As you may have noticed from my previous posts, things are done a little bit different around here. There are some things that are easier to adjust to than others. For example some things that were not too hard to adjust to are:
-bugs being everywhere. I thought this would bother me, but once you realize the spiders never leave their webs and catch the mosquitos that are constantly biting you, you learn to not be bothered by the spiders. Huge, as I call them "turantulasourus" spiders hanging out with you while you shower is a big more bothersome, but you learn to deal with it. I call those, I'm not conditioning my hair days.
-Rains. You just kind of go with the flow here. We are constantly subject to the weather here. It starts pouring...so you wait a few minutes to see if it will stop, and then you strap on a rain coat, and head to class. Hey, at least you're not sweating.
-Riding your bike everywhere. It's free, and much easier than trying to find transportation. I've ridden my bike more in the last month than I have in probably the last 15 years. On the plus side, I love my bike, and I'm sure I'm going to have awesomely fit legs when I get home.
-Wearing bug spray like it's going out of style. It beats getting dengue.
Other things are not so easy to adjust to:
-Always being sweaty. For instance right now, I am sweating. It is the rainy season here and therefore, it's always humid. It's humid right after it rains, and all day until it rains. It's humid when you wake up. Right now, you just kind of can't escape it, so slowly we've been adjusting to the heat.
-Being bitten by bugs. No matter how much bug spray you put on, you will sweat it off, and when you're spending time with your family after dinner, you will get bit...a lot. I hate mosquitoes.
-Laundry. No washing machines here. Everything is done by hand with some buckets, some soap, and two hands. One day my neighbor (my yay's sister) came over when we were doing laundry, she laughed at us and proceeded to school us at doing laundry. She was literally like 20 times faster than we were. Maybe one day I'll reach that level of skill. Until then, I'll continue to be slow and add fabric softener, not so my clothes will be softer, but so they won't stink because it takes them 2 days to dry.
Even though some things are harder to adjust to, it's nice to feel like I'm doing things the Cambodia way. Next week we leave to visit our permanent site. I'm nervous, and I really want to be be able to integrate into my community and makes friends there, so hopefully, having the attitude of wanting to do it the Cambodian way, will help me love life here in Cambodia.
2 comments:
I am really loving all of these great updates! It sounds like a wonderful, life-changing experience. Yay Sam and Hal!!! :-)
It sounds like you're taking everything in strides! That's a great outlook to have and I'm hoping everything goes well once you get to your permanent location!
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