lost in translation...just google it

This evening, while my husband and I prepared dinner (bratwurst, mac-n-cheese and steamed green beans), we both smelled something burning.  We initially thought it was the food we were cooking and quickly checked on it.  Seeing that the food was ok, we both noticed that the switch on the wall for the ceiling fan had smoke billowing out of it...not a good sign.  I quickly turned off the fan and my husband opened the windows to help ventilate the rooms.  Since the switch did not burst into flames, we decided to go ahead and eat our dinner before contacting our landlord about the situation.

After dinner, my husband sought out the landlord and maintenance man and all three return to our apartment, toolbox in hand.  Given that my husband and I do not speak Khmer and they do not speak English, informing the two of them as to what the problem was became a bit of a challenge.  At first, my husband tried to explain in simple English that "the switch for the fan was smoking".  Looking at their confused faces, he begins gesturing "smoke...coming out of box", yet two confused faces continued to stare back at him.  He then grabs a notepad and tries to illustrate what happened, still the man seemed confused.  He looks to me for help, but I am clueless as to what to do.  He then gestures a person smoking a cigarette.  This gesture causes one of the two men to leave and quickly return with an ashtray.  Although he understood "smoking", he failed to see the connection between the ashtray and the fan switch on the wall.  Finally, my husband turns on the laptop and goes to Google, types in "smoke" and searches for a translation into Khmer.  After just a few seconds, he finds it and shows the screen to the two men.  They instantly know what he means, excitedly exchange a few words (in Khmer) to each other, and the one man opens his toolbox.   Within moments, the switch on the wall is opened and we all are looking at a melted circuit board.  A few more sentences are exchanged between the landlord and my husband about coming by tomorrow to fix the switch and then the men are leaving.  On the way out, the landlord (who ran to retrieve an ashtray) looks at me, then the ashtray and kinda chuckles to himself, smiling and saying "smoking".  Although we struggled to communicate with each other, we all seemed to have a pretty good sense of humor about it.

Lesson: "just google it"

Here's a picture of the fan and light switches.  The fan switch is on the left and obviously not smoking.  At the time, I was not thinking "get the camera", although that would have been a pretty fun pic.

Inside the fan switch - burnt!

The dinner that did not get cold - green beans, bratwurst and mac-n-cheese....yum!

Mike's blog

My husband is also keeping a blog about his experience living and teaching in Cambodia.  Check out his blog at http://myholidayincambodia.blogspot.com/.

A visit to the local villages

It's been three weeks since I stepped off the plane and began my life here in Cambodia.  Although I have adjusted to the heat and feel pretty comfortable finding my way around town , I have not even begun to scratch the surface in getting to know the community in which I live in.  

Prior to the start of summer school, all the new teachers were taken around to the local villages where our students live.  We were accompanied by one of the school staff members who is knowledgeable of Cambodian culture, speaks the language, and is a familiar face in the village.  We even met a few of the students and also visited a local elementary school.  Words cannot describe the level of poverty here and I am left speechless.  (It's taken me two weeks to process this visit so I can sit down and write this post for my blog...my eyes keep tearing up just recalling the images.)  The homes of my students are nothing more than simple wooden huts on stilts.  Although I knew this coming here, it was still stocking and leaves my heart feeling very heavy.    Some of the students' homes were washed away during last year's floods and they are still trying to rebuild them.  

When we visited the local elementary school, all the children were running around outside and playing.  The teachers were sitting in chairs under a tree, trying to stay cool.  After introducing ourselves to the teachers at the school, and they realized we were also teachers, they quickly ended "recess" and sent the students back to the classrooms.  Each of the eight classrooms had one teacher and about 50-60 students sitting on old wooden benches behind even older wooden tables.  The buildings were dilapidated with holes in the walls and ceiling.  There were very few, if any, books in the classroom and the teachers had very little control of the students.  One of the classrooms began reciting the Khmer alphabet but when asked what a particular letter was, they could not tell us.  The students were simply memorizing songs and not really learning much.  Knowing that most local schools function this way motivated me to work that much harder for my students.

Below are some pictures from this visit to the local village and the area surrounding the school.  I find the images both beautiful and heart-breaking.   

