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June 16, 2006
Back from the Wild East!
Emma and I got home on Thursday evening, following a highly adventurous and exhausting trip. We travelled through a total of four provinces, all of which were equally interesting and exciting. We ate nothing but rice and meat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for six days. When you order something like "Beef Noodle Soup" in Cambodia, you have to be prepared for liver, brain, intestines, and other unidenifiable parts of cow swimming arond in your bowl. Emma and I had to constantly be vigilant about what we were putting in our mouths! Needless to say, we lost our appetite on a few occasions.
Our first province on the trip was Mondulkiri, which has the climate and landscape of the wine country in Northern California (minus the vineyards, of course.) It was refreshing to have cooler weather, especially at night. In Mondulkiri we visited a few different waterfalls, and Emma captured some great photographs of the landscape and sunset. A lot of ethnic minorities live in the province, so we went to one of their markets. Most of the ethnic minorities speak Khmer and their own language. They are also mostly Christian! We went to a church celebration on Sunday to check it out. They do a lot of singing with guitars...it was pretty surreal. Mondulkiri was a pretty amazing place. Driving through the hills in the evening, we saw two little boys riding home on their elephant!
The second place we went to was Rattanakiri. On the long drive there, we stopped in a province called Kratie to rent a boat to take out on the Mekong River so we could look for river dolphins. We were able to spot a few, but the population has been devestated by "dynamite fishing." Unfortunately, we got kind of a late start from Kratie so nighttime quickly fell before we got to Rattanakiri. Driving through the deserted jungle at night, we had just begun to tell ghost stories, when, all of the sudden, we got a flat tire! Changing the tire took almost an hour. Luckily I had a small flashlight, but the jack wasn't big enough to lift the car up high enough. So, Barang, one of the DC-Cam staff members, balanced the jack on a log to change the tire! It was very impressive.
In Rattanakiri, Emma and I had two very interesting meetings with ADHOC and CARE. We learned about the human rights situation in Rattanakiri. Montagnards are a group of people living in Vietnam that are being greatly repressed. They are fleeing in increasing numbers into Cambodia and being resettled by ADHOC and UNHCR. CARE in Rattanakiri is working on an equally interesting project. They have started bilingual education for the ethnic minorities, so the children can read and write in both Khmer and their own language. To keep kids in school, CARE works with the elders of the villages to develop relevant and familiar curriculum.
We were also able to go to a few more waterfalls in Rattanakiri, and a beautiful pristine jungle lake. It was formed by a cater a long, long time ago. We got to go swimming, which is so nice after being so overheated and dusty.
From Rattanakiri, we went to Stung Treng, which is situated next to the Mekong River. From there, we took boat trips to see ancient temples even older than Angkor Wat. We also went up to the Lao border to take a boat ride down the Mekong (Cambodian side on the left, and Lao side on on the right) and hike to see another waterfall.
We were extremely close to the Vietnamese and Lao border during this trip, which was pretty incredible.
Back in Phnom Penh, Emma and I have still been very busy at work. We got to meet David Chandler yesterday. He was very excited about our project, and we exchanged email addresses. Youk also seems to be very excited about our project. He told us that we are welcome to come back to Cambodia some time in the future to tour our exhibit around to the provinces, to show the Cambodian people. That would be such an amazing and important opportunity.
On Monday we are planning to go to Angkor Wat. Stay tuned for updates.
One last thing: I have decided to decicate my portion of this project to my Grandma Nona, who has just passed away. She was a very strong, resilient woman, and I want to do something in her memory. I know my grandparents were trying to read my blog, so I hope Nona had a chance to read about my work before she passed away. I love you Nona.
Posted by laraf at June 16, 2006 10:13 PM