A Big Announcement

My school’s library development project has been fully funded!

Thanks to the generosity of so many friends, family members, and service organizations, a total of $1,771 was raised in just 20 days. The donations will now be processed, and the money will be wired to Cambodia in about two weeks. This means that we should have books on the shelves by the end of April.

The school has been so excited about this project that it began work immediately by cleaning, tiling, and painting the library room. The school director even purchased tables and chairs on credit in faith that the funding would come. The school’s hard work and commitment will allow us to move forward with this project very quickly in the coming weeks.

While the list of donors is not yet available to the school and me, I’d like to offer great thanks to anyone who contributed to this project. Your gift demonstrates the American friendliness and compassion which I seek to represent every day through my work. I feel truly proud to come from communities and a family which believes so strongly in helping others.

Below I’ve included a few thank you letters my students have already written and some pictures of the library’s current state. There will be much more to come!

Once again, thank you for inspiring me and supporting the 1,000+ children who will now have access to maps, dictionaries, visual aids, novels, and textbooks in English and their local language. You are truly making a difference in their lives.

 

(Sorry for the strange editing I had to do to make the text appear.)

 

 

You Be the Judge

Over the past two months I have been working with my English club to improve their creative writing skills in preparation for the “Write On!” contest which was held today at my school. “Write On!” is a competition in which students from around the world compete to write the most interesting essay as judged by national and international panels of Peace Corps volunteers. Each country chooses one finalist/grade to send on to the international committee to award first through third place.

Last year my school produced the national champions for grade 11 and 12, and my students are hoping to defend their school’s titles this year. I’ve included summaries of each participant’s essay from today to show just how wild my students’ imaginations can be!

Grade 11 Prompts

 

One thing I wish I could do that is not allowed is…

or

What does a blind person see?

Raksmey: I want to buy something without paying money. If everything is free, maybe there would be no meaning, no hurt, no happiness, and no success. The world would be broke because of the crowd of people.

Daro: There is an enchanted forest which no one can pass through because ghosts will kill whoever passes through. A rich man declares that he will marry his daughter to any man who can cross the forest, and one man is successful. When asked by the rich father how he was able to cross, the man explains that he was blind and not able to see; he just followed his dream.

Chanleak: Blind people have different lives, and they are able to see ghosts and spirits. Their blindness allows them to talk, play, study, and go places with the ghosts (including into the earth and inside trees). After time, blind people are able to integrate into the ghost culture, and their lives are fantastic.

Phanny: Blind people see black, blue, brown, gray, orange, red, and yellow. They are not afraid of being eaten by tigers or lions because they cannot see them. Everything is beautiful for blind people because someone always takes care of them and all they need to do is sleep and eat.

Kea: We can’t see into the future like blind people. We go about studying and working blindly to have unknown future successes.

 

Grade 12 Prompts

 

What would you do if you knew you were going to lose your memory at the end of every day?

or

If death were a person, what would he/she be like?

Monorith (last year’s grade 11 national champion): His mom poisons him with milk every day and while he sleeps a creepy woman causes him to have no idea who his mother or his sister is. He doesn’t even know his own name.

Panhasey: If he knew he would lose his memory every day, he would tell his sweetheart, a cow. Although people think he’s strange for loving a cow, he gets drunk and impregnates the cow. The cow bears a man-child in the forest and then demands an iPhone. The cow uses the phone to call heaven and then the happy couple elopes to the trenches of the sea where they visit underwater clubs and ride on helicopters.

Saroth: Death tries to steal a dog, but Saroth tries to stop him. Death’s face is very red, and he wears red clothes. His body is very very fat, and his hands and legs are very very long. He has a big nose and mouth, but most importantly, he has body odor and terribly bad breath. The police come to try and save the dog from death by stalling death with a toothbrush and a request for him to brush his teeth. Saroth then poisons death with a cup of water and causes death to forget why he came in the first place.

