New Library Facility!

The old books and a many dog-earred textbooks will live in the old library attached to classrooms. This new building, donated by a local family in the village, will be a library and main office. The library is upstairs.

More updates to come on the new library! The high school and community is very blessed to have such a luxury in Cambodia, but now the important part is how to use it efficiently and keep it in good condition for future generations.

It’s currently under construction until late October 2010… it might be on the news 🙂

A tree was chopped down so its visibility from the road is clear. I thought it a shame to see more shade go… it was a mango tree, I believe. But if you were on a bus passing by, you’d see the orange building immediately. Kids are stoked about reading! It’s the advent of a great, passionate reading culture.

Speed Bumps: People Don’t Get It

Long ago, I dreamed of a speed bump on the road. It’s like, “hey, people here drive by too fast and even at the turn-around will zoom by without thinking to look at both corners.”

And then my prayers were answered. Even a yellow sign is posted to warn drivers, “Hey, Driver, a speed bump awaits you.”

Near the turn-around and after it, there are two large speed bumps. And then a bicycle lane that is flat with the rest of the road. However, to my dismay, taxis, motorbikes, and cars honk at bicyclists to get out of their way, as they squish their vehicles into the bicycle lane, avoiding the speed bump as if it were life-death. The point of a speed bump is to slow those vehicles down, but they rather keep their high speed (in a crowded area, in front of the market and a high school, and passing elementary students) and shirk the speed bump. Once I was trying to take up the middle of the bike lane because it was empty, and a car almost swiped me, after freaking me out with some fancy honk on his broken down Camry. He has a whole car lane and just needs to slow down a little to drive over the speed bump, but no, he wants to assume I’ll survive in my bike lane and that his car is larger, so he can do whatever he wants. Obnoxious drivers these days with the newly installed speed bump.

All kinds of people do not use the speed bump. There doesn’t seem to be a law that cars must use their designated lane. Maybe until it kills someone, or a great many pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists who are entitled to use those bike lanes. Dear God, I hope not. It’s grossly ironic that someone motivated by safety to install these speed bumps had success and later, it’s backfired on so many levels. No one far and near the community uses it. Cars should stick to their lanes!

So pretty much I think the 50 meters near the turnaround, cars and massive trucks never use.

Why were trees chopped down (causing more heat) and roads consequently expanded in Cambodia?

So drivers can stubbornly hog the bicycle lane. Awful reality!

It’s not safe, and it’s just over their terms that they need to keep up their high speeds, that countless lives are at risk on a daily basis. The speed bump is as high as 5 inches or so, and they should slow down for it. I can see it’s a new idea, from Siem Reap City, it’s the first of its kind, and it’s placed near the border of Siem Reap province, about an hour out of Siem Reap City. I understand it can seem like a nuisance and a rare one, that can dissipate in a local’s care for attention, but more education or enforcement needs to be brought. I spoke to Handicap International about the dangers of people avoiding the speed bump, and I wonder what’ll happen next.

Reamker Inauguration

This blog was supposed to be posted a while back. April 2010.

I found these notes off NyoNyum magazine (Free! Coupons. 45th issue Feb – March 10 – Cambodian Life Navigation in Japanese and English). Indian epic poem, Ramayana, morphed into Cambodian lit as Reamker.

“The former story praises Vishnu, while the local version contains Buddhist ideas. It’s about Prince Rama’s adventure, namely his trials in rescuing detained Princess Sita with great help from Hanuman, a monkey warrior, don’t you know? There are 16 volumes to the story in Pali and Sanskrit. Some scenes are especially famous and performed in traditional Khmer dancing or… ”

inaugurated in statue form, atop a circular base that echoes the roundabout that marks the center of my little charming village.

^^ABOVE, 2 of my World Map painters in the crowd of smiles.

People are on TV, in my village! It’s moving on and becoming a town,I think. Not the small place it used to be.

The police here told me to step back, so the road was fully devoted to important people who sat on Persian carpets in the middle of the road. But all sorts of people were on the main road, trying to get a closer look.

When I arrived on the scene, 3 large tents were placed in front of the statue: one for the speakers (monks, I believe), one gave shade to about 200 students, and the other side with community leaders.
On the street were fuzzy, colorful carpets. None of that normal plastic mat stuff. This day was fancy! There was a roasted pig and a great many ways to fold leaves to make money trees and flowers.

The representative from the government of the Kingdom lit the candles around the flowers, fruit, roasted pig, and other things to wish the town well with its inauguration of the epic Indian story-based statue.

^^ABOVE, Jasmine gets thrown on the statue!

Our statue gets blessed with a brave soldier/police man who is asked to climb to the top of the statue without any ladder assistance, and to place a laurel of most intense perfume-d jasmine flowers on the arrow somewhere. It was scary watching, and afterwards I left, and didn’t take photos of the cutting on the ribbon; who knew it was similar to America’s ribbon cutting? I thought the wreath of flowers ending was appropriate way to see the memory end for statue blessing.

Weird thing I noticed about the statue was that the tale of Hanuman (? ) is a different kind of sand(?) stone. For structural stability purposes or hey, we went Hanuman to have a slightly sepia tale vs the grayscale theme..

Recent Donations, Constructions

Lots of construction projects going on. Especially in terms of bricks, paint and concrete bags. I’ve been in my rural village long enough to witness these changes. It’s on the main road to Angkor Wat, Cambodia’s magnetic and amazing tourist site. Nowadays, people are obliged to destroy their front yards (being government property) to enlarge the roads.

Many storefronts had been destroyed or moved into their house instead of the lawn/side walk. One reason I heard for this was so people coming to shop would have space to stand on the actual sidewalk instead of in the street where traffic can hit you. So enlargement of the roads will facilitate tourism and travel as in the surrounding countries. It’s amazing: the dirt roads I’ve known so long won’t be causing the dust storms I bike through, but will be black asphalt and too-soon-faded division lines. I think it’d be wonderful to have more speed bumps around to prevent the driving getting too fast.

^^^ABOVE, a 2nd grader’s page from required textbook. Crash course into life skills

It’s an odd thing to see that even with a huge statue at the roundabout, people are still speeding through the curve, pretending to be possesor’s of omnivision of all people around the corner, like a small kid on a bike (who’s usually too small for his bike so only half a foot is on a pedal at a time – hence, less control of bike maneuvering). Doesn’t it worry you too?

In other news, the school fence is being built like there’s no tomorrow. The high noon sun is fierce and painters still paint and cement is still churned on the ground. It is custom to have the names of the donors of the fence materials be written near the top of the 1.5 meter concrete fence. Sometimes I think a barbed wire fence is enough because it keeps out the cows. But people have a fancier vision of my high school. My school director recently called it a resource school — grabbing many kids as far as 13 km to attend because surrounding high schools are either far or understaffed (very common problem in rural setting).

And a WOW for this next update! 🙂

A donor in the neighborhood has graciously blessed the school with a $70 000 construction project of a new 2-story library. There is some conflict of interests as to where it will be placed. The donor and teachers at the school would like to construct the library in the center of the school, but officials(? – someone of authority) would like it at a different edge of the school. I was talking to some teacher friends and asked them if the conflict would disappear if the donor just bought $70 000 worth of textbooks. . . Nonplussed looks were my part of the reception.

Another kind person, a former high school student, with friends from a western university in Australia helped bring 3 new computers to the school. The friends at the university had paid for the computers to be shipped over and decided to give the computers to the school because they were going to be recycled, but thought better to continue letting teachers and students use the outdated PCs albeit much-new-to-my-colleagues. So far, only 2 teachers know how to handle computers so they’re not so used these days.