Just a place to share my photos

Website Update

I've been back in New York for 4 months now, and I'm still enjoying having this website because it's a good place to post photographs I want to share. True, I haven't spun any inspiring text blogs in about 6 months now, but no one seems to have noticed. To recognize the transition of this website from South East Asian travel blog to a more general content, I'm changed the layout and the design. And I'd be delighted if anyone has any genius ideas (punny or not) for new names/titles for the site.

The Scotland photo album is now complete, and has been receiving very positive reviews (and what's not to love about furry cows, border collie puppies, and breath taking landscapes?) New photos to be posted will include New York in Autumn, Whisky Fest, and more random New York outings...

The National Plowing Ceremony

There are a lot of holidays in Cambodia that are new to me: International Women’s Day (I highly approve), the King’s Birthday (why not? in the USA, we celebrate George Washington’s birthday), and the National Plowing Ceremony.

The National Plowing Ceremony took place last week, and I attended part of the festivities.  The upshot of the ceremony is that the agricultural prosperity of the country for the next year is predicted based on the culinary preferences of 2 cows.  In many ways, it is kind of like the Cambodian equivalent of Groundhog’s Day, except that Groundhog’s day is not a national holiday in the United States, and the Cambodians (as far as I know) have not made a movie starring Bill Murray about National Plowing Day.

The king and his family assembled at one end of on the lawn in front of the National Museum, and the local throngs watched from the perimeter of the lawn (the lawn is one huge square block). When I arrived, six cows, highly adorned for the occasion, were waiting near the royal assembly. After a long time, during which time I thought that the Cambodian soldiers in full dress uniforms who were standing near us might pass out from heat exposure, the cows were marched around the edge of lawn 3 times. Then 2 of the cows were escorted to the middle of the field where bowls containing different grains awaited them.

(I still haven't figured out why there were 6 cows if only 2 cows are needed for the important part of the ceremony. Moral support? Back-up cows? Do cows chicken-out under pressure? Or would a cow cow-out? It's so confusing...)

Under the expectant gaze of the king, his family, the milling crowds around the perimeter of the lawn, and the military band, the 2 cows were offered each of the bowls in succession. I'm not sure of the contents of all of the bowls, but apparently they included rice, peas, water, and other grains. Depending on how much the cows consume from each bowl, the officials predict how the farming season will procede for the following year. The cow likes the rice? There will be a good rice season. The cow avoids the water? There will be a drought.

So, we weren't quite sure what it meant when one of the cows turned its back on the bowls and began eating the lawn. In fact, this unexpected turn of events is still apparently being discussed by the powers that be, and it is unclear if it means that the Cambodian people will become ill in the next year, or if it means that Cambodian people will turn away from foreign aid and instead rely on native resources, or if it means that they should have used one of the back-up cows.

At about this moment, before any official proclamations were made, my group of compadres decided that it was too unbearably hot to stand around in the sun anymore, and, despite it being 10 in the morning, we went to get ice cream.

Mindfulness

I've decided to embrace the Buddhist tradition here in Phnom Penh by trying to learn how to meditate.

While I was at the Plowing Ceremony last week, I happened to meet a Canadian guy named Adam amidst the throngs of onlookers. At some point in our conversation Adam told us about the meditation sessions that are held 3 times a week at one of the local Wats.  (A Wat is Pagoda or Temple. Here in Cambodia, many men become monks and join Wats at some point in their lives. Unlike in the Western tradition, in the Buddhist tradition one can be a monk for periods of time without having to commit for life. Thus, there are many Wats in Phnom Penh.) I decided that I could use some mental untangling, so I agreed to meet Adam on Monday at 6pm at the Wat.

