There's a Method to the Madness

(click to enlarge)

As I've been learning the rules of the road here, there began to emerge a beauty to the madness of Khmer driving. I put this little diagram together to give you an idea what it's like. You probably won't find this diagram in a Cambodian traffic school (yes, they have a couple around town), but you should.

-Josh

Just a Groovy Little Motorbike

It's Not a Big Motorcycle...
...Just a groovy little motor bike

So now that we're getting settled in, Naomi and I decided to get our own motorbike, and here it is! It's a 50cc Honda SuperCub. I got it from an importer last week - it had a previous life in Japan, and now it's our new family car!


If you're familiar with the Beach Boys, you might know the song "Little Honda" (I've transcribed the lyrics below) in which they sing about shifting through the gears of his little Honda. I've always wondered why he stops at 3rd gear (first gear, it's alright/second gear, i lean right/third gear, out of sight), and now I know the answer: it only has three gears! My speedometer maxes out at 65 kph - or about 40 mph, gets about 100 mpg, and so far I've driven it about 300 miles just around town!

According to a show by the Discovery channel, the Honda SuperCub is the #1 motorcycle of all time. There have been like 50 million of them made, and it seems about 1 of 4 bikes on the road here is a SuperCub. (Daelim's make up another 25%, and then an assortment of Honda Chaly's and newer motorbikes and dirt bikes round out the pack).

Driving here is scary, but it got a lot easier after getting some advice from my Khmer friend Bora - he told me that when I was driving I looked so scared, and that I just needed to relax! RELAX!? I thought he was crazy, but then I realized what he meant: I was looking in my mirrors waaay too much. Cambodians, when they buy motorbikes, will take the mirrors OFF first thing. They get rid of them, because when you're driving, there's really only one rule that you can never break: KEEP YOUR EYES AHEAD OF YOU AT ALL TIMES!!!! If it's behind you, it doesn't matter. That's it!

All street signs, lights, stripes, etc are more or less like the yellow "suggested speed" signs in the States.
Seriously, all lane control, intersections, one-way streets, stop signs, everything else is treated more or less like a suggestion. But if you keep your eyes ahead, you'll be fine - just don't hit anything! It's pretty simple. Motorbikes are everywhere, and drivers are far more aware of mororbikes then in the States (given, motorcycles make up 80% of vehicles on the road), we Always wear helmets, and pray a lot as we ride.

So far, it's mostly just me on the bike, but Naomi and I ride together quite a bit as well. I've also started branching out and used the Cub to deliver some new chairs to our apartment... a very small load by Khmer standards, but I think I kept it in 2nd the whole way home!

Josh
Phnom Penh
24 February, 2008



Little Honda, by the Beach Boys

Go!! I'm gonna wake you up early cause I'm gonna take a ride with you We're going down to the Honda shop I'll tell you what we're gonna do Put on a ragged sweat shirt I'll take you anywhere you'd like me to

*chorus:
First gear [Honda Honda go], it's alright [faster, faster] Second gear [Honda Honda go], I'll lean right [faster, faster] Third gear [Honda Honda go], out of sight [faster, faster] Faster! It's all right!
It's not a big motorcycle, just a groovy little motor bike It's more fun than a barrel of monkeys that two wheeled bike we'll ride on out of the town to any place I'll know you'll like

chorus
It climbs the hills like a Matchless cause my Honda's built really light When I go into the turns lean with me and hang on tight I'd better turn on the light so we can ride my honda tonight

chorus 2x

The Dollar Top 10 (week 4 edition)

Top 10 ways to spend a dollar in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

1. 3 hours of internet access or a 20 minute call to the States at the internet cafe.
2. Rice soup. Mmmmm... so good! It comes piping hot, with shrimp, fish pate', sprouts, ginger. Great stuff!
3. A refil, delivered, for your 20-liter jug of drinking water.
4. Getting your hair washed, complete with a facial wash and 5 minute shoulder rub. Very refreshing!
5. Iced coffee (Only 3000 real) from Mr Bounarreth at the Russian Market. Best iced Coffee in Phnom Penh!
6. A manicure of pedicure. I never knew my cuticles could look so nice!
7. 1 KG of oranges
8. A Moto-dop ride from one end of town to the other
9. 2 Angkor beers from the ladies on the riverside.
10. THE Phnom Penh Dollar!

