see the macho, pretend like your a hero type thing... but it just seems bad taste, when you think what they can do to people's lives... bad taste like you wouldnt go around with a t-shirt with Hitler or pol-pot on the front... unless you were weird.
4. the arrival of dad bought many new toys for telfy... i now have a spangly new mp3 player (the old one was killed during a power surge).. it is green and exciting, and plays movies... which i didnt think would interest me, but you can get the complete series of ''the office'' uploaded for a couple of quid at the shop downstairs and i think that could be a good way to kill a bus journey... better than boxing orangutans... oh and i have a new compoooter. the old one was not killed by a power surge, but was very ancient (6 years)... it couldnt cope with me uploading digital photos and kept crashing... i think it only really functions as a typing machine... so i am very happy with my purchases, and my courior for shipping them for me... however i am dyspraxic (read clumsycareless), so i will try my very bestest not to ruin them anytime soon...
now off for diner i think xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Sunday, May 28, 2006
Ponderings
I was thinking about what to write in this blog when I was cycling around and about this morning… then I came to the internet and was reading other peoples blogs and realized there was a something rather similar about Spearsy’s most recent blog and what I wanted to write about…great minds spearsy great minds…
Spearsy was saying how fragile life was after seeing pictures of the earthquake in Indonesia… I was thinking how fragile life was after watching someone go up in smoke as I cycled past the cremation tower in the temple at the end of my street, and because for the last few days I’ve been getting more and more __________ about the disparity in how people live in this country, and the fact that for so many people here life is as fragile as …. hmm an eggshell??? That’s pretty fragile right?
The blank line in the previous sentence is because I don’t quite know what the verb is I want to use… its partly angry, partly sad, and partly guilty…
I’m angry because some people in this country are so stupendously ridiculously rich, and they get that way treding on anyone and everyone… through corruption and through selling off natural resources etcetc… landmines and war and conflict in general is another thing that is making me mad… most days you see people who have had their lives damaged by violence.
I’m sad because of child mortality rates, illiteracy levels… levels of stunting and malnutrition, the highest HIV/AIDS incidence in Asia… statistics… it is easy to let them run over you without taking in what they mean to real people… but everyday I see the statistics in the children begging or playing in the street and the people with blank empty faces…
I feel guilty because it is all too easy for me to sit and judge rich corrupt Cambodians, but I live a pretty nice life here, and in the UK… giving money or buying someone some food slightly salves ones conscience… but I am becoming more and more convinced that I need to reflect carefully on how I spend my money and my time… the world is small… what we do or don’t buy impacts people in other places, and the environment… life is fragile and short… can we really justify only spending our money to build ourselves up? The world is also full of lonely and vulnerable people and we pass them by the whole time.. I speak for myself – I can spend ages engrossed in my own mini dramas (what massage shall I choose today type thing)… that I become blind to other people… giving money to a charity is the easy option… but is it really the only option?
My thoughts on these things are a bit scatty at the moment… possibly I need to ponder them further… I’m not convinced the answer is to renounce all worldly possessions, or sleep on a bed of rusty nails… or embrace Marxism… ultimately, for the majority of people in the world the changes we can make to injustice is going to be at the individual level not some sort of global revolution… which means… I think… I need to consider more carefully how I am spending my time and money…
Hmmm I think this is all a bit heavy, sorry I’m in a ponderous mood today… off for a swim…
xxxx
Spearsy was saying how fragile life was after seeing pictures of the earthquake in Indonesia… I was thinking how fragile life was after watching someone go up in smoke as I cycled past the cremation tower in the temple at the end of my street, and because for the last few days I’ve been getting more and more __________ about the disparity in how people live in this country, and the fact that for so many people here life is as fragile as …. hmm an eggshell??? That’s pretty fragile right?
The blank line in the previous sentence is because I don’t quite know what the verb is I want to use… its partly angry, partly sad, and partly guilty…
I’m angry because some people in this country are so stupendously ridiculously rich, and they get that way treding on anyone and everyone… through corruption and through selling off natural resources etcetc… landmines and war and conflict in general is another thing that is making me mad… most days you see people who have had their lives damaged by violence.
I’m sad because of child mortality rates, illiteracy levels… levels of stunting and malnutrition, the highest HIV/AIDS incidence in Asia… statistics… it is easy to let them run over you without taking in what they mean to real people… but everyday I see the statistics in the children begging or playing in the street and the people with blank empty faces…
I feel guilty because it is all too easy for me to sit and judge rich corrupt Cambodians, but I live a pretty nice life here, and in the UK… giving money or buying someone some food slightly salves ones conscience… but I am becoming more and more convinced that I need to reflect carefully on how I spend my money and my time… the world is small… what we do or don’t buy impacts people in other places, and the environment… life is fragile and short… can we really justify only spending our money to build ourselves up? The world is also full of lonely and vulnerable people and we pass them by the whole time.. I speak for myself – I can spend ages engrossed in my own mini dramas (what massage shall I choose today type thing)… that I become blind to other people… giving money to a charity is the easy option… but is it really the only option?
My thoughts on these things are a bit scatty at the moment… possibly I need to ponder them further… I’m not convinced the answer is to renounce all worldly possessions, or sleep on a bed of rusty nails… or embrace Marxism… ultimately, for the majority of people in the world the changes we can make to injustice is going to be at the individual level not some sort of global revolution… which means… I think… I need to consider more carefully how I am spending my time and money…
Hmmm I think this is all a bit heavy, sorry I’m in a ponderous mood today… off for a swim…
xxxx
Monday, May 22, 2006
Rule number 7
The guest house where I live has 11 rules.
Rule number 7 is: Prostitution, gambling, drug taking and other illicit activities are not permitted in the Hotel premises.