The Wat were the sessions take place is a large complex with many buildings. The temple itself is in the middle, and thus somewhat secluded from the road and the noise of the city. It is a typical Cambodian temple. (I've included here a picture I took at the Silver Pagoda to give you some idea of what it looks like. Clearly, the Silver Pagoda is more ornate, but you get the idea.) You walk up a flight up stairs to get to the main room of the temple. It is an enormous room with a vaulted ceiling support by large pillars. At one end there is an alter upon which sits a large Buddha. There are also smaller Buddhas and photographs of enlightened monks that surround the main Buddha.
    My favorite thing about this grand room, though, is its 4 massive doors, 2 on either side, which are opened wide throughout the meditation. The only light in the room comes from outside via these portals, so the room is softly lit, and a gentle breeze stirs through the room. As you look outside, you can see trees and rooftops, and hear the muted evening noises of children, dogs, and people making dinner. Thus, even without meditating, I found that simply being in this room made me feel more calm and peaceful.
    When we arrived, there were cushions arranged on the floor for the participants. Although it is a group meditation, there is no leader. People merely arrived, silently removed their shoes and arranged themselves on a cushion facing the Buddha, and then close dtheir eyes and began to meditate. Because it was my first time at the Wat, a young monk led me out onto the verranda surrounding the main room, and gave me a short lesson on mindfulness meditation. He explained the goals of meditation (to clear ones mind of all thought and awareness of the body and the external world, thus making onself prepared for insight), but he also explained that, as a beginner, my goals should be more modest. I should learn how to sit comfortably so that discomfort of my body does not distract me from the meditation. I should learn to perfect mindfullness, rather than immediately trying to clear my mind of all thoughts.
    Mindfulness means perfect awareness of all sensations and thoughts. You hear a siren outside the Wat? Make a mental note that you hear it, note how it sounds and the emotion it causes in you, and then let it go. Your foot fell asleep and you need to move it? Note how your foot feels against the cushion, note how the air feels against your leg as you move it to a new position, note how the blood feels as it flows again into the repositioned foot. Everything is intentional and filled with awareness. Eventually, the mindfulness should come to focus more and more on breathing, and less and less on the surrounding world. Slowly, one learns to sit still, become unaware of the sensations of the body, and empty one's mind of all awareness of the external world, including thoughts about problems, stress, etc.
    I was a pathetic failure at my first attempt at meditating. My back muscles are weak, and I couldn't sit up street; my feet kept falling asleep; then my neck became uncomfortable. During the few minutes when I was not fixated on my painful body, I tried to be mindful, although I found I was distracted by the chattering bats in the rafters, the delicious sensation of the cool breeze as it passed through the room, the noise in the street. But, hey, I'm a beginner. You have to start somewhere. At the end of the hour, a senior monk passed out copies of a book about mindfulness and meditation, and steps and exercises for learning the techniques. There's no assumption that meditation is easy; the monks reiterated multiple times that it is hard.
    And, in the mean time, as I am learning, I will enjoy simpy being in this calm, peaceful place twice a week.

What happened to the photo albums?

Short answer: nothing, really.

I have changed the links to the photo albums because I wanted to make them non-public. That is to say, they are no longer google-able. Previously, people might be googling "Kirirom" or "jackfruit" or "Cantho" and they could end up on one of the pages of my photo album. At which point they could backtrack to the home page. I do not mind friends of friends or even friends of friends of friends visiting my website, but I do not want people to stumble across it by accident. You never know who might stumble upon it.

Thus, the photo albums are now "private", meaning you can only access them if you know their URLs. However, TypePad has facilitated this by allowing me to include the URL links in the left column of the weblog, so it's really no different than before, except that there are no cute little preview pictures accompanying the names of the photo albums. Just click on the name of the album you wish to view, and you will be taken to the pictures!

I'll try to write more commentary about Phnom Penh soon.

