party in the mountain and wedding in the countryside

I had quite a busy weekend. On Friday night I went to that boat bar I’d been to before with Dana. I didn’t know I’d end up there and once again I felt so underdressed compared with the other people. I wish I’d brought some of my going out clothes to Cambodia. At work I feel prissy compared to my Baraing colleagues, but when I go out in a place like here, I feel like a bit of a tramp. What is quite strange about this place is that if you were teleported to this place (bear with me…) you would have no idea you were in Cambodia. Not one Cambodian face, but sexy barmaids in dresses that cover just the minimum, cocktails, western music and western design. Anyway, the music was good and I enjoyed myself.

On Saturday I left for the Kirirom, a mountain south of Phnom Penh. A French guy had organized a huge full-moon party there. We set off at noon by bus and arrived at the entrance of the natural park at about 4. The landscape was amazing and the air so fresh and pure. It was hard for me to realize that we were still in Cambodia. There were pine trees and everything! I just stuck my head out of the window and breathed in all the air my lungs could take in. We arrived at the top of the mountain where there’s supposed to be waterfalls. We walked around a bit, looked for the waterfalls, couldn’t find them or even hear them, so went back in the bus thinking that we would go look for them later, after we had dropped our stuff in the hostel. Except the bus driver had no idea where the hostel was, so we went up and down the mountain 3 times, finally arriving there after 6, by which time it was dark and too late to walk around anymore. I was quite disappointed cos I would have really liked to see nice landscapes and take pictures. But anway, the party was really good. The people who were there were nice and we had a good time. Dancing outside is so much more fun than in clubs.

Saturday morning before I left for Kirirom I had been hunting for shoes to go with my Barbie dress in my favorite market: Psar Orussey. And I found exactly what I wanted in no time at all. But maybe I’ll explain why I needed Barbie shoes. I was invited to the wedding of Corrines’s cook’s daughter. Cambodian weddings last two days, are an opulence of food and drink, music and guests in their best wedding clothes. You don’t just wear a nice dress. You wear an absolutely gorgeous princess dress. At first the western eye would say that these dresses aren’t gorgeous at all but very tacky, and that they look like fancy costumes. I agree the dress I ended up wearing (Kesor my Khmer teacher lent it to me!) was quite similar to a dress I once wore for Halloween when I was dressed as a fairy. Except it was much more sophisticated. And it was Barbie pink. So I had to find Barbie pink shoes. Check out the pictures and tell me if you don’t agree that I look like a real life Barbie, in which case I will assume that you are just dead jealous. So anyway, the wedding on Sunday afternoon was awesome I really loved it. I wasn’t the prettiest girl, as Amory kept reminding me (these stupid Belgians are so untactful), because all the Cambodian girls looked like princesses or Barbies too. The hosts were so honored to have Baraings at their party and we were treated as kings. They wanted us to be present for when the bride meets the groom which is usually only for parents and siblings. The parents wanted to take pictures of us with the bride and groom and everything. And after the meal (which consisted of 6-7 different courses) they kept inviting us to dance. The guys come up to the girls and bow and you have to bow back to accept the dance. But I was so tired by the end (and the Barbie shoes weren’t that comfortable for dancing on dust floors) that I’d sometimes pretend I hadn’t seen the guy bowing in front of me and walk off the dance floor. No but it was really fun. The girls were really eager to show me the different dances, and I was probably making a fool of myself by attempting to do it right but they were so glad for us to be there that it didn’t matter. The bride changed dresses 5 times in the evening and each dress looked more gorgeous than the other. Amory and Corinne kept explaining to me all the different rituals that they were performing. It was really interesting. Then we had to give our money. You take the envelope that you’d received with the invitation and you put in money (you are expected to give quite a bit if you are Baraing) and you hand it over to the two guys sitting near the entrance. One opens the envelopes and tells the other what your name is and how much you gave and then the other writes it down. At first I thought that wasn’t really on, but then I realized that wedding lists in our weddings are not that different.
Anyway, after hours of dancing around the center table, we decided to call it a day, and I set of in the princess-worthy coach otherwise known as the back of Amory’s motorbike. I had to hold up the different layers of dress and veils, so it wouldn’t get stuck in the wheels. That’s Cambodian top class, I’m telling you…