Settling In

Thanks everyone for your kind notes and well wishes :) I doing very well and feel as if I have made a full recovery. I got home (to my new home in Cranbury!) on Saturday night. Since then it has been so nice to be with my family and relax. (Although I think I do more sleeping than anything else!) I am getting settled in to the Cranbury house and already feel very comfortable there. I still have a lot of unpacking to do (from the move, not from my trip!) but I am making steady progress. Right now I am concentrating on finding a job for next month and writing my dissertation, which is due on August 31.

Will write more soon, just wanted to let everyone know that I am happy to be back, feeling fine and hoping to see you all again soon!

An Early Goodbye

This past Tuesday morning I ran into a bit of trouble, which is why I haven't posted in several days. I got a very bad case of Salmonella food poisoning, and ended up in the hospital on Wednesday morning. I think I contracted it on the bus from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap (in Northwest Cambodia, where I was going to continue my research). Pretty quickly I knew something was wrong, because on the bus I felt extremely cold and couldn't stop shivering. By the time I arrived in Siem Reap I had a horrible headache and felt like I was going to throw up. I went to the hotel to take a nap and when I woke up I felt even worse.

That night was terrible. I would get so cold and shiver and then really hot and throw the blankets off. I was also terribly thirsty, but didn't know what to do because I didn't have anything to drink in the room. I started hallucinating that I was drinking out of the toilet, and that was when I knew I had to go to the hospital because something was really wrong.

Thank god I had a girl with me, who was suppossed to be my research assistant but ended up being my nurse instead. She took me to the local hospital early Wednesday morning. Let me just say that I am using the word hospital very loosely - it was nothing close to western expectations of what a hospital should be. Needless to say, I was absolutely terrified at this point. I was thinking to myself, "you have finally gone too far". I was in a country with very poor health facilities in the best of circumstances and now I am in this rural area with a hospital that is open-air, with bugs and lizards everywhere, and nobody speaks English.

That was really fun, the nobody speaking English part. When I first got to the hospital there was only one doctor there, and he didn't speak English or even Khmer! He only spoke Chinese! (I swear I am not making this up). So Samphors, my research assistant/nurse had to translate from English into Khmer, a nurse was there who could translate from Khmer to Chinese so the doctor could understand what I was saying. Then the translation would go from the doctor back to me in reverse. I know you are all thinking that I studied Chinese for 7 years, and that is finally going to pay off, right? Well, I never learned words like "hallucinating" or "nausea" or "headache", so my Chinese was pretty useless. Plus. I was barely coherent because I was in so much pain.

The Chinese doctor, without even touching me or even taking my temperature, decided that I had malaria and wanted to start me on a "IV Serum". I don't even know what that is, but trust me, I was in no hurry to find out. I am pretty much panicing at this point, but thankfully we were then told that an English-speaking doctor was coming to the hospital. I was very relieved but also still pretty scared, as I had almost no faith in the quality of treatment I was going to get there. In my head I was trying to think how quickly I could get to Bangkok and the US Embassy, which would have involved about a 4 hour drive on un-paved roads. I really could not have done that trip, so thank God it didn't come to that.

The English speaking doctor arrived, took my temperature, and ran blood tests. I had a 103 degree fever and the blood tests showed that I did not have malaria, but salmonella food poisoning. Because I was so dehydrated he admitted me to the hospital and hooked me up to an IV and I think I got about 5 injections of something. I left on Wednesday evening and was still in pretty bad shape until this morning (Friday). Today is the first day that I can really move or eat without pain. The doctor said that this was normal for as bad a case of food poisoning as I had.

Well, after all this I decided to come home a week early. I just didn't want to push my luck by staying, and I probably wasn't going to get much research done anyhow. So I bought a ticket yesterday to fly home, and today I began my journey. I left Siem Reap and flew to Bangkok, where I am now. It was definitely bittersweet to leave Cambodia this way, and especially to say goodbye to my wonderful research assistant/nurse. I really don;t know what I would have done without her!

I booked a room in a really nice hotel here in Bangkok, as I just wanted someplace I could relax and unwind after these stressful and scary days. I really think I am going to be ok now, but I couldn't say that until just recently.

But now I am just counting the hours until I am home again...

