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Published: November 29th 2013
Taranchula: The other dark meat
Yes, I did--whole. Did not taste like chicken.I’m woefully behind in posting. When you live abroad, or maybe just when you live anywhere, it is either feast or famine. It feels like weeks will go by when nothing in particular happens and then—BAM—everything is happening and it’s all coming so fast you don’t have any time to write about it but you know it is really impactful and you want to share. Since my last blog the political situation has gone from heightened to off the radar. The opposition party has refused to assume their seats in the government and they schedule occasional protests and tour the world trying to get someone to pay attention to the situation in Cambodia. Eventually, people get tired of opposing and they have to go back to work. Now it is sort of like YAWN, old news, enough already.
Since last post, I hosted 19 friends and friends of friends from American Leadership Forum, I wrapped up another semester and went to Vietnam for two weeks with my friend Patrick from Bangkok. I will begin my final semester at PUC this weekend. My students from the Heroic Imagination Project are also launching a fund raiser this Sunday that will provide
ALF in Cambodia
Michele Pola and I at Angkor Wat. 70 ceramic water filters for a community that is drinking water out of the Mekong River. UNICEF reports that 2,000 children a year die in Cambodia from contaminated water. These ceramic filters cost $12 each and will provide a family with clean drinking water for two years. It is almost certain that providing filters for 70 families living along the river for two years will result in at least one child’s life being saved. In my opinion, this qualifies as a heroic act and I couldn’t be more proud of my students. On Thanksgiving Day we bought 60 loaves of bread and bottles of water and went to large park where homeless children live and handed out food. That was my idea of a good Thanksgiving if I could be home with family.
I don’t know about you but I’m challenged to throw a dinner party for an evening that will keep 19 people happy and entertained. Maybe it was the history of Cambodia or maybe it was my wonderful assistant, Ratha, or maybe it was the amazing children of this country but somehow it all went perfectly despite the torrential rain, flooding, traffic fatality including a
Buddha Restored
Who knew that the Buddha wore glasses? Taken at Angkor Wat. dead man in the street and my young host who was supposed to show us his school and village in Siem Reap up and moving to Thailand two days before we get there. I think I sufficiently prepared everyone to expect the unexpected and when things were stressful I sent them all for $4 foot massages which can tame just about any beast. Not to pat myself on the back too much but I think the trip really was close to perfect, or at least it was for me. I was able to provide a much more personal touch than had any of them just done an excursion to Cambodia. They experienced meditation with my monk students and saw how monks live in a pagoda community and later that day visited the Toul Sleung Genocide Museum and mass graves of the Killing Fields with my Ph.D. students. For several of my students, this was their first time to ever see these horrific places. They each told their personal stories of how they were impacted by the Pol Pot regime. I was frankly astounded at how my students opened up to the ALF participants. I can’t cover every detail of the
Angkor Wat at Dawn
Few things are worth getting up at 5:00 a.m. This is one of them. trip and Angkor Wat’s magnificence sells itself but I would like to share the story that was most meaningful to me.
A year ago when I went to Siem Reap I met a boy named Thy (pronounced Tee) selling books on the street. His English was fantastic and he was so charismatic. He didn’t even mention selling books until we had chatted for several minutes. I ended up not buying a book but I bought him a pair of pants because his were in such terrible shape. I think I blogged about this before. When I went back with Janet and Jeff last year for Christmas, I saw Thy on the street again and bought him dinner and I introduced him to my family. When the ALF trip started coming together I had an idea that I would get Thy to be our “guide for a day” and take us to see his village and his school just outside Siem Reap. In exchange I would provide a gift to him and his family. I went back to do a recon trip in June and easily found him. Ratha and I went out to his house and he took us
A Pen, Pencil and a notebook.