Last night I was coming home about 10ish and I followed 2 ‘ladies of the night’ down my street and into my guest house where they were greeted by one of the owners. I then followed them all up the stairs and watched as they were both shown into one of the guests rooms. The guest looked rather embarrassed as I walked past to my room as he ushered them in. I felt rather uncomfortable, although the irony of the hotel owners breaking the rules is vaguely entertaining…
Of course this stuff goes on everywhere… several Cambodian women have told me they reckon 90% of Cambodian men go out to brothels of an evening, just like men at home might go down the pub. The Garry Glitter image of old western man and young Asian girls is much vaulted, but in reality the biggest users of the sex industry here are local men.
It’s another irony that on the one hand traditional Khmer culture is so reserved and on the other sex for money is a huge industry. My friend describes it as a rare phenomena – a culture where you can touch, but not look! She’s probably right!
Rule number 7 is: Prostitution, gambling, drug taking and other illicit activities are not permitted in the Hotel premises.
Last night I was coming home about 10ish and I followed 2 ‘ladies of the night’ down my street and into my guest house where they were greeted by one of the owners. I then followed them all up the stairs and watched as they were both shown into one of the guests rooms. The guest looked rather embarrassed as I walked past to my room as he ushered them in. I felt rather uncomfortable, although the irony of the hotel owners breaking the rules is vaguely entertaining…
Of course this stuff goes on everywhere… several Cambodian women have told me they reckon 90% of Cambodian men go out to brothels of an evening, just like men at home might go down the pub. The Garry Glitter image of old western man and young Asian girls is much vaulted, but in reality the biggest users of the sex industry here are local men.
It’s another irony that on the one hand traditional Khmer culture is so reserved and on the other sex for money is a huge industry. My friend describes it as a rare phenomena – a culture where you can touch, but not look! She’s probably right!
Sunday, May 21, 2006
7 days
Wow, it’s been nearly a week since I wrote anything here… this last week has been fairly full of various things and the time has sped past…
The start of the week was public holidays and Clari was visiting, so we went down to the beach.
We lazed around at some beachside bungalows for a few days, just reading and swimming and sleeping. Randomly met a woman who had been to a conference in Milton Keynes ages and ages ago that Spearsy, Holly and I were notetakers in chief for… it is a small world.
Oh yes, excitements were had on the final night when we heard (rather too close for our liking) a shoot out at the neighbouring 5* beach resort… seems the guards sometimes get drunk and shoot each other or the sea. [note to self: midnight dips might be dangerous]. A reminder that this country has not been ‘peaceful’ for long, and perhaps an example of the wealth the supermega rich have – it needs to be protected with guns.
After the shooting there was a huge rain and thunder and lightening storm. Wondered if we would be washed out to sea, but the next morning we were still on the beach.
The in-bus entertainment on the way home from the beach was slightly different from the normal mix of Cambodian karaoke, exceedingly violent Chinese movies, or Cambodian horror movies… instead we had a film made at a Khmer zoo… a boxing orang-utan show. I’m sure the RSPCA would lock people up for such a thing in the UK. Orang-utans were dressed up in boxing outfits and made to hit each other with boxing gloves. Meanwhile other orang-utans dressed up as cheer leaders danced around, lifting up their skirts. It was bad taste and rather cruel to say the least.
On Friday I had a telephone interview for a joby job. It was fairly nasty, mostly because the delay on the phone was so huge, and the people speaking to me were using a speaker phone, which made them seem even more distant. It made me realise how much we depend on non-verbal communication to guide us… I had no idea if I was saying too much, or too little, if they were liking what I was saying or if they thought I was an idiot! Ho hum.
Yesterday Clari and I went on a Khmer cookery course.
It was really cool. We learnt how to make spring rolls, red and green curry, fish amok (fish curry steamed in a banana leaf) and this weird banana tapioca dish. We ate everything we made so felt quite fat and had no need for diner… instead we went to the Raffles Hotel Le Royal. It’s the hotel in the movie the ‘killing fields’ (although the movie was filmed in Thailand). It was stupidly posh, and the bar was fairly pretentious… but 2 for 1 cocktails is always a good thing… we had these random champagne cocktails named after Jackie Kennedy’s visit back in the 1960’s… followed by an amaretto sour mmmmm my favourite. The most exciting thing was rubbing my feet on the carpet. A carpet I tell you, and a plush one at that. My feet are so used to tiles they were in heaven in the soft cushiness of it all.
Mel and Sophie we checked out the toilets and quite frankly they weren’t up to Lainston House standards… the towels were only paper not linen for starters.
The rains have started. There seems to be no pattern, any time of day they fall from the sky. It’s definitely cooler. Last night was almost what you would call cold… 29degrees C… needed a sheet when I went to sleep!
I think this is enough for now x x x x
The start of the week was public holidays and Clari was visiting, so we went down to the beach.
We lazed around at some beachside bungalows for a few days, just reading and swimming and sleeping. Randomly met a woman who had been to a conference in Milton Keynes ages and ages ago that Spearsy, Holly and I were notetakers in chief for… it is a small world.
Oh yes, excitements were had on the final night when we heard (rather too close for our liking) a shoot out at the neighbouring 5* beach resort… seems the guards sometimes get drunk and shoot each other or the sea. [note to self: midnight dips might be dangerous]. A reminder that this country has not been ‘peaceful’ for long, and perhaps an example of the wealth the supermega rich have – it needs to be protected with guns.
After the shooting there was a huge rain and thunder and lightening storm. Wondered if we would be washed out to sea, but the next morning we were still on the beach.
The in-bus entertainment on the way home from the beach was slightly different from the normal mix of Cambodian karaoke, exceedingly violent Chinese movies, or Cambodian horror movies… instead we had a film made at a Khmer zoo… a boxing orang-utan show. I’m sure the RSPCA would lock people up for such a thing in the UK. Orang-utans were dressed up in boxing outfits and made to hit each other with boxing gloves. Meanwhile other orang-utans dressed up as cheer leaders danced around, lifting up their skirts. It was bad taste and rather cruel to say the least.
On Friday I had a telephone interview for a joby job. It was fairly nasty, mostly because the delay on the phone was so huge, and the people speaking to me were using a speaker phone, which made them seem even more distant. It made me realise how much we depend on non-verbal communication to guide us… I had no idea if I was saying too much, or too little, if they were liking what I was saying or if they thought I was an idiot! Ho hum.