Pesach in Phnom Penh

     When Adrienne first told me about the times she had previously visited Cambodia, I was captivated by her story of celebrating Passover in Phnom Penh. She had seen an ad in the English-language daily paper (the Cambodia Daily) posted by a couple who were hosting a seder, and she decided to go.  This year Adrienne and I were both eager to participate in a seder, but we weren’t sure how to go about finding one. As a first attempt, I contacted Chabad of Bangkok to ask if they knew of a Jewish community in Phnom Penh. (There is a large Jewish population in Bangkok because Thailand receives many Israeli tourists.) As I expected, the Rabbi in Bangkok was unaware of a Jewish community in Cambodia. He did, however offer to send matzah to us in Phnom Pehn.
    Knowing that there are Jews in Phnom Penh, just not an organized community, we decided that this year we would be the ones to post a classified ad. I stopped by the Cambodia Daily last week and wrote a short ad that would ran on Thursday, April 21, 2 pays before the first night of Pesach. The ad said I was interested in finding people who also wanted to celebrate Passover, and listed my email address. Thursday came, and I waited with anticipation. My first response turned out to be the jackpot: a guy named Peter said that he and friends were in the process of organizing a seder, and that Adrienne and I would be welcome to join. Fabulous! Although we were willing to host our own dinner if there were no others, we were much more interested in attending a seder in someone else’s home (less work and all). The seder being held by Peter and friends was going to take place at Irina, the only Russian restaurant in town, in the VIP room, as Peter called it (the very informal Passover room). We were told to bring wine, Charoset, and the infamous Chabad of Bangkok matzah, if it arrived on time.
    Friday and Saturday I received 2 more emails in response to my ad. A British man who was in town for a short visit wanted to join our seder, and an Israeli tourist and some other Israelis she had met were also looking for a place to break matzah. I forwarded their emails to Peter, who responded along the line of: the more, the merrier!
    Amazingly, thanks to the miracle of Fedex International Priority mail, a package of matzah arrived at Institut Pasteur du Cambodge of Friday the 22nd. The box contained both familiar, square machine made matzah, as well as special, round Shmurah Matzah, which is made in Israel by hand. The email from Chabad Bangkok heralding the arrival of the matzah said:

    “It is strongly recommended to use the Shmurah Matzah to fulfill the obligation of eating Matzah on the first night of Passover, April 23rd.

    Matzah is commonly referred to as “the food of faith” because G-d redeemed the Jewish people from Egyptian bondage in the merit of their faith in G-d. Throughout history it was that faith that has led us through thick and thin and it is what unites us all together at all times. With our faith, may we merit true unity and ultimate freedom together in the holy city of Jerusalem, with the coming of the final redemption speedily in our days.”

