My Final Project

It's hard to believe that my time in the Peace Corps is coming to an end. July 22nd will mark my two year anniversary as a volunteer, and I'll be on a flight home just a week and a half after that. Yesterday I completed my last official project as a PCV, and it was an incredible way to wrap up my service.

My school hosted two environmental workshops (one for grades 11 and 12, the other for grades 7-10) which were taught by 24 American high school students and the 5 Cambodian students from Kampong Speu province who recently studied abroad in the US. Sarann, a Cambodian English teacher who accompanied the 5 Cambodian students on their study abroad in D.C. and Hawaii was my counterpart and co-coordinator.

Over 200 Sokha Phally High School students participated in sessions on litter/waste management, the 3R's, and the dangers of burning plastic. For many students, this was the first time they'd heard about these topics. The 24 Americans and 6 Cambodians co-taught the highly engaging lessons which included Khmer rapping, a scavenger hunt, and popping balloons by sitting on them. At the end of the day, there was a raffle for prizes like sports equipment, Khmer-English dictionaries, backpacks, and the grand prize - bicycles. All of the students were excited and engaged during the lessons, and I was particularly impressed with how well the American and Cambodian leaders worked together to teach their classes. The smiles in the pictures below are proof of just how much fun learning can be!

 

 

After the lessons, students lined up in groups to answer content review questions. This is one of my favorite students who I nicknamed "Frida" when she studied in my Spanish Club.

 

Cambodian and American students co-taught each lesson. Here they're teaching vocabulary related to burning like "put out a fire."

 

In this lesson, students learned about the 3R's. Panha is giving an example of waste that can be recycled.

 

After a scavenger hunt, teams divided their items into "compost," "recyclables," and "other" bins.

 

These co-teachers engaged their classes by allowing students to sit on the top of the desks - a radical idea! (The female teacher is Raksmey, the student from my school who studied in the US in April.)

 

Students wait with anticipation for the raffle drawing at the end of the workshop. Grades 11 and 12 studied in the morning.

 

Namji, the coordinator of the 24 American students, hands out prizes.

 

Soccer ball or volleyball -- tough choice!

 

Namji announces the two grand prize bicycles as students concentrate on their lucky numbers. 

 

Co-coordinator Sarann and all the students applaud the winner of the second bicycle.

 

Sarann and the 5 Cambodian students who studied in America and co-taught the workshop pose with the two winners of the bicycles.

 

These grade 9 participants were excited to share the knowledge they'd gained.

 

Afternoon participants (grades 7 - 10) listen closely to the review questions.

 

Look at all those smart girls!

 

She was answering, "How do you spell 'reduce?'"

 

Sokha Phally High School's director draws for the grand prizes.

 

And the winners are...

 



These girls!

 

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Special thanks go to my counterpart, Sarann, and the Southeast Asia Youth Leadership Program participants for organizing the event, Namji Steinemann of the East-West Center and her team for coordinating with us and ensuring that the event was fun and engaging, Sokha Phally High School for hosting the event and rescheduling national testing to accommodate our proposed workshop date, LICADHO for arranging a human rights panel on land-grab issues for the American students, and Karuna Café for providing our lunch and dinner.

An Embarrassing Misunderstanding

With only 38 days left to enjoy Cambodia, I decided to take a break from my standard afternoon snack of Pringles (or the knock-off Mister Potato brand… or if really in a bind, Jacker) and try something new. For the past few weeks I’d been scoping out a fried banana cart in hopes that I might glimpse the hidden compartment where the seller keeps all the fried potatoes, but realizing my delusion I resigned myself to a fruitier crisp.

Brakes screeching, I pulled up beside the banana cart just as I realized that I had no idea what a fair price for this tropical treat may be. Thinking 2,000 Riel (50 cents) seemed reasonable, I turned to the seller, smiled, and said, “2,000, please.” The woman gave me a crooked look and said she didn’t have any as she bustled away into the market, leaving me and her cart behind.

Seeing that she still had some bananas sitting in the display of her cart, I figured that she must not have had any ready and that she had just gone in to buy some more oil. I was willing to wait, so I just stood awkwardly straddling my bike while doing my best to avoid the stares and motos darting towards me.

After a few minutes, the seller came back with a small cooler which she popped open to reveal a large stash of money. She plucked four 500-riel bills from the pool of cash with one hand and gently extended them to me with a warm smile on her face.

Realizing that she thought I was begging for money, my face turned as red as the bills she was holding. I quickly apologized and explained that I wanted to buy 2,000 Riel worth of bananas. She told me that she was finished selling for the day, so I thanked her before zooming away from the embarrassing situation as quickly as I could.

