My March madness

Wow, my month has gone and sadly, I didn't know for about a week and a half who actually won the NCAA and then to hear Kentucky, really?

Anyways, so if you have talked to me lately you know the past month has been crazy, lots of trips, my first semester test :/ and a bit more I will fill you in on, but as of right now Happy Easter, Alleluia.. the house and school are quiet, all of the girls have gone to see family and celebrate the Khmer New Year which is officially next weekend but they have a little over two weeks off of school.  So we have to finish grading our semester test (which I already have, Carmen's slacking) and we are holiday!  We have somewhat made our plans to THAILAND and then on the way back through Battambang to hopefully catch some of our girls at home!

Okay Mondulkiri, we got home and were exhausted, ate dinner and then went to sleep because we had another week starting the next day.  This week had three and a half days of school, I'm telling ya you just never know when we will have class :) but stopped class for CAMP, so the sisters have three different schools in Cambodia, Tuol Kork (me), Teuk Thla (about fifteen minutes away) and Battambang (several hours away)  but for CAMP they all came to Teuk Thla, the girls were split up into groups so they got to meet girls from the other schools, literally made a tent and not like our tents with the plastic poles, nope they had a tarp, some stakes, a hammer, a massive sheet of plastic and then two trees for poles lol okay not a tree..... but, well no trees is the best way to describe it, logs.  This is where they ate their meals and worked on certain activities.  The decorated with leaves, posters and anything else they could find.  This is usually full of games for two straight days, but becuase the was the 140 years of the Salesian Sisters they decided to make it a little more.  They have talks about vocations: religious, married, lay missioner, and volunteer....give you one guess who had to give the last one :)....Yup Carmen and friend....so we gave a 30 minute talk to 4 different groups.  We were afraid that they always see volunteers as silly foreigners coming into their schools, so we shared our stories about getting to Cambodia and the history before it and how it started with small steps, little things in the summer or on the weekends and how you don't have to leave your home or your country to do it. (Yes Dad I know, then why am I 12 hours time difference away from you, you wonder)  but we wanted them to know there are so many ways and you find something that you like or think you can share and find a place to share it.  Funny thing at the beginning of the talk we asked, when you hear the word volunteer what do you picture, what do you see?  Some responses were very sincere patient, kind and then we got fat, white.....perfect, thanks so much.  But anyways in my class I had them journal about CAMP and so many of them wrote about volunteering, maybe they were just sucking up, but they said that they want to share what they have learned from the sisters and those around them with others and want to help with those from their villages or provinces so I think we got our point across, that you don't have to be an expert or travel far away to serve.

The next week of school was a bit rough, we had some issues with the 2nd years and class was off and on, but luckily I didn't miss any of my classes, BUT we had a special visitor come to see us.  Our director for the SLMs, my organization I came through, came to see us as well as meet the sisters and explore our sites and the city a bit.  He was only here for about 4 days, so quick trip, but he got to see a lot, constantly talking about the heat....amateur :)  but is was great to get to share our home and for him to put peoples and places to names he hears in our emails.  He sat in on some of our classes, Sr. Dory took us on a FULL day tour of the city, including a temple Carmen and I had been to before where Sr. managed get a monk to give us a tour around, then to the Killing Fields and Toul Sleng Museum...both very big parts of the Khmer Rouge, was very hard to take some of it in especially because of how fresh it all really is, it all happen in the later 70's, The Killing Fields is pretty self explanatory and Toul Sleng was a school made into a prison/torture chambers.  He also throughout the other days got to meet the other communities and schools around Phnom Penh, had some very interesting moto rides and wonderful memories of the sisters here.

Our next big adventure was Siem Reap!  This is what Cambodia is known for: Angkor Wat and all of the temples and we went with the Don Bosco 6th graders.  They had been studying for 3 weeks about the history when they were all built and all of the war and corruption that they survived through.  I saw real life ELEPHANTS, so magical, they are truly elegant creatures!  I had been dying to see one up close, contemplating riding one, I just want it to the be the right experience, not just being carted around and making a scene out of it, but just chilling in the jungle or something, I'll let you know how the search goes.   So, they were there where you could ride around one of the temples and I didn't becuase we were with the kids and I wanna trek it in the jungle with the elephants, see their homes, ya know, but I not gonna lie when I saw them coming around the corner I was in awwwwwee.....I cropped my pictures where you can't see the people that actually paying for the ride and then gleefully walking between two of them trying to get Carmen's attention for a picture, one of the pictures, I look like such a dope, so stinkin' happy but I loved it all.  We also saw monkeys!  The first day there they were in cages at a cultural park we went to and then after Ankgor Wat we were walking back to the bus and then in the field a little family hanging out.  The kids were of course handing them candies, great, thats gonna be good for em, they are going to start attacking people becuase of their sweet tooth, but something cool to see and not expecting, definatley a nice surprise.  We went around through I believe 6 temples in the morning and then Angkor after lunch, the magnitude, the size and then also the detail of everyone of them is absolutely incredible!  A little history for ya, Angkor Wat is the largest religious building in the world (so the tour guides tell you), it was started in the 12th century and was completely built sometime in the 13th century, so the people that spent their lives building it, some never saw the finished structure, the construction took the time of three kings, it started as a Hindu structure and later changed to a Buddhist with many years and battling for power in between.  Every wall around the outside of Angkor is filled with a story that has intricate carvings completely covering its walls, definately one of the moments you just stop taking pictures and look at it in awe and wonder how in the world it is still standing. The sisters were trying to get a guide for the kids, but decided it was too expensive but one older tour guide finished up his tour and saw our group of kids and jumped in and gave them the tour anyways, proud to share the history with the Khmer future.  On Sunday, we ended up at the river I believe, I couldn't tell you the name and like it would help, I assume half of these names of places I say, you have to wikipedia anyways, totally understandable, I had to too just a few months earlier than you :)  but the kids just ran in and continued until the last possible minute.  Although, Cambodians have no real idea what bathing suits are besides tiny little things that foreigners wear, I'll continue with this later too, but they are terrified of becoming darker, funny right, considering in the states, people shove themselves into hot beds for long lengths of time just to get some fake color. But so they get into the water in pants and long sleeves....seriously, unless your a certain age then you just go naked, no worries.  But, they loved it that also had mats with straw roofs with hammocks hung, so i was lazy and didn't want to have to change after getting in the water, so I settled with a nice nap in a hammock.