The Phnom Penh Dollar

OK, one of things to remember about Cambodia is that people here eat just about anything. Anything! So, one of the common treats you can buy on the street or at markets is deep-fried insects! Which leads me to introduce: The Phnom Penh Dollar!

During our visit in September last year, we first encountered fried tarantulas at a bus stop between Siem Reap and Phnom Penh. We saw these ladies with huge metal bowls on their heads. I asked them what they had, to which they enthusiastically replied "Spiders!".

Well, in Phnom Penh, on the Riverside near the royal palace, we then encountered these ladies selling just about every gross thing imaginable, deep fried! I asked to take a picture, and she said "No!" I then offered her a dollar and she said "OK". I took some photos, but while I was taking them, she began filling a bag with just about one of everything. I took the bag, and I now present to you:

THE PHNOM PENH DOLLAR.
(click to enlarge)

Legend has it that any man or woman (no way a child could handle this) who can consume the whole bag of goodies in 1 minute is destined to be the next king of Scotland. Or something like that..

Temporary Apartment, in Pictures

Living room of our new (temporary) apartment.
Note the following: 1) Bars on the windows. Apparently, break-ins are common here, so just about every house has barred windows and doors. 2) The half-floor. The second floor of the apartment has 2 bedrooms with lower (8’?) ceilings. 3) The TV. TV’s are so common here that every house comes with one. And they are always made by “Sony”. Always. And when you turn them off, the sides close in like curtains on a musical… so you get a second or two to reconsider your decision. It doesn’t go “beeewwwwp” but you can almost hear it when you hit the button. 4) Wicker furniture – it’s everywhere. This came with the apartment. Very cheap but nice enough. 5) Every conceivable surface is tile. Nice.

Our current bedroom.
1) Bags everywhere. We just moved in today. 2)Bars on windows 3) The air-con unit on the wall. According to my dad, this is called a “Ductless split system”. In Asia, it’s called AC – this is the only kind there is.

Bathroom.
Very typical for Cambodia. Note: 1) Showering is just done in the same place as everything else. Everything is tile here, so this works fine. 2) Toilet is a pour-to-flush type (note bucket, plastic pot, and lack of tank behind toilet). This really appeals to my engineering sensibilities – you just use as much or as little water as you need to flush the john!

Toilet, close-up.
Note bucket and pot as previously discussed. Also, note that nozzle thing next to toilet. Remember in Demolition Man that scene with the “Three Shells”? Well… in Southeast Asia, that nozzle is the 3 shells. And it’s awesome.

Kitchen.
This is a really nice one, compared to the ones we’ve seen. Note: 1) small fridge – probably the biggest you’d ever have at a house here 2) bars on widows 3) Lock on door. I am in the house, but this is how they say I should keep it. This is funny, because we’ve NEVER felt threatened while walking on the street… and by all accounts intruders never mean harm to the residents… but petty theft seems to be a constant concern.

Close-up of lock.
It’s a “Solex” – as they all are, and huge. And it’s “Made in USA”.

Weird gate.
This is hard to explain, but there’s like 1 floor plan of houses in Cambodia that is very very common, and it’s like the one we’re in. There are several floors, in our case I believe it’s 5, and they are all connected by a stairwell. But, in our case, we’ve only rented 2 of the floors. So, the floors above and the floors below are separated from us by this funky gate – so theoretically the person upstairs could come down to the gate and still be in their house. It’s kinda weird, but that’s how it goes. There’s an outside stairwell for the folks above, and it’s really funky. Funky enough, that it deserves it’s own post.

