HSB: Part Two

It has been over eight months since my last post, a recollection of our lockdown life at Liger as the pandemic swept the world. We ended up spending nearly five months in that remote setting before moving, on August 1, to a new home about 20 minutes from school. We were able to come together for a graduation ceremony for our first cohort, also in August, and start the school year for our 50+ tenth-graders, now our only cohort, in late September. We still consider ourselves among the lucky ones, as here in Cambodia COVID-19 has only popped up sporadically, never in very high numbers and almost always due to people traveling into the country; government-mandated restrictions have proven to quell any serious spread. The combination of a young population, the hot weather, a populace that listens to the government and puts the welfare of the community over individual freedoms, the real fear about how a true COVID outbreak would decimate the already fragile health care system... these have all played a role in the fact that Cambodia, to this day, has 0 recorded deaths from COVID-19. Oh, and we wear masks here.

What a strange time. Talking to a close friend last week it occured to me that if we do get to travel home to the US in June and July 2021, it will have been two full years since we will have seen most of our family and all of our friends. The way that time has passed or dragged, the things you focus on and bury.. my mind had simply never calculated or verbalized this plain fact.

And Henry -- everyone is asking how Henry is. He turned two in September, is bright and beautiful, with blond curls that we didn't know he had until he started refusing homegrown hair cuts. His pale skin is nearly translucent, his big blue eyes frequently catching the attention of passers-by. More than once we have been out when approached by a Khmer family with a child Henry's age or a bit older; they beckon their child to go stand with Henry for a picture. Unabashed, adults approach him and want to pinch his cheeks; a woman in our neighborhood of grandmother age bellows "BAY-BEE! BAY-BEE!" with a huge grin, every time she sees him walk by.

Henry is observant and serious. I came home the other day expecting my welcome back hug and kiss, but he was deeply engrossed in his ABC Bears book. Our nanny was reading the letters to him and providing the corresponding sounds; he was repeating. He could not be torn away from this important work to kiss his mother. Jeff recently ordered a new batch of graphing calculators to our house -- they quickly became Henry's new before-bed routine. Pecking out the different numbers, learning about the clear button. He's a very thoughtful little man.

Henry's language has taken off. He has recently added some new expressions to his vocabulary, which he deploys only in his favor: "a LOT" and "uh litta bit," which he uses when describing the number of birds he saw on a trip to the Royal Palace (former) or how much more of someone else's food he requires after already having eaten most of it (latter). He also says "first!" with his finger pointed straight up and eyes wide open when negotiating. As in "first readuhbook (one word) and THEN showah."

Henry is silly and energetic. He loves balls -- throwing them into his mini basketball hoop, exclaiming the Khmer words for "got it in" or "didn't get it in" over and over. The pink volleyball, the red rugby ball, the small yellow "spikeball" balls that roll under our couch. Henry loves rushing to get the broom and laying flat on the floor to retrieve them. He loves the overinflated soccer ball he got as a late birthday gift from one of our colleagues, choosing it the most for kicking around the neighborhood circa 5pm. These balls are always underfoot, always come along on car rides or trips, and have provided him with probably hundreds of hours of engagement and movement.

Henry can be shy. Just yesterday Jeff, our nanny and I were all playing with him, throwing him a ball so he could whack it with a small bat (read: the broken wooden slat that used to be one of the sides of a box holding blocks). When he got too excited and smacked the glass door pane with the "bat," receiving a reprimand, he burst into tears. Not because the reprimand was too stern, but because there were too many adult eyes on him when he did it. 

Henry can be mischievous. When we were in Siem Reap recently, staying as the only guests in a small hotel, he was eating a peanut butter sandwich and demanded that I clean his hands (since, after all, he is my child). I ran inside for no more than 20 seconds to grab the baby wipes, and when I came out, in a shock to exactly no one, he had disappeared. I followed the sounds to find that he had entered a room further down, where three staff members must have been doing a routine room check. Not only had he let himself in, but he had also climbed up onto the massive white bed, peanut butter hands and all. When something like this happens, like the running away or the peanut butter hands on the white sheets that aren't ours, he often assures me that he was "just joking," to avoid a time out. Sometimes it works.

Henry loves. Multiple times a day, unprompted, Henry will say "Hen-dee love Mommy/Daddy." When he sees a dog, even the dirtiest, weirdest-shaped Cambodian street dog, he proclaims "I lud dat dog!" He loves books. He loves his baby bottle, which is a stand-in for a pacifier, and filling it up himself with the coldest water. He loves pillows. Hiding in them, climbing, jumping. He loves trucks -- trucks in books, or on his shirt, or on the road.

Henry is a constant source of joy for Jeff and I. We smile and reminisce about small moments from the day after we've put him to bed. We laugh about his moods, his demands for songs, his love for pasta, broccoli, rice and cake. It is a constant pleasure to see the ways in which his behavior and character mimic either Jeff's or mine. He is so curious, so sweet and so loved.

As we go into a new year, head back to school, and try to make sense of the unmitigated mess America has made of itself, I will lean into these small moments of joy and try to stay present in them.

Untitled

Jeff, Henry and I have been locked down on our boarding school campus since Monday, March 16. Today is the 20th day that I have not stepped out, ridden my motorbike down to the road, turned left through the village, right toward the city, stopped at our floating shack, Sharpey's, for an icy cold beer. It's a route I know in my mind's eye, a commute I have done five times a week for years.

"How are you?" our families ask. We are fine. We are hanging in. We're good. Physically, with the exception of a common cold and Henry constantly toppling over in his quest to walk on gravel, grass and mango-strewn pavement, we are good. Healthy. Strong. We know we are among the lucky ones.

Routine-wise, we are still working on developing a new normal. The first two weeks we were living here, nearly 95 students and several other staff members were all "locked in" for a 14-day self-imposed quarantine. The days flew by, but the weeks stretched. I was busy. Supporting staff and organizing remote learning for 50 graduating Seniors who are now at home across multiple provinces with limited wifi access. Last week was the first that we started kibbutz life, as we've come to call it, rather unironically. We have free reign of the expansive grounds, from the two empty teacher apartments in front, which have turned into our game room and our cinema, to the sports field for Cara + Janet's morning workouts. The pool is where we have dusted off our beer pong skills from college, where we listen to reggae and "Mood Booster" from 4-5pm as Henry plays with the ice in the cooler and splashes. 

Henry can run all over the basketball court, only steps from the apartment we moved into. There he becomes absorbed with balls of all kinds: soccer, football, basketball, dodgeball, not to mention bike pumps and frisbees. He has become a dirtier version of himself, sitting in the sand, walking barefoot down the path, often pantsless. He sings to himself, echoing refrains of "mama, dada, hen-dee" over and over. He can point out a bird or "hah-wee" the dog, and looks on with a concerned face when he hears the nearby construction vehicles pushing mounds of dirt our way. He sits in the sink to help wash dishes, yesterday earning a stern talking to when he dumped two bowlfuls of water directly onto the floor. Oh he knew exactly what he was doing.

