Xmas ramblings …..

I am completely removed from xmas being up here in my little town but i remember last year as I was in Bangkok and now reflecting back, its kinda kewl that i got to see a Thai version of xmas.

I never will forget the "jinka bells, jinka bells" carols which I have no doubts happens cos maybe the Thai language not have the "jiggle" sounds in their language

For me the 25th was a normal work day, although plenty of expats arrange to take some annual leave so as not to work. there was an expat lunch gathering for the day however i was in the nearby town of Stung Treng. i had a health sector meeting of like-minded organisations and we all discussed how our liaising with the government is going, or not going as the case might be.

Odd tv moment, as I rarely turn tv on but on English language Natural Geographic say an “asia showreal” about xmas in asia. They showed the ‘xmas elves’ of southern china as they make toys and xmas trees; meaning the factory workers and showed the competition for the design of xmas decorations in Singapore as well as a Japanese Santa going to a father xmas conference in Denmark, who gets ‘accredited’ as a quality-assured Santa who then returns to Japan to teach other Japanese Santas. The Santa debates with Japanese colleagues about how turkey is not real xmas food and everyone should eat pork, cos that was what he was told in Denmark

Bet not many of you have thought about Santa schools in Japan

Travel stories from November

Getting to KL from PP this is what I wrote, in ecstasy it must be admitted;

already so impressed with cleanliness, helpfulness and sense of expecting people to be around. My leaving Phnom Penh was curious but not stressful; the staff very unorganized and they must have had a total of about 6 flights for Saturday yet were unable to figure it out. Leaves a sense that one is pushing the staff to absolute limit, simply by showing up and expecting a flight.

On return home:

Happiness no mice!! Saw white fur on seat a few times but now kitty clearly not wanting to share my balcony even tho it would be very welcome

Last year after few weeks away when I went and lived with the nuns and then to Bangkok I had so many mice move in due to my absence. Took my months to convince the blighters I am not the sharing type …

Silly things from the travels

- I did get through customs easily with the 6 month of tablets I had with me. I had wondered how unlucky would I be if some dude decided to check my luggage. 6 months supply of naturopathy tablets to deal with intestinal issues, such as acidophilus would be close to useless for a male customs dude but in Cambodia it would seem so wealthy to have so many tablets and so would b stolen on principle. But hey, as usual there was no customs at all …..

- Brisbane with only one set of loos and over crowding at midnight was all very unwelcoming. it was a twilight zone of international airport procedures. Had to go through customs again even though only had boarded plane at Sydney. Eventually got back on identical plane and went to Kuala Lumpur

Cambo news stories worth checking out

Stories about Cambodia

Have found this terrific compiler of Cambo stories. Some people might enjoy seeing what’s happening in my backyard:

http://www.cambodia.org/news/

Game hunting African style but in my province??

This is the type of development that is coming and yet there is no land title system and so the land is being stolen rather than negotiated. Local people might actually like to join the monetary system and get into tourism but here local people have no rights; local people only know about this proposal if they saw the english paper news!

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=9583

One of the Cambodian’s princesses story of her exile from her country and now she is a diplomats wife …..

http://homepage.mac.com/norodom/norodom/articles/2003/07/profileincourage.html

The international war crimes court system is at, http://www.cambodiatribunal.org/

A longer story about the first person going to trial: http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=914&Itemid=31

Alternative medicine in warfare

This is completely silly and I think it ever so clever!

These arrived in inbox courtesy of Bob

Aerial of Joanna & Elmo's house

Taken June from little Cessna plane, before wet season turns roads into rivers. First right from bottom with airstrip to the left, fourth house on left which can't be seen cos of gorgeous tall tree in front yard. The 'main' road of town is parallel with my street beneath the plane. I walk or ride my bicycle across the little airstrip to the markets for food

Rain for kids

Experimenting if can all look at a very basic -non youtube quality- little piece showing kids having fun. Watch it on small, like the equivalent of a 'thumbnail' and you'll see the kids rolling a tyre and in far background there is a man sheltering under his little push handcart from which he sells icecreams. this from Joanna's balcony looking past neighbour's front yard. This was a mild monsoon rain period!