Snoop at the Monastery

Today we went off in search of a monk who is very famous for his magical abilities. He is based in a monastery about 15 minutes outside of Phnom Penh. Unknown to me however, Sunday is the day when everyone goes to the wats (Khmer word for temples, the word pagoda is also used) so the place was packed! When we arrived everyone turned to gawk at me (probably wondering why on earth I was there!) - I have never had so many people staring at me before! We were quickly ushered into a large room with a whole crowd waiting for the "big monk" to arrive. Big Monk indeed! This monk looked exactly like Buddha! The crowd pushed me in front of the monk, where everyone started to bow and pray. I didn't know what else to do so I did the same. He started to say prayers over people's things, mainly cell phones, incense, money and water. It was this whole crazy ritual, with the big monk running around to everyone and everyone running to him. The final touch of the ritual is when the whole crowd gets doused with water by the big monk.

After the dousing we were able to ask him for an interview, which was thankfully granted for tomorrow morning.

When we left the big ritual room I heard the craziest music playing over the monastery loudspeakers - you all are going to love this - Snoop Dogg's Drop It Like Its Hot! I thought it was the funniest thing ever, but I don't think anyone else there got the joke.

Survival Memoirs of a Takeo Tourist

So I got back a little early from my Takeo/Loak Da trip, as it is Saturday evening right now and I got back to Phnom Penh yesterday evening. Basically I was away for about 36 hours but it felt like so much longer than that! Allow me to explain...

On Friday morning the taxi driver we had hired picked us up. We drove about an hour to the outskirts of Phnom Penh where we met with a loak da! That was great, and really interesting. I asked her a lot of questions and then got to sit-in on one of her "possessions". Whenever she summons the spirits the spirit of a tiny child will take over her body, and that is when the patrons of the loak da will ask the spirit for help with things or to have objects blessed. I guess this is a pretty modern group of patrons because they asked to have cell phones, car keys and some expensive perfume blessed by the spirit-child. It was kind of bizarre and freaky to watch, as I am sure you can believe!

The loak da does her possessions in this small garage-like building, with an elaborate buddhist alter inside and a huge (what looks to be a) termite mound! I asked her what that is and she said that a snake spirit lives in the mound and it came to her after she agreed to be a loak da. That was about all the information I could get on that... I have to admit that the whole thing was just genuinely all-around bizarre, but I guess that is what I should expect.

After that we drove for quite sometime and arrived in Takeo. Oh what a place. It is really in the middle of nowhere. We hired a boat to take us to see some ancient temples that are on top of mountains in the middle of the ricefields. In the rainy season the mountains become islands and the only way to get there is by boat or swim. The temples were great, and a whole retinue of little kids showed up to follow us around/give us a tour. Then, however, we got caught in a torrential rainstorm. We waited out the rain inside one of the temples, but by then the whole town had turned into a wet slippery mess. On the way back to the boat I promptly slid down a hill on my butt, and was such a mess! The kids of course thought this was hilarious! I had to laugh too, there was nothing else to do!

The story gets better because we were staying at the "best" hotel in Takeo, which is pretty much a joke! There were lizards and bugs everywhere, the sheets had holes in them and pretty much everything was dirty. But I am trying to be a good sport, and there are a lot of people in Cambodia that could never have the luxury of staying in this hotel. So I grinned and decided to bear it. Oh what a night! I only had one pair of pants with me so I had to wash my muddy pair in the sink. No big deal, right? Except the sink drains onto the floor, not down any sort of pipe! So in addition to the bugs, lizards and dirt, I had a wet, muddy bathroom.

This really is just the beginning of my adventures in Takeo, (haha... it does get worse) but I really feel badly complaining like this. Lets just say it was not a comfortable night, and the next morning we all agreed to get back to Phnom Penh as soon as possible. We called the taxi driver to come get us on Friday afternoon.

On Friday morning, however, we went to Angkor Borei, which is another town that is only accessible by boat during the rainy season. Visiting this town made the whole trip worth it. I got to interview 3 looters there, the woman they all sell their finds to, as well as the town museum curator. I got so much great material for my research, it just about made the whole Takeo experience worth it. I think.

Looking for a Loak Ta

Hey everyone! Thanks for all your kind messages - it is so nice to hear from you!

The past two days in Phnom Penh have been a bit slow. We kind of ran out of people to interview! On Monday, however, we went to interview one of my assistant's counsins, who wears an old bead on a necklace because she believes it will bring her good fortune and protect her from harm. It was great to meet and talk with someone who wears the kind of thing we saw so much of in the market.