Her act of generosity was as humbling as it was kind.

 

Just had some more of these instead...

 

Why Are Things the Way They Are?

So many times I’ve asked my students to practice writing second conditional sentences. Now I’d like to propose one of my own. “If I were prime minister of Cambodia, I would fund 5,000 students and young professionals to study or work abroad over the next five years on the condition that they return to work or continue study in Cambodia for at least five years after their return.” Here’s why:

As I pass through a stinky overcrowded market, nearly get sideswiped by motorbike drivers zooming into oncoming traffic, and leave my classroom at 5:00 pm only to notice that every other classroom has been vacant for at least the past hour, I wonder. Why are things the way they are, and why doesn’t anyone in my community seem upset by these conditions? Of course there are numerous factors such as history, culture, and economics which must inform any answer to these questions, but I think a lack of connection to the outside world is another large part.

Last year I asked my students how many of them had been to Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh, located just 30 miles east of our school. Out of several hundred students, only three raised their hands, and of those, only one has been outside the country. Not only is it difficult (expensive) for many Cambodians to travel, it is also hard to access news and information from around the world. There’s one radio station in all of Cambodia that plays western music, and the slanted pro-government television stations fill their programming with variety shows, singing competitions, local news, graduation and military promotion ceremonies, and music videos with little attention to international affairs. Without speaking English, it’s nearly impossible to learn about the world outside Cambodia, and even with strong language skills, there are few libraries, media programs, or opportunities for internet access for most citizens.

This lack of connection to the outside world means that change and innovation must be thought up and created from within. Yet schools have no outlets for creativity like arts programs or musical groups, and critical thinking seems to be suppressed far more than encouraged in lecture-based classes and ubiquitous hierarchy systems in which challenging authority is unheard of. New ideas are neither streaming in from abroad nor being fermented from within. The result is stagnation.

Instead of comparing systems, implementing best practices, and striving to improve, there’s a general indifference and acceptance. (At least what we have now is better than what we had during Pol Pot’s regime, many people say.) While most Cambodians I’ve met concede that their country has many problems, they’ve lacked the sense of agency to do anything about them. They have trouble stating visions and dreams because it’s hard to imagine something you’ve never seen before, and culturally it’s unusual to think (let alone share and promote) ideas that are different or which break the mold.

One solution that I’ve come to believe in even more over the past two years is international youth exchange which would allow Cambodians to travel abroad and see a different way (not necessarily a better way) of how to do everything from markets to traffic to education. Not only would exchanges empower young people to think critically about their country’s situation, they would also give young adults credibility and templates for growth which could be altered to fit their country’s reality.

In my next post, I’ll highlight an environmental project being planned by five students and one teacher who just completed an exchange program in Washington, D.C. and Hawai’i. The vision, excitement, and knowledge to implement their plan and the eventual benefit to their communities are the direct consequence of an international exchange, and I believe with more opportunities for thousands of students and young professionals to study abroad, Cambodia could take off and overcome the indifference that stymies the country today.

A Dream Come True

Less than five months from its conception, Sokha Phally high school's dream of a warm and welcoming library with hundreds of reading materials and two trained librarians was fully realized this past Friday. Nearly 100 students filled the room throughout the opening day poring over the new novels, textbooks, dictionaries, and maps as if they were gifts under the tree on Christmas morning. Despite the pleading of the librarians, many students found it hard to contain their excitement as they read. The room was full of smiles and laughs which were only interrupted by groans when the school's bell signaled the time for students to get back to their classrooms.

As I looked around at the tables, chairs, bookshelves, maps, and books, I imagined those of you who gave so generously to make this space possible. I wished that I could share the fun and excitement in the room in a more real way than the pictures I've included below, and I wished that these students could know the amazing people who had given so generously to this project.

As a sign of friendship, I hung the American flag which had adorned my room over the past two years on the library's wall. I hope it will be a lasting reminder of the kindness so many of my American friends and family showed by supporting the school and giving thousands of students over the coming years a chance to read, learn, and grow in a way that wasn't possible before.

From all of us at Sokha Phally high school, thank you so very much.

 

Before

 

After

 

 

One of the two new librarians helps a student sign in. 

 

 

The register allows librarians to track how many students have used the library (measureable by sex/grade), how much time they spent in the library, and which materials they are reading (optional). The school's current objectives are: 1) at least 150 students will visit the library per month, and 2) at least 40% of students will spend at least one hour per week in a library.