Yesterday Clari and I went on a Khmer cookery course.
It was really cool. We learnt how to make spring rolls, red and green curry, fish amok (fish curry steamed in a banana leaf) and this weird banana tapioca dish. We ate everything we made so felt quite fat and had no need for diner… instead we went to the Raffles Hotel Le Royal. It’s the hotel in the movie the ‘killing fields’ (although the movie was filmed in Thailand). It was stupidly posh, and the bar was fairly pretentious… but 2 for 1 cocktails is always a good thing… we had these random champagne cocktails named after Jackie Kennedy’s visit back in the 1960’s… followed by an amaretto sour mmmmm my favourite. The most exciting thing was rubbing my feet on the carpet. A carpet I tell you, and a plush one at that. My feet are so used to tiles they were in heaven in the soft cushiness of it all.
Mel and Sophie we checked out the toilets and quite frankly they weren’t up to Lainston House standards… the towels were only paper not linen for starters.
The rains have started. There seems to be no pattern, any time of day they fall from the sky. It’s definitely cooler. Last night was almost what you would call cold… 29degrees C… needed a sheet when I went to sleep!
I think this is enough for now x x x x
Sunday, May 14, 2006
Arrivals
This morning saw the arrival of what could either be the start of the rainy season, or just a huge rain storm. It also saw the arrival of Clari who is here for a 2 week visit. I was really glad her plane landed 60min after the storm had passed, yuk planes are bad enough, but planes and thunder storms… argh.
So this afternoon we are off the beach. Did I mention we have more public holidays here in the ‘bodge? Friday was Buddha’s birthday, Monday is the kings birthday and Tuesday is the Royal Ploughing ceremony… or something like that. So we shall go down to Sianoukville, and laze on the beach, and hopefully go to a tropical island. I’m sure half of Phnom Penh are there as the place seems empty, but never mind. I’ve booked us into a ‘romantic’ beach side bungalow. Excellent.
I will endeavour to take and upload some photos… but internet is crappy slow..
Ta ta
So this afternoon we are off the beach. Did I mention we have more public holidays here in the ‘bodge? Friday was Buddha’s birthday, Monday is the kings birthday and Tuesday is the Royal Ploughing ceremony… or something like that. So we shall go down to Sianoukville, and laze on the beach, and hopefully go to a tropical island. I’m sure half of Phnom Penh are there as the place seems empty, but never mind. I’ve booked us into a ‘romantic’ beach side bungalow. Excellent.
I will endeavour to take and upload some photos… but internet is crappy slow..
Ta ta
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Ginger nuts
Today, for the second day running, the food stand near work is shut. This is a major tragedy for many staff including myself, and means we have to retreat to the Caltex petrol station and gorge on mangos and pot noodles (not the original pot noodles you understand... these ones have pictures of 'Miss World'emblazoned on the side)...
Today, due to major headache induced sleep deprivations (the evil things have been back with a vengence of late) i was in need of a sugar high... excitments of excitments i found a pack of ginger nuts. yumyumyumyum... theyre not 100% crunchy but have done the trick and woken me up... a bit. I have tried to share the ginger nut love with my collegues, but theyre really not into them at all.. what ho more for me.
Today, due to major headache induced sleep deprivations (the evil things have been back with a vengence of late) i was in need of a sugar high... excitments of excitments i found a pack of ginger nuts. yumyumyumyum... theyre not 100% crunchy but have done the trick and woken me up... a bit. I have tried to share the ginger nut love with my collegues, but theyre really not into them at all.. what ho more for me.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Lights
Living fairly close to the equator the daylight hours, and the quality of daylight don’t really change much.
I was half watching the V music channel and a couple of the videos caught my eye and reminded me of home, where if you look at the sky you can often tell what time of year it is… one was a Red Hot Chilli Pepper’s live concert, it was in the summer, and must have been 10ish in the evening, the point where almost all the light has gone from the sky, but there is still a hint of blue left, summer dusky dark… I can almost smell the BBQs. The other video was Simon Webb (V music love him and play his music all the time… he used to be in ‘Blue’ apparently and is the 6th sexiest man in music according to their recent poll…) anyway in his video he is wandering around London in the dark… it looks cold and wintry, but the streets are lit up by the many many florescent lights coming from the shops he is passing. It is always dark here by 6.30, but there are not many street lights, and by 10pm its pitch black almost everywhere as people go to sleep ready to get up at 5am Yay!
By the way… for those who are interested who is the most sexiest man in music (according to the V music channel) it is JD Fortune, who won a lengthy competition to be the new lead singer of INIXIS… interestingly this was aired on the V music channel… I’m not a cynic really…
I was half watching the V music channel and a couple of the videos caught my eye and reminded me of home, where if you look at the sky you can often tell what time of year it is… one was a Red Hot Chilli Pepper’s live concert, it was in the summer, and must have been 10ish in the evening, the point where almost all the light has gone from the sky, but there is still a hint of blue left, summer dusky dark… I can almost smell the BBQs. The other video was Simon Webb (V music love him and play his music all the time… he used to be in ‘Blue’ apparently and is the 6th sexiest man in music according to their recent poll…) anyway in his video he is wandering around London in the dark… it looks cold and wintry, but the streets are lit up by the many many florescent lights coming from the shops he is passing. It is always dark here by 6.30, but there are not many street lights, and by 10pm its pitch black almost everywhere as people go to sleep ready to get up at 5am Yay!
By the way… for those who are interested who is the most sexiest man in music (according to the V music channel) it is JD Fortune, who won a lengthy competition to be the new lead singer of INIXIS… interestingly this was aired on the V music channel… I’m not a cynic really…
Sunday, May 07, 2006
Feta maddness and a facial
Today is a great day for the pods… Marionanon is getting married, in fact probably now she is married. I am pretty sad not to have been able to go to the wedding, however Hils has been doing a fandabulous job of keeping me updated with proceedings… the photo below shows the small orange animals (from Milton Keynes) celebrating the great event by eating feta and melon salad, as the real wedding guests will be doing… excellent.