However, this woman did not get her necklace from a market, she got it from a loak ta, (pronounced look-da) which is a holy man of sorts. So now we are going on a bit of a roadtrip this weekend to meet with two loak ta. How crazy is this - I am setting off in search of two old holy men living somewhere in the Cambodian countryside, where there is no phones or electricity so we can't reach them any other way... My assistant says she knows where they live, so tomorrow we are off!

On Monday we also went to a Buddhist Institute here in Phnom Penh, and interviewed two old Buddhist scholars. It was a great interview but I think I could have probably predicted the things they told me: Yes, Cambodians wear amulets, but only the tiny buddhist figures are actually powerful, everything else is just silly superstition.(There is a kind of heirarchy in Cambodian religious beliefs like the ones I am studying, educated people view amulet usage as uneducated and very provincial, but most buddhists do think that the Buddha figure itself is powerful - just like a cross in Christianity. It is the dried fetuses, tiger claws and old beads that they don't believe in) But they did tell us that they believe all buddhist statues have spirits in them, and the older they are the more spirit (or spirits) are in them. Therefore, older = more powerful and can protect people who wear/have them. This might be a small reason why old buddhas are so often looted from temples! Granted most of these statuary end up outside Cambodia, but my hypothesis is that the smaller, more insignificant items are destined to a life circulating inside Cambodia.

Tuesday was slow, but good because it gave me a chance to transcribe all of my interviews. Today has also been slow, we went to another market in Phnom Penh, hoping they would also have old items. We only found one old buddha for sale, and the woman told us that she just bought it off a poor villager who needed some cash. She didn't really have enough information to help us.

Then last night I took my two assistants out for Japanese food. They had never had it before and I thought it would be a fun experience for them. When I saw the menu I immediately knew why they had never had it before - most plates started around $15, which is a fortune by Cambodian standards! Most Cambodians are happy to make $5 a day, so it is not a surprise to me that this Japanese restaurant did not have any other Cambodians eating there. Cambodia has a lot of places like that restaurant - clearly aimed at foreign aid-workers and diplomats and totally inaccessible for the average Cambodian.

My two assistants are endlessly entertained by stories of life in England and in the United States. Today we had a long conversation in which I tried to explain what cookie-dough ice cream is. I had to start by explaining what a cookie is, and then what the dough is, why it is better raw and how it ends up in ice cream. We also have had long talks about baseball (they don't know what that is) and what a hot dog is. In Cambodia (and in England too... Crazy Brits!) they think a hot dog is a synonym for sausage, and any American can tell you that they are NOT the same!

Anyway, tomorrow we leave early in the morning for Takeo (pronounced Take-ow). I don't know if there will be internet access there, so I may not be able to post until I get back.

18 days left in Cambodia

The performance last night was absolutely incredible. It turned out to not be a shadow puppet performance, and just traditional Cambodian dance. I think it is honestly one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life, particularly the numbers with just the girls in the beautiful costumes. Cambodian dances are very similar to Thai dancing, with the golden stupa-like headdresses, slow movements and elongated fingers. Simply breathtaking!

Today we went to a market to interview people who sell antiquities. It was very informative and I got a ton of material out of it! Tonight I have to sit down and transcribe all the interviews, which will probably take several hours after all the interviews we did.

This afternoon we went to a temple that is a famous gathering spot for mystics and fortune tellers. I was very interested in why they gather THERE, and not other places. I think the answer is that in Cambodia, old = powerful, not just in terms of statues or jewellry but also in terms of places. The mystics gather at this one temple because it is the oldest in Phnom Penh.

I am still feeling pretty homesick and ill-at-ease here, but I am trying to keep busy so that I don't notice it as much. The worst times are at night and when I first wake up in the morning. I really want nothing more than a familiar face or an email from friends and family back home. I don't know why I can't just brush off my loneliness and homesickness better, I am trying to have fun but inside my head I am just counting down the days until I can go home. Still feels like a long way off.

One-month Catch-up (Part III)

Well, while I was travelling with the group, I stayed in Cambodia for three days and then went to Vietnam. We went south from Phnom Penh (Cambodia's capital) on a Mekong River boat, which was wonderful! We then spent one night in Chau Doc, a small Vietnamese town not far from the Cambodian border. That was the 4th of July, not exactly a typical way to spend Independence Day! There really wasn't much to see or do there, but we did go to a karaoke bar and then to play pool with some locals (they slaughtered us!).