 

 

Once signed in, students have over 150 English and 250 Khmer books to choose from. Books are organized by category with colored dots to aid librarians with re-shelving. (One of the librarians knows no English.)

 

Novels

History

 



 

Math and Science

 

 

There were so many girls!

 

This girl is brilliant. She even stands up to the English technical leader when he teaches something incorrectly during our classes, no small act in this culture.

Another one of my favorite students, Diamond. This guy went straight for the English science books when he came in. Most of his peers were engrossed with Khmer romance novels.

 



While this guy's smile is great, I love this picture for another reason. I can only imgaine that the boy with the mask had been reading Harry Potter (in Khmer) and is now using that huge dictionary to look up something like "muggle" or "quidditch."

 



 

I brought my 1,000-piece puzzle into the library, and these students loved it! It was a great teamwork and critical thinking exercise.

 

A Sign of Friendship

 







"Cow Child"

By popular demand, I present a twisted account of love and technology which received no votes in the final round of the national creative writing competition but which nonetheless captured the hearts and imaginations of judges from across the country.

Additionally, I have the great pleasure to introduce my first guest blogger, Ms. Christine Holmes of Peoria, Arizona. Holmes, an esteemed expert on race and sexuality, provides timely analysis of Kheav's essay and answers its most pressing questions by drawing upon her deep cultural understanding of Cambodia after nearly two years of Peace Corps service in Kheav's Cambodian homeland.

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Student’s Name: Kheav Panhasey

School: Sokha Phally High School
Village: Tmey
Male or Female: Male
Peace Corps Volunteer’s Name: Leslie Miles
Student’s Age: 18
Grade: 12
Prompt: What would you do if you knew you would lose your memory at the end of every day?

If I knew I were going to lose my memory at the end of every do, I would go to tell my sweat heart. My sweatheart is a beautiful cow that make me happy every day and she always ride to forest every day to eat grass with her. When I have free time I always go to take her to the club every night and always dance with her and people around there always look to me, when I dance with her but I don’t care about every thing that happened and than we are going to the restaurant to eat hot dog and hot cow that make me very romantic. After a few week ago she has a baby. I know don’t know how she has a baby? Because I don’t do anything to her. I just take her to club and go to the restaurant and one day I drink a lot and I rent a room to sleep but when the morning I don’t know everything that happen at the night. I just sleep and other thing I don’t know.

Next year is best year that my sweat heart born a baby but suddenly I take my sweatheart to the forest to born a baby. but after a few time ago her is born a beautiful child. I’m very happy but I wonder my sweatheart is a cow why her baby is a child? and than I go to the forest and saw my sweatheart and she says that I want to have IPHONE to call to my friend and my family and play facebook with my and also skype and I than I go to the sea and make a new phone from the land and than I take it to her and than she very happy and prefer with this thing and everynight she always plays facebook with her friend and call to her friend and her family on the heaven and than she say that you know the phone code on the heaven and than I laugh and laugh and say that you go to ask the tiger because he know every phone code on the Land and under the Land and tell you how to call to the heaven? and at the evening I always take her to top of the tree to see the landscap and view around the world and very happy and we sleep on top of the tree in this night.

When we get up suddenly we are on the sea that has a lot of big wave and has a big fish want to eat me. and than my sweatheart say that have you got phone and face? yes. I have and also skype I always play internet with my friend in the sea. Oh, I will add you to my facebook and than I ask a big fish that in the sea have a night club? and than he say, yes. I have and also hotel, the fish around the sea always go to dance my club every and at the night I’m busy because we a lot dance my club. and every year we have a lot vistor come from other countries such as USA and Cambodia they are come to my club and restaurant that is in the sea. and in the sea is very interesting. If you have free time you can go with me. After lot time ago I think oh my memory is so crzy and crzy and than I say that do you want to ride helicopter with me it very wonderful and funy you can go to any where that you want to go you can go to the heaven or go under the land.

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A Critical Analysis of "Cow Child" by Christine Holmes

A tale of love and entrapment by 12^th grader Panhasey leaves us with two inescapable questions: What were the underlying motives for this gold digging seductress of the forest? And how was she able to produce a human child?

The narrator seems to have been swept up in a burning romance with his new “sweat heart” and unmistakable sweetheart- a social butterfly unaffected by public response to their cross-species relationship. Their love is light-hearted at first: late night clubbing, romantic hot dog/hot cow dinners…blackouts.

With inhibitions thrown to the wind, the young narrator finds himself playing ‘father’ to the alleged cow child. A product of free love and excessive drinking, the child seemed to have not only appeared out of nowhere but to also bear no resemblance to his mother (or her species) which brings us back to “how?” After much speculation, one can safely assume that the child biologically belongs to neither of the lead characters but served as an impetus to accessing the wonders of the technological world through the narrator.