[Hils I cant seem to login to orange midgit i'll check my work email tomorrow, perhaps i wrote down the login wrong!]
Other, perhaps less surreal events have been the opening of a handbag shop under my apartment block… previously there was a bar, but the alcohol has been replaced by some fancy bags…
Last week I mentioned facials… so this weekend I toodled off for one. I think I was expecting someone just to slap on some cream and rub it off or something… but the facial seemed to involve having my face gently massaged with many different lotions and intermittently being blown with steam from a fancy Chinese machine. This was followed by the application of banana and jasmine lotion… whilst this was drying I had a arm and hand massage, and then at the end, after my face was well and truly pampered I had a head, neck and shoulder massage… during the whole experience there was aromatherapy oil burning, and the sound of running water from the Japanese garden outside, and birdsong (presumably from a CD given the inner city location?) I can now cross facials off the things to do list… excellent… however I have added a body wrap and scrub to things to do before I leave Phnom Penh… they sound exciting… I am a pampered princess indeed.
[Hils I cant seem to login to orange midgit i'll check my work email tomorrow, perhaps i wrote down the login wrong!]
Other, perhaps less surreal events have been the opening of a handbag shop under my apartment block… previously there was a bar, but the alcohol has been replaced by some fancy bags…
Last week I mentioned facials… so this weekend I toodled off for one. I think I was expecting someone just to slap on some cream and rub it off or something… but the facial seemed to involve having my face gently massaged with many different lotions and intermittently being blown with steam from a fancy Chinese machine. This was followed by the application of banana and jasmine lotion… whilst this was drying I had a arm and hand massage, and then at the end, after my face was well and truly pampered I had a head, neck and shoulder massage… during the whole experience there was aromatherapy oil burning, and the sound of running water from the Japanese garden outside, and birdsong (presumably from a CD given the inner city location?) I can now cross facials off the things to do list… excellent… however I have added a body wrap and scrub to things to do before I leave Phnom Penh… they sound exciting… I am a pampered princess indeed.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
PMT
I thought I would blog about PMT… the airline that is…
In this case PMT stands for Progress Multi-trade airlines… I think I posted a photo of their logo on my flickr site, as it entertained me…
Anyone who knows me will know I dislike flying… and small airlines, particularly those operated in developing countries, are not ones that inspire me with confidence, more like deep dread…
Yesterday the paper reported that a PMT plane (a sturdy Russian Antonov of course) flying into Ratanakiri had engine failure, and so was diverted back to PP, where the airport could actually manage an emergency landing, as Ratanakiri isn’t much more than a dirt runway… apparently Antonovs can fly with only one engine (???). So it made it back to PP and proceeded to land safely (unlike last November when a PMT plane crash landed off the end of the runway…. injuring several of the passengers)… PMT said that the engine failed due to human error… the mechanic forgot to screw the oil cap back on…. Duh
In conclusion I shall not be flying PMT air…
http://aviation-safety.net/index.php is an interesting database of all air accidents ever… and is useful for vetting dodgy airlines… if you’re paranoid… yupyupyup that’s me
In this case PMT stands for Progress Multi-trade airlines… I think I posted a photo of their logo on my flickr site, as it entertained me…
Anyone who knows me will know I dislike flying… and small airlines, particularly those operated in developing countries, are not ones that inspire me with confidence, more like deep dread…
Yesterday the paper reported that a PMT plane (a sturdy Russian Antonov of course) flying into Ratanakiri had engine failure, and so was diverted back to PP, where the airport could actually manage an emergency landing, as Ratanakiri isn’t much more than a dirt runway… apparently Antonovs can fly with only one engine (???). So it made it back to PP and proceeded to land safely (unlike last November when a PMT plane crash landed off the end of the runway…. injuring several of the passengers)… PMT said that the engine failed due to human error… the mechanic forgot to screw the oil cap back on…. Duh
In conclusion I shall not be flying PMT air…
http://aviation-safety.net/index.php is an interesting database of all air accidents ever… and is useful for vetting dodgy airlines… if you’re paranoid… yupyupyup that’s me
Monday, May 01, 2006
respect for Mr Bush???
I am not a huge fan of the President of the United States...
however i woke up this morning and watched him take the piss out of himself durring the Whitehouse Correspondants Association Annual Diner... he did this with the help of a george bush lookylikey... it was fairly amusing... and i was kind of impressed he subjected himself to that sort of ridicule, Im not sure Tony Blair would have done the same!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,1765025,00.html
however i woke up this morning and watched him take the piss out of himself durring the Whitehouse Correspondants Association Annual Diner... he did this with the help of a george bush lookylikey... it was fairly amusing... and i was kind of impressed he subjected himself to that sort of ridicule, Im not sure Tony Blair would have done the same!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,1765025,00.html
1st May
For this blogsite I use a webstats website called tracksy... its pretty cool and tells me all sorts of imformation like how many people visit, how many people re-visit, what the ISPs are of the people that visit... where theyre located in the world... its very clever...
anyway i thought i would have a look at my webstats today, and i decided to look at the list of websites that were reffering people to my blog, and then look at the search engine key words that people had typed in, and then ended up at my blog... of vauge amusement to me where 2 people searching for information about massage parlours in Phnom Penh... i am sure they will have been disapointed by the information in this blog...
other news... i found some pine nuts sooooooooooo expensive but well worth the investment. The resulting pesto was fandabuloso mucho amazingo... yumyum
other food i have eaten today: a deliciously scrummy Belgium chocolate brownie from 'The Shop' - a very nice deli... this was a very nice eating experience considering chocolate is only available in a couple of shops, and even then it is hidiously expensive, and fairly manky as its imported from malaysia or indonesia and i dont think theyre chocolate capitals of the world... as a result i feel chocolate deprived a lot of the time. [not necesarily a bad thing]
went out for a cycle about the place and ran into a large protest/march calling for better conditions for workers in Cambodia (relating to Labour day i guess)... it reminded me once again how globalised our world is, and how much we in the west benefit from the poor labour laws or cheap labour in countries such as Cambodia...