We are the lucky ones, who have great company in our isolation. Cara and Janet and Richard make us six. Cara, from North Carolina, has been teaching the Seniors for three years. Her warm smile, genuine spirit, easy laugh and camaraderie make me feel at home. She gets me. Cara is positive and easy going, but wants to talk about the things that matter -- to me, just the right personality to get through a global pandemic with. Janet, from Wales, has only been at Liger a year, but fit into the fabric of our community almost immediately. She is the self-proclaimed and much acclaimed mother of our tribe. She cooks us healthy, delicious dinners each night, makes sure our wine glasses are never empty, takes Henry for an hour a day to give us a break, and keeps our minds fresh trying to decode what the hell she is talking about in her Welsh accent (ha!). Richard, or "ree-chart" as the students pronounce it, is a brand new addition, funnily enough a substitute teacher covering a staff maternity leave. He arrived in January and was supposed to be making his exit around this time in April. Little did he know when he moved onto campus that he would be rounding out our little lockdown family.

"What are you up to?" my friends ask. "What does your day to day look like?" Well, today Henry discovered four white ceramic plates in a drawer he can now reach. He moved them from table top to slate floor carefully, finally giving them a new home under the couch. We co-opted an old, discolored Rubik's Cube from one of the student apartments, and when it promptly fell apart in Jeff's hands (interesting innards, in case you didn't know), the 100-odd pieces became sharp teeth blending into the carpet, a little shock to step on, or in Henry's case, to chomp on with his newly toothy mouth. 

I mean...what are you up to?

Balls. Swimming. Tupperware. Walks. Showers. Using the blender, Henry's ultimate favorite pastime. Even pretending to use the blender is a win. A new set of blocks, a gift from a fellow kibbutz-er. A 1,000-piece puzzle. Putting Henry in hats, a new thing for him to allow something to stay on his head longer than 30 seconds. A tear-inducing Pixar movie. Tiger King.

"How are you staying busy?" By identifying and tabulating small wounds. An ankle scratch Henry points out woefully. Freckles he wishes didn't adorn his pale skin. Two old mosquito bites on his right knee. A large, fresh one on his left arm. That one needs some attention, a kiss, perhaps even some cream.

Yesterday, out of the blue, Henry pretended to pluck out Jeff's eye and put it in his mouth. Our shrieks of delight cemented this spontaneous action as his best new trick. Making us smell his "stinky" feet recedes to a distant second place.

In our two-bedroom apartment, one room is for tussle time, where the bed is big and soft, perfect for pillow fights and tickles. The other is where he naps during the day and is read to by night, board books littering the floor. (Who are we kidding? I stack all his books on the desk neatly AF.)

We are filling the time with old things, like answering emails, listening to podcasts, rediscovering 90s acoustic music and reading (may I recommend Circe), as well as new things, like giving a toddler a haircut, making an Americano, or leaning in to a game of volleyball for the first time. We know we are lucky to have our space, our people, our basic needs met.

But "what do you worry about?" I ask myself. Small things, like the fact that we're paying a nanny who isn't working, and rent for an apartment we no longer stay in. Medium things, like whether Henry is getting enough socialization, whether he is missing out on playing with kids his own age. Big things, like when this will end. If we will get to see our families this summer. How my 88-year-old grandmother will fare. And whether that was it. 

Was that it when we saw the last student leave campus with a wave and a "stay in touch?" Was it the last time we will ever be together as a whole group again? Has this eight-year experiment, which began as an adventure, a risk, a whim, a why not, and turned into us building our lives, our careers and our family here... was that it?

Humans don't like uncertainty. They don't like the unprecedented when it applies to a global pandemic and not the ratings for a new reality TV show. To not be able to plan for when you can reschedule your wedding, when you'll be able to tap back into the interview process for a new job, when you'll see that cross-country best friend, or even share a meal with a grandparent again. The might or could or probably doesn't feel like enough to stabilize the thoughts whirling through our minds, keeping us up at night, creeping into our dreams.

So all I can do is remember that I am one of the lucky ones.

Here goes nothing...

Love/Hate -- Appreciate

I have been going through a bit of a love-hate relationship with Cambodia over the past few months, undoubtedly related to becoming a mother and the shift in perspective that brings about. I don't think I allowed myself to really stop and take in the fact that not only were we making a monumental change in having Henry, we were also moving out of our home for the past six years, and into the city. I have never lived in a big city before, especially not one that comes with crazy moto traffic and city-wide power outages. Our move to Cambodia in 2012 was cushioned by the fact that we lived on campus at Liger. We had air conditioning in our bedroom and a super quiet, comfortable village existence. We always said we had the best of both worlds -- the Khmer village and close access to the city, only 20 minutes away by moto. We went into the city 4-5 times a week generally, either to work out or go to dinner or grab groceries. It didn't seem like it would be too big a change to just move there. However, now that we are here, I am realizing that by living out at Liger, I was still insulated, either by circumstance or choice, from some of the issues this country faces. 

Currently, Cambodia is experiencing their hot season with temps reaching into the high 90s every day and very little to no rainfall in most provinces. As a result, the amount of electricity generated by hydropower has decreased to the point where the government has been forced to schedule half-day power cuts in different parts of the city. This has been going on for about two weeks and will continue until the rain returns -- usually mid to late May. Of course, it's an inconvenience. Of course it sucks because it's 100 degrees in your bedroom by 9am. Of course it makes everyone a bit more on edge, a bit less patient, a bit more sweaty. But it has also given me, for the first time in my life, a real, honest and empathetic look into the lives of the millions of people who live off the grid every day in countries around the world. Worrying about milk for the baby spoiling. Worrying about him waking up from his nap because the fan shuts off. Worrying that the city power won't go on before dark as promised, and the tiny kernel of fear that chaos will break out. 

Since moving into the city, I have been commuting to and from work each day, which averages around 45 minutes by motor scooter. I leave around 7:10 to make it to work by 8 and usually have time to stop for a coffee. I have perfected my route and often see the same people each morning. The middle class family of mom, professionally dressed dad and two kids, a boy and a girl, coming out of their home and walking to school, lunch boxes in hand. The collection of six or eight men stocking motorized carts, covered with plastic goods, getting ready for a day on the roads, selling their colorful tubs, buckets and baskets. The moto driver in the funky neutral hued camo vest perched on his bike on the corner by the gas station. The dark-skinned Little Person, most likely homeless, sitting on his short plastic chair by the huge intersection of three major thoroughfares, collecting riel and dollars from passersby. It never ceases to break my heart and bring a tear to my eye when I see a clearly impoverished Cambodian, often riding a rickety bicycle and wearing provincial garb, pedal slowly by this disenfranchised and stigmatized man and pass him 500 or 1000 riel (12 or 25 cents). Every penny counts to them both, so the gesture is immense.

Jeff has always said that he can judge his mood based on how he reacts on a ride to or from the city. There is so much to see, so much human interaction happening on the streets, so many smells and sounds. If he takes it all in, marvels at it, remarks at it and smiles, he is in a good mood. If it causes him chagrin, he grumbles about it or ignores it, he knows he's in a bad mood. I have begun to agree with him, and take it a step further. On mornings of optimism, when the traffic lights are all green and the air feels cool and I know I am not going to be late for work, I feel a genuine sense that we are all in it together. All of us on the roads are working together to get everyone where they need to go. On one morning like this, I saw a man on a moto use his larger vehicle to block car traffic and go out of his way to help a little girl on a bike cross a major road. That gesture stuck with me. But, on mornings when I leave late, hit a pothole, am in the righthand "lane" and someone to the right of me cuts me off to turn left (no really, this happens all the time), my stomach clenches with fear of being in a road accident, I lament being covered in dust and breathing in the polluted air, I curse ending up behind the Cintri garbage truck on the one lane road, and I know I am not in a positive headspace. As I said initially, I have recently been in a love-hate relationship with this country.

