typical.

I’m easing back into life at site after being away for 10 days. The trip was a mixed bag. The first half of the trip, which was vacation, I was sick. When I finally got into Phnom Penh I found out I had a bacterial infection in my throat and started antibiotics. I was feeling better just in time for the Mid Service Training to start. While we were in town we had a nice reception at the embassy to celebrate 50 years of the Peace Corps. We finally got to see the 50^th anniversary video that my project was featured in; it’s all in Khmer and was played on national TV this week. I haven’t had a chance to look yet but it should be showing up on facebook or youtube sometime soon, I’m speaking Khmer in the video and you can see more of my site and the kids I work with everyday so I’ll be sure to share a link once I find it. I left MST feeling accomplished, I have a rough outline of project goals for the rest of my time here and I started figuring out and moving forward with plans for life after the Peace Corps.

Today was a very typical day. I went to a Village Health Volunteer meeting; VHV’s are representatives from the villages that are served by the health center, they have a meeting once every two months to learn more about health education topics and turn in reports about the health status of their village. I sat through that meeting impressed with the amount I understood as compared to the very first VHV meeting I went to which just happened to fall on my very first day at the health center, overwhelming. On my way out one of the midwives told me that they were going to be doing an outreach activity that afternoon and I should come meet her at the health center at 1 in the afternoon.

That afternoon as I headed back to the health center it looked like it was going to rain but I went anyway. When I got there at 1 there was no sign of the midwife, by 1:30 I was getting ready to ride my bike home to avoid the impending downpour when someone told me she was on her way. Not even 5 minutes later she was there and the sky had opened up. For the next hour we had one of the heaviest storms I have seen since coming to Cambodia, tons of lightning and thunder so loud and close the building was shaking, heavy winds and pouring rain.

So instead of doing outreach this afternoon I sat in the health center waiting out the rain while some old women told me I should marry a Khmer man because our babies would have pretty noses. Just another day in Cambodia.

Later in the afternoon I went to the English class I have been helping with, one of the girls handed me a plastic bag filled with a ton of what I guess I would call mango fruit roll ups. It’s nearing the end of mango season so people are taking overripe mangos, turning them into a jam type paste and then letting them dry, they are similar to fruit leather and delicious. For the last few months I have been going next door each evening to read dialogues from their book and let them practice speaking English and asking questions. By now everyone in the class knows I love mangos and earlier in the season a girl brought me a mango the size of my head, I also randomly get drawings from students and they always make me smile. Going to help has been a great way to end my days; the class helps remind me that even if my typical workday is frustrating and doesn’t feel particularly productive that a big part of my service is the relationship I am building with these kids. I know they will be there each day to ask me the same questions, to give me something to laugh about and every so often surprise me with treats.