finally, i have decided that i need to have a facial... i have come to this conclusion as i feel it is what is missing from my check list of ex-pat activities.
massages: done
manicures: done
cocktails: done lots
yummy food: done even more
lazing by the pool: done done done
new clothes: done [although admitedly i havnt got anything tailor made, and my new clothes arent exactly executive]
having someone clean/wash/iron for me: done [although i am feeling guilty about it, and this week have been doing my own washing up... its very stressful as you can imagine]
if anyone is wise in the ways of facials can you tell me what to expect? and what type of facial i should go for... the choice seems rather huge...
on that note i shall end... i realise this blog reads like some sort of long lazy holiday... which in a sense it is given the rediculous number of Cambodian Public holidays... but i am actually working quite hard here... its just i dont think this blog, or indeed any blog... is a place to air comments, thoughts, opinions related to work... the potential for legal repercussions must be reasonably significant
x x x
anyway i thought i would have a look at my webstats today, and i decided to look at the list of websites that were reffering people to my blog, and then look at the search engine key words that people had typed in, and then ended up at my blog... of vauge amusement to me where 2 people searching for information about massage parlours in Phnom Penh... i am sure they will have been disapointed by the information in this blog...
other news... i found some pine nuts sooooooooooo expensive but well worth the investment. The resulting pesto was fandabuloso mucho amazingo... yumyum
other food i have eaten today: a deliciously scrummy Belgium chocolate brownie from 'The Shop' - a very nice deli... this was a very nice eating experience considering chocolate is only available in a couple of shops, and even then it is hidiously expensive, and fairly manky as its imported from malaysia or indonesia and i dont think theyre chocolate capitals of the world... as a result i feel chocolate deprived a lot of the time. [not necesarily a bad thing]
went out for a cycle about the place and ran into a large protest/march calling for better conditions for workers in Cambodia (relating to Labour day i guess)... it reminded me once again how globalised our world is, and how much we in the west benefit from the poor labour laws or cheap labour in countries such as Cambodia...
finally, i have decided that i need to have a facial... i have come to this conclusion as i feel it is what is missing from my check list of ex-pat activities.
massages: done
manicures: done
cocktails: done lots
yummy food: done even more
lazing by the pool: done done done
new clothes: done [although admitedly i havnt got anything tailor made, and my new clothes arent exactly executive]
having someone clean/wash/iron for me: done [although i am feeling guilty about it, and this week have been doing my own washing up... its very stressful as you can imagine]
if anyone is wise in the ways of facials can you tell me what to expect? and what type of facial i should go for... the choice seems rather huge...
on that note i shall end... i realise this blog reads like some sort of long lazy holiday... which in a sense it is given the rediculous number of Cambodian Public holidays... but i am actually working quite hard here... its just i dont think this blog, or indeed any blog... is a place to air comments, thoughts, opinions related to work... the potential for legal repercussions must be reasonably significant
x x x
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Smile
Living in Cambodia is very nice… I love lying in my hammock, I love the sunshine, I love finding out how things are different and yet the same… I love eating out… I love going swimming in an unheated outdoor pool and not freezing to death, I love having massages (ooooo I am addicted for sure!)
But I miss home too… I miss some lovely people, I miss not being able to drink out of a tap, I miss the smell of grass, I miss feeling cold (sometimes)… I miss not having an oven… I miss not being able to understand everything people are saying… I miss not having proper speakers so I can play my music loudloud… I miss the countryside… I miss recycling and I miss my bike (very much).
Living in another country seems to be finding a balance between what you miss and what you like about where you are… and being happy. Mostly I think I am happy… this morning 2 things made me smile.
I was cycling home from church and stopped along the way to distract myself in a supermarket… when I came outside it was raining… and raining very hard, Cambodia style. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, I seem to always forget my raincoat… anyways I hopped on my bike and cycled… the streets clear a bit in the rain and so I cycled fast, very fast given my bike only has 1 gear… the air was cool, the rain soaked me, and I was laughing my head off (yes I am going mad)… it was exhilarating…
The other thing that made me smile was sitting in the internet café, and I looked up at the old lady opposite me. I’ve seen her before, she must work here… anyways she was just sitting there, smiling in a lovely way, at the email she was reading. She reminded me of my lovely grannie… and I smiled, because she was smiling. Nice.
Tomorrow is international Labour Day, and the Royal Government of Cambodia has put large banners up telling me I must ‘celebrate’ this. So I shall celebrate international labour day by not going to work… which seems ironic… surely you should have to go to work on ‘labour’ day? I have various plans which involve applying for jobs... acquiring a new swim card as I lost my old one… sourcing some pine nuts to make pesto… on that note I should add that I have been away 3 months and in all honesty, aside from porridge, smoothies, lollypops and sandwiches, have only cooked once, and that involved the difficult task boiling some asparagus. I actually really like cooking, but it is too easy to eat out. However this weekend so far I have made a Greek salad (ok, not really cooking… but it did involve lots of chopping)… hummus (yes you can buy tahhini imported from Macedonia… how exciting)… pumpkin soup… mmmm and would have involved making pesto if only the shops hadn’t run out of pine nuts… so I feel quite Delia like.
Currently I am lying in my hammock, listening to DJ Shadow, trying to drown the sound of jinglyjangly wailing from the temple at the end of the street… and pondering how to end this blog…
Kisses and love perhaps??? X x x x X
But I miss home too… I miss some lovely people, I miss not being able to drink out of a tap, I miss the smell of grass, I miss feeling cold (sometimes)… I miss not having an oven… I miss not being able to understand everything people are saying… I miss not having proper speakers so I can play my music loudloud… I miss the countryside… I miss recycling and I miss my bike (very much).
Living in another country seems to be finding a balance between what you miss and what you like about where you are… and being happy. Mostly I think I am happy… this morning 2 things made me smile.