Kunthea: Death would be rich, have smooth long hair, and would meet a lot of sexy boys and girls. Death would hunt living people and possess them in order to control and damage the world by 2016. When the world is destroyed, death will destroy 5 other planets by developing them with ghosts and monsters. These planets would have blond factories, ghost car factories, ghost teeth factories, and especially spirit factories. Since death can only live two hours after being born from bamboo, death must inhabit human spirits. In sum, die now, or die in 2016.

Which story would you choose as the winner from each grade? Let me know!

 

 

My New Favorites

By some stroke of fate, the English for Cambodia chapter on women’s rights happened to correspond with this week’s International Women’s Day celebration. I opened up the lesson with my 12^th graders by drawing a T-chart on the whiteboard with “Men” and “Women” as the headers. My first question to them was whether or not men and women are equal in Cambodia. To my surprise, many students (male and female) shouted, “Yes!”

While I’m no cultural expert, I’ve certainly noticed quite a few ways in which men and women are treated differently here. While I agree with my students that there have been many advancements in equality for women in Cambodia such as equal access to primary and secondary education, I think my students were answering a different question than I was asking. I believe they meant men and women should be equal, not that they actually are.

With some coaxing, I got them to fill in the T-chart which I’ve reproduced here as well as my memory serves. While there were a few disagreements between the boys and girls in the class, they mostly agreed about traditional gender roles.

 

 

	Men	Women
Housework	eat and sleep	cook, clean, wash clothes, and take care of children
Jobs	high power: government, military, doctors, police	usually stay home
Bad Habits	drink and smoke	not allowed to drink or smoke
Freedom	can go out at night	must stay home
Money	earn money	spend money

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, my co-teacher was overly eager to teach about passive statements with “must” for necessity, and I didn’t have much time to discuss gender inequality with my students, but I did leave them with one image which I think took them by surprise.

I asked them to think about the flag ceremony which they perform every morning at 7:00 before heading to their classrooms. All students line up by class and sing the national anthem while two students, one male and one female, raise the flag. Before the singing starts, the two students bow to each other, and then the boy unties the knotted rope and hands one side to the girl. As the anthem is sung, the boy exerts force downward to lift the flag while the girl passively holds the rope away from the pole to avoid tangling. Once the anthem is over, the male ties the rope, and they bow to each other again.

As I reviewed the flag routine with my students, many of them had an “aha! moment.” That such a small mundane activity could have such large gender inequity implications was truly eye-opening for these high school students.

During the past year and a half I’ve developed two new favorites, a favorite letter and a favorite word. If my students begin pronouncing “s” when speaking in the third person singular or start asking “why”just a little more often, then my work here is complete. 

 



Big Work

Some days it's easy to feel small and insignificant in a stagnant environment which I've tried for a year and a half to change for the better. When I'm feeling down, I often pull out my students' past work to remind me of the lessons learned or to simply have a good laugh. From philosophical essays on the smell of love to advice on how to use a condom, my students have so much to share with the world.

In honor of International Women's Day this Friday, let's start with two essays that girls wrote to practice the 2nd conditional. Enjoy!

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"If I Were a Boy" by Sen Srey Huy

 

If I were a boy, I would go anywhere and would not need cooking a food. I would not like work house. I would freedom and I would easy wear cloth. I would have time to study a lot and I would go to work part time for help my family. So my sister would study English and my parents would have money for buy a thing support family. and I would help a girl when she had accident. etc. "If I were a boy".

 

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"If I Were a Boy" by Khen Sovanapha

 

IF I were a boy, I would became a strong man. I would find a good job and contine to study at university. After that when I finished, I would earn a lot of money to support money to my family exspecially my parents and also I would make my relatives and my parents became persons who have a happenes family. Furdermore when I have money alots, I would marry with a beautiful girl who has a good knowlage and have best job also. Furdermore she would love and look after my parents well. After that If I have alot of money, I would take my wife travel at the famous Country.