    Saturday afternoon arrived. I had been out looking for cinnamon for the Charoset. The only thing they appear to sell here is mixed cinnamon and sugar. I guess the taste of cinnamon is too strong for most Cambodians to eat without the accompanying sweetness of sugar.  I was back in my building, watching TV in the common room on the first floor when the door opened and Matthieu and Geraldine came in. They are both from Paris: he’s a doctor who is doing an epidemiology project here, and she’s a free-lance journalist. He asked what I was doing that night. I began to explain how tonight was Passover, and Jews celebrate a special dinner called a seder (all of my other French colleagues had never heard of seder before), and Matthieu gets this funny, sheepish look on his face. It turns out he’s Jewish, but hasn’t celebrated or observed any holidays in a long time. After some discussion, Matthieu and Geraldine said that they would like to join us at the seder, which delighted me. After weeks of accompanying my French colleagues to their social events, I was pleased to be able to share a social occasion with some of my IPC colleagues.
    Which brings us to the actual event. Irina restaurant, like many other restaurants here, is in a traditional style Khmer building: the upstairs is enclosed with walls and a roof; the downstairs is open air, with tables between the stilts that support the second floor. The VIP room was upstairs in the back. It was a long narrow space, with walls on both short sides and one long side, but open on the fourth side like a terrace. The roof was made of thatch, and there were tropical plants and vines winding along the walls and the bamboo and wooden pillars.  The restaurant had set a long table with probably 15 chairs on a side (maybe 30 feet long?) When we got there, people were just arriving and handing over their assigned items. The dinner was to be part potluck, part restaurant catered. While children ran around and adults introduced themselves and mingled, the seder plates were assembled. One person had brought eggs, another Karpas, another lamb shank. We contributed our Charoset and Matzah. Wine bottles accumulated. The person who was supposed to bring the bitter herbs (wasabi, because horseradish is not easily found in Phnom Penh) had forgotten, so we asked the restaurant if they had a substitute; they came up with ginger root. 
    On the table was an assortment of Haggadahs, incuding the time-honored Maxwell House Coffee edition. One of our esteemed leaders, Uriel, had put together a Phnom Penh edition of the Haggadah made from photocopies of other editions (primarily from the “Prince of Egypt” animated movie version). There were multiple copies of this home-made local Haggadah that were all entitled “the executive summary”. Peter had warned in his email that many attendees would be people from the world of finance and business, so I wasn’t too surprised by the executive summary Haggadah.
    The crowd itself was very eclectic: American Jews and honorary Jews were highly represented.  The British man who had contacted me was in attendance, as was the young Israeli woman, who brought a group of Israelis she had met in Phnom Penh over the previous few days. She said, “I can just tell an Israeli when I see one on the street,” and had picked up about 6 or 7 Israeli tourists with no seders of their own. Most of the other guests knew one another, and had participated in seders together during previous years. There was a pair of Haitian brothers, a Korean woman who had been raised in France and her children, two Californians, and several people who had been New Yorkers in previous incarnations. Here’s the real kicker: it turned out that there were at least 2 other seders taking place in Phnom Penh that night. Who knew?
    The ceremonial reading part of the seder was great: abbreviated, but with all the right spirit and mood. I got to read aloud my favorite part, “Lo, this is the bread of affliction”.  The afikomen was hidden for the children. The Israelis were happy to provide the Hebrew versions of prayers, as well as to sing all the songs. We discussed the meaning of the 4 questions. The Shmurah Matzah was a  big hit. We made Hillel sandwiches with matzah, ginger, and Charoset: a good combination, but I still like horseradish better. And then we ate.
    And in Jewish tradition, the food was abundant. One of the guests had convinced her mother to mail her matzah ball mix from the States several weeks ago, and she made the most delicious, traditional matzah ball soup, with enough matzah balls for all 30 of us to each have one. This was followed by the restaurant’s amazingly good Russian food: their own version of Gefilte Fish, stuffed cabbage leaves, dolmades, latkas, beet salad, garden salad, and steamed fish in a cream sauce. I ate until I could eat no more. Like many seders, the ceremony part basically deteriorated after dinner. The children searched for the afikomen, and we said “next year in Jerusalem”, and drank more wine, but that was about it.  We all took the opportunity to chat and get to know each other while we digested. Gradually people drifted out, exchanging emails and business cards before leaving.  The 5 of us who remained at the end packed up the remaining matzah (we told the Israelis to take the bulk of it) and wine, and went to Mikey’s Irish bar for a little after seder drink.

Those of you who speak French...

...should be ashamed of yourselves! I apparently have been flagrantly abusing the French language, and no one commented on it. I have now fixed the name of the website to reflect proper French grammer and spelling. I just had a discussion with my colleague Nicolas, and we decided that "en" is reserved for feminine countries (La France, La Chine, etc), whereas "au" is used for masculine countries (Le Cambodge), and "aux" is used for countries whose names are plural (Les Etas-Unis). In addition to this grammatical complexity, I was spelling the French version of Cambodia wrong: Cambodge (not Camboge). Merci, Nicolas, pour ces corrections.

And if you are reading this and wondering what the hell I mean regarding feminine and masculine countries, it's not some judgment I am making regarding girly-men or cheese-eating surrender monkeys. French, like many European languages, assigns nouns (including proper nouns, like places) a gender. Click here for one of the weirder links I found explaining this phenomenon (who knew the word for armadillo in French?) Of course, the all time best explanation of French gender assignment comes from the musings of David Sedaris. Go to NPR's collection of Audio links and click on "the Sex of French Nouns" to hear David relate his impressions.

