Cambodia Problems

I have decided there is no way I am going to drive a moto here.  I like my head and limbs just the way they are, attached and in one piece.  That said, I have to rely solely on others for my day to day transportation needs: getting to work, the market, the restaurant my friends are waiting at, Shine to volunteer with the girls, etc.  I have a fairly good system set up, but there are always glitches, which leads me to the subject of my post: moto and tuk tuk drivers.

As far as problems go, these are pretty minor.  Absurdly annoying, but in the whole scheme of things, minor. In the mornings, I have a few drivers to choose from.  At one point, I tried to set up a daily agreement with one, but he wanted an absurd amount of money, so I started using Mr. Smiley (I never did get his name, even when I asked him in Khmer, he just smiles.) Mr. Smiley was pretty good.  He was a careful driver, but not a turtle.  Things were going well.  Then he decided that driving down durian street and by the stinky market every morning wasn't enough of an assault of my senses.  So he added the stinky river and the worst road in the city.  Ot joe jet, Mr. Smiley, ot joe jet.  Wanting to give him another shot, I showed him the way I like to go.  It bypasses the stinky market, goes nowhere near durian street, and the roads are nicely paved.  He went that way for a day, before he found a way to again take me by a new stinky market, and along the second worst road in the city.  I was getting more and more irritated every day, telling him to turn, while Mr. Smiley just smiled and ignored me.  Then one day, a wonderful thing happened.  He wasn’t there in the morning.  I was free to pick another driver, and not feel guilty.  Then a second wonderful thing happened, the new driver charged me less.  It was glorious.  But it only lasted for two weeks.  

For the past two days, Mr. Smiley has been back.  And when I apologize, and say other driver cheaper, he, you know, smiles, nods his head, and then looks like I kicked his puppy as I go with another driver.  I wish my Khmer was better, so I could explain that a) he doesn’t go the way I like, and b) he charges me more than I want to pay now.  It doesn’t look like he will ever understand either of those factors, so I am left with apologizing to him every day for the foreseeable future.  Awesome.

Then there is Mr. Beep Beep, my tuk tuk driver.  At first I was calling him Mr. Honky in my head, then realized that just doesn’t sound right…

He takes me to my volunteer job and home after, and it is quite nice and relaxing to sit back and enjoy the sights of the city.  And to figure out a way to try not to focus on the fact that Mr. Beep Beep is trying to kill me.  I am fairly certain that he thinks honking his horn emits a force field, thereby protecting the tuk tuk from oncoming traffic.  It really is the only reasonable conclusion after driving with him.  That, or he thinks he gets paid extra for each honk.  It has now become comical, and I am waiting for the day that the horn sticks, a la “Little Miss Sunshine.”  I just hope I have either my camera or my phone around to document it when it happens…

Other than these minor problems, life here is wonderful as always.  

Long Time, No Post

Oh life, why must you get in the way of, well, my LIFE?? The past few months have flown by, it is hard to believe I have been here for 7 months already!  I'll write a reflective post later, this is a quick story that has all of my friends using the phrase "but it is not delicious..."

At my new school, they host a camp night, a sleepover if you will, for the elementary students.  In the morning, as everyone was eating breakfast, they kept running out of pretty much everything.  Towards the end, many of the students didn't get much of a breakfast, as we were out of juice, rice, eggs, and hamburgers. (Because, who doesn't like a hamburger for breakfast?) As people were complaining about the lack of these major breakfast items, I noticed a table of girls, with 8 full cups of juice, just sitting there, as they were getting up.

I went up to ask why they were not finishing their juices, and they looked at me, and with completely sincere faces, told me that they could not finish the juice because, "Teacher, it is not delicious."  I was dumbstruck.  And irritated, because I had 100 little kids tugging on my sleeve to tell me that they didn't get juice because we were out, and yet here are the girls, not drinking theirs, because it was not delicious.

Later, as I was drinking a beer, and nowhere near small children, I thought about it some more.  And I realized that those girls have the right idea.  Why should they be forced to drink non-delicious juice?  Why should people have to eat food they don't find utterly mouth watering?  So from now on, I will no longer force down food to be polite.  When I am offered durien or balut or any of another foods I find bizarre and repulsive, I will try them, and then kindly refuse to eat any more, with the lovely phrase, "but it is not delicious."  I encourage you to do the same!