Just last night, one of our neighbors asked us if we'd heard about the 17 year old girl, the daughter of a prominent ministry official, who drove her Range Rover through the packed city streets at 65mph and killed a girl about her age who was riding a moto. I hadn't. So glad you shared. Oh, there's video of it? Cool.

Last week, when reviewing protocols for road accidents with our staff, ensuring that they understood we are covered by insurance for leaving the scene of an accident, our Director made the point again that we are not in the Western world with Good Samaritan laws and hit-and-run lawsuits. He noted that just last week a man on a larger moto got into an accident with a smaller moto, and though it was not his fault, an enraged and ignorant crowd grew into a mob, ultimately killing the guy on the larger moto. Their definition of justice.

Last weekend, an acquaintance of ours, a Western man involved with a Cambodian woman, lost his children. Quite literally, he returned from abroad and was unable to discover the whereabouts of his three and four-year-old daughters. His panic bled into us as we sat by the pool with him and looked at Henry, imagining how we would feel if he was lost in Phnom Penh. Thankfully he has now found the girls and they seem to be just fine, but it was a stark reminder of how easy it is to disappear in this country.

I think it's also hard, in general, to talk to family and friends about the downside of living here, because we know that many of them think we're crazy to be living here in the first place. If I had a dollar for every person whose eyes grew large and expression changed to shock when I told them I was giving birth in Cambodia...well...we could afford to get Henry onto the USC crew team too. We don't want to talk about the negatives because we feel like we're arming them with even more reasons why we should come back to the US.

I know I don't deal with change well; I am a slow transitioner. We moved to the city September 1 and Henry was born one week later. The first three months, I was basically inside our apartment with a newborn -- I wasn't commuting or fully immersing myself in the city. And we had power all the time. Since January, the reality of our new situation, both the good and the bad, has really hit me. It's important to me to take the time to process all the aspects of this new chapter of our lives. Savor it. Challenge it. Integrate these new experiences into my existing understanding of this country so far.

I look forward to creating an even deeper connection to Cambodia -- it just might mean traveling a sometimes scary, always sweaty, meandering path to get there.

An emotional gate in our neighborhood

Henry Samnang Boucher: Part One

I used to tease Jeff every so often, when we were laying on the couch together or on the moto, by saying "when are you going to put a baby in me?" It was crass, superficial, a pretty one-sided request, and really not something that I meant. Eventually, after a few years of saying this maybe once a month, he turned to me and said, "are you serious? Because if you are, we should talk about it." We decided we would make a final decision over the Christmas holidays. The discussion ultimately occurred when we were in the car on the way down to Sihanoukville to celebrate the holidays with friends for a few days. It ended with Jeff turning to me and proclaiming, "let's have a baby!"

We had a trip planned to Sri Lanka that April, so we decided that I would stop my birth control once we got back from that trip. Many of my friends and acquaintances had babies already, and I had heard a lot about best practice for getting pregnant. There were cycles to learn about, apps that could help, steps to take -- but I didn't want to go this route. I was young and healthy and I figured if we just went about our lives, stuck to our usual patterns, without birth control we were bound to get pregnant.

In the end, it took until December to make that a reality. We think we actually got pregnant when we were on a trip to Kampot, which is a wonderful thought because it's a wonderful place. One of our favorites, a quaint and quirky riverside town about three hours from Phnom Penh. We have visited Kampot a few times every year since 2012 and it never ceases to reinvigorate our love for this country -- the lush green rice fields on either side of the road on the ride down, the various modes of transport that in turns make us smile or shriek, and in Jeff's words, "the streets in Kampot are so wide and good for walking!" Taking a riverboat ride, watching the sunset, going for a dip in the pool at our favorite hotel -- we always leave feeling like the lucky kids we are.

That December we were in Siem Reap over Christmas and had plans to go on to Hong Kong, which we canceled at the last minute. I was sick, the HK weather was looking stormy and we were both eager to save some money. We ended up returning to Phnom Penh and our apartment at Liger. I was maybe a week late and had bought quality pregnancy tests when I was home in the States for my grandfather's memorial and burial. I told myself that I was probably not pregnant, as I had no symptoms of morning sickness or extra tiredness. I also didn't want to waste the expensive and limited tests with a false diagnosis. I talked to Jeff about it and retraced my steps on the app that I eventually did end up using (in concert with a basal thermometer, which I used religiously each morning). He was convinced I was probably pregnant. 

He was right...

Early one morning, circa 5:30am, I couldn't wait any longer. I jumped out of bed in the dark, lit up my cell phone light (for some reason I didn't want Jeff to know I was awake and taking the test -- if it was negative, perhaps subconsciously I wanted to deal with that on my own at first) and took a test. The digital test needs light to activate, so the first one I took was a dud. Damn. I took another one and it was positive! It also happened to be pouring rain, which I love. Jeff was already awake and was outside laying on the couch. When I opened our big sliding bedroom doors, he looked up. I went to him and said, over the din of the rain, in the dark, "I took a test." "Aaaand?" he asked. "It was positive!"

Being the detail oriented and rather compulsive person I am, I had to fight the urges to give in to all the societal demands placed on expectant mothers from the get-go. I tried not to fall into the trap of believing there is only one way to produce a healthy baby. What to eat, which vitamins to take, what not to eat or drink, how much to sleep, which medicines were safe and not, how often to go to the doctor. We did a lot of Googling, and of course tried to stay within normal and popular guidelines (I had to kick the meth habit obviously...), but as ideas about only eating balanced and extremely healthy foods, tracking every bite -- no snacks, no sugar crossed my mind, I quickly shooed them away. Of course we would be healthy, but I was still going to eat pizza and wings and cookies when I wanted them.

A book was recommended to me by a friend from high school, which details the pregnancy and child-rearing experience of an American living in Paris. As I read it, I relaxed, because a lot of what she was saying was the norm in Paris, was what I was doing and how we wanted to raise our kid. Not giving up a sense of self, only to replace it with all things baby. Not molding our lives to the baby and over-structuring everything to the point of social paralysis. Not buying everything, brand new, that the baby could possibly want. Worrying about things like color coordination, eating placentas, birthing playlists, newborn photo shoots. None of that stuff appealed to us, so we didn't do any of it. 

I was very lucky to have, by any account, a very easy pregnancy. I had no morning sickness. No terrible mood swings or cravings or aversions to food. I did not gain a huge amount of weight. I stayed small for almost five months. I was able to wear my normal clothes almost until we went home for the summer in June. I worked full time up until the day before Henry was born. My only pregnancy related complaints were lower back pain, occasional exhaustion, which would have me asleep by 5pm some days, and terrible heartburn, for which I popped 6-8 Gaviscon a day. Yum. I liked watching my belly get bigger, seeing the change from occasional pictures I took in a sports bra and underwear. This is really happening!