Uncovering the ex-pat life

    It’s Saturday afternoon, and I am sitting in my apartment as I type this, drinking a cup of coffee and eating a steamed pork bun. (I’ll post this on the internet later. There is still no internet access in my apartment, as we have yet to figure out how to configure the airport on my iBook to be in sync with the firewalls securing the IPC’s PC-based WIFI.) A gecko just chirped its distinctive cry from somewhere by the window in the living room. I can never see these little guys, but you can most definitely hear them. I read somewhere that it is suppose to be good luck to have geckos in your home. Well, that may or may not be true, but they are known to eat mosquitoes, and that’s a very good thing.
    The sounds of the neighborhood come in through the closed windows: my kitchen faces the Khmer apartment buildings next door. I can hear dogs and children and an ice cream truck. The ice cream trucks here, too, as in the United States, play tinny music, but it’s different tinny music than the trucks in NYC.
    This week was very tiring, perhaps because I actually started doing work, perhaps because there was a certain amount of stress and tension in the air.  This past week there was a case of avian flu that was identified here in Cambodia. The patient was a man from the provinces who came to Phnom Penh for treatment and died this past Tuesday in the hospital. There’s still no indication that this virus can hop from person to person; the man who died apparently worked with chickens. The IPC is major center of viral diagnostics in the region, and so the avian flu outbreak has led to disruption of normal routines around here. People stop work on their regular projects to get on board with the clinical needs of the country. 
    I started preliminary experiments for my project this week. It’s comforting to find that a lab is a lab, just about anywhere in the world. Here at the IPC we have containment hoods, centrifuges, microscopes, pipettes, etc.  Most of the equipment is identical to equipment I have used elsewhere, be it in New York, Boston, or London.  On Thursday I went through a practice experiment, and stored my cells overnight with the intention of using the FACS machine to analyze them the next day. (A FACS machine, or fluorescence activated cell sorter, also known as a flow cytometer, is used to identify surface proteins on individual cells.) But then the a/c broke in the immunology suite on Friday, and because the FACS machine uses a laser, we were unable to even turn the machine on, for fear of over-heating the equipment. (You need to keep a FACS machine well cooled and ventilated in any lab, but it’s particularly important here, where it gets up into the 90s during the day.)  Apparently the a/c has been fixed, so I’ll be able to go ahead with my experiment tomorrow or Monday.
    In response to my fatigue, I’ve chosen to have a much mellower weekend than my previous weekends here.  I went for lunch today with Dorian (the French student who lives downstairs from me at the IPC) and Adrienne (my American roommate) on Street 240. Street 240 is well known by ex-pats, especially English speaking ones. Over the course of one block there are 2 English-language used-book stores, several souvenir shops, and a number of very good restaurants.  Today we ate at The Shop, a breakfast and lunch spot that makes great sandwiches, salads, and smoothies (as wells as stocking some amazing pastries.). We parted ways to run errands afterwards: Dorian went to buy motorcycle gear for the motorbike adventure he and 5 friends plan to undertake over Khmer New Year (April 14-16), Adrienne went off in search of a moto helmet, and I went off in search of a place I’ve read about called Kiwi Bakery (which sells both European and Khmer pastries.)
    It’s strange to feel like one of the only white people in Phnom Penh when wandering the streets, but then to be completely surrounded by European and American and Australian ex-pats in certain restaurants and bars, like The Shop.  The life of the ex-pat in Phnom Penh is not the life of the local Khmer.  Street 240 caters to foreigners, as do the restaurants along Sisowath Quay. In part the segregation of locals and ex-pats is a financial thing: $5 for dinner seems very cheap to us, but it’s expensive to someone who makes $100 a month (and that’s a high salary here.)  But, it’s also, in part, cultural differences, I think. I’ve eaten several times now at Calmette restaurant next door to the IPC.  The menu is in Khmer, English, French and Chinese, but the servers speak only Khmer.  Adrienne and I are usually the only non-Khmer people in the restaurant when we eat there.  Dinner is 3-4$ a person. Granted, there are no prices on the menu, so perhaps we are getting charged substantially more than the locals. Or perhaps there are lots of Khmers in Phnom Penh for whom $4 for a meal is reasonable, and these Khmers just have no interest in eating in the western style tourist restaurants. I need to investigate more.   
    I walked past the US Embassy in my search for Kiwi Bakery. The Embassy has the most over-the-top, and yet make-shift, security arrangement, which was constructed in response to 9/11.  Barricades around the embassy extend out onto street 51, taking over more than half the street.  I thought I’d take a photo of this monstrosity. The Khmer guard, minding the entrance of the Embassy, saw me with the camera, got to his feet, and actually began to position his rifle in my direction before I was able to put my camera away.  Ok, ok, no photos of the embassy, I get it.  How about a simple, “no photos, please”? Strangely, I think I would have been more perturbed if this incident had happened in the United States, with an American solder on the other side of the gun. (Like it’s weird for me to see US soldiers in Grand Central Station with semi-automatics, but it’s not that weird to me to see police armed with rifles on the street corner here.) I think it’s something about this city being so foreign to me already, that unsettling incidents like this sort of just roll off of my back.
    I didn’t find the bakery. It’s supposedly on Street 63. I’ve twice previously been down Street 63 on a moto, and couldn’t find it either time. Today I thought maybe walking down the street would give me more of a chance to read the shop signs.  Still no luck. Although the streets themselves are logically numbered here, the buildings on the streets DO NOT have a logical numbering scheme.  So the fact that Kiwi Bakery is suppose to be 83 Street 63 really does not help me. I’ve seen it’s location marked on maps, but somehow I must have walked right by it today. I made myself feel better by buying 4 steamed pork buns from a woman with an enormous steamer outside of a restaurant in the Chinese section of town.
    Tonight I am going to the infamous Heart of Darkness bar for the first time (and perhaps the almost as infamous bar next door: Howie Bar, which the French pronounce “Ow-wee Bar”.) I’ve heard about these ex-pat hangouts since I arrived here; they are some of the few ex-pat social spots to stay open very late. I think Heart of Darkness T shirts are almost as popular as the ubiquitous “Danger Land Mines” T shirts here in Phnom Penh.  Today at lunch, an Aussie friend of Dorian’s came into The Shop, and when I asked how they knew each other, they said they’d met in a drunken haze at Heart of Darkness.  Perhaps there will be tales to tell tomorrow…

