Made in O Russei

The last two days have not been as exciting as usual, as I mainly stayed in the office all the time. I'm really behind with all my reports. Today I was supposed to visit a family house and take pictures and interview the kids but I didn't have time so instead I'll just interview the mom when she comes to pick up her allowance on Monday and use pictures which were taken a few months ago and weren't used in a previous report. Tomorrow I'm planning to go to the temporary center of Chamcar Mon. This guy called M. Phanna is the director of the center. He's great. He is so dedicated to his work and he does so much for his center. Writing the annual report for this center is a piece of cake as he already written his own report and all I'm left to do is to make sense of fis English and type it out nicely. Having said that, making sense of his English is not always easy. Here is a paragraph from his report, under the heading of "the reality of streets" :
The sexual contact
Most of the streets children have involved with sex issue. According to the age of puberty, sex attraction, influence of TV, VCD, or films, many children happened with the sex issue. It has found as in the streets:
a) The street boys and street girls have fallen in sexually
b) The street boys and street boys with homosexual (having not often living in the streets)
c) The street women were sexed with young boys (having often happened in the streets)
d) The adult men were convinced, threaten the street girls and raped and quitted, this case never been arrested them.
e) The both Khmer and foreigners have often involved convinced the street children for sex by consoling and offering some thing to the children.

It's even harder to understand Khmers when they speak sometimes. But I'll get used to it. And in the meantime I will improve my Khmer. I started classes this week. I should have never said I was an intermediate level. The teacher speaks to me in Khmer ONLY. She'll repeat the sentence again and again if I don't get it, and then if I repeat a word which is blocking my understanding of the sentence in an inquisitive manner she just uses another sentence in Khmer to explain that word. I suspect she doesn't speak English or French at all which would explain her determination never to translate anything but by explaining and confusing the hell out of me. But 3 classes of complete confusion per week will undoubtedly help me a lot. I only had 2 classes and I can already feel it easier to make whole sentences. One thing is for sure, I master small talk (that is presenting myself, saying if I have a boyfriend, why I'm not married etc etc) for all the kids who ask me, order a meal at a restaurant and not just by pointing on the menu, by reading it out, and most importantly, negotiate with the motodop driver the price of the journey and get him to go in the right place. Granted, I obviously wasn't up to that a few days ago (see fiasco Saturday night) but I've learnt my lesson well.

During my lunch break I went to Psar O'Russei with Corinne to buy crappy toys for her kid's birthday. He's having a party with all the kids from his street Saturday afternoon as I've been enrolled as a chaperone. Oh my goodness, you should come to Cambodia just for his market experience. There is SO MUCH crap there you cannot even imagine. I mean I went there thinking I need to buy plastic toys and party hats and I just wanted to buy everything. I just can't describe what was there. Cos there was just absolutely everything one may need or may probably have absolutely no use for but still wants. Half of the stuff is just made in China crap so mountain of plastic toys sold in rice bags by the kilo. One kilo of plastic army men and tanks for example costs 2000 riel, or half a dollar. Then there's (in a similar order) wedding dresses, notebooks and pens which are stacked up to the ceiling, ribbon, floor tiles, spices, towels, packs of bulk cookies and crisps, hairclips and jewelery, dried fruit, Chinese new year decorations, car parts, mobile phones… and so much more. It made me think of this slogan for this department store in Paris (which by the way just closed) called La Samaritaine. It used to be "on trouve tout Paris à la samaritaine" (One can find all of Paris at la samaritaine). This market's slogan could easily be "One finds the whole wide world at Psar O'Russei" Anyway, you have to be there.

Not much more to report, apart that things are looking up for me. I feel like I've made my nest here now. I more or less situate myself in Phnom Penh, I've got stuff on every night and plans for a weekend packed of fun (including a birthday do on a boat on the Mekong – last time Corinne went on one it sunk and the fisherman who tried to save the poor souls sunk as well) and probably another visit to Psar O'Russei. I've also decorated my room to make it more homely despite the noise the heat and the dust. And I'm getting paid this week so I won't have to worry about every riel spent anymore.

Anyway, gotta go meet Clayre at the Garden Café. I've heard it's -7 degrees in Paris. Boooww, tough luck…. Morijtos by the pool for me!!