It doesn't get much better than this

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We spent our Sunday at the baray, a man-made reservoir. (In this case, "man-made" means literally that: dug by hand.) I’m not sure of its size; it’s certainly not Lake Champlain, but it’s a good-sized body of water, and it is an excellent place to while away a Sunday afternoon. On at least one edge there is a beach of sorts with palm-thatched structures full of hammocks and a strip of stalls selling fruit and cold drinks and roasted meat and fish. It seems to be a place where far more locals than tourists go, and we were eager for a little R&R - because our vacation is so exhausting, I guess.

Even better than the “beach” is a small island in the middle of the baray, and we hired a boat to take us there for the afternoon. Erin, Jaz, our tuktuk driver, Chamnan, and I rented some inner tubes (25 cents each) and piled on a boat with our food and three cold beers tied up in a plastic bag with rapidly melting ice. We brought our books, my iPod, cameras, towels - but no bathing suits. Cambodian women swim fully clothed, so we figured we’d swim Khmer-style. (We did see a few tourists in bathing suits along the beach, and for future reference, I wouldn’t swim in my clothes again.)

We arrived on the island to find more thatch-roofed huts and hammocks, a crumbling 12-century temple, a blue wooden pagoda, an old toothless woman, and a score of children selling trinkets. They gathered around and made half-hearted attempts to interest us in their bracelets and postcards, but didn’t persist for long. We dug into our roast chicken, roast frog and rice, washed it down with the beer, topped off the meal with some rambutan, and licked our fingers clean.

Jasmine installed herself in a hammock with her book and mid-term exams to grade, Chamnan stretched out his long legs on the mat (he is certainly the tallest Cambodian I have ever met) and Erin and I took our tubes to the water. Again, I must say that swimming in your clothes, no matter how carefully you have chosen the lightest-weight, fastest-drying fabrics, really puts a damper on things, and the fact that the water was bathtub-warm meant that it was less refreshing than we had hoped, but we still enjoyed our time floating and bobbing and fighting the forces that kept trying to push us to shore.

While I had anticipated a quiet and lazy afternoon of reading in the hammock, that’s not exactly how our afternoon unfolded; it was much more interesting than that! A young man named Sith approached the first time I tried to read and asked the usual questions: Where are you from? How long have you been in Cambodia? How old are you? Do you have any children? I countered his questions with my own and learned that he is 22 years old, lives in a village near the baray, his parents are rice farmers, he is the middle child of five, and he would like to go to university and study law, but it is too expensive. He comes to the island every chance he can when he has free time (Sundays only) to speak with foreigners and improve his English. He asked me to write my name and address in his notebook (I figured name and state was adequate) and then he carefully wrote his on my Post-It note. We chatted some more about Cambodia and life in America, and when I thanked him for the conversation (hinting that perhaps it was over) he asked if I could give him any money to help with school. We had discussed the cost of his “public” education, which is theoretically free, but of course he must pay the teachers a little bit every day and more on the days there is an exam. I must say that there is a certain discomfort with being asked for money - it somehow takes the wind out of my sails - yet I had to give the kid some credit for working so hard to improve his English (which was quite good) and getting as far as 12th grade at all. So besides giving him credit, I gave him $5. Was it a good idea? I have no idea, but I won’t miss the five bucks, and even if he doesn’t spend it on his education, he’s more likely to buy food for his family than to go out and blow it on beer or drugs, so there you go.

I decided to take a little stroll and ended up stopping to watch some of the younger children stripping leaves off a palm tree and weaving them into little birds and other designs. Each of them had their plastic basket of trinkets for sale nearby, and I hoped they wouldn’t construe my interest in them as a sign of a potential retail transaction. As I watched admiringly, one of the older girls held up her bird and assured me, “Easy!” It didn’t look easy to me, and I pulled out the camera to capture a little of the process. And as usual, the camera was the big ice-breaker. They all wanted their photo taken, and then wanted to see the result on the screen. Erin joined in and both of us were offered a palm-leaf bird “free for you!”

In return, I went back to my backpack and pulled out a couple of Frisbees. On our last trip, we brought a couple of Frisbees and had a great time playing with some kids. When I got home, I posted a notice on Freecycle that I was looking for more. A very generous woman from Essex emailed with an offer of almost two dozen regulation-size Frisbees leftover from an Ultimate Frisbee team she had played on. I was thrilled to get them, but a little worried about the fact that they “North Avenue Alliance Church” was printed on them. (Who knew that churches had Ultimate Frisbee teams???) Thankfully, the other designs printed on them didn’t include any religious symbols, so I just put colorful stickers over the word “Church” and they were good to go. (I didn’t want to be mistaken for some kind of missionary.) The kids had either played before or were very quick to learn and soon they were tossing them around like...well, like kids. By later in the afternoon, some of the kids had turned the Frisbees over and were using them to carry and display their goods for sale. I also pulled out my Koosh ball (one of those funny balls made of elastic strings), which always provokes curiosity, and they had fun with that as well.

Over the course of the afternoon, we played with the kids, wandered around the temple ruins, and took photos. Some of the younger kids followed us to the temple, hamming it up every time I tried to take a photo - which resulted in some of my favorite shots of the day. As hard as we try, it is very difficult to get candid shots, as they all strike a pose when they see the camera in action. They wanted photos of themselves, group photos, then photos with us. I had one of the kids take a photo of Erin and me, possibly the only shot of us together this whole trip.

A couple of times, a boatload of Korean tourists arrived on the island, walked around for ten minutes, and then left. It was interesting to watch the children when they heard a boat approaching. Some would leave the game, pick up their goods, and be waiting on the shore for the tourists when they arrived. Others would just continue playing. It was fun to watch them just being kids, and a little sad to see some of them so eager to make a dollar.

I tried to relax in the hammock a few times (though I had to choose a new one, as Chamnan was taking a leisurely nap in mine) but I could never sit for more than a few minutes. It was too much fun hanging out with the kids and wandering around. If too many of the kids gathered around our hut, the toothless woman would shoo them away, barking in Khmer and waving her broom in their general direction. Then she would grin at us and sweep some leaves and branches into a pile.

Near the end of the afternoon, I pulled out a bag of longan from my backpack and offered them around. The kids gobbled them up in no time. This seems to have become my staple offering - longan are relatively cheap and the fruit is small enough to be shared easily among many children. I suspect that the kids were there all day without food or water, and I only wished I had brought more to share.

So I came home from the baray minus five dollars, a koosh ball, two frisbees, and a kilo of longan, but truly much richer for the experience. For any of you considering coming to visit next year, you can be sure that I will suggest an afternoon like this one while you’re in town…

For more photos, click here.

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Comments

[jessw]

Allow me to point out that
comments are like blog Miracle-Gro, the fertilizer that keep the entries appearing....but lack of comments are fine too; then I'm off the hook.

[Miriam]

ON the hook
Sorry, Jess, but you are so on the hook. The expereinces that you write about, and post pictures of, keep many of us entertained, given us food for thought, and in more than a few cases, inspired some travel or plan of travel as well. There are hints of spring here but I still long for a day like the one that you described. It seems a world away. What surprises me, but shouldn't, is how much there is to explore.

[darrell]

comment :)

[jessw]

Hmmmmm...
Maybe I should just write email updates to Miriam and Darrell......