Within the next three hours, the first five Cambodia SSTers will be returning to campus. Kelly, Phil, Seth, Trisha, and Jake boarded their Korean Airlines plane at about 11 p.m. last evening for their two lengthy flights back to the States. Fourteen of their peers stayed behind to travel in…
Easter Sunday was the second day of project presentations and reorientation events for Cambodia SSTers. The highlight of the day were afternoon project presentations. Charlie, who with Jake spent the six weeks of service in a Cham Muslim village in central Cambodia, led us in the Muslim Call to Prayer and the bodily movements of Islamic prayer.
All of the Cambodia SSTers returned to their Royal University of Phnom Penh classrooms Saturday morning for final language testing, meeting with their teachers for discussions about what they did in the provinces. Nearly everyone showed marked improvements in language abilities after being more deeply immersed in Khmer culture over the last six weeks.
All 19 Cambodia SSTers arrived back home in Phnom Penh sometime Friday, checking in at the Graber Miller home before returning to their host families. Everyone was healthy and happy to be back, though some were melancholy about leaving their villages, where they had developed close friendships over the last six weeks.
One of the Graber Miller family activities this week -- in addition to bumper cars and bowling -- was getting our photos taken in the Cambodian style, with traditional Cambodian clothing and excessive amounts of makeup and even hair extensions or curls for Ann and Mia. Not everyone in the family was thrilled with the process, but it made for a fun afternoon activity. Posted here are two photos from the 15 we took that afternoon.
Allison and Trisha are living 15 minutes outside of Kampot, tucked in the southwestern part of Cambodia about half an hour from the beach. The Graber Millers made their last service visit there from Monday to Wednesday this week; all 19 students will be returning to Phnom Penh in 8 days (Friday, April 2) for several days of reorientation and project presentations. Trisha and Allison work in the small community of Kampong Kreang, which is the home area for Cambodian Parliament Member Mu Sochua.
Three hours from their nearest counterparts in Kampong Phluck, Rachel and Kat are living and serving in Mongkol Borei, a town an hour and a half north of Battambang, Cambodia's second largest city. Mongkol Borei is only 50 kilometers from the Thai border and part of the region where the Khmer Rouge held power long after they were booted out of Phnom Penh in January 1979. The rest of the Graber Miller family left Siem Reap for Phnom Penh Wednesday morning while Keith boarded a bus to head northwest to Bantey Meanchey province. Kat and Rachel both are living with pastors' families and their work is at Kone Kmeng, a Christian school about a half hour away from their homes, deep into the dusty countryside.
Julian and Annalisa are living in working in two of the three villages that make up the Kampong Phluck communities, the stilted villages near the Tonle Sap lake and Siem Reap. The entire group visited Kampong Phluck back in late January when we went to Angkor Wat, and many said the village visit was almost as intriguing as the ancient temples of Angkor. Homes are placed on 20-foot stilts, and during the rainy season (beginning in about June and running through the fall), the Tonle Sap expands to three times its dry-season size, flooding the small land mass in Kampong Phluck and requiring boat travel for getting around.
This is the third and final posting from this week's visits to three different student village settings -- seeing Corinne, Seth, Bailey, Sarah, and Chloe in Tampoun villages, Michael and Austin in their Jarai village, and Charlie and Jake in Kampong Cham province. The Graber Millers head off tomorrow morning for Siem Reap and Kampong Phluck, where they will see Julian and Annalisa, and then Keith will go on to Oddar Meanchey Province (12 hours from Phnom Penh) for a visit with Rachel and Kat. Charlie and Jake are loving their multicultural experience in Svay Khleang, located off a dirt road and right on the Mekong River in Kampong Cham.
Austin and Michael are living and working with a Jarai indigenous family in the village of Kong Yuk, about 50 kilometers outside of Banlung, the provincial capital of Ratanakiri Province, and just 40 kilometers from Vietnam. Some may remember the story of the "jungle girl of Cambodia," a young woman who reappeared from out of the jungle in January 2007 after being missing for nearly two decades. The young woman is from a small village near Kong Yuk and Oyadao, and her village is where Michael and Austin are doing most of their English teaching.
