Kep

BREAKFAST - SPIDERS
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The Valentine’s Day party at Joe’s turned out to be a complete flop, I’m sorry to inform! We’d had a big night the night before, and on the 14^th some big VIP Swiss donor was in town and needed pandering to, so most people were preoccupied (he was a total wanker... he wore a WOOLEN CRAVATE. It is HOT here). Still, all the decorations were up and it looked very pretty (was going to take photos but have gone now!) The 2 waiters, who speak English, still do not get the hearts. Joe actually had to explain ones like ‘my monkey have big banana’ and ‘my krama is too small to hide big surprise.’ Last year apparently Hak thought he’d cracked it, and took one off the wall, wrote ‘I am good at fucking’ on it and stuck it on his chest. Seriously though, euphemisms and the like are rarely used in Khmer. Which is why on Valentines Day Sit says to me, with absolutely no agenda, ‘Laura, I am sad because it is Valentines Day and I will be all alone in my home tonight. You are looking very beautiful today, are you busy tonight?’ and then doesn’t understand why I find this funny.

Bokkor mountain
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Last weekend I went to Kep on the south coast, and it was absolutely gorgeous. I had a lift to PP in Charles’ pick up truck (in the cabin this time!), which was a little squashed as I was sitting next to a man called ‘Big Heng,’ who is very big indeed. I share taxied to Kampot (the capital of Kampot province, where Kep is), where I met up with Hannah and got introduced to Her Other Job. She works for the Cambodian branch of British NGO Epic Arts. They run all sorts of creative workshops with disabled people, all over the country – mostly dance, but also other activities as well. In Kampot they have a café, Epic Arts Café, which started as a place for all the deaf people in Kampot to hang out at, and is now run by them as well. They have insanely delicious cakes (banana, date, chocolate...) and fruit shakes (banana and cinnamon.... mmm!), and sell lots of it to take away too. I am now eatingmy delicious fresh rolls from the market every morning with EA Kampot banana jam – it’s so tasty, and it’s red. Each item on the menu is accompanied by a pictogram, so you can order what you want in Khmer sign language – which was only formalised last year. To say milk for example, you mime milking a cow’s teets, and then make horns with your fingers above your head. I think this is a fantastic idea cos you have to learn and join in if you want anything to eat! The NGO also runs various outreach activities, for example actively looking for deaf people in the communities, asking around for them etc, as there are people in really rural areas who must think they are the only ones that can’t talk and hear, and teaching them sign language. EA also works with a former prima ballerina from the Cambodian Royal Ballet, who is now an amputee, and runs inclusive dance workshops, and they even have a professional troupe who have performed all over SE Asia. They’ve done owrkshops at VI in Ken Kleang (the PP one), and trained staff from the other VI sites (from Kratie it was Phalla). All in all, very interesting and worthwhile! Hannah and I motoed the beautiful half hour drive to Kep as the sun was setting; Kep is a crumbling tiny beach resort with an amazing guesthouse called the Veranda, all wooden cabins up in the jungle overlooking the sea, and it was there we met the other vols. Over dinner (the most delicious crab at beach front stalls, so much and so fresh, but only $4!) I met an ONL called Fran who was here for 10 days looking for an English teaching job in Cambodia – she’s a drama teacher in the UK. Coincidence! (Although my favourite is Polly’s – she bumped into Aleema on a beach in Thailand a couple of weeks ago!!) On the Saturday we all hired a pick up truck and went to Bokkor (‘cow hump’), a deserted colonial hill station on the top of a nearby mountain, in the middle of the jungle. The trip up was a 3h painful as shit bumpy ride along a track not renovated for like 60 years. I am still bruised! It’s inside a national park, but theystill have serious issues with poachers, as there aren’t enough rangers, and something like 40% of the rangers get malaria anyway, so we didn’t see any of the once abundant tigers, elephants etc that used to live there! At the top there’s an old palace, a casino, a church, a hotel, and various other buildings, all totally abandoned. After the French left it it was empty for a while, before being the site of shootouts with Vietnamese forces in the 70s. You could see for miles, although I’m told it is more atmospheric in the swirling mist, a la Shimla, and at the top there are 2 women selling hot rice and dried fish. There I met 2 Dutch women, both PTs, who were heading to Kratie the next day, and I told them to come along to VI. We spent most of the day at the top and arrived home after dark to the sound of Chinese New Year celebrations i.e. small children setting off fireworks in the street. This continued all over the country for a good couple of weeks after! On the Sunday morning I took the boat across to Rabbit Island with a couple of people – this is the main reason people go to Kep. It is a smallish island, maybe a few Ks long, with beautiful beaches, totally unspoilt by tourism – just a few cabins on teh beach, although I hear it’s just been sold to Japanese developers. It is also one of the few places where it’s acceptable to wear just a bikini on the beach – most Khmers just swim (ok sit in the water) with their clothes on. In Kratie for example, on holidays, people go to Kampi, sit in the flowing water or sleep on stones for a while, and then drive the half hour back to the town, blowing their clothes dry. Attempts at tanning though (which when explained result in incredulous ‘but you want to be black???’ comments) were thwarted – no sun!! We all travelled back to PP together, and I stayed one night there before returning to K on the Monday. That evening was so much fun – four of us went to the fair / night market. It was absolutely heaving, interestingly with women and children as well as men, so we felt really comfortable. I didn’t brave any rides though as they looked like total death traps. For instance, on a chairoplanes style ride, one guy lowered himself down the horse he was sitting on (as it’s spinning round really really fast), and goes whirling around the ride hanging off by his hands. He then tires of this and lets go, falling into the crowd. Ah! They had a skate rink, dodgems (isn’t the PP traffic enough??), games, food music, and mucho más.