News snippets about Cambodia

Snippets from Cambodian news

from June 4 Cambodian Daily

- swearing oath to ruling party

local CPP officials asked residents to swear an oath over a small Buddha that they are their families receive divine retribution (some reports said swore over death) if they betrayed the ruling party

It came about as before the commune council elections in April (like local government) CPP distributed 1, 895 sarongs and food but only received 1, 141 votes

Human rights workers, Khmer and expats, pointed out that just possibly this was intimidation

- 139 Cambodian deminers left for Sudan having learnt their trade helping clear land in Cambodia. It’s the first time Cambodia has been involved in an international UN peacekeeping operation

- Global Witness have released a sensational and sensationalist report on how the kleptocracy of Cambodia is illegally logging the country. (means governed by thieves if you like most expats here who asked what’s kleptocracy!?). The government banned printed copies and its been front page news of english language newspapers. Its all part of lead-up to the big donors meeting with the government, where Global Witness is complaining that donors (who Joanna works for) are not being tough enough on this dictatorship and actually are propping up the bad stuff happening

Executive summary very readable 2 pages if anyone wants to check it out: http://www.globalwitness.org/media_library_detail.php/546/en/cambodias_family_trees

- The Khmer Rouge tribunal is still arguing about its rules and has taken 8 days to try to get consensus. Argument is between international standards and the Khmer legal non-system as fair as the news tells us

- Ratanakiri officials are to be disciplined or fired for letting the state run tv channel go off air for a month. Apparently there is a US$3,000 in electricity but the Information Minister said “that was an unacceptable excuse as government were always in arrears but a compromise could always be reached.”

- Cambodia’s prime minister refused to meet the Un human rights envoy and added “If you continue to stay in Cambodia another 1,000 years and if I survive another 1,000 years I still will not meet with you” (expats were waiting for childish, ner, ner ner and sticking out of tongue but that didn’t happen)

And last but not least ….

- In Mondulkiri (nearby province along the Vietnam border south of me) 8 newly elected commune councilors are being trained by the opposition party (whose leader has recently returned after the prime minister promised to not put him in jail as had previously been stated a number of times). The new councilors are mostly indigenous peoples and one is quoted as saying how he wants to protect his ancestral lands.

Too much prayer - too much rain?

Hughie giveth a bit too much

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

(## this made me laugh. Maybe the Gods of all the religions probably answered all the prayers but forgot to liaise between themselves about logistics!### and hadn’t heard the euphemism of Hughie for god and weather since leaving country NSW ten years ago ### but not making fun of the natural distaster and I am hoping people's insurance will help in this emergency)

Phillip Adams

I LIVE in an officially designated disaster area. As is common in Australia, the weather is being ironic. The drought, particularly severe around this part of NSW, has been interrupted by a deluge. Like nails driven in by a hammer, every drop of rain has been driven by a gale.

We don’t know yet whether this is the beginning of a swing of the meteorological pendulum, with the rainfall driving nails into the drought’s coffin. Or it may turn out to be one of the events predicted by climatologists in these unpredictable times and we’ll quickly return to parched earth, dusty riverbeds and dry dams. But at least it has given us a chance to survive another six months.

A few days ago the many dams across our 4000ha were empty sockets staring at the sun. They’ve been like that for years. Overnight they filled to their brims and many are spectacularly, joyfully tearful.

We awoke to find ourselves surrounded by snow, more than I’ve ever seen. The drought had made the hills gaunt. Now they’ve gone from threadbare to Thredbo. And our sad gutter of a river is roaring, fighting its way through the 6m she-oaks that took the opportunity to grow between its banks. You know it’s dry when a riverbed turns into a forest.

We’ve been lucky for once, spared the gales that have ripped off roofs and uprooted trees and drowned motorists. For others in the Hunter Valley, the cure has been as bad as the disease.

At the time of New Orleans being wrecked by Hurricane Katrina, Tim Flannery warned anyone who’d listen that the east coast of Australia would soon be copping a lot of batterings, another symptom of climate change. But no one in government here was listening. They’re still not listening.

Perhaps the rainfall represents a sort of religious revival, God responding to the PM’s call for public prayer. As George W. Bush constantly reminds US voters, God votes Republican. So perhaps the President has lent him to John Howard to help win the election. If so, God should turn down the volume of his response.

Or we should turn down the volume of our prayer.

If the perfect storm that thumped Newcastle is a case of Hughie letting her rip, then his overly enthusiastic response will do little to enhance regional religiosity. We’ll have to put Howard’s prayer in the same failed category as Catholic Archbishop of Sydney George Pell’s intervention in the stem cell debate.

Moreover, many voters expect a PM to do more at a time of crisis than pass the buck to God. If God is the only way Howard can deal with climate change, will he also have us pray for reduced interest rates? Lower petrol prices? To hell with the separation of church and state, let’s pray for better health care and education. Let’s replace the kangaroo and emu on top of Parliament House with a huge crucifix. I’m sure Cardinal Pell would have one to spare.