As soon as the beautiful child is introduced, the seductress is all about getting that iPhone to play on Facebook, Skype, and call her family in the sky. Fortunately for her, the unassuming narrator finds this amusing as he laughs and laughs and then, of course, takes her tree climbing.

There could be no greater symbol for this relationship than that of the lovers waking up in the depths of the sea. Even in the face of man-eating fish danger, cow lady asks the fish, “You got phone and face?” Still enveloped in the world of party-going, the couple finds themselves at an international disco for sea creatures only to later take off in a helicopter bound for endless adventures.

Although the narrator was undeniably a tool used for mindless entertainment and facebook, this tainted love also aided in lowering his guard to experience the parts of life he was missing out on. One could argue he has more troubles now than he did to begin with, but…is there ever really a price for true love?

 

Christine and I have birthdays which share a midnight. Here we celebrate together by candlelight.



Unexpected Connections

Every once in a while a letter will literally fall into your lap* and remind you that the world is truly smaller than it seems. In the past month, this happened twice, first with a letter and then with an e-mail.

Raising money for my school’s library development project was challenging in a number of ways, one being the lack of communication between Peace Corps and me about which people or organizations had already donated. In fact, it wasn’t until after the project was fully funded that I received a list of donors who had agreed to share their contact information with me. I was surprised to see one name on the list which I didn’t recognize, so I wrote to the donor to ask about his connection to Cambodia or literacy work.

The man responded that he was a representative of a Unitarian Universalist congregation in Pennsylvania which had decided to donate to my project because two of their members, Reed and James, had been doing some work in Cambodia, and their church was interested in social justice projects. After a second read of the e-mail, it hit me. I know James and Reed! We met at a dinner party hosted by the then chargé d’affaires of the US embassy in Phnom Penh. I had collaborated with James to sing at the 4^th of July celebration last year hosted by the embassy, and I had even just run into him again while on a private tour of the embassy last weekend.

As far as I know, the congregation knew nothing of my connection to James, but they still found my project online and donated generously to it. It seems so mysterious how the events played out. My mom kept telling me throughout the weeks I was seeking donations that the money would come, and indeed it did.

The other unexpected connection came in the form of a letter. One of the program managers of Peace Corps Cambodia called me a couple of weeks ago just as I was finishing my lessons at the high school. He had recently attended an overseas staff training in Washington, D.C., and he told me that he had met someone I know. I thought of my friends currently working in D.C. and wondered how he’d come into contact with one of them, but I was surprised when he said her name was Heather. I had no idea who he was talking about. After a few moments of trying to explain who she was, he said something about a map, and I understood immediately.

My first year at Carleton I had an extremely excellent residential assistant on the second floor of Myers Hall. Heather was fun, friendly, and adorable. She kept her door open with bricks which we had painted together as a floor bonding activity around the beginning of the year, and I often snuck around to spy on her or just say, “Hello.” We shared a few common interests like Spanish and Hillary Clinton, and at some point I decided to share my affection for her by giving her a map of the world.

About a year later, Heather messaged me to let me know that the map was hanging proudly in a school in Kazakhstan where she was serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer. Several months later, the Kazakhstan program closed unexpectedly, and Heather returned home. I hadn’t been in touch with her since then, but I remembered the map and knew it was her.

The program manager said he had a letter from her that he would place in my cubby in the Peace Corps lounge. Last week I was able to retrieve it and find one of the nicest and most thoughtful letters anyone has sent me. She included a powerful quote from The Ugly American which I read my sophomore year in high school in preparation for my youth exchange in Argentina.

          “The simple fact is, Mr. Ambassador, that average Americans, in their natural state, if you will excuse the phrase, are the best ambassadors a country can have,” Magsaysay said. “They are not suspicious, they are eager to share their skills, they are generous. But something happens to most Americans when they go abroad. Many of them are not average… they are second-raters. Many of them, against their own judgment, feel that they must live up to their own commissaries and big cars and cocktail parties. But get an unaffected American, sir, and you have an asset. And if you get one, treasure him – keep him out of the cocktail circuit, away from the bureaucrats, and let him work in his own way.”

The Ugly American by Eugene Burdick, The underlining is Heather’s

Heather continues in her letter:

          “For whatever reason, this was a pretty helpful/inspiring reminder while I was serving. I think particularly when I felt like I didn’t have much in the way of concrete skills or substance to give, it was helpful to remember that I was doing good by being genuine, eager, and generous.”