 

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"The Smell of Love" by Phanny

 

Love smells like dog shit. When the girl meet the handsome boy she will fall in love with him and she walk on the road and doesn't see the road and the road has a dog shit and she stop on it and she doesn't know and go and talk with the boy and they were in love. While they were talking they smell the dog shit and when they at the ground and see that ther slipper got a dog shit. And when the girl and the boy smell the dog shit they will remember when they first meet. And their love smells like dog shit.

 

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The following are postcards which my 9th graders wrote for my mom.

 

What a bunch of lies! My students were not at Angkor Wat. They give away their bluff when they claim that it has a lot of new buildings...

 



 

Again, they were not in Phnom Penh. Also, isn't it hard to miss someone you've never met? These students must have had maps on their minds... What they intended the stamp image to be, I can only imagine.

 

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The following are posters my students made in groups after learning about HIV transmission and proper condom usage.

 

My sitemate, Dave, must have been doing some nude modeling for this campaign against HIV. Not sure how I feel about the mullet, Dave...

 



Teens and their creepy vampire/werewolf dramas... Isn't this getting a little out of control?

 



My student came up with this important idea about blood transfusions all on her own. It wasn't even part of the curriculum.

 



Were the labels really necessary?

 



 

So much good information!

 

 

I did not teach them that they must wash their hands before condom use. That was their own idea. Also, I'm so relieved to know that these students don't have enough experience to know that banana is a flavor, not a scent.

 

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Finally, the all-time best exposition of my service - For the International Creative Writing Competition, students were asked if anything is purely good or evil. One girl masterfully incorporated her faith into her answer.

 

"Is Anything Purely Good or Bad?" by Bol Sinuon

 

Everything that I know on the world is so beautiful because when I born I saw everything that my Father make is so great for me because when I born I don’t have anything but my Father always bless and help me now I Can write about the purely good. The purely good For me is my God. My God is always help me like support care bless a lot of mercy I remember one time when I Sick. my mom g’went to work don’t have someone stay with me. I ran to the toilet and ate to much. ho! I forget don’t have anything here. I went to do big work. when my mom Came she say ho! Smell Something bad from the toilet. What happen baby. anden she think. I Cook food in the toilet she don’t know when I went to totel and did big work. On the moment she saw the pupup on the cooker. Say Scream. ho my food. So nice today because I not yet but the season when She Saw me the toilet she say Thanks baby! The food today is meal with pupup But foralongtime. I know Jesus I don’t Care about anything that happen for me like some time I don’t have the food to eat but I reallry happy because. my God Can die For me and he blood Can give me have the life. and I Can do anything today that I like my God is the Father that love. me to much on the world. I think is the purely for me is my God. because everything that have in the world. is my Father make only I want to tell you Jesus love you !

 

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Thank you so much to everyone who has donated towards my school's library project! Only $596 to go! If you would like to make a donation, please click the link below:

 

https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=13-303-013



The Little Things

When I joined Peace Corps, I thought the most difficult challenges and frustrations would relate to being away from friends and family, lack of electricity or ability to use my electronics, and a very unstructured work assignment. While I do miss everyone back home, sometimes sweat uncontrollably through power outages, and can have weeks of school with unexplained student and teacher absences, these are not the factors that make me want to lock myself in my room for hours with just my fan, my Pringles, and my box set of “ER” seasons 1-8.

Here’s a list of some of ten things that get to me on a regular basis which I never expected:

1) Children screaming their lungs out saying “Hello, Barang!” as I pass by on my bicycle – Barang translates as Frenchman, and its usage stems from Cambodia’s time as a French colony. Today the term is used to describe any white foreigner (not necessarily in a negative light). I just don’t like being stared at and treated differently for the color of my skin. You’d think after a year and a half they’d have accustomed themselves to me ignoring them. Nope. It’s as if the single most important lesson new parents teach their babies is how to scream “HELLO! HELLO! HELLO!” at anyone who doesn’t look Cambodian.

