Adventures…

In April, 2005, we were packing up our 850 sq. foot house, selling our cars, and compacting our combined 50 years of life in Canada into one 8’ X 6’ storage space and 8 suitcases which would accompany us in our move to Cambodia. Though we were unaware of the changes that would happen in our lives because of that move, we knew that things would never be the same. And they haven’t been – we now have friends all over the world, have traveled more than we ever thought we would, eaten things we never thought we would, and lived for two years in a part of the world that we had very limited knowledge of prior to the move.

I liken the situation we currently are in to the move to Cambodia. Any day (or hour, or minute) now, we will have a baby, and life will never be the same. We can’t say specifically how, but we can be sure it will never be the same. And, like our move to Cambodia, we can’t wait. What an adventure.

Deporting Cambodian-Americans who Commit Crimes: Passing the blame…

Today, while reading the KI-Media blog of Cambodian news, I came across an article outlining the plight of Cambodian-Americans who break the law and are deported to Cambodia. Many of them have never lived in Cambodia – they grew up in refugee camps on the Thailand border, and moved to Long Beach when toddlers. They don’t speak the language (Khmer), and have more knowledge of Hip Hop culture than Cambodian culture. When they commit crimes in the US, they are deported to Cambodia, and left to fend for themselves. These are people already on the margins of American society – people with addiction and mental health issues. To quote Holly Bradford, founder of an NGO to help re-patriate these Cambodians:  “In my opinion, it is a direct violation of his human rights to send somebody who has that kind of mental illness to a country where there’s no resources to treat him.” She goes on to say that 25% of deportees have mental health problems. Drug use runs rampant among deportees once they arrive in Phnom Penh. Bradford’s NGO, Korsang, gives work to some of the deportees, taps into their sordid past as a way to educate others, and aids them in acculturation.

Cambodia is a country already rife with child poverty and inequity. It seems ridiculous to me that these Cambodian-Americans, who grew up in the USA, who are products of American culture, and who were failed by the American education and legal system, should be returned to a country struggling to deal with its own demons of the past. It seems like the American government is sending away its dirty laundry instead of acknowledging and addressing what is causing the crime and drug abuse, the beginning of which might be the decision to prop up Lon Nol’s government in Cambodia in the 1970s. But, that’s another post all in itself… You can read the whole article about the deportation here.

Am I in Cambodia?

I was confused when carpooling to work this morning – I thought I was living in Cambodia. There were three main reasons:

a) A construction worker was unabashadly peeing on the side of the road just around the corner from our house

b) The car in front of us followed a curve in the road, and signaled to indicate they were turning, even though they had no option but to turn

c) There was just an election that cost common people a ton of money, and meant nothing

If it weren’t for the frigid weather, my nagging cold, and impending winter, I may have been fooled.

Talk about the weather

For two years I lived in the tropics. For two years I sweated. Daily. And profusely. For two years I ran the air conditioning in my bedroom at night. I complained about the heat. I complained when my classroom aircon quit. However, as I reflect on those years, I am starting to see that things we “endure” becomes much more appealing once they have passed.

For example, this winter, I longed for the days of never ending sweat, sunburnt feet, and hit and miss aircon. This winter was cold in Saskatchewan. Very cold. Colder than usual, they say. And I hated every minute of it. I had kind of forgotten how much I hated it until I spent last week in Hawaii with my mom. But, a week spent in the tropics again reminded me of the glory of nice weather. My body quickly adapted to my made-in-Cambodia shorts and $2 Russian Market flip flops. I happily met the morning breeze, as it floated in the open windows of my mom’s house. The day before we left I cut the silicone that had sealed our own 1960s windows shut for the winter — they had gone un-opened in 5 months.

Hence, the question that came to the forefront of my mind as I was flying home yesterday was “why.” Why would someone choose to live in Saskatchewan? One argument is that it was cheap. Well, it is not nearly as affordable as it used to be.
The days of cheap housing anywhere in Saskatchewan are over. So why am I back? Well, it turns out that over and above the weather, this is where my friends and family live. Or most of them, anyway. And I do like them. So, I’ll stick out another winter or five, and enjoy the company. And drink a lot of hot chocolate to cope, I suppose.

Oil in Cambodia

Here is a link to an article outlining the trouble that oil will cause in Cambodia. The quote “factors are already in place to suggest that the impact may not be all positive” is the understatement of the year. The increased revenues will only increase the corruption and further expand the growing chasm between the elite and the poor. In the last two years, the American presence in Cambodia increased dramatically — a massive new Embassy (built by Thai and Vietnamese labour, of course) and an increased military presence hinted at the value of the oil hidden beneath the Sea of Thailand. Though the oil is valuable, the true cost of the exploitation will be immeasurable and far reaching for the citizens of Cambodia.

“Development” in Cambodia

In my grad class we’re talking about the term Third World, or the Developing World. Above is a picture taken in May, 2007 of a village on Boeng Kak Lake in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. However, this village is being buldozed because the government sold off the rights to the lake to a “development” company that kicked all of the residents out, and is filling it in to sell the land. This new development will create economic growth as construction companies build high rises to attract multinational corporations and mansions for the rich. The GNP of Cambodia will rise, and it follows that they are more developed, right?