It meant so much to get Heather’s letter as a reminder of our friendship, but it also struck me how timely her message for me was. Nearing the end of my service, I’ve constantly questioned what good I’ve really done here. My impact seems so small in a country that appears impossible to change. Yet Heather is right, us volunteers do make a difference just by being here and being genuine, eager, and generous. We offer a different perspective, and we challenge the norm in hopes that our unseen ripples will manifest into greater change in the years ahead. We’re able to do that because we live humble lives as part of rural communities and families, not as bureaucrats in the business district of the capital.

To put it simply, the State Department, USAID, the embassy – they’re all about money, but the Peace Corps is about people. Human connections surround us and give our lives meaning. Although I’ll likely be a cocktail circuiting bureaucrat someday, I’d like to think that I’ll be a little less affected after this experience and that I’ll never forget the value of building personal relationships as a means of peace.

 

Painting brick doorstops with Heather 

 

2nd Myers Pirates

* (Fun Fact: Carleton College Choir Director Lawrence E. Burnett literally single-handedly changed the definition of the word “literally” to mean its exact opposite.)

Winning

Last weekend was the judging for the international creative writing contest called “Write On!” Over 400 Cambodian students participated, and it was difficult to choose just one winner from each grade level. After pairs of volunteers narrowed down the selection to just the top three from each grade level, the finalists were read aloud and voted on to determine the national winner. For the second year in a row, my school’s students won both the grade 11 and grade 12 titles. Their essays which I’ve included below will now go on to the international committee for final judging against the national champions from Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ethiopia, Georgia, Lesotho, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, the Philippines, and Ukraine.
 

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Name: Prom Daro
School: Sokha Phally High School
Village: Kandoldom
Male/Female: Male
Peace Corps Volunteer’s Name: Leslie Miles
Student’s Age: 20
Grade: 11
Prompt: “What does a blind person see?”

Ther are a forest that have a lot of ghosts that make people scard of the forest. No one person can walk across that forest. If have people walk across that forest they will die because of the ghost make thme scard and scard until they die.

There are one person is a rich man (who are choising the man to marry with his daughter). The rich man say who are brave to walk across the forest of the ghost can get my daughter. There are no men can across the forest, also have some men were death in the forest. One day have one man is come out of the forest so he become a famouse person and many people thing that he is a strong man, a brave man no one like him so a rich man invite him to his house and marry him with his daughter.

After that the rich person interview him in front of many people. The rich man ask: How did you across the forest and then the man answer I don’t know anything because I can’t see. The rich person ask why? The man answer I am a blind man. So a blind person can’t see anything but he can see by dream only.

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Name: Yann Konthea
School: Sokha Phally High School
Village: Toulkok
Male/Female: Female
Peace Corps Volunteer’s Name: Leslie Miles
Student’s Age: 18
Grade: 12
Prompt: “If death were a person, what would he/she be like?”

One day, if death become a person who have smooth and long hair and were very beautiful. One more thing, he has a lot of money, has modern cars and big house. He would meet a lot of sexy girls or boys and make them fail in love. After that they would be killed by the death person to make them to be broken heart. The death would make himself to be a hunting man to use his thing that he has to make people to be crazy or dead and he would control the world and damage the world.

Moreover, when the world were destroyed already, he would make the world again to become a place for produce the death person to destroy others plannet. According to a head master of the death person factory said that “he has a plan in 2016. He would make the death person amount 50,000,000. And he plan to destroy 5 plannets in 2020 and then when he damage those plannets already he going to develop all the plannets to become a heaven or paradais for ghosts, monsters to visit after they tired with earth. On the other hand, he would make the factories in there also such as: The blond factory, The ghost car factory, The ghost teeth factory especially The spirit factory or The labor for put all humen spirit after they take from the people they would take to put here. Depend on an expert for the spirit. He said that the spirit is very special things because it easy to find but difficult to protect. So we need a very bad and big to put it until on time to put in the death person. Because the death person can live only 2 hours after they was born from the bamboo. So we need human spirit to insert their life. After we put spirit to the death person they continue their life in 200 years ago.” reported by Monster daily. I am a death person that want to take the spirit from you.

In sum up, the death person would like to tell you some advise that don’t be try to study or hard working because in 2016 I will destroy your world. So please die right now if you do not want to meet me in 2016.

 

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The students won a large Khmer/English dictionary, a grammar book, a notebook, two pens, and a correction pen. In addition, they earned prizes for their school's new library including a Cambodian map, a world map, and an awesome picture dictionary.