I was cycling home from church and stopped along the way to distract myself in a supermarket… when I came outside it was raining… and raining very hard, Cambodia style. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, I seem to always forget my raincoat… anyways I hopped on my bike and cycled… the streets clear a bit in the rain and so I cycled fast, very fast given my bike only has 1 gear… the air was cool, the rain soaked me, and I was laughing my head off (yes I am going mad)… it was exhilarating…
The other thing that made me smile was sitting in the internet café, and I looked up at the old lady opposite me. I’ve seen her before, she must work here… anyways she was just sitting there, smiling in a lovely way, at the email she was reading. She reminded me of my lovely grannie… and I smiled, because she was smiling. Nice.
Tomorrow is international Labour Day, and the Royal Government of Cambodia has put large banners up telling me I must ‘celebrate’ this. So I shall celebrate international labour day by not going to work… which seems ironic… surely you should have to go to work on ‘labour’ day? I have various plans which involve applying for jobs... acquiring a new swim card as I lost my old one… sourcing some pine nuts to make pesto… on that note I should add that I have been away 3 months and in all honesty, aside from porridge, smoothies, lollypops and sandwiches, have only cooked once, and that involved the difficult task boiling some asparagus. I actually really like cooking, but it is too easy to eat out. However this weekend so far I have made a Greek salad (ok, not really cooking… but it did involve lots of chopping)… hummus (yes you can buy tahhini imported from Macedonia… how exciting)… pumpkin soup… mmmm and would have involved making pesto if only the shops hadn’t run out of pine nuts… so I feel quite Delia like.
Currently I am lying in my hammock, listening to DJ Shadow, trying to drown the sound of jinglyjangly wailing from the temple at the end of the street… and pondering how to end this blog…
Kisses and love perhaps??? X x x x X
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Battambang
I am sitting in Battambang... pronounced Battambong i think... we arrived today from Kampong Chhanang, and appear to have a free afternoon before working thursday and friday and then back to PP on Saturday. I think my collegues are going to take me on a moto ride round the sites later, but whilst they replicate their emails i have been wondering around the place, taking photos of slightly dilapidated french colonial arcitecture, probably getting sunburnt and finding the fastest internet connection in cambodia so far! This place reminds me of Siem Riep without the tourists... Siem Riep is the town that all the Angkor temples are close to, and really the centre is totally set up for tourists and isnt particulalrly cambodian at all... here it is so much more laid back... but there are a lack of nice restaurants selling fruit smoothies mmmmm. Mostly when traveling with work i am obliged to eat rice 3 x per day... my collegues were distressed this morning when i ate a mango for breakfast and not a huge bowl of rice and beef...
A final thought... whoever decided that hotel rooms with no windows were a good idea should be shot (well possibly not actually shot... i am fairly anti guns i suppose) ... i am staying in an airconditioned, but decidedly prison like room for the next 3 nights...
ta ra
A final thought... whoever decided that hotel rooms with no windows were a good idea should be shot (well possibly not actually shot... i am fairly anti guns i suppose) ... i am staying in an airconditioned, but decidedly prison like room for the next 3 nights...
ta ra
Sunday, April 23, 2006
23rd April 2006
Well I completed my swim across the Mekong, and came 50th out of about 111 people so I felt pretty pleased with myself… mostly because I didn’t panic about being way out of my depth, which is what tends to happen if I swim in the sea… I don’t think we actually swam that far… its probably only about 700m… however the bally organisers told us the current was going the opposite way from the direction it was actually going in and so most people tried to compensate for the current and then realised halfway across that they were heading miles down river… so we probably swam about a kilometre I would guess. The river was a bit choppy but otherwise it was fine.
Now in the last 12months I’ve run a half marathon, cycled the length of Wales and swum the Mekong. Tri-athlete telf I shall be. [not]
Other thoughts…
I am fairly rubbish at knowing my age, although after a few seconds rummaging in my brain I can usually get it right… however I always remember the age of my one and only cousin in the whole world - Jackjack… today he is 7 years old. Interestingly this makes me feel old, I can’t believe it is 7 years since he was born and I was studying for part of my modular geography A-level.
I think the reason it makes me feel old is that in another 7 years he will be 14 (nasty beard sprouting boy teenager I expect?) and I will be…. Ummmmm 31, its not that 31 is old… its just that I am speculating all the unknown things that could happen before I am 31… when Jack was born the immediate future was less hazy than it is now…finish college, go to uni… but now I have not the vaguest idea what I’ll be doing in 7 months let alone 7 years…
Although I want to cycle the length of both islands of New Zealand I don’t exactly have many long term goals…
Char I’m thinking to join you as a postman… it sounds like a seriously good plan… if anyone has any other suggestions for what I should do with my life dooooo let me know.
Now in the last 12months I’ve run a half marathon, cycled the length of Wales and swum the Mekong. Tri-athlete telf I shall be. [not]
Other thoughts…
I am fairly rubbish at knowing my age, although after a few seconds rummaging in my brain I can usually get it right… however I always remember the age of my one and only cousin in the whole world - Jackjack… today he is 7 years old. Interestingly this makes me feel old, I can’t believe it is 7 years since he was born and I was studying for part of my modular geography A-level.
I think the reason it makes me feel old is that in another 7 years he will be 14 (nasty beard sprouting boy teenager I expect?) and I will be…. Ummmmm 31, its not that 31 is old… its just that I am speculating all the unknown things that could happen before I am 31… when Jack was born the immediate future was less hazy than it is now…finish college, go to uni… but now I have not the vaguest idea what I’ll be doing in 7 months let alone 7 years…
Although I want to cycle the length of both islands of New Zealand I don’t exactly have many long term goals…
Char I’m thinking to join you as a postman… it sounds like a seriously good plan… if anyone has any other suggestions for what I should do with my life dooooo let me know.
some photos now on FlickR
Ok, I think I have just uploaded some photos of my Kratchie/ Rattanakiri trip to flickr (link on the right hand side of this tool bar)… it was seriously sloooow, I don’t think there are any places with speedy internet in this country!