One of the best moments of the pregnancy was when we finally decided to tell the Liger Seniors, students we have known, taught and loved for nearly six years. I tried not to get my hopes up that they would be as excited as deep down we both wanted them to be. This is not about them, I reminded myself. They are teenagers, what does a baby matter to them? On top of everything else, it was the day before a long break, a day when the staff members who would not be returning the following year had made their departure announcements to much chagrin and tears. However, it was also a day that ended with all staff and students outside on campus playing a variety of hilarious Khmer games to celebrate the impending new year. Tears were replaced with laughter and smiles as kids ate bananas blindfolded, sucked water into their mouths for transfer to bottles on the other side of a field, and were tied together for a bodily tug of war. 

We decided we would do it that night. Why not add on to the heap of emotions they were clearly feeling already? We called ahead to Mak Theary and asked her to gather all the Seniors in the Study Hall after dinner. I had told Jeff that we should prank the kids, make it seem like we were also leaving, so that's what we did. Jeff took my idea and ran with it. Upon entering the cavernous room, all but 4 Seniors in attendance, Jeff squatted down low, so as to be at eye level with the kids who were sitting on the floor, on bean bags, etc. He started by saying that today was a day of changes, and that we also had a change to announce -- he said that we had been there since year one, and that the kids were now a part of our family, and we wanted to be the ones to tell them specifically our news -- at this point, some of the girls already had tears in their eyes (Dalin, Soliday); others had suspicious looks on their faces, or looked shocked or disbelieving. I was standing next to Jeff, looking at the ceiling so as not to betray the truth. As he trailed off, he turned and looked up at me and I announced "We're having a baby!" I should not have worried about their reaction, because the entire room erupted into cheers, hoots, yells and sighs of relief. A visitor to campus was in one of the Senior houses during the time of the announcement and emailed me later that night to congratulate me and say he heard the reaction from where he was. 

After the cheers subsided, kids immediately got up, reacting in their own ways. Some came right up to me, others went straight to Jeff. Kids said they knew it, they were shocked, others wanted to touch my belly, ask me questions about twins, boy or girl, would we have the baby here or at home?

That night I got an excited text from one of our girls, Chimean, saying "Caro, you can name your kid Taylor because it could be for a boy or a girl. If it's a girl name her Alexandra. If it's a boy name him Alexander -- Alex for short! I'm so so excited for this Caro!" The following morning as I was walking into work, one of our students, Maya, approached me, put his arm around my shoulders and said, "you know Caro, yesterday, your news...it really made my day." Their reactions and their immediate support of us and our unborn baby are things that still make me smile, memories I will never forget.

2017 America / Post Khmer Rouge Cambodia

The past couple of weeks I have been very anxious and very in my head, and I know exactly why. I feel like the world is turning into a really bad place, and all I can think about are the problems and crises breaking out -- I don't see actionable solutions, and it's left me rather paralyzed. Suffice to say, I have reread the first four Harry Potter books (right around 1,800 pages) in just over two weeks and started three new shows (Lizzy Borden, you should check it out) in an attempt to squash the fear and doubt that refuses to leave me.

I have been off of Facebook since the election results were announced, choosing not to submerge myself in all the opinions, outrage and pain. I limit my news consumption to one email newsletter per day that breaks down the need to know about Trump and other key global events; for the first time maybe ever, I am not convinced that knowing more or educating myself on the issues is going to benefit me or anyone else.

This has left me trapped, oscillating between feeling mentally healthier (maybe?) not knowing the minute details of the human rights travesties that are daily headlines and feeling un-American for not being informed. This combination often gets finished off with a large dose of fear of the future, uncertainty about whether I want to bring a child into this current world, and knowledge that, for all the shit that is going down, little to none of it impacts my daily life, so what right do I have to complain anyway?

Yeah, that sums it up.

On top of this twisted inner dialogue, my emotions have been on my sleeve as I have led a group of 12 students through an exploration of the fall of the Khmer Rouge and the aftermath of their regime. For those of you who never studied Southeast Asian history, the Khmer Rouge was a communist regime that seized power in 1975 and in a little over three years, managed to starve, torture and eventually kill between two and three million Cambodians. This seven-week project has included trips to Choeung Ek, better known as the Killing Fields; the S-21 Genocide Museum, a former high school turned torture prison; and several events in Phnom Penh, including one about the treatment of the Muslim Cham minority during the regime. This educational event, which was part of the Khmer Rouge Tribunal's reparations program, featured several Cham survivors and a new documentary about their historical attempts to fight the regime. In reflecting on the Muslim Cham event, where a boy in his early twenties stood on stage and talked about how many of his Cham peers refuse to believe the Khmer Rouge ever happened, I became even more astonished by my students' open and honest insight into this section of their history. They have so many conflicting feelings about the tragedies that occurred not forty years ago, but they are not afraid to grapple with and experience them head on.

For example, after more than two hours touring S-21, which displays thousands of mug shots of the actual men, women and children who were confined and tortured in the buildings we stood in, one fifteen-year-old said that the experience was the first thing that had truly made this study of the Khmer Rouge real. She said, fighting back tears, that once you were there, once you stood on that ground, you couldn't deny it. She had heard about it, read about it, seen photos and visited the Killing Fields, but S-21 in its stark intensity really brought it home for her. She later put together the short film at the end of this post.

Then, just last week, and apropos to nothing, a student raised his hand during class and asked if I knew that America had dropped more bombs on Cambodia in the 60s and 70s than all the bombs dropped during World World II combined. I said I did. He looked down at his desk, hands balled into fists and said, "You know, when I think about that. When I really think about that, it makes me so angry. Why did they do that?" I told him he had every right to feel that way -- that the more I learned about the US's role in the Vietnam War and its resulting impact on Cambodia, the more ashamed I grew. I told him he had hit on a really important point. While America stands as a beacon of hope to many -- the land of the free and the home of the brave -- it has wreaked havoc on countries across the globe. Despite this, Americans benefit from that skewed perception every day. On the other hand, from a global perspective, Cambodia is either completely unknown or is only known for genocide, when in reality, it is a wonderful place to live and work. I told him he was going to have to fight that characterization of his country and its citizens for a long time. And no, I told him, it's not fair.

Finally, when I asked the students how they felt about being the only Cambodian visitors at the Killing Fields on the day we went, one 13-year-old said she thought it was because it was too hard for many Khmer people to face, while Western and Asian tourists are able to experience it from a distance. She said if her mom had to go, for example, she would have "started to cry as soon as she stepped through the door." Her peer, without missing a beat, raised her hand and very respectfully said that in her opinion, that was life -- she said that even if it's hard, and even if you don't want to do it, you have to. She said all Khmer people need to come face-to-face with the history of the country in order to understand it and move forward. "Life," she said unequivocally, "is not always easy, and sometimes we have to just do things we don't want to. They should just go."

I guess I need to take to heart the words of this fourteen-year-old girl. Right now, life for millions of people is not easy. There is heartbreak and fear and injustice running rampant, from refugees fleeing Syria to gay men in hiding in Lebanon. Families in Flint who still don't have clean water, women performing at-home abortions because they either can't afford medical care, or because other options don't exist in their country. Despite this knowledge, sometimes we need to just put our heads down and get through it. Lean into the fear? Read the headlines anyway. Donate time or money or resources to the organizations or individuals we believe can make actionable solutions. And for me personally, realize that the wisdom of Cambodian teenagers reflecting on the horrors of their past can teach me how to handle the fresh challenges and shocking dismay of 2017 America.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q15GJKQ3KE

A Fifth Year in the Kingdom of Wonder

Read all about it: ridiculous things seen on the streets of Cambodia, funny things my students say, and my new Exploration, learning about the Khmer Rouge.