This is the dirt road that I take everyday to and from work.  My school picks up the teachers in town and transports us (via air-conditioned bus) to the school, which is located about 5 km out of town.  

A house in the village.  Houses that live in flood plains are built on stilts.  However, the insides of the houses are extremely hot and most of the actual furniture are under the house where it is a bit cooler.

Another house on stilts.

These two houses are ones that some of the students at my school live in.  We did go and visit the families and talk with the students, who were happy to see us and meet their family.

View from the back of the truck that took us around the villages.

This house has a car battery sitting out in front.  This is how some houses get electricity.

 This vehicle is delivering jugs of water to local villagers.

Walking along the dirt road, this guy is carrying a heavy load of palm branches.  Several houses' walls and roofs are made from this material.

This is a house that was affected by the flood.  At the peak of the flood, you could only see the roof of this house.  They are slowly rebuilding the side walls that were washed away.  The orange sheets hanging on the side of the house are the clothing of a monk.

Students from my school also live in these houses, or what's left of them.  The floods completely washed away most of homes in this little village.

This house has been completely abandoned after the flood.  If possible, families are moving to higher ground, especially since there is fear that the floods will return again this year.

Inside the abandon house was this basket and a flower growing up through the floor.  An image of "beauty", a sign of "hope" in a place that typically does not have these words associated with it?

I wonder if this chair was already in the house or  wash up from somewhere else and became lodged in the structure.  Note the plastic bottles...there is litter everywhere in Cambodia.  :(

There are several boats along the small rivers and streams throughout the villages.  Although they do not look functioning, many of them are...

 ...or they are used as a home.

This woman was happy to talk with us (through our translator) about the floods.  She expressed appreciation for the school coming out and helping the villagers but is concerned that the floods will return.  Here she is feeding her dog, two puppies, and a rooster their lunch...they all get rice.

Here's one of the puppies who took a chunk of rice and tried to hide behind us.  I don't think he wanted to share his lunch with the others.

We also visited a local Wat (a Buddhist temple).  This particular Wat housed many of the students and their families during the flood last year.

This building is where several families slept to get away from the flood waters.

Inside the Wat.

One of the monks standing in front of a beautiful painting on the wall.  The interior walls of the Wat are covered with these paintings and my camera will never do justice to the size and beauty of these images.

Home Sweet Home part 3

After being in our apartment for a little over a week, it is really starting to feel like home.  We've made a few purchases to add comfort and personal touch, further making it feel like our own place.  Going from living in a "developed" country to a "developing" country takes some adjusting, given that many of the modern convenience associated with living are just not available.  However, I am enjoying the transition and at times even finding it entertaining.  It's actually not as difficult as I originally thought it would be and everyone that I have encountered seems happy and willing to help answer my questions and point me in the right direction.  

Here's some pictures of our apartment, enjoy!

Laundry Room

We have two bathrooms in our apartment and the washing machine is in one of them, so we've pretty much turned it into a laundry room.

I was very appreciative that the directions were in both Khmer and English.  Note the "Air Dry" options #5 & 6.  This is as close to a dryer as we will get here in Cambodia.  It just an extra long spin cycle.  Most people hang their laundry up to air dry and several balconies in our building are filled with large drying racks.

We bought this drying rack to hang in the bathroom/laundry room and it seems to work quite well.  This is a shower curtain rod, but we have yet to see a shower curtain for sale...hmmmm.

Here's the rack full of clothes.  I was surprised at how much clothing I was able to hang up in a small space.

However, at times we have to resort to hanging larger pieces like towels and t-shirts on the backs of chairs in the living room.  The fan works great to help dry the clothes faster.  :)

Laundry detergent and fabric softener.  After we did our first load of laundry, our clothes were really stiff and  we would need to add extra fabric softener.  We triple the amount suggested and found that keeps our clothes nice and soft.  :)

Kitchen
Our kitchen stove is three burners and no oven.  There is also no microwave or convection oven.  As someone who loves to bake, this will be an adjustment.