2) Wedding and funeral music blared over loudspeakers at all hours of the day

3) Dust blowing in my eyes as I bike down the national highway

4) Constant honking from motorcycles, cars, vans, and semi-trucks – Instead of honking to signal an impending collision, Cambodians honk to signal that they are coming, they will not slow down, and you’d better get out of the way. The strength of a vehicle’s horn is a huge selling point in Cambodia, I would imagine.

5) Eating rice every day twice a day – Although I thought eating exotic local food might be one of the biggest challenges of Peace Corps, the real difficulty for me is the rice. Some days I struggle to choke down spoonful after spoonful of white nothingness. For me, the daily rice is much more difficult than the fertilized duck eggs, congealed blood, and ant soup that I occasionally come by.

6) People not understanding my Khmer – Many times when I speak Khmer, even only a phrase or two, I’m greeted with a shocked expression and a congratulations on how well I speak (a few months ago my speaking ability was tested at “intermediate high”), but once in a while I’ll speak to a local and he or she will have absolutely no clue what I’m saying even though I’m certain I’m speaking clearly and correctly. I’ve learned to laugh it off as a joke that the native is the one who doesn’t speak Khmer, but it can be frustrating because it seems more like the person is unwilling to understand me than unable.

7) Flat tires

8) Being quoted an unfair price in my community – While I understand vendors asking inflated prices from foreigners in touristic areas, I strongly dislike when someone attempts to rip me off in my city where they know me as a volunteer and see me regularly. It’s worse when they plan out their scheme to overcharge me when I’m standing right in front of them.

9) “English for Cambodia,” Cambodia’s national English curriculum – Written by the British, the textbooks are too difficult, largely irrelevant to Cambodian students’ lives, boring, and… British.

10) Lack of water in my garbage bin – In my bathroom there is one pipe which deposits water into a large trash can. From there, water is scooped with a small bucket to shower and flush the toilet. I always take extra care to refill the bin and ensure there is plenty of water throughout the day, but sometimes someone in my family will use up nearly all the water before I even wake up, or I’ll come home from school to find there’s no water left at all. This wouldn’t be so bad, except there are frequent water shut offs, or the pressure may be so low that it takes hours to refill the bin.

Many of these issues are related to sound and transportation, topics that only briefly crossed my mind when Peace Corps asked me pre-departure how many miles I could bike comfortably in one day and when I read a warning on the PC Cambodia Facebook group that “Cambodia is loud.” I’m sure the frustrations of transitioning back to America in five months will be just as unexpected as those of living here for two years.

 

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Thanks to the generosity of so many friends and family members, $1,175 has already been raised to support my school's library project. Now only $596 is needed to start putting books on the shelves. If you haven't had a chance to donate yet, please consider giving at the following web address to share the power of literacy with hundreds of students in need.

 

https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=13-303-013

Tickets and Admission

Let me admit a few things.

I love to win. I love awards, certificates, medals, trophies, titles, you name it. I love the satisfaction of working towards something, achieving it, and being recognized for it.

While you could use adjectives like proud or immodest to describe someone like me, you could also use terms like competitive, hard-working, or determined. The word used depends on the individual’s affect and appreciation of self, I suppose. Nonetheless, I would like to view these characteristics in a positive light. Most of us want to win, and we want to be noticed for our effort. I think that’s a very good thing as long as it comes with a measure of humility.

Unfortunately, in Cambodia there is a great lack of confidence. Students are rarely rewarded but frequently blamed. While there is a national love of certificates and status, there are few opportunities for advancement based on an individual’s skills or qualifications. Out of this culture comes a disastrous education system where students are punished or humiliated for their lack of knowledge and teachers are evaluated not by how much their students learn but by how many chapters of the textbook they completed. Classrooms become stages for teachers to perfunctorily rush through lessons while most students either sit quietly lost in confusion or chatter without reserve while binging on sugary drinks from the school’s canteens.