I would like to start with a couple of wonderful traffic-related things that we have witnessed since returning to Phnom Penh at the end of July.

• We were on our way to the gym (a critical part of the story), when I saw up ahead what looked like a father driving a motorbike with three, possibly four, children on the back. As we pulled up alongside them, I looked and saw that it was not four children, but actually SIX. There were three daughters, large, medium and small, who could be seen from the back, as well as a small baby squished between the dad and first daughter, a chubby toddler standing between the first and second daughters, and a young boy smushed in between the second and third daughters. When Jeff and I both turned and gave the father huge smiles of awe, he actually took his left hand off the bike and gave us a thumbs up. True story. 

• On our way to town last week, there was a woman riding on a motorbike, sitting behind a male driver. She was wearing a light brown, long-sleeved zip-up. On the back were two words, written in glittery font and pretty hard to make out. Squinting, I pointed and said to Jeff "something girls?" He amended the guess to "typical girls." When we got closer, the actual words said, "Figfeet girls." Your guess is as good as mine.

• This afternoon, on our way back from town (the gym played a role, but if I'm being honest so did a phenomenal charcuterie board, some gnocchi and a lemon tart...), we saw a mid-sized car, possibly a CRV or RAV-4, in front of us. It was clearly full of people, but as we got closer, we saw two faces peering out at us from the enclosed trunk. Upon further inspection, we both realized...they were grandmothers. Tiny, shriveled old ladies, relegated to the back for the duration of the trip. My guess? They were being sassy.

• But, probably the best scope was a t-shirt, on the back of which declared: "Go to love! horse sweet."

I'll just leave that there.

Other than driving to and from Phnom Penh, since we've been back we have welcomed 35 new Junior students to Liger, aged 10-12. Our staff has almost doubled in size, with many new colleagues in both the Senior and Junior cohorts. The brand new Senior campus has been unveiled, and I am not kidding you when I say it looks like a five-star resort. All the hard work our students have put in the last four years truly earned them this amazing new environment to call their own. As per our Country Director's genius vision, cooking their own meals and managing their own house budgets will essentially be their first taste of running a small business.

With only two weeks behind us, it already feels like we never left. The kids' English is shaking off it's summer rust as they jump back into curriculum: math, literacy, Khmer, physics, biology and engineering in the mornings. Coding, robotics, podcasting, economics, current events and independent discoveries after lunch. And for Explorations, an eclectic mix of Khmer Rouge history, board game design, setting up the internal Liger economy, researching the prevalence of iron deficiencies in Cambodia, as well as solutions, and identifying and contacting global "change agents."

I am lucky enough to be working two hours a day with 12 Seniors (12-14 years old) on a project about the Khmer Rouge. One of our students spent three months in Siem Reap last year, on the set of the upcoming Netflix movie version of the renowned memoir, First They Killed My Father. With such a personal connection to the movie, of course we want to screen it for our kids. Therefore, we needed to grapple with the reality that they are now old enough, and mature enough, to begin to learn in-depth about the genocide that ravaged their country in the early 1970s. So, with a lot of help from many people, both at Liger and in Phnom Penh, I have outlined four different Explorations: the first is a look at the global factors that led to the KR taking power, including what Cambodia was like beforehand. The second installment, with a different 12 students, will focus on the time that the KR was in power. The third group of students will tackle the immediate aftermath, while the final group will work out the present-day implications of the genocide. How did the war shape Cambodia as we know it in 2016?

So far I have been amazed by the students' curiosity, questions, engagement level and knowledge. Our first trip was to the Documentation Center of Cambodia, an organization in Phnom Penh whose mission is to provide justice for the victims of the KR, and whose office is home to over one million photos, documents, documentaries, interviews and other primary sources from the KR period. In about two hours, we met with the Director (show below, white shirt, center), the legal department, the business office and the film/documentary/media wing, all while being hosted by the wonderful man in charge of national genocide education for high schoolers (standing, far right). I had goosebumps about twenty times, and was nearly moved to tears twice. Watching the students examine their own national identity, and ask major questions, all while expanding their understanding of the details of that time period has been an unparalleled teaching experience. In the photo below, you can see the many standing wall safes, filled with primary sources.

I will leave you with some of my favorite student quotes so far.

Reading a student's response to a chapter she had read in her guided reading book. She had written that the Mexican immigrants were focused on making money to "eat and feed their children." I highlighted the section and added a comment, saying, "The way this is written makes it sound like they want to EAT their children and FEED their children, haha."

The student's response? "Oh Caro, come on!"

Another student was writing about Bridge to Terabithia (so good!) and had written about Leslie's "funeral," when she meant wake. I highlighted the word funeral and commented: "really?" After a few days, I reminded her that she needed to make the proper edits. She went home that day, read my comment and responded, "Caro, you give me a headache. I don't get what you really mean."

And finally, one of my male Seniors came by my apartment to help me carry over new library books that we had purchased when we were back in the States. I had also purchased 50+ sports bras for the girls. Upon seeing the bags of sports bras:

Student: "What are those, bathing suits?" 
Me: "...Sort of." 
Student: "For who?"
Me: "The girls, don't worry about it." 

His eyes got wide, he stepped back, looked me dead in the eye, shaking his head and said: "They are NOT going to want to wear those!"

Hot Hot Heat

"It's like a sauna." -Khmer colleague, smile on his face, referring to our conference room

April has arrived, and with it, sky-high temperatures. Just take a look at this little ditty from a recent Phnom Penh Post article:

That is ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHT POINT SIX DEGREES mind you. Some Cambodians may feel a claim to fame about this, taking pride in their record; it literally strikes fear into my heart. I feel my lungs working harder to suck in the oxygen from the heated air around me, I clench my fists and howl in despair...

Let me just give you a small taste of what April in Phnom Penh is like.

Scenario One

Where: on the moto with Jeff, riding into town, following closely behind a large truck

What: said truck drives through a mud puddle on the side of the road, causing small water droplets, probably filled with God knows what bacteria, to sprinkle all over my legs

Reaction: "Ahhhh. That feels good."

My Defense: any sort of coolness from air or water is always preferable to living in hell; bacteria be damned

Scenario Two

Where: at a local hotel that doubles as a spa, after a massage (*it's not ALL bad over here)

What: clad in only my rather small bikini, I went into the dining room sans cover-up to order my lunch

Reaction: horror from the two older French ladies enjoying their Salad Nicoise; embarrassment from the three Khmer male twenty-somethings behind the bar

My Defense: if I had added another layer to my body at that time, I simply would have passed out and then they would have had to deal with that

Scenario Three

Where: in my classroom, around nine am, after the AC has already been on for about an hour and a half; sitting on the couch with a group of students

What: I cross my legs for comfort; fifteen seconds later, the leg on leg contact has already produced a gracefully flowing stream of sweat

Reaction: (inwardly) "Oh my god, am I peeing my pants?"

My Defense: I forgot that there was no skin on skin allowed during the month of April.

Scenario Four

Where: at a nice restaurant for dinner, in full AC, sitting on a leather bench

What: as I get up to leave, I realize I am leaving behind two full-on leg prints of sweat for the next patron

Reaction: "Oops."