Complications when translating

Miscommunication, and fear of miscommunication, seems to be a constant theme around here. American/English, French, Khmer: they are not just languages, but also cultures. So even if the words are right, the meaning might be wrong.

Here are some trivial examples of cross-cultural miscommunication, and fear there of.  The other night a group of us went to dinner at a restaurant called Le Duo (because it's an Italian restaurant run by an Italian-French couple: Luigi and Sylvie. Not surprisingly, with this combination of nationalities, I finally got my perfect cup of cappuccino! A petite tasse of espresso topped with frothy milk, flanked by a small saucer containing raw sugar and a small saucer containing two diminutive biscotti.)  My colleagues at dinner were Nicolas and Linda (students at the IPC), Frederick (the head of Parasitology at the IPC, and the boyfriend of Linda), Adrienne, and Antoine (here from Paris for 3 months to help sort out traffic issues in Phnom Penh...oh la la.)

Although the owner of the restaurant speaks French, the waiters do not. Despite their relatively good command of English, my French colleagues are at a loss for some the subtleties of the English language, and of translation into English from French (as, I am sure, am I when translating the other way). The first problem was that they did not know the word for "scoop" in English (as in "scoop of ice cream".) Combine this with the fact that cafe glace means both iced coffee and coffee ice cream, and we created a real confusion for the poor Khmer waiter who spoke English, not French.  Frederick wanted 2 scoops of coffee ice cream with one shot of espresso poured over them. Not knowing how to say scoop, her ordered deux glace cafe, and he ended up getting two glasses of iced coffee and no espresso and no ice cream.  I felt very sorry for the waiter, who clearly felt very bad for having confused the order (although it really wasn't his fault.) So, even the French are visitors here, subject to cultural misunderstanding as much as the Americans.

And finally: Adrienne and I have decided to take the plunge and try hiring a femme de menage to clean our apartment and cook lunch. Virtually everyone here at the Pasteur hires a woman for these tasks (and some people stipulate breakfast and dinner, as well as lunch.) I was very wary about this at first. A cook/maid? It seemed both a ridiculous luxury as well as something rather, well, colonial. It turns out that being a femme de menage at the Pasteur is a fabulous opportunity for these women. Even though it seems like very little money to us, the 20-30$ a week we pay them is a very good salary in Phnom Penh (I think the police in Phnom Penh get about 20$ a month.)