My co-teacher for grade nine, Chantrea, understands the quantity over quality problem so ubiquitous in Cambodia, but he isn’t quite sure what to do about it. Still, he wants to make a difference, at least in the lives of his students, by teaching them English. Our first few weeks together in the classroom were hard. The students were out of control, and our attempts at calming and quieting them down were failing miserably. My stern voice, his lectures on respect, and our pauses to wait for a silent room were to no avail.

One day Chantrea asked if I had any ideas for classroom management. While I’ve never had any formal training as a teacher, I simply thought back to my experience as a child. How did my teachers get me to behave and work so hard? It then hit me that (in addition to my family) a whole lineup of middle-aged women from Mrs. Freiberg to Mrs. Eaves was responsible for my well-mannered behavior and drive to succeed. They had shaped me that way (in the psychological sense of the verb) all throughout elementary school.

Mrs. Freiberg had her mason jar which to which she would add big blue marbles when our class behaved exceptionally well. Whenever the jar was full our class got to have a big party. Mrs. Gabriel awarded us ingredients of an ice cream sundae whenever we completed a new multiplication table. At the end of the unit, we got to eat the ice cream with whichever toppings we had earned. Mrs. Eaves rewarded good behavior with money in our “checkbooks” that we got to use at monthly auctions for fun trinkets or at the end of the year auction for autographed paraphernalia which we had solicited from celebrities while practicing our letter-writing skills in computer class. All of them handed out certificates on awards day for perfect attendance, exceptional skills in each subject, and student achievements in activities like spelling bees or invention convention.

While most Peace Corps volunteers don’t have the technical knowledge of professionally trained teachers, we do have the experience of growing up in a different educational system and the university training to understand that system well enough to apply improved teaching techniques from our experiences in America to Cambodian schools. Given my experiences with positive reinforcement as a child and my understanding of the psychology behind it from my classes in high school and at Carleton, I was able to craft a behavior modification program with Chantrea that would work in the Cambodian school environment.

To improve student behavior, we began a ticketing system with a lucky drawing for prizes at the end of the month. Students were informed that to receive a ticket in the drawing they must do three things: 1) come to class on time and stay for the full session, 2) listen quietly and respectfully to their teachers and classmates, and 3) participate in English to their highest personal ability. Whenever Chantrea or I see a student doing all of these things, we give him or her a ticket to be signed and put in the pot for the monthly drawing. For the students whose names are drawn, prizes have included bonus points added to the student’s grade, a small cash prize, snacks, study materials, or items like a little American flag.

The reward system was an immediate success. Usually only the very best students (top three) from each class are recognized for their hard work, but now any student who behaves well is acknowledged with a ticket in front of his or her peers. The change of demeanor in the classroom and the new sense of pride was palpable. Teaching became easier, and students have been more engaged in the lessons.

It is small successes like these that make Peace Corps service worthwhile. One teacher learns a new technique which he will use in other classes and perhaps even share with colleagues. Eighty students have a better learning environment and greater self-confidence, the effects of which will never be known by me.

There is no medal or bright golden sash given at the end of a hard two years of service, not even a simple certificate. In fact, you just finish, get on a plane, and go back to being a nobody in the US. Most volunteers are fortunate to even get a “thank you” for their work. However, the reward for us is our service itself, the opportunity to learn, grow, integrate, and sow the seeds of a better life for those who seek it. For me, at least, that is more than enough.

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Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who has donated to my school's library project. So far, you have raised $610 (34%)! However, we still need $1,161 more to make this school's vision a reality. If you would like to give, please click the link below:

 

https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=13-303-013

 

To find out more about the project, please visit this post:

 

http://wantingmemory.blogspot.com/2013/02/a-great-opportunity-for-you-with-catch.html



Photo Journal: Vietnam

 

Uncomfortable, conflicted, guilty, skeptical, proud, heartbroken. These were some of my feelings as I slowly moved from room to room in the large War Remnants Museum in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City.