My Defense: None.

Scenario Five

Where: on Rabbit Island, a small island off the coast of Kep; part of an end-of-the-year school trip with all students and staff

What: the students all got sunburned backs and faces after not reading the directions on the sunscreen bottle and spending the entire day in the water

Reaction: "What did you think was going to happen?"

My Defense: I feel no sympathy for Cambodians with their never-sweating bodies, who barely notice the heat and come to work in long pants and long sleeves. The fact that they have lived in this country for their entire lives and have NEVER been sunburned speaks volumes.

Summary: it is so hot here that when you leave an air-conditioned place for a non-air-conditioned place, it feels like you have been given this life as a punishment. The change in air temperature and humidity is like walking into a wall. It never ceases to astonish me (in the worst way possible). 

I have taken to shrieking at students for the following infractions: 

(1) not exiting or entering the classroom swiftly enough, and allowing precious cold air to escape

(2) not turning the AC back on IMMEDIATELY after a power outage

(3) sitting in an AC-ed room without fans on to distribute the gloriously cool air fairly

(4) sitting too close to me or touching me in any way, thus spreading body heat

(5) not turning on the AC well before I arrive in the morning (*this one may be going a bit too far)

This is no joke, folks. 

In other news: there are about seven more weeks until the end of the year. We just began our last round of Explorations, including a coding project with a programmer who joined us from Poland. We have several new hires starting work early, including a new tech/engineering facilitator and an English facilitator for the new cohort. Speaking of which, about 25 new Liger students have officially been accepted for the 2016-2017 school year, with another several months of recruitment ahead to bring that number up to a full 50. Parent-teacher conferences went especially well this year, with about half our students fluent and confident enough to translate for their parents on behalf of the Western facilitators.

I ran several Explorations this year, including a fiction writing team of two, who are well into their 15th chapter of a fantasy book written for kids their age in both Khmer and English. I also worked with a team of students on creating our own version of Humans of New York, aptly titled Humans of Cambodia. Check out our website and bear in mind that it was designed and managed by two thirteen-year-old boys. All the photos were taken by students, and all the interviews were planned, conducted, written out, translated, edited and posted by students.

Other big news (though I feel it gets less and less "big" as the years go by) is that we will be returning for year five at Liger, to witness the new cohort in all their glory, and make sure the senior cohort doesn't get their egos bruised too badly. I will be taking on more of an administrative role, stepping back from teaching literacy, while continuing to do Explorations. Jeff will continue doing Math with the senior cohort and running Explorations.

Finally, we will be home this summer for about seven weeks, bouncing around between LA (BABY CARA!), Boston, Buffalo and Florida. Let's make plans.

Middle School Madness

Before I begin with the latest batch of Ligerisms from the kids, I want to send out a big Happy Birthday to my lovely mother-in-law, Barbara Gubb, who has always been among my most loyal blog followers and appreciators. Since we can't be there to make a fruit salad and have dinner with you, I dedicate this blog post to you. I hope you have an amazing day! xxoo

If you know me, you know that I have always loved babies and that I have only ever wanted to teach the youngest kids wherever I was. When I was a camp counselor at the YMCA in Buffalo, and later on at Nobles, I was with the "ones," or the rising first graders. This meant I had to sunscreen up to thirty tiny bodies twice a day, take hundreds of parent calls and worry too much about food allergies; it was worth it.

I studied Early Childhood Education, a major which has since been discontinued because it was seen as too narrow a focus. (It was perfect for me.) My student teaching was in K, first and second grades, and my first real job was in a kindergarten classroom. That year we dealt with one kid smashing another over the head with a block, multiple incidents when the room needed to be cleared because of a student meltdown, a case of lice, and another student falling from the top of the play loft. I freaking loved it. I mean, c'mon! We also got to hatch baby chicks and visit a donut factory!

Before starting at Liger, my oldest students were third graders. And these were kids I had also had as second graders. So, when I came to Liger with the promise of teaching 8 and 9 year olds, and found out there was actually a mixture of 9 and 10-almost-11-year-olds, I was a little bit grumpy. How many eight-year-olds did Liger have that first year?? Only THREE! I consoled myself with the fact that they all had the English skill level of much younger children, and for the most part, were much smaller physically than their husky American counterparts. I managed.

**To be clear -- I was eager for my students to be happy, healthy, smart and linguistically proficient. I would never intentionally starve students of food or knowledge, simply to conform them to my preferred parameters.**

I know this has been a heart-rending read so far -- the trials and tribulations of someone who can't handle students over the age of six. What a lot in life. But, I am here today to tell you that so far, against all odds, I have survived the first two months of the Liger students transitioning to middle school. This post shall be the start of my memoir, the working title of which is: The Long, Sweaty Road: One Teacher's Experience with Flirtation, Body Odor and Four Thousand WHYs.

Currently, our oldest student has just turned fourteen, while our youngest is not even twelve. Quite the range. Some of our boys are skinny, baby-faced little things, with piercingly high voices that echo through the halls, while others are almost taller than me, with deep voices and the beginnings of facial hair. (Jeff would tell you a few of them actually have real facial hair, but I refuse to accept that). Let's just say its a pretty mixed bag.

If this had been year one, and we said be silly, they would've been silly. Note the composure now....

This year the students moved from mixed-gender housing to single-sex, which I think has been a big relief for all involved. Next year, with the introduction of the second cohort, our older students will move to an entirely new section of campus, and will be responsible for cooking their own dinners. In the meantime, they have really grown up, becoming incredibly aware of the opposite sex. Take this conversation for example:

Female Student: Carooohhh, Male Student won't stop following me!
Me: Well, maybe he thinks you're pretty...
Female Student (running away): CAROOOOOHHHH!! NOOOO!!!
Male Student (totally oblivious): What did you say?
Me: She said you were following her and I said maybe its because you think she's pretty.
Male Student (smiling slyly): Nope. Someone else thinks she's pretty already, so I can't think she's pretty...cuz, you know...

Teaching Literacy, I didn't think I would run into so many situations that are embarrassing or funny for the kids. Turns out I was wrong. Teaching the definition of the verb to peck, for example: they were very forthcoming with the bird-related meaning, but NO ONE volunteered to define the kissing version until an entire table of girls ventured into this tricky territory together, with voices barely above whispers. I tried to neutralize it, by giving a "peck on the cheek" example, but even that was met with giggles. I was just glad we didn't get into "was pecking...he pecked me..." Maybe next year.

On a vocab quiz, I instructed the students to write a sentence using the word glance. Three of my boys wrote about glancing at cute girls -- in the market, at school, it didn't matter. They then, quite unabashedly, raised their hands to share their answers when we were going over the quiz in class. Ladies, take note.

The students are also incredibly immersed in American pop culture these days. They have always loved music, and have known most popular songs since they got their computers, but recently it has invaded the classroom. When asked for the meaning of a bay (body of water), I had one girl write "the name you call your boyfriend or girlfriend." I had a male student ask me, very innocently, if I wore Apple Bottom jeans. When asked about the plot of his guided reading book, and who the most popular boy was (in the book), another student responded with "Justin Beiber." As their reading levels progress and the type of book they are interested in changes, I have had to provide definitions for such shocking words as "jockstrap" and "mooning people." I actually get a kick out of describing these words, but the best is when only one kid in the group knows it and is trying to get his/her peers to understand the meaning without saying anything embarrassing. Good luck.