By sad and surreal coincidence the decision of the NSW Government to declare the Hunter disaster occurred on the day of another Hunter disaster: the same Government’s decision to approve a huge open-cut coalmine a few clicks upstream. Another triumph for CO2 and climate change. It’s enough to make some of us call on the religious competition and sign one of those mephistophelian contracts. Many people would gladly trade their immortal souls in return for lower mortality weather.

And piling calamity on calamity, here’s another one. Or at least a big embarrassment, occurring elsewhere in the governmental food chain. The same day as the killer floods and the mine approval, we learned that our local mayor, who seems otherwise comparatively sane, is a total disbeliever in climate change. He was heard describing global warming and Al Gore as frauds. This as the worst drought gave way to the worst winds and downpours in living memory.

But to hell with those fraudulent scientists. And to hell with those fraudulent world leaders at the fraudulent G8 negotiating those fraudulent global agreements on emissions, with their chorus of agreement that we’re facing the worst crisis in human history. Our local mayor knows best. Having a mayor such as that anywhere would be a worry, but when coalmining surrounds him? And powerful mining companies? Then it’s a joke.

And the sight of the giant winds and waves making that thumping great bulk coal carrier stuck in the sand at Newcastle takes on metaphoric significance. If I weren’t an atheist I’d reckon God was trying to tell us something.

Over to you…

http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/phillipadams/index.php/theaustralian/comments/hughie_giveth_a_bit_too_much/ has the comments this article generated

Happy Khmer New Year (with colouring and replaced angels)

## it was my third ‘new year’ for 2007 and like last year celebrating in April makes lots of sense to me. So to all, happy belated Khmer New Year. This is a gorgeous message from a work colleague. (the other two new years are the western date and the Chinese new year which I saw lots of as I was in Phnom Penh at that time)

>>>
Dear all,
I hope all of you are well and happy.

I would like to take this opportunity to send this email to all of you
as of my friend as same as an ICSO family for the event of KHMER NEW
YEAR, the year of PIG for duty replacement the angel the year of DOG.

I would like to thank to the existing angel to warming us for a year
period of April to March 2007.

Therefore, I would like to pray to the new angel coming up this April
to bless all of you and particularly your family would be in
LONGEVITY, SOCIALIZING and COLORING, GOOD HEALTHY, GOOD WISDOM and
MORALITY and PROSPERITY within progressively of all your both official
and private businesses for the year of PIG.

I would like all of you to forgive all bad things but to bring victory
for our family.

Please accept my regards and forgive the words you do not like in this email.
With Lovely and friendly to all.
Best wishes.
From XXXXX
>>>>>

Aid agencies assist beer corporations

CARE is an international NGO and it is seriously large. Larger than World Vision for example. They do a marvelous bi-lingual education program here locally that can’t be criticized. But recently CARE took on a contract with Heineken and it is to assess the impact of the beer company’s own safe drinking messages in developing nations. Its one of the odder links between aid agencies and the corporate world.

2nd prize is "ya don't get to go to USA!"

And this is one of Leak’s clever cartoons from a week ago. Aust has announced some crazy plan to send refugees to America via Nauru

There have been some very unkind but realistic jokes made at Australia’s expense over this plan of Howard’s; getting a ticket to the USA will only increase refugees to Aust!

(as Aust is always considered 2^nd or 3^rd option down for any refugees who do have any thoughts on where they’d like to end up, getting to the USA is not a disincentive) The sense that Aust really does present itself as a major player in world politics is embarrassing rather than funny but Leak’s cartoons can make me laugh

observations Feb- March 07

Feb-March 07

Hi from Elmo,

Elmo loves telling tales on Joanna. She was away for 2 weeks in February mostly for work but Joanna was at times the cliché of remote-living-lass-gone-to-the-big smoke and there were too many nights when she did not get home until 2am. On a (supposedly) quiet night in the noisy backpackers hostel where Joanna stays, she met Greg ….. a classic drinking with strangers moment that only people who travel lots can know. And Elmo knows – comes from being friends with Joanna, not cos Elmo also makes friends with strangers ….

Ya just gotta, gotta, gotta check out Greg’s great blog. And especially see from another writer’s perspective what 24 hours is like in Cambodia. Well Elmo is exaggerating about 24 hours but Greg’s trip in Cambodia very different to Elmo’s. (psst Elmo didn’t meet Greg but Elmo thinks that Greg must be okay cos he gives some compliments to Joanna – Elmo is a bit biased. Joanna is calling out from the balcony here at home that actually Elmo’s talking about her habit of drinking with strangers is breaking some rule …. Elmo is ignoring her!)