Anton a public request to pretty please upload a few nice photos of the Wat of Angkor?
Mucho gracias
X x X
Ps off to north west Cambodia with work this week, so will probably be quiet on the blog front until next weekend…
Anton a public request to pretty please upload a few nice photos of the Wat of Angkor?
Mucho gracias
X x X
Ps off to north west Cambodia with work this week, so will probably be quiet on the blog front until next weekend…
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Fires and Rivers
Today we had fire practice. This involved the loudest alarm ever… actually I think it was so loud that probably half the office will suffer permanent damage to the ear drum. We then walked outside into the carpark… unlike in the UK there was no one waving a pink flag or taking a register, so who knows who stayed in the building… then most excitingly a big, square, red fire engine shows up… hmmm thinks I, perhaps this isn’t a practice… perhaps I should be more concerned about where Sophea and Lyna are… and then the little firemen (they were quite short) started running out the hose and being guided into the building by policemen… the hose reappeared about 5 minutes later from a 3rd floor window, where the firemen proceeded to squirt water on the flower beds… no one else seemed at all perturbed by all of this so I assume that this is standard practice in a fire drill, and that the drill is not just for staff but also the fire brigade? Obviously they don’t have enough real fires to fight if they need to water our flowerbeds…
Other excitements involve the discovery that the Mekong river race is this weekend… I have decided to enter… and hopefully come Saturday lunchtime I will have swum across the mighty Mekong… this could be a stupid idea (despite there being kayak canoes to rescue stragglers)… I haven’t been in training, I have never swum across any rivers, the river is probably reasonably polluted, and I have minor panic attacks at not being able to see the bottom of a swimming pool if its cloudy… cant imagine what a bally river is going to do to me… I know there are no sharks, but possibly there are some large hungry fish??? Hmmm well we shall see… more reports later.
Other excitements involve the discovery that the Mekong river race is this weekend… I have decided to enter… and hopefully come Saturday lunchtime I will have swum across the mighty Mekong… this could be a stupid idea (despite there being kayak canoes to rescue stragglers)… I haven’t been in training, I have never swum across any rivers, the river is probably reasonably polluted, and I have minor panic attacks at not being able to see the bottom of a swimming pool if its cloudy… cant imagine what a bally river is going to do to me… I know there are no sharks, but possibly there are some large hungry fish??? Hmmm well we shall see… more reports later.
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
The return of the swimsuit...
Hello blog reader(s)
For those of you like Katie, who were concerned about my lack of swimwear… fear not the costume hath been discovered (don’t ask me where) and returned to my room ironed (why?) and on a hanger… everyone can now breathe a collective sigh of relief… especially me as the weather is so so so sooooo hot… I know I keep saying this but it really really is… the average temperature of my room (with aircon off) is 35 degrees… and outside its considerably hotter, and the sun burns I tell you… it burns… one of my Khmer colleagues told me today I was going black… this has to be the biggest overstatement ever as from my assessment I am pasty pasty, but with a few more freckles… however here whiteness = beauty, and any slight darkening of the skin is not a good sign apparently, hence the wide availability of bleaching lotions, moisturisers etc
For those of you like Katie, who were concerned about my lack of swimwear… fear not the costume hath been discovered (don’t ask me where) and returned to my room ironed (why?) and on a hanger… everyone can now breathe a collective sigh of relief… especially me as the weather is so so so sooooo hot… I know I keep saying this but it really really is… the average temperature of my room (with aircon off) is 35 degrees… and outside its considerably hotter, and the sun burns I tell you… it burns… one of my Khmer colleagues told me today I was going black… this has to be the biggest overstatement ever as from my assessment I am pasty pasty, but with a few more freckles… however here whiteness = beauty, and any slight darkening of the skin is not a good sign apparently, hence the wide availability of bleaching lotions, moisturisers etc
Monday, April 17, 2006
Dolphins, an elephant and a lost swimsuit
Well the last week has been a whirlwind tour of the north east of Cambodge. Hopefully I am attaching a map, so that all my millions of readers can become wise in the geography of the Cambodge.
I have seen so many different things it is hard to know where to start.
Hmmm… ok chronologically is probably the best way to arrange things.
First things first we caught the bus up to Kratchie (central cambodge). Catching the bus involved getting a moto to the bus station… dicing death on various forms of transport was a theme of the holiday and the first moto ride was no exception… don’t you just love cutting across 3 lanes of traffic without looking and then speeding the wrong way down a one way street facing piles of oncoming traffic… all to avoid some traffic lights? Great fun. I have decided that should I win the lottery (impossible as I don’t play) I will start a small NGO (non-governmental organisation) called ‘wing mirrors for the ‘bodge’… it will do what it says (on the tin) - provide wing mirrors for all the motos which don’t have them (probably about 90%).
Soooo we arrive at the bus station (we being my English friend Carol and Cambodian friend Sophea) and catch the bus ok. The bus ride was fairly uneventful, on time (7 hours), we had our own seats, aircon, Cambodian karaoke and exceedingly violent Chinese movies on the video… the road to Kratchie is paved and the buses cain it along, honking their horns incessantly for the moto drivers to get out of the way. Have I mentioned road traffic accidents are the number one cause of death in this country???
Kratchie is a beautiful beautiful town on the banks of the Mekong. It’s the dry season so the river was low and there were lots of long sandbanks which looked like tropical beaches! We stayed with Adam, Sopheas husband who works in Kratchie some of the time. The main thing to ‘do’ in Kratchie is get a moto 30km out of town to see the Irrawaddy river dolphins. This was more dicing with death, and this time we actually managed to kill (or perhaps seriously maim as it was still flapping when I last looked) a chicken. The dolphins were interesting, went out in a little boat and floated around watching their fins pop in and out of the water. They don’t jump around and do tricks so in that sense it isn’t really exciting, but they’re so so rare - an endangered species and I think there are only 100-150 in the world. The population is under serious threat from pollution, logging, dams etc. The people living near the river are so poor, that it is hard to get them to think about conservation – although this is what the project Adam is working on is addressing.
