Neighbours

Our neighbourhood had a paved area, in the late afternoon many kids come out to play. We often share balls and trikes. Today there were some people playing a game where you had to jump over an elastic. There are a few hundred houses who share this space so we haven't gotten to know everyone, there are often people we play with who we haven't seen before. But there are also some families who we see many times each week, including a family opposite us who have a 3 yo and a girl the same age as our toddler.

It s so nice to have this space, in Phnom Penh its hard to find a place to hang out out side as most of the surfaces are covered in either buildings, ppl selling things or rubbish. Also its mostly too hot. Our neighbours mostly bring their kids out around 5-6pm. Most of the day this area is deserted but around that time its a colourful chaos of prams, roller blades, scooters, balls, pet dogs and even a monkey!

There are also a group of older women who do laps, walking around the outside doing exercise. I only recently realised our toddler put his hands together in a formal Khmer greeting (prayer hands) when he sees the "grandmas". They have been greeting him almost his whole life, and they all know his name.

oops i guess we had a communication breakdown

When I invite other English speaking expats and their kids over to play in our wading pool, I know how to say it, they know what I mean. Recently I tried to invite some neighbours over, I thought they got what I meant, and the kids and been over to swim before so I didn't think it would be that complicated. But when they turned up, they didn't get in the pool with our toddler. I found out later they had just had a bath and were not allowed to get wet! Last time they swam at our place it was a holiday, and it was with their mum, but this time their mum was at work.

I used to laugh...

Yesterday I got a lift home from playgroup in a friends car. She is also white, and also has a toddler. We both sat in the front with our toddlers on our laps. ( It was a really short distance.) I'm used to seeing Khmer families with lots of kids in the front, including on the drivers lap, I found it amusing that there were 2 of us , both white, doing it.

Rain
When I first came to Cambodia I was told that people don't go out to things if its raining. I thought that was kind of funny. I still turned up to teach my English class when it rained, but found no students there!

And the other week it rained in the morning. It was a Sunday, the time we were normally getting ready to go to church. We decided not to go as it was raining. When you are on a moto or even a tuk tuk a lightening storm with strong wind is scary! Also the roads around church flood, and its just so much work to drive through them, esp as you can't see the potholes under the water. I've come off my bike 2 times while riding over flooded pothole streets so I'm afraid of them now.

Some people in this part of the world stick a white menthol patch to their head when they have a headache. Looks really weird and funny to me. Last week I had a headache and neck ache. I got Soeun to stick some band aid looking things on my neck, it make it feel nice! Was able to get to sleep.