The next morning we left early for Ho Chi Minh City. HCMC is very modern and exciting, it reminded me of Shanghai in a lot of ways. I have, however, never seen such insane traffic! There is a 12 lane highway (6 in each direction) going through the center of town and there are no crosswalks. Everyone just darts through the cars and motorbikes, and apparently there are a very large number of accidents there. No surprise!

I really only had about a day and a half in HCMC before it was time for me to go back to Phnom Penh. I went to the Cu Chi tunnels, which was very interesting but way too clausterphobic for my taste! Other than that I did a lot of exploring on foot to the different markets.

Then, on Friday (yesterday) I arrived back in Phnom Penh. The hotel I was suppossed to stay at was far too filthy for my taste. I knew right away that it was not going to work out - the white walls were brown where they met the side of the bed - EWW! I don't even want to know what THAT is! So I left to find another hotel, and I found a decent one right in the middle of the town. It has such a spectacular view out over the royal palace, national museum and it is right across the street from the organization I am working with. On top of that, it is cheaper!

I did, however, wake up this morning with ants all over my stuff (gross, but not the end of the world) and a cockroach in the shower (super-gross, and a much bigger deal than the ants!) I am going to go buy some heavy duty bug spray and hope that all these little buggers go away. Is clean and bug-free really too much to ask? Maybe in Cambodia it is!

I met my two research assistants this morning. I did not plan on having two but now I have two anyhow! I had agreed to hire one but she brought along her friend... I am such a sucker. I know I could have put my foot down and hired only one, but neither's English is 100% and they are far more outgoing and comfortable when they are together. I could see right away that they would be better as a team, so now I have two! (and for $5 a day each, it doesn't make a tremendous difference to me)

Tonight I am going to a Cambodian shadow puppet performance, and taking along my two new assistants. They are really excited because they say that they have never been to the theatre before! Should be fun! More to come soon...

One-month Catch-up (Part II)

Well, as I was saying...

Cambodia is quite a country of contrasts. There is a lot of beauty and the people are very friendly (and an amazing number speak English!) but there is also so much poverty and dirtiness and ugliness. It is quite confronting and sometimes very very difficult to be there. I have never seen so many beggars in one place before, most of them very young children. It is very hard to know what to do sometimes, because the poor flock to foreign faces, asking for money or food. Obviously, you want to give it to them but is that the right thing to do? Some people say that this just reinforces Cambodia's dependence on foreigners, and it sometimes seems like the country could never function on its own. Phnom Penh is packed with foreign aid-workers and NGOs (Non-governmental organizations). Should we perpetuate this cycle?

But maybe it is just one more example of my own foreign privlidge and entitlement that I have the luxury of asking, "should I give food/money to this child?" To the child it might be all s/he eats that day. It is so hard to know what the right thing to do is. Most people say the right thing is to donate money or things to organizations working to help the poor. That is fine, but how do you say no to a dirty, bare-foot 5 year old girl?

Needless to say, I have never felt such guilt for being who and what I am. To these people I am a millionaire. I feel guilty for being overweight, as no Cambodian has that luxury. I can't eat a whole meal in a restaurant, because I can either see the faces of hungry children or just know that they are waiting outside. I have started eating only half a meal and boxing up the other half to give away. This is easy to do - the poverty makes you lose your appetite.

(More to come soon)

One-month Catch-up (Part I)

Sorry to everyone who actually reads this blog that I haven't written in a while. It has been a crazy past month, and there is so much to update you all about!

My exams were fine, not my finest hour but they are done and I am just thankful for that. I just don't do timed essays very well. I much prefer to be able to think about things for a while, read further about the topic, and take my time in responding. Obviously, one hour is not conducive to that! I still don't actually know my grades for the exams, but I am so busy right now that it just isn't a high priority for me to find out. I *think* that if I failed someone would have told me already.

After my exams I hung around Cambridge for two weeks. It was so nice to be able to spend quality time with my wonderful friends in Cambridge. Goodbyes are always so hard, but thankfully I only had to say goodbye to a few friends - most are going to be staying at Cambridge next year. I still don't know if that includes me, but I decided that, no matter what, I would go back to Cambridge in late September/early October. I might be staying for the year and starting my Phd, or it might just be to pack up the rest of my stuff. My mom and Lou have said that they will come with me then, which would be so wonderful. I really really want to show them Cambridge and London so they can see where I have been for the past year. It has been such a significant place for me and I would really like to share that with them. So my fingers are crossed that they will be able to go with me!