The trip was kind of like a farewell, there is a Singapore group that comes to volunteer for a week or so in December and they provided the money for the trip, we took two Laura girls who cooked for everyone in between getting to see several of the temples, but we were definately living as Khmers eating rice at every meal, eating on the floor and sharing everything.  If only that would have gotten us into the temples for free.  The kids LOVED it, the boys collecting bugs, yup and girls were stealing our cameras and taking dozens of pictures.

We arrived back home on Sunday night with finals starting the next morning for our girls, they have eight subjects. So Monday and Tuesday are split into 4 times each day and they take all 8 test in two days, so my college friends you think you had it rough, think again....and of course the English test was the last test on Tuesday, so we were so worried that by then they would be so dead or were too concerned with every other test, they would just wing it on the English.  So funny to be teaching this age in this setting because I was there a year ago, I catch myself getting frustrated for little things in class or like they don't care and then I think back to my first and second year of college and realize that our behaviors aren't much different :/....live and learn, right.

So Tuesday was over and it was time to head to the beach with the 2nd years.  This is also like their final gathering, we only have one week in April and then May and then the 2nd years go out for 2 months of an internship, so this was as good of a time as any.  So we left Wednesday morning and they quickly forgot about how hard they thought Carmen's test was the day before :)  many of them had lived within several hours of the sea but had never been, some knew how to swim and other not so sure, but definately excited to see.  So we arrived by lunchtime, we num bye (ate rice) and then everyone changed into their "swimming clothes."  The teachers had talked to the girls the day before about their shoulders being covered and no short shorts, they should be close to their knees, so we thought we should go with that and who knows how many laughs we would have gotten from the girls if we walked out in our swimsuits.  Although they did ask us later saying, Tr, if you weren't with all of us, would you be wearing things like that, pointing to the foreigners tanning on the beach and we both said yes and talked about how you always want what you don't have, that we want color, so we wear swimsuits, not too mention IT'S HOT...but the girls LOVED it almost all ended up in the water, although many didn't plan on getting in.   I was in the water from 12 to 4 with them and some even stayed in  after me.  They said so many times, I should get out because I'm afraid I'm going to be black, but this is my only time at the sea, so I'm gonna enjoy it and they definatley did.

The next day we ended up at a so called waterfalls, but its at the end of the dry season so it was more like a puddle, but I ended up being pushed in with one of the girls making almost every piece of clothing I took with me on the trip wet, I enjoyed up riding the rest of the way home in basically my pajamas :).  We got back to school and I went out to one of the noodle stalls to sit for one last meal with the few girls still at school.  Then the next morning they all took off for their provinces and to celebrate Khmer New Year with their families.

So, luckily this month we have got to see so many places and do so many things, but the thing that has made it all so great, is being able to see it all with them.  Packing all our food and eating where ever we stop, swimming in whatever clothes we have and learning a few more Khmer words each time, especially with the 6th graders it was all Khmer and how far you can get with about 10 words and a lot of animations.  All the games we learned on the bus rides and the many stories and memories we have with them from along the way.  It's so nice to see these places through their eyes as well as ours.

Enjoy the pictures always my favorite parts.  I do have to give credit to Adam for many of these but I couldn't let you see some of them.

we were bonding

I think he looks like something straight out of Jumanji

My buddy for the Siem Reap weekend

Carmen and I at Angkor Wat

Don Bosco Grade 6

Ta Prohm temple

Bayon temple

                                                                         pretty gitty

At the river with the 6th graders

:)

Oh ya, first crickets now spiders

Another monkey called a gibbon

Headed to oratory

Hanging with the girls at CAMP

So they had a contest to prepare for a wedding in 15 minutes and had just scraps of paper and some makeup

Setting up the tent at CAMP

SLM's at work

They had a bonfire also

Adam caught a couple pictures during class

always laughing

English 1C

One of the Buddhist nuns, right I didn't either

Cross Culture

 

and again

Pictures all the way around the temple

Posed

Foreigners big time today!

At the 'waterfall' after the sea

Sin and I posing

Add caption

Dinner at the beach

 
Last but not least, my beautiful English class