The other day, I wanted to reheat some leftover pizza we had delivered the previous evening.  Since we don't have a microwave (yet), my only option was to use the stove.  This turned into quite an ordeal and I missed using a microwave and having my pizza ready in 15 seconds.  In order to heat up my pizza, I took the following steps -
Step 1: turn on the propane tank

Step 2: turn on the burner

Step 3: heat up the wok...that's right, a WOK!  I didn't have a frying pan and it was either use the wok or the large stew pot sitting on the left burner.  The upside to using the wok is that it heats up very quickly and was ready in about 30 seconds.

Step 4: put pizza in wok and heat up.  Although I started with the pizza in the center of the wok, I quickly moved the slices to the edge for more indirect heating to keep the crust from getting burnt.

Leaving dishes sit in the sink is just not an option here in Cambodia.  Bugs and little lizards quickly find their way to the bits of food and liquid left behind on the dishes.  One morning, I found a baby gecko inside one of the glasses we used for drinking juice the night before.
Dish soap - I have no clue what the names of these dish soaps are but they have pictures of sparkling clean dishes on them, so I figured they were dish soap.

Here's a picture of our main living area.  The living room, kitchen, dining area is one big room with these two huge doors at the end of the room.  There is a balcony on the other side of the doors that looks at the apartment's pool and exercise room.

This is the view from our balcony.  Unfortunately it has been quite hot and very rainy and we haven't had much time to enjoy sitting outside.

Here's a view of the main living space from the opposite end of the room.  As you can see, the windows on the two doors provide plenty of light for the entire area.

Living Room 
Our apartment came furnished with plenty of furniture for the living room, kitchen, dining area, and two bedrooms.  The living room has a couch, four chairs and a coffee table.  The furniture is beautiful, hand-carved wood with a dark stain finish.  However, they are not very comfortable and we quickly realized we would need to find cushions and pillows for them.

We found a small shop near "Old Market" that sold pillows and cushions for our furniture.  We were able to get cushions and pillows that coordinate with each other and are interchangeable.  The store is owned and run by two Cambodia women who helped us find all the cushions so that they would match.  They were simply delightful and eager to help.  When we first left the store, we only had four of the five cushions.  However, when we walked by their store later in the day, they noticed us and told us they found another cushion that matched the rest, so we bought it as well.

Option #1

Option #2

Option #3 - this is the one that we settled on...for now.

Here's one of the four chairs that matches the couch.  The cushions for the couch also fit the chairs, which will be nice if we want to rearrange them.

Bedroom
Our place has two bedrooms, so family and friends are welcome to stay and visit anytime (hint, hint).  Here's the furniture and comforter that came with the apartment.  We did purchase a mattress topper for our bed because the bed are extremely firm.

We purchased this bedspread at "Old Market" with two pillow shams.  It helps add some color to the room.  We're still on the hunt for a runner to go across the bedspread to break up the pattern a bit.  We also want a couple more small pillows but have yet to find ones that will compliment this design.

 A close up of the pattern on the bedspread.  Dark green and gold, not something I would probably think of getting back home but found this design simply beautiful.  The pictures don't do it justice.

This is my closet/dresser.  The luggage and bag in the bottom of my closet serve as my dresser and store all my clothes that can really go on hangers.  The three drawers at the very bottom store my shoes.  

Bathroom
The bathrooms here are quite different from the ones we are used to in the States.  For starters, there is no shower curtain to separate the shower from the rest of the bathroom.  The tiled floor has a slight slope so the water runs to the drain in the corner.  We bought a little plastic shelf (seen here in the lower right corner) for our showering items along with a larger enclosed storage container for all the items we want to keep dry.  Any electric objects are stored in our bedroom.  

The toilet is located right next to the shower and has a spray hose attached to it.  I'm not quite sure if this is some form of a bidet or what but I have used the hose once to spray at a cockroach I saw one night walking across the bathroom tile.  LOL

After showering, there is water all over the floor.  My husband suggested we get a squeegee to get rid of the water after we shower.  Brilliant idea!

One of the things that I was surprised I would miss is the use of my iPhone.  In Cambodia, it serves as my alarm clock...and that's it!  The phone on the right is what I use to make calls and text.

I bought this t-shirt as an art shop near "Old Market".  As a huge fan of The Wizard of Oz, I could not resist this purchase.  For those of you not familiar with transportation options in Cambodia, "tuk-tuk" (basically a rickshaw pulled by a motorcycle) is the most common way to get around town.