On the other end of the spectrum, these kids are still such sweethearts. They are still pretty sheltered in some regards, especially when it comes to dating or sex. Kissing is not prevalent in Khmer culture. In speaking with my male colleagues about whether they kiss their wives goodbye in the morning before work, they literally laughed in my face. Absolutely not, it just would never happen. Another colleague told me she has never, in all her life, witnessed her parents kiss. She is in her early 30s. As a result, our kids still giggle, and many of them cover their eyes, if they are watching a movie with a kissing scene.

Another example of their innocence is when I asked one of my male students where he was going that day, as I had received an email that he and a female student would be missing class that day. He said, trying to be cryptic, that they were going to get their "two balls checked," and pointed to his eyes, just a little too late. This is in front of about 12 other students. No one batted an eye. I had to keep from snorting myself. If that had happened in an American 7th grade classroom, forget it.

Besides all the laughs, the thing I have appreciated the most about working with this age group so far is their ability to take control over their own lives, finally seeing themselves as a part of something bigger. I will leave you with one really inspiring conversation I had with one of my middle schoolers (gag).

This is a girl who did not really stand out the first year. She remained in the middle of the pack in year two, and it was not until last year that she really started to gain a place at the top, due almost entirely to her passion for reading and subsequently developed reading and writing skills. She is part of my two-woman fiction writing team, and has astounded me with her natural writing ability. This week, I took her aside and told her how amazed I was with her product so far, and said that she could definitely go to university if that was what she wanted to do. I told her, rather emotionally, that she was a gifted, hardworking writer and she should believe in herself. She sort of looked down at me (she's among our tallest students as well) and was like..."yeah, I know, that's my plan."

She went on to say, very plainly, that she intended to go to university (not sure where yet) and study psychology. She then wants to get a job where she can make a lot of money (she is thinking pharmacy-related) over a short period of time, and then invest in a 5-star hotel. She plans to eventually own one and live in the penthouse ("Caro, do you know what a penthouse is?"). This is a kid from a province two hours from the city who did not speak a word of English when she got here. She had only been to Phnom Penh a handful of times before arriving for her first day at Liger. Within three years she has become an amazing, self-confident, independently driven young woman. It's been pretty cool to watch it all go down.

Also, Kate (sister) and Ty (brother-in-law) had their baby, and she's the best thing ever. Forget everything I wrote above and just remember Cara Isabel Barns' perfectly squishy face...


 

A Series of Unfortunate Events

It seems like the greater forces of the country of Cambodia read my last blog post. They sensed that I was growing overly satisfied with my grasp of the country and its unique flaws. These forces conspired to rip me out of my peaceful, storybook existence and plunge me into the depths of the worst it has to offer. Okay, perhaps I am being overly dramatic, but I shall allow you to decide that for yourself.

On Friday, as usual, Jeff and I headed out to Sharpey Shack, our local floating shack at the end of our road. It belongs to Dom, but has been adopted by all of us. Since the second year, our staff has gone there just about every Friday afternoon for a few beers, to take in the sunset and exchange stories about the week. We decompress and come together for a couple hours, because during most of the week, we move in parallel lines, barely getting the time to talk. Sharpey's has become a very special place for us -- in fact, at our wedding, we had four specially themed tables, representing four of the most important and formative places in our life: Sharpey Shack was one of them. My friend Caitlin handmade gorgeous needlepoint images of each place; below is the one for the Shack. You can ask anyone who has been there, it's spot on.

Okay, we had a few cocktails at the wedding.

Needless to say, Sharpey Shack has never let me down. Sure, it's old and rusty and creaky. The bridge is often perilous to walk across. Depending on the level of the river and how far away it is from the shore, we might have to walk through some garbage to get there...but really, it's a special place. (Aren't I selling it well?) Anyway, it's one of my happy places. However, on this particular Friday, as I sat on a chair overlooking the river, chatting casually with two of our new staff members, Jan and Karen, I noticed a quick movement out of the corner of my left eye. Upon further inspection, I saw that there was a palm-sized, brown spider on one of the metal roof supports. It was just inches from Richard, another new staff member. Richard happens to have quite the large beard, and I could immediately sense that our spidey friend (enemy) was itching to bury its disgusting, octo-legged body into that thick mass of hair. So, I screeched, and pointed it out to Karen, who used to be an Alaskan park ranger, and she offered to switch chairs with me. She's a keeper. Richard did not seem particularly alarmed; he actually stayed in exactly the same place. Neither did Karen, who met her husband while he was being chased by a three-legged bear -- Jan was running, she was laughing. So I don't think this spider business was the worst she's seen. Karen promised to keep an eye on it for me, because obviously the spider you see and then lose track of is ten times worse than the spider you can watch from a distance.

My pulse had quickened, and my heart had picked up (are those two things the same...? I never know..), but I was okay. Although Karen had promised to babysit Spidey, I wasn't taking any chances. I stared at that thing as the sun went down and it got a little darker. I tried to keep up a conversation, but I am pretty sure I wasn't making any sense. I was distracted. A few minutes later, a bat flew through the Shack, whipping past my head. No problem. I actually like bats -- they eat mosquitos and never stick around for long. I was hoping he had come along to eat Spidey, but alas, the thing was still perched in the same position. I heard Jan say "Damn, did you see that bat," and I agreed that I had. But wait...did he say bat? I eyed Jan, who is incredibly laid back and an eternal optimist, just to confirm that he had, indeed, meant to say bat. Because it sounded suspiciously like he had said rat. He smiled and said...wait for it..."yeah, rat." That couldn't be right. Matt assured me he was joking. I drew my knees up onto my chair, just in case, and pacified myself with the thought that there couldn't be a rat on Sharpey's because rats can't swim and we were floating, so it would have had to use the bridge, but rats aren't smart enough for that, and why would it want to be around people in such a small space, etc.

Right around this time, Spidey flexed a leg at me, and gave me an evil smile that it was too dark to see. So yeah, it was really dark at this point. My heart was picking up a pretty good pace and I was remembering that Jeff never did that whole "carry his bride across the threshold" thing and that perhaps this would be the time to invoke that right. He could just pick me up and carry me right off the Shack, not letting me touch the ground until we were back home. Good plan.

Just as I started to explain said plan to my husband, a huge, brown, skinny-tailed rat ran between my chair and Karen's and I absolutely lost my shit. I think I temporarily blacked out, because all I can remember thinking is: "is it dark enough that people aren't going to see that I just burst into tears over a rat?" and "why isn't everyone else screaming and jumping onto a chair?"

This is not a drill, people. This is my real life.