It’s hard to describe the feeling of standing next to, even rubbing shoulders with a lanky older Vietnamese man as we both stare into a black and white photograph of a horribly disfigured child featured prominently against an orange wall signifying the cause of the child’s birth defect. It was easy to disregard the pain and suffering of war depicted in charts and documents showcased throughout the corridors, but the pictures were inescapable.

 

Although the data and the presentation were heavily skewed, some facts are inescapable. It’s numbing to bear witness to the horrors we can commit against our fellow man. Chemical gasses, tiger cages, nipple clamps, water torture, beatings, rape… These instruments of terror were used by common men, not psychopathic murderers or one dark executioner, and they continue to be used today.

 

Although museums are supposed to offer information and answers, I left with more questions than when I arrived.

 

 

The beautiful yet petite opera house seemingly in the middle of the road is a testimony to the French influence which appears more noticeably in Vietnam than Cambodia. Unfortunately, there were no performances while I was in the city, but I hummed my own arias as I strolled around the large boulevards surrounding the venue.

 

 

While most things seemed bigger, more beautiful, cleaner, and more orderly in Vietnam than Cambodia, this market in the center of the city was a partial exception. It was quite comparable to Phnom Penh’s Central Market, but I’d dare to say that Cambodia’s is bigger! Also, kudos to Cambodia for its MUCH friendlier and more efficient immigration staff.

 

 

I had it my way more than once while in Saigon. While most of the backpackers at my hostel were all about the pho and other cheap rice-laden local dishes, I got my fill of burgers, fries, pizza, ice cream, and slushies. It was surprising to me that the socialist republic had many more western options that its “democratic” neighbor to the west. However, McDonalds was notably absent.

 

 

Unsure what to do with my Sunday morning and having a few things I wanted to pray about, I attended mass at Notre Dame Cathedral, another French remnant built in the 1880s. While mass can be quite confounding for a protestant, I enjoyed the opportunity to sing a few responses and pray in a more reverent environment than Cambodia has offered me in the way of churches.

                                                                             

 

I had my picture taken several times on this bridge. First, I was in the background of some photo shoot for some too-cool-for-school hooligans (or as my grandma would call them, crackpot teens). I was afraid they would throw their bicycles at me or look at me. I’m not sure which would have been worse. At the other end of the bridge, a young guy approached me and asked to take a picture with me. My instinct whenever this kind of thing happens (someone talks to me) is to put my hands in my pockets. (No, I’m not THAT weird, I just fear I’m about to get robbed.) I asked him why he wanted to take a picture with me, and he said he thought it would look beautiful. How could I disagree with that? His friend took our picture, and I escaped with my camera, phone, wallet, and passport.

 

 

Strolling through a park near my hostel, I kept noticing large clumps of Vietnamese youngsters hanging around one or two foreign-looking people. At first I thought it was some kind of sad prostitution ploy (because I was constantly being asked if I wanted a lady – and these were mostly young girls talking to older white men), but later I found myself as the one surrounded by all the girls (and a few guys). It turns out they are university students who like to spend their free time practicing English in the park with native speakers.

After feeling lonely traveling by myself for a few days, it was so nice to have people to talk to. There must have been about 15 people grouped around me at one point, all listening intently. I told them I had never felt that popular in my life!

Their kindness, humor, and dedication to learning was really awesome. It was a great opportunity to speak with locals and have some of the questions I had been building up answered in a low-risk setting. While my initial experiences with the embassy, immigration officers, and war museum made me feel uncertain about Vietnam, it was this interaction with these students that made me feel welcome, comfortable, and endeared to Cambodia’s neighbor on the east.

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Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who has donated to my school's library project. So far, you have raised $535 (30%)! However, we still need $1,236 more to make this school's vision a reality. If you would like to give, please click the link below:

 

https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=13-303-013

 

To find out more about the project, please visit this post:

 

http://wantingmemory.blogspot.com/2013/02/a-great-opportunity-for-you-with-catch.html