Josh Svensson
Phnom Penh
January 31, 2008

Last Day of Work... at the County

Well, it's been about 3 weeks, we're still doing great, making lots of friends, building our networks, and today (12 Feb) is my official last day of work. (Goodbye, paycheck ....*sniff*)
The process of stepping away has been SO GOOD. We reflect each day how thankful we are to be here, and are so glad and have been so blessed in the risks we've taken. (Faith can be fun?)
We still don't have internet access at home, but I will be uploading some photos in the future, thanks for your patience.

josh

Week 1 Language Fun

Being a USA-native English speaker is both a blessing and a curse. Take the following (oft-repeated) joke as an illustration of this point:

“What do you call a person who speaks 3 languages?”
“Tri-Lingual”
“And a person who speaks 2 languages?”
“Bi-lingual”
“And a person who only speaks 1 language?”
“I don’t know, Mono-Lingual?”
“Nope. You call them American”

I tell this joke far too often, but that’s because to me this is my most lamented lacking skill. Sure, I took 4 years of German in high school (unfortunately EVERY German I’ve ever met speaks English twice as well as I speak German – not true for the French I meet by the way), sure I can get by in Mexico with my minimal Spanish and in China with my minimal Mandarin… but when it comes to anything beyond “how much does this cost” or “where’s the toilet”, It’s going to have to be my good old mother tongue.

Now compare this to your average Kenyan (let’s call him Mr. Matatu). Considering that Mr. Matatu is your average Kenyan, he speaks at least 3 if not 4 or 5 languages – his mother tongue (1) will typically be his tribal language, then the national language Swahili (2), then English (3), and more than likely he can get by in the languages of the tribes near his (4 & 5). Not only can he speak these, he can more than likely read in all of these languages.

I just don’t understand the American system of language teaching. Why do we wait until HIGH SCHOOL to start teaching another language??! This is craziness to me! It is widely known that children not only are able to rapidly learn languages, but that it by all accounts helps them in their other areas of study, and sadly, the brain begins to lose this magic ability to absorb new languages by the time children are 12 or 13. What the hell, America?!

OK, that off my back, let’s talk about Cambodia. Cambodian people and language are called “Khmer”, which when said by a Cambodian person sounds like “Kuh-my” (2 very quick syllables). People say that Khmer is a difficult language, but so far we are having a great time learning the basics. So far we’ve learned how to excuse ourselves, count to 10, ask for the bill, say hello, and to say that something is beautiful (sa-at). One of the funny things about Khmer is that unlike Chinese (and just about every other language I’ve studied) there’s no set system for writing out pronunciations of Khmer words with roman (i.e. English) letters.

For example, one dictionary will spell “thank you” as “Ak-kuhn” and another will have it “Og-goon”. This is because there are many consonant and vowel sounds in Khmer that are not in English. Of course this isn’t unusual for English-foreign language dictionaries, but in the Khmer case, the linguistic geniuses seem to still be duking it out. Oxford or Merriam Webster need to step in and put together a definitive system, and then Lonely Planet can get their English-Khmer phrasebook put together (I lived by my Mandarin-English Lonely Planet phrasebook during my year in China).

So why does it matter? Well, I stepped into a small café with Naomi on Monday and the waitress didn’t speak a word of English. We have had 2 or 3 cases like this before, but the person spoke French or Chinese and we had somewhere to start. In this case, we were stuck pointing at the menu (which thankfully was in English) and gesturing for what we wanted. In the midst of this we pulled out our pocket dictionary and started looking up how to say “Chicken” and “tea” and suddenly I had remembered my first Khmer word. There is something just so great about being stuck, learning a word, and getting unstuck.

When you think about it, language is an amazing thing – I would even argue that it is the most significant thing that makes us human. The ability to reason and the ability to create mean very little when our thoughts and creations cannot be expressed to another. And it was the fundamental element of language – the word “Word” – that the Bible uses to describe Jesus in John 1. God’s greatest act of love and compassion were summed up by John in the word “Word”. God’s communication to us.

In getting ready to leave, I’ve had several conversations where I’ve told people that selling all our stuff and moving to another country is for me a way to discover my humanity – that is, what it is at my core that makes me a person. So often I feel like I define myself by my occupation, my possessions, or my location. Here, these are still true, but as we’ve left most behind, we’re left with “just us”. To me, being whittled down to the real “me” – by God, myself, and others – is one of the most exciting parts of this upcoming year.

Josh Svensson
January 31, 2008
Phnom Penh