The rat ran around everyone on the Shack, probably bearing its fangs and sharpening its claws as it went, before disappearing into the edges of darkness near the bar. I found that I had pretty much jumped into Matt's lap and was choking down panic. Now, let me interrupt myself here for a quick second to explain that I am currently about 700 pages into Shantaram, a 900-page novel about India that has absorbed me so completely that it takes all of my willpower to not think and talk about it exclusively. It has, without a doubt, taken first place as the best book I have ever read. In the book, the main character is living in an Indian slum that houses over 25,000 people, and is coming home late one night with his girlfriend, by means of a pitch black alleyway. Big mistake. They hear something, and before they can react, they are pushed flat against the wall, unable to move or make a sound, as a cascade of thousands of cat-sized rats roll through on their nightly excursion from one sewer exit to another sewer's entrance. Apparently everyone in the slum knows about this and knows to stay inside their houses when it happens. Now, to be clear, this book is insane. It details everything from war to torture, imprisonment to dog fights. There is a scene with a bear. Lots of awful enslavement of people in brothels, poverty, prisons and other atrocious circumstances. I don't know what this says about me, but I want to be honest here: the scene with the rats was almost more than I could bear. It was the worst thing I read in that entire 700 pages. I was almost nauseated, imagining myself pressed up against a slum wall as swarms of chittering, slithering rats ran over my feet. If it were me, I would not have been able to stay still. I would have run and screamed and been eaten to death by rats -- the end.

That night, when we got home from the Shack, I was sitting on the couch next to Jeff, looking at wedding pictures, still feeling pretty jumpy. I reached for my water bottle when a dust clod fell from the ceiling and got picked up by the fans in the room. I screamed. I was ashamed, and Jeff immediately told me it was dust and to get over it, but let's just say I took half a sleeping pill that night.

Saturday occurred without incident.

Sunday morning, with 24 rodent-free hours on the books, I started to feel like maybe this was just a one time thing. I had paid my rat dues. I mean, I am no idiot, I know there are rats everywhere. I get that. I live in a huge city full of trash piles, and when it gets dark, the rats come out. Okay. I just don't want to see them or feel them or have to look at their ugly little faces and tiny, hideous paws, or know they exist. Too much to ask?

Anyway, it was about 7am, and I didn't have my contacts in, so I could only see about two feet in front of me, and I wandered into the bathroom. Without oversharing too much, I grabbed the toilet paper and out from the center of the roll jumped A MASSIVE SPIDER. Let me repeat that: I am at my most vulnerable, pretty much unable to see, and still in what I like to call "my sleep zone," and a freaking spider launched itself from inside of something that was IN MY HAND.

I then leapt out of the bathroom and screamed for Jeff. I will end the scene there, but let me assure you, justice was eventually achieved. And Jeff made me consolation French toast.

I remember being in high school English class and learning about "coming of age" and a "loss of innocence" and all that. I never knew what it meant until this weekend. That is all.

Now, to wash the taste of rats out of your mouth, here are some pictures of me and Jeff looking slamtastic at our wedding.

Paul, Josh, Liam, Michael, David -- Kate, Claire, Lindsay, Bridget and Cara

Griff, Tom, Mom, Granny, Dad, Liz, Ben, Tyler, Kate -- Barbara, Ashley, Ben Fox, Michael, David and Bob

Freshly Sharpened Pencils

Unfiltered panoramic sunset off Sharpey Shack last Friday

Aaaaand, we're right back into it.

Less than two full weeks back with the kids and it already feels like we never left. We spent the first two days rolling out our new curriculum: Independent Discoveries, Make-Your-Own-Explorations and Expertise, but there was no easing back in -- more than half of our students would be in grades 8 or 9 if they were returning to government school, so high school is upon us. Not literally (thank God), because some of their skills are still not quite up to par, but their inventiveness and work ethic kick most high schoolers' butts, so I guess we meet somewhere in the middle.

Independent Discoveries are essentially individual research projects. What do you want to know more about? Propose an idea, we will facilitate you and, if possible, connect you with a mentor. You do the rest. You have seven weeks to produce something that is portfolio-worthy, and a presentation of some sort will be made to your peers. We had almost 40 out of 50 students propose an idea, although it was not required and they only had a day to think about it. Some ideas include building a hovercraft, researching the history of Cambodian architecture, inventing a new sport, learning about birds, and becoming an expert in Adobe Muse. I don't even know what that last one is...

We have had Explorations for the past two years now, check my last entry if you don't know what they are, so we thought it was about time we turned it over to the kids. Out of the five Exploration blocks, two will be entirely student-run. They propose their idea, gather their team and write their plan. We will be there to facilitate, but they will run the show. Some of the best ideas include an interior design team that wants to learn about and then design some of the many new spaces that are being built on campus; starting a mobile library movement in Cambodia (you have all seen the little wooden bird-house "take one, give one" libraries around the U.S.?); a Robotics team that wants to send itself back to Singapore (for a third time), to compete in the high school category, while including a few students who have never been; and, a creative writing duo who hope to write fictional short stories that teach kids values like integrity and determination.

Expertise was a hell of a puzzle scheduling-wise, but is turning into a great idea. It links with our Explorations and front-loads the skills the kids will need. For example, if your Exploration is visiting the Bunong people to learn about their culture and background, culminating in a photo book, you need a class on photography. If your Exploration seeks to find old Khmer music that was lost during the Khmer Rouge and record it, you need an Expertise course on audio engineering and podcasting. The other category of Expertise aims to expand the students' frame of reference, mainly through current events and video presentations. In the first two weeks, I have introduced seven students to the Cecil the Lion controversy, and helped them get their feet under them when it comes to the meaning of "transgender."

Unsurprisingly, our little Ligers have risen to the new freedom and responsibility with open minds and incredible questions. In the Cecil the Lion debate, I had one student stick to her guns (pun intended), arguing that if someone wanted to pay $50,000 to shoot a lion, they were allowed to without consequence, that it was "just business." She was outraged that the African guides were not the ones getting into more trouble. The other kids shot her some serious shade (no pun intended), but backed down when we read about the connection between conservation and big game hunting. Watching their perspective shift and widen when I introduced the Zimbabwean point of view was probably the best thing I've witnessed so far this year.

Even today, when presenting the basics of what it means to be gay, lesbian and transgender, I trusted that they would be respectful, but had no idea how seamlessly they would ask questions and share their ideas. We talked about transitioning, identified challenges to coming out, talked about gay-marriage laws worldwide, including Southeast Asia, and I showed pictures of different people who are openly gay or transgender. Throughout, they shocked me with their maturity and excellent questions. What happens if you're gay and you like someone, but they aren't gay? What does coming out mean? How do you know you're gay? What if you're at a party and you tell someone you like them but they don't like you back, how would you feel? These are all questions that were posed by students to the group. They were so interested and had so much to say that we will be revisiting it next week, through the lens of gay marriage and citizenship, and openly gay athletes.

Besides having a great start to the school year, it has been so nice to be back in Cambodia. When we walked into one of our favorite restaurants the first Wednesday back, the Khmer bartender immediately saw me and started making my favorite drink. At the salon I frequent, the girl who usually takes care of me wasn't there, so the store manager stepped it -- talk about customer service. I was also shocked to see on their shelves the exact Clarins face wash that I use and usually have to buy at Bloomingdale's the day before I fly back. Another huge sign of progress is the insane amount of road construction on the main road that connects Liger's village to Phnom Penh. There are huge trucks out there widening and smoothing the road. Its going to be awesome and well worth it when its finished, but for now its just a huge dust cloud of potential.

These anecdotes may not resonate with you, but with me its like watching a little kid grow up. This city and the people in it are moving full speed ahead, responding to their growing economy, learning more about customer service and improving their infrastructure. I feel so connected that I take pride in their baby steps.

Also, now I never have to go to Bloomingdale's again...
________________________________________________________________________________

Below, the gems that were created after learning about idioms (literally and figuratively, of course). See if you can tell which one got lost in translation.