After we saw the dolphins we header up river to some floating cafes and lazed around eating eating and paddling in the river.
The next day we hired a car to bounce us 250km up the unpaved road to Ratanakiri. We spent 2 days in a hill lodge (after escaping from a prison cell style hotel in the town)… at the lodge we stayed in little wooden cabins in the jungle and woke up to birds and geckos and other assorted animal and insect noises. Lovely. We did all sorts of things… swimming in a beautifully clear volcanic lake, swimming in a not so clean river, visiting ethnic groups, boating on a river and best of all a really great trek to visit some of the different hill tribes that live in the area. The trek was 25km guided and we learnt so much… the guide was a bit Lofty Wiseman… I learnt that you could use just about every single leaf we went past… there are leaves for smoking, leaves for eating, leaves for cooking, leaves for healing, leaves to use as warning signs… the tribes don’t have a written language so they use different signs. We visited several villages and people wanted to talk and make us drink rice wine. It was Khmer new year, and even though the hill tribes are not ethnic khmer they have recently started celebrating Khmer new year. This seems to involve drinking lots of rice wine out of filthy dirty cups, or just sucking it from huge clay pots through a thick rubber straw… its lethal, and reminded me of Airag mongol people! The tribal groups live in houses made almost entirely from natural products from the forest. They weave these into roofs, floors etc. They’re incredibly isolated and poor, scraping a living from the forest. It was another world… it actually reminded me of going to the ‘Weald and Downland Open Air Museum’ near Arundel where you look round all these houses that people lived in hundreds of years ago… except this was real, not a museum demonstration, and people really lived like this… and seemed to be pretty happy. Although I am sure statistics such as incidences of Malaria, dengue fever, education rates and access to clean water are horrific. The tribes people didn’t wear traditional clothing anymore, however the women (especially the older ones) just wandered around topless… very surreal… some of the younger ones wore t-shirts or just a bra (also surreal)…
After we got back from the trek I went for an elephant ride in a rubber plantation which was so so sooooo peaceful, and considerably less commercial than the one Anton and I did at Angkor. I love elephants!
Evenings at the lodge were spent eating, watching the stars and having my friends try to convert me to whiskey… cant say they succeeded… gin and vodka win hands down every time… then it was off to bed before 9.30 as the electricity went off then… and we woke about 5am with the birds!
One of the themes of the trip (it seemed to me) was deforestation. Traditionally the tribal people practice small scale slash and burn where they cut down a small area of forest, plant some rice crops for a couple of years and then move on to another area, leaving the forest to recover. However now this is all changing, people are planting cash crops such as cashew and rubber, and large scale companies are bribing government officials and chopping down huge huge swathes of forest, often illegally stealing land from communities . The governor of Ratanakiri province was recently fired as it is claimed he is not doing enough to tackle deforestation and had received as much as $15million in bribe money from various sources… I reckon his sacking is just an opportunity for someone else to make some cash by selling this countries natural resources (cynic)… It is so sad grrr and it makes me angry. I’m not sure if I have said it before, but living here reinforces the fact that the world is so interdependent and that ok, the wood we buy in the UK may not necessarily be from Cambodia, but it is from somewhere, and unless the source is a ‘sustainable’ one, then somewhere someone is loosing out… and most likely it is someone who is incredibly poor and has nothing… not even land rights. It is so hard to know how to live an ‘ethical’ life… and impossible too… I am sure me staying in swanky hotels at Angkor Wat and eating imported cheese contravenes this… but somehow I think we all have to try somewhat to be more aware of the fact that many of our actions impact other people negatively – be that directly or indirectly.
Finally… this is a long blog I know… I was most distressed to arrive home and discover that my swimsuit that I put in the wash has disappeared. NIGHTMARE NIGHTMARE. Basically I need my swimsuit to go swimming… naked swimming would not be allowed in a school pool… and I am convinced my bikini would scare the children and fall off… so unless the bally cleaning lady can find it I am in a mong… swim wear is not readily available here and the stuff that there is, is designed for midget Cambodians whose waist is the size of my arm, possibly a slight exaggeration… but you know what I mean? It is so hot here that I neeeeeed to go swimming. Ho hum didlium.
Now I really should stop procrastinating on this blog and attempt to write my CV. Today has been designated official CV writing day… oh the joy.
PS Katie I have some photos of me babyhugging (I love Cambodian babies!) that I will try and upload for you sometime this week.
PS2 Anton are you going to upload some Angkor photos pretty please with a cherry ontop?
Sunday, April 09, 2006
for hilary... mostly
Hilary,
i thought you would appreciate this photo of me looking very corporate... please note the corporate scarf (made by a women's income generation group) and the orange bike...
the helmet is also exciting...
x x x
traffic
Sometimes when I am cycling along the roads here in Phnom Penh I get really annoyed with the traffic, in particular the way people are constantly trying to kill me (or so it seems). Road rage on a bike is not a good thing… ultimately I will always loose out.
A couple of weeks ago I devised a way to quell my annoyance… it is absolutely perfect… I realised the reason I was annoyed was because I was taking the moral high ground, obviously I was a model cyclist obeying all traffic regulations… I came to the conclusion that the only solution was for me to break every single traffic rule and then I would have no grounds to be annoyed by other people… now I cant say I do this everyday as it might be marginally more unsafe than normal cycling… however every time I start to get annoyed I make sure I:
- Run a red light,
- Cycle on the wrong side of the road
- Cycle the wrong way down a one way street
- Cut up people on mopeds (it is actually possible to cut up a moped on a one gear grannie bike, I can be quite speedy)…
- If im making a right hand turn at a traffic lights and there is a petrol station on the corner, I just cut through it instead of staying on the road and waiting for the lights to change…All in all I am finding this method saves time… and significantly reduces annoyance with cambodgian driving… excellent…
I shall probably get into much trouble with the traffic police when I get home!
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