First Thanksgiving in Cambodia

Hello! First of all, I want to say THANK YOU for all of your kind words and inspiration. I am fast learning that each day of teaching is a new one: with a whole new set of challenges and inspirations to work with. Some days I will be up to this challenge, and respond effectively to the different situations that present themselves, and some days, not so much. I’m trying to remember this, and be patient with myself when I fall short.

Last week I was able to push pause on the sometimes-taxing realities of teaching, to go to Kampong Cham for an IST (in service training) with my fellow volunteers. This is the province just north of me. Half of the volunteers (those who live in the south) met in K. Cham for IST, and half of them (those who live in the north) met the week before in Battambong. My counterpart, So Wichea, and my vice school director, Ongkean, came with me to the training, where we brainstormed secondary projects that could help my school and community and talked about what our roles will be to each other throughout my service.

At first I was a little discouraged when we started talking about secondary projects, because my school director seemed only to be interested in the installation of a basketball court and a computer lab, two extremely resource heavy projects that will not be possible without the input of grants. I explained the limited resources I'm currently working with, though, and we agreed that improving the library is a much more feasible project for the present. The library is very musty/dusty/moldy and virtually unusable for students due to its lack of organization. It has no real check out/return system so that books often go missing, and there's virtually no selection of books in English. I hope to improve this in the future if and when I’m able to somehow get ahold of the necessary finances. 

My counterparts and I also talked about planting a garden, which I really hope can happen! I haven’t yet run the idea by my actual school director (who didn’t come to K. Cham: “too busy”), but there is definitely space for it, and technically he has extra money that is meant for “beautification of the school” in the words of my co-teacher, so maybe he will be generous and help me fund the initial start up costs.

Thanksgiving dinner with the other volunteers was amazing! Not only did we have a REAL turkey (which doesn’t even have a name in Khmer, by the way, it’s just referred to as a “foreign chicken”), but also mashed ‘taters, carrots, green beans, stuffing, corn bread, salad, and many, many delectable deserts to choose from. (This proved too difficult for me so I just tasted them all). The meal was amazing, the company was great, and it was just comforting to feel so much a part of a familiar community, amongst so much unfamiliarity. Peace Corps went above and beyond its duties to create a memorable first Thanskgiving away from home for all of us new volunteers. 

This is the bridge that’s on the back of every 500 riel note!

This is the most imbalanced snack I could find in K. Cham

Outside of the Provincial Teaching Training Center (PTTC)

Thanksgiving Feast!!

That's about all from here for now! Thanks again for all of your words of encouragement. Keep me posted on what's going on with all of you, too! I love to hear news of what you're up to, and anything related to current events in the states. I learned recently that pizza is now being considered a vegetable in elementary schools (tomato paste, duh), so that's great news... :-/