One of the kids at the school that we visited on the ALF trip. to his school. This all seemed to fall into place exactly according to plan. We all get to Siem Reap and Ratha calls Thy’s grandmother to make sure everything is all set. We are informed that Thy’s mother, who has worked in Thailand for several years came home, took him out of school and back to Thailand to work selling trinkets on the street. My heart sank. Not only did we not have a plan now for seeing a rural Cambodian village but I know what happens to these kids that are hauled off to Thailand. Many are exploited, trafficked, abused and become child slaves. His future would not be better as a result of this very short term decision. I shared this information with the group and all of us were questioning out load, “what can we do?” We had firm plans to visit his school but were not informed that we’d have to wade through 8-10 inches of water to get there. Our bus stopped where the paved road met the dirt road leading to the school. I looked at the ALF group and asked them what they wanted to do. Every single person said if the kids
have to walk through the water to get to school, we can walk through it to be with them today. I will tell you there were piles of cow shit floating in the water. There were giant hogs mired in the mud beside to puddles. Without question, my ALF friends rolled up their pants and plowed through the water. One beautiful woman declared, “now, I want to see my daughter call me a wuss, or whatever that word is she calls me!” The kids at the school were so wonderful. We sang songs with them and passed out pens and notebooks and children’s books in English for their library. They were so appreciative and every kid clutched their notebook, pen and pencil like it was the only one they will ever have.
As we were leaving the school, one of my students that was accompanying us on the trip calls me over and introduces us to Thy’s grandmother who had still come out to meet us at the school. She was prepared to receive us at her house but said the water was quite high and we’d have to forge more mini-lakes. I couldn’t believe that she had come
there to meet us. My student started asking her about Thy and what we could do to get him back. I told him to tell her if we could get him back we would get him enrolled in a good private school and help the family to replace his lost income. She never wanted him to leave to begin with and I think she knew what his life would be like if he dropped out of school and stayed in Thailand. She placed a call to his mother and that night Thy was on his way back to Siem Reap to be with his brothers and his grandmother! Since that moment, we pooled $1,600 which will allow us to pay for his tuition, books, school uniforms and send him to afternoon English classes plus provide extra for food for his grandmother! I really feel like we saved a life. Two weeks ago I went and bought a bicycle with a backpack and school supplies for him. I’m going to go up to Siem Reap for Christmas and take him shopping binge to buy food for his grandmother. I hope to meet with his teachers and see how he is doing
Goodness Snakes
I needed this thing to stop me from gorging myself on all that great Vietnamese food. in his two schools. My colleague Susan owns a restaurant in Siem Reap and she’s offered to allow him to come there between schools so he can study, relax and receive a good lunch. It really has been an extraordinary effort to get this boy in school and in a stable situation. I know you can’t save every child but I can give this one an opportunity for a good education and he very well could change the course of his family well into the future. If he can finish high school and do well in English then I feel certain I can get him a scholarship at PUC for college. I should add that not only did almost every member of the trip pledge $100 for Thy’s school and family support but they agreed to do so until he finishes school as long as he continues to do well. I guess this assures that I have to come back here at least once a year to check on our adopted child and make sure everything is OK. I think I can handle that. It certainly makes me think about how random life can be. He's just one of XXX
Cu Chi Tunnels
This was incredible. 100s of miles of underground tunnels around Saigon hardly big enough for a dog to crawl through. million children in Cambodia. Why him? Why any of us?
The trip to Vietnam was fantastic. I’m going to let the pictures on this blog share that story. I will just say that it was very cathartic. I grew up in the late 60s and early 70s listening to the body counts being announced on the evening news and wondering if this war would still be going on when my brother and I turned 18. Fortunately, it was not and seeing it now emphasizes even more what a tragedy it was. It also highlighted the utter hypocrisy of our objection to Syria’s use of chemical weapons. When I saw the devastation created by Napalm and Agent Orange I choked. Rather than singling out Syria for essentially doing as we did, why don’t we lead an international effort to eliminate these weapons from our human arsenal? We could start by destroying our own stockpiles. It’s true, I’m a naïve idealist. I think that when you help someone you might actually be assisting the birth of the next Buddha, or Jesus, or Nelson Mandela. I prefer this world over the one that lives in fear and preparing for the worst.
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D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
Glad to see you blogging again
Great photo.