We asked for someone who could speak English, rather than French. I should have realized that this would mean a young woman, rather than an older one. Last Friday, Malin arrived with her aunt. I cannot tell how old Malin is: she could be 15, or she could be 25. Most Khmers look to Americans younger than they are (and clearly, the majority of the population is younger than 30, as most of the adult population was killed in the late 1970s by the Khmer Rouge).  It turns out that Malin's aunt, who speaks flawless French, is the femme de menage for the financial director here. I was able to communicate MUCH better in French with the aunt than in English with Malin. Malin takes classes in English, and can write in English, but her English is far from fluent. We agreed that Malin would come Monday-Friday, go to the market daily to buy fresh produce and meat, cook lunch for Adrienne and me, and do some basic cleaning in the apartment. She would start Monday (today).

So Malin arrived (alone, without the aunt to translate) this morning, and the experiment in communication (and miscommunication) begins. So far, so good. I came home at noon, and she had prepared amazingly good grilled fish kabobs with tomatoes and shallots. And there was a huge plate of cut up watermelon and pineapple.  While Adrienne and I ate, Malin was busy cleaning the floors and dusting.  She was delighted that we liked her cooking. Adrienne tried to ask about leaving clothes for the laundry, and we think that Malin understood. Perhaps I will be learning Khmer.

The sense of cultural misunderstanding, for me, extends not only to actual communication with language, but to the meaning of my actions. What does it mean to Malin to  work for me and Adrienne? I do not know what it means here in Phnom Penh that we have hired a woman to cook and clean. How do the Khmers view this decision? The French think nothing of it; to them it is totally normal, if not required. And yet part of me feels creepy that I could even be associated with the term "hired help."

New Name, New photos

The Phnom Penh album was getting a little bit ripe with photos, and so I split it into 2 albums: one for my day to day life, and one for adventures in Phnom Penh.  Thus, the Phnom Penh Album no longer exists, but you can find both new albums in the margin on the left.  I have just added photos to the Adventures Album of our visits to the National Museum and the Royal Palace that took place while Mom and Dad were here.

You may also notice that I have changed the name of the website. Same address, different name. (I have been meaning to change the name to something more interesting than the original eponymous title. The first title was the result of my lack of ability to imagine life in Phnom Penh while I was still in New York.) Despite someone's suggestion that I call this "Phnom Penh Pal", I have settled (for now) on "Ma Vie au Cambodge", which is a reflection on my surprisingly francophone existence in the middle of this South Asian capital.

Life lessons in Phnom Penh

I've ventured more outside the Pasteur over the past week, and I've been discovering the virtues of my new city. At first blush, Phnom Penh is overwhelming. You arrive on big, wide avenues that have little charm and are congested with insane traffic. Ruleless traffic. Motos and Tuktuks and pedicabs and cars and trucks and bicycles fighting it out. Cars and trucks tend to observe traffic lights, but the rest do as they please. And making a left turn often involves driving long stretches in the wrong direction on the left side of the road. And there is all sorts of poverty along the road side. And a certain degree of filth. (Neither of which is very surprising.)

But then you are here a little longer, and the beauty and charm and character of this city emerge. Get off the big main boulevards, and you find small tree lined streets, old French colonial architecture, riverside cafes, markets overflowing with clothes, dishes, housewares, purses, shoes, plants, electronics, and food. There are gardens and roof terraces and hidden courtyards with swimming pools. Small children everywhere love to smile and practice their Enlgish ("Hello!"). It is said that a smile goes a long way here. And it does.

Some of the things I have learned in Phnom Penh so far:

1. To cross the big boulevards, NEVER RUN. Wait for even a minor break in the traffic (preferably with no cars imminently oncoming) and walk slowly out into the road without hesitation, keeping an eye on the motos. You can pause midway across the street before dealing with traffic coming the other direction. The bottom line is: they WILL slow down or go around you. Just be extra cautious at night, because for some reason some moto drivers prefer to drive without headlights.

2. All money is paper. Riel is currently 4000 to the dollar. So 1000r notes are equal to a quarter. If something costs $5.40 (five dollars and 40 cents), you pay with 6 American dollars, and they give you back 2400r in Khmer bills. I've never seen anything small than a 100r bill. I keep the two types of money separate in my wallet. Riel comes in very handy for moto rides, which cost anywhere from 500r to $1 in the city (compare that to NYC taxis; of course Phnom Penh is much smaller than Manhattan; however, a ride the distance equivalent to the width of Manhattan, from 1st Ave to Amsterdam along 79th street, costs about 7-8$ by NYC taxi. In Phnom Penh the same ride is less than a dollar.)

