These are some observations I've made recently that I would like to share.
- Burning trash smells like weed - So, no, all my neighbors are not drug users, they are just getting rid of their trash. I'm not sure which is better though, me inhaling all the burning trash and plastic fumes around my house or disposing of it the way my family does, which is by throwing it into the creek in front of our house. So I'm living in front of a landfill AND inhaling toxic fumes. Double win.
-If I randomly take 2 pieces of clothing and put it on in the morning, I'm usually much more beautiful than when i carefully plan an outfit that I think looks cute. No matter what, it's always the tackiest clothes and hairstyles that I always get the most compliments on by my students and co-workers. I've stopped trying. Today I wore my hair in braided pig tails (I look like a crazy 5 year old) and I put on a floor length skirt and a polo and a random belt. SO BEAUTIFUL. According to them at least. So I'm going to get dressed with my eyes closed from now on to maximize the "beauty".
- ANGRY BIRDS are taking over the world. Everything here is angry birds. I was one heartbeat away from buying a pair of flats that had angry birds on it. I had my students write their own advertisements and over half of them were just pictures of angry birds. I doubt most of them have ever even played the darn game. They just have all the paraphernalia.
- Students here can sing all the words to an Akon song, but yet can't understand me when I ask "What is your name?" I don't get it.
Those are just some of many things I've noticed here. Overall though, I'm loving it. I'm starting to get used to living with my new host family (which probably will never live up to the awesomeness of my old one but they set the bar high) and my co-teachers and I are bonding. My 2 co-teachers, Socheath and Dany (male and female) are fantastic. They are always there to help me out and teach me how things work and help me with my Khmer. It's really great to have them around. AND I might start teaching at the University near my house soon! College professor at age 20! I've also started bonding with some of my community members more which is nice. I made friends with the bon chaio (the most delicious thing here) lady. I was sitting at her stand for a while and a lot of people were there and they kept telling me how beautiful my skin was and proceeded to ask me how much I weighed (which is a completely normal question for them) and when I said that I didn't know how many kilos they got into an argument with each other in front of me about how much I weighed. It's an interesting site to see when 5 people are surrounding you guessing and arguing about how much you probably weigh. No worries though, at least they didn't force me to get on the rice scale (which has happened to many volunteers). But they summed it all up by telling me how beautiful I was and changing the subject to how many times a day I shower in this country. lol. The interesting conversation topics never stop.
That's about it for now. I'll let you know if something noteworthy happens.