I flew home 5 days before my mom and Lou's wedding, which was just such a special time. I loved being home to help my mom get ready and feel like my life is predictable and comfortable. The ceremony was so lovely and it was so nice to spend time with my family (which now is a whole lot bigger!) I am writing this blog entry in Vietnam right now, and thinking about the wedding is making me terribly homesick and sad, so I am going to move on to what I am doing now!

I took a marathon flight from Philadelphia to Bangkok two days after the wedding. My first flight (out of a total 3) was delayed because of engine problems. We ended up sitting on the runway for two hours and I was convinced that I was going to end up missing all of my connecting flights and enduring hours and hours additional travel time. However, I guess God was looking out for my sanity because I got to Chicago with just enough time to run and make my flight to Japan. From Tokyo I then flew into Bangkok and reached my hotel about a million hours after I left. I really lost count, and the whole flying west/back-in-time thing baffles me anyhow.

Something about these epic plane rides to the other side of the planet really gets to me. I suppose it is the hours and hours of time to just sit and ask myself what on earth I am doing. Why am I leaving home and everything and everyone I love to go someplace terrifying that I have never been before? The plane from Chicago to Tokyo had one of those in-flight phones for passengers to use. Even though I knew it would cost an exorbitant amount to call home, I can't tell you how many times I thought of calling. I can't tell you how badly I wanted to hear a familiar voice, but I know from experience that that actually makes my homesickness worse. I won't call home this entire month in South East Asia, because if I do I really might lose it and get on the next plane home. So email will have to be my only comfort for a while.

My first week here has been a blast. I am so glad that I decided to spend my first week of fieldwork as a complete and utter tourist. It is tremendously comforting to adjust to a strange place with other foreigners and have people to laugh and have fun with. I got so lucky with my fellow travellers, they have been a pleasure to travel with. Now that my trip is over, I still don't feel ready to get to work, but I suppose I am as close as I am going to be!

Bangkok was a great city, and I am planning to go back there again at the end of my research. I figure I can probably spare a day or two of fun before my flight out of there on the 28th. I am debating about maybe staying in this super-swank hotel and just going all out for a day or two just for fun and to treat myself ("all out" is pretty cheap in Bangkok, relatively speaking. To stay in a REALLY nice hotel would be about $100-$120 a night)But this will depend on how my research goes, and whether I am feeling indulgent or totally panicing about my dissertation!

While in Bangkok I met up with a friend of a friend who lives there, however this was not just any Thai... she is the grandniece of the King. Yes, the king, so technically she is a princess! She showed me around for several hours and it was just the coolest thing ever!

I really liked Bangkok, and the more I travel in Southeast Asia the more I like it! Initially I was turned off by the overcrowdedness, squalor and general dirt, but now I see that Bangkok is pretty clean and modern compared to other places in the region. There are a lot of hippies there, and it is such a strange amalgamation of business people, backpackers, beggars, people trying to sell you stuff and shady men looking for god-knows-what. Obviously, like any city, there are some not-so-nice places and some spectacular places, but if you have money I don't think there is a more fun place to spend it!

After spending two days on my own in Bangkok I met up with my tour group. The first day was spent on a 8-hour bus ride from Bangkok to NW Cambodia. This was not just any bus ride though, because guess what? The roads are not paved in parts of NW Cambodia. This insanely bumpy ride was just my first introduction to what life is like in Cambodia. Now that I have the benefit of comparing Cambodia to both Vietnam and Thailand, I would say that Cambodia is about 20 years behind its neighbors in terms of infrastructure development. And I thought Bangkok was dirty? Cambodia takes a lot of adjustment, and I don't want this entry to sound like I am just complaining about the state of Cambodia. It is an unfortunate reality that Cambodia has been crippled by events in its recent history, and comparing Cambodia to Vietnam and Thailand just makes this reality all the more poignant and visable.

(So this blog entry is already really long, but there is so much more to write about! I have to go meet my fellow travellers for our last dinner together now, so I am going to have to write more later. The next entry will be all about Cambodia and Vietnam... stay tuned for further updates!)