3. There really is no need for cars and trucks for those of us who are living here in the city. If you hire a Tuktuk, which is the little cart attached to a moto with two 2-person seats facing each other with a roof, you can be driven around for half a day for less than 5 dollars, even with 3 people in the Tuktuk. A very convenient thing to do if you have lots of shopping to do. When my parents were hear, we called Thou, the great guy who took Nicolas and I to L'ile de la Soie, and he first took us to the Royal Palace. Then he came back and drove us to the Russian Market. He waited for us while we shopped. (Actually, he went across the street and got his haircut by someone who must have been a real artist. The cutter was still at it when we had finished shopping, so mom, dad, and I sat in the shade and drank cold sodas until the cutter was satisfied with his work.) And then I asked Thou where I could buy a moto helmet, and he took me to a place where I wouldn't get ripped off. (Although, despite the styrofoam lining and padding, I'm sure the helmets here are not as goods as the ones in the states. But, it'll provide some protection lest, god forbid, I fall off a moto.)

4. The average Khmer individual is warm and friendly and eager to be helpful. I have already had multiple experiences in which strangers on the street came to my aid, with absolutely no motive other than to help. Truly. As I said, a smile goes a long way here. A universal expression that is much appreciated here.

5. Most big companies here shut down for lunch from 11:30 am until 1:30 pm. People start their days earlier (7:30 or 8:00 am) and end a little later (5:30 or 6:00 pm) than we tend to do in the states. (Small businesses tend to be open all day, weekday or weekend, many until very late.) I enjoy this civilized break in the middle of the day, although I'm sure I'll probably find myself working through it once I actually start doing lab work.

I do agree with those people who think that this city will become too big and too poluted and too crowded before something is done to address the problems of traffic and poverty and healthcare. The government is thoroughly corrupt, and little is done for civic improvement. NGOs are trying, but they still must interface with the government. The fact that the cellphone company Mobitel can pay off the government to make internet phones illegals (even though there is no actual law on the books), is one example of the wild west politics of this city. But it's not random: the ploys of the police are well known.

The only real frustrations I have had so far have been the difficulty (impossibility?) of setting up an internet phone connection from my computer (I'm faced with the combination of Pasteur's firewalls and the illegality of certain internet phone companies), and the hurdles required to ship scientific reagents here (and we need to ship several items from Boston still. Anyone coming to Asia in the very near future who wants to be a courier?)  Otherwise, I've been delighted by little things daily.

I've inserted a map of Cambodia here (click the image to make it larger) that I found on the internet, in case, like me before I came here, you have little idea of the geography of the country. I realize that, although the names of the surrounding countries and the surrounding bodies of water are all written in English, the names of the towns in Cambodia are all written in French. Very apt for my life. Living here at the Pasteur is like living in a small francophone country in the middle of Phnom Penh. Life here is French. I go to the local restaurant (see the Phnom Penh album for photos of Rega Restaurant) frequented by the Pasteur staff and the French Embassy staff (which is right up the road), and I run into people I have met at French ex-pat social gathering, and they recognize me too! Yesterday, by happy accident, I lunched with Dominick et Christoff, and, bien sur, the conversation was all en Francais.

Tomorrow I am going for the day to Svay Rieng with Anne Goldfeld (my boss, here from Boston), Adrienne (also here from Bosotn; she will be my roommate for the next few months and will be working here at Pasteur on other projects), and several other people who are participating in the research here.  Svay Rieng is the little part of Southern Cambodia that juts into Vietnam. It's extremely poor (received a little too much military attention during the war because of its location, and is still suffering from the devastation), and has a very high prevalence of tuberculosis. Anne has been working to treat TB patients using novel approaches in this region for many years now (see this article if you have access to JAMA). All of the samples I will use for my studies will come from patients in this region. I'm intrigued to visit this community so that I can understand more about the patients.