#21 Holiday in Cambodia is a must read, but check out the other stories. Elmo’s fave is the Whiskey in a Jar title, from time in Laos
http://www.getjealous.com/lothar

………………………

BBC covered a big story about a ‘jungle woman’ who came back to a village after some amazing number of years living in the jungle. Elmo wants to know was it covered in Aust? If yes, then that story is from the Ratanakiri province where we live.

It seems a very sad story and there is still no definitive true story. Either the woman really did live in the jungle and for some reason was running out of food and so she began to steal food and village people set up a watch so as to catch the thief or, likely but also not verified, is that she is mentally ill and was kept as a prisoner somewhere and for some reason was stealing food or accused of stealing food and so then in some bizarre journo twist has found herself in the middle of an international media circus.

Elmo wishes the woman well and hopes that there is peace in her future

…………….

Joanna commutes about 5-10 minutes to her current workplace on her little 100cc moto. She has taken recently, in the past few months, wearing more skirts and dresses instead of the practical cotton slacks. Elmo has discussed with Joanna that one day her skirt is going to blow up and its going to be like when in a cartoon, when the windscreen of a car comes undone and the driver is unable to see the road; except it will be Joanna showing way tooooo much to the locals and her fighting fabric and trying to see where she is going. They are long skirts almost to the ankle!!! And one even has frills in wonderful Asian style. Elmo also disapproves of Joanna’s habit of wearing long dangling earrings and then tucking them up under the helmet on the way to work.

Joanna ignores Elmo sometimes but Elmo is just trying to be helpful

……………………

Joanna here to add, if I return to Australia will I get a motorbike license and progress to a 250cc bike or will I stick to a pushbike? Can’t imagine ever owning a car but I know weirder things happen.

Anyone offering to see if they can remind me what a motorbike clutch is …… ?? my little 100cc scooter is more like a bumblebee motor added to a bicycle! Has no brakes, useless lights, no fuel gauge, no speedo, has 4 gears and certainly no clutch

………..

Today at lunch there were 5 fave expats sharing gossip. Joanna got a toast for announcing her leaving her current organisation in 10 week’s time. Everyone was sickenly positive and no-one can imagine us being homeless.

But there was also a funny joke about how she will leave the volunteer budget lifestyle and go world-bank-employee-money-lifestyle and soon be turning up in a “road train of a 4WD” to use Ben’s excellent turn of phrase. So Elmo is here to say that while Joanna queries about getting her motorbike license in Australia local expats are already teasing that she will renounce motoscooters and will soon be into fuel guzzling, people mowing, huge 4WDs

Possibly since none of you have seen that the expats who drive such vehicles are mostly awful, yucky, pretentious people working for unethical world bank projects, so Elmo’s comments might not make sense?

Things I doubt/disbelieve

# I live in remote corner of Cambodia and yet now have internet at home. Am I really re-connected to virtual world on daily basis? A world of daily news, bad blogs, uni research, recipes such as pumpkin scones and trivia like what does/did the dodo look like?

# Did a quiet politician get sacked for a 20 min convo but are ministers in charge of United Nation’s biggest corruption fraud (Aust wheat) still in office?

# Will I ever find a way to describe how good Ratanakiri cashews are; which is the current cash crop bringing both positive and negative change to indigenous people?

# is there a cultural appropriate way to use locally woven fabric into outfits for myself?

# Can it be I’ve forgotten the awfulness of Australian drought? Here its only 2 months until wet season – its taken for granted rains will come after 6 month absence. I write this as there is thunder lightening and a hint of rain – only 8 more weeks until smell that smell. Australia’s heartbreak of drought not forgotten, not really

#10 mins later, as writing this, big rain drops falling. Smells so peculiar – lifts the dust and dust in my nose but also smells good and coolish

to think all of wet season just around the corner

Written Saturday 17^th March

Note:

Proving me wrong twice over!!

My phone bought with the GPRS feature that makes internet possible at home has died so I am back to limited internet connection in short periods at work

and

It rained so much last night that roads are slippery and muddy and it is hard to believe that we will go back to dry season dust. But colleagues are all guessing this unseasonal rain will be over soon and that we get the dusty red of dry season

Written Tuesday 20^th March (Katrina-Jae’s birthday)

Bangkok - sorta a holiday

Written by Elmo

Bangkok

Elmo missed out on Bangkok and Elmo is still unhappy about this. Not Joanna’s fault but Elmo was unlucky. Elmo chose not to go to the retreat with Joanna – getting up at 4am and not eating for half of every day for 10 days is not for little monsters.

But after the retreat Joanna was flown to Bangkok to an international resort, ehem, I mean hospital and a cyst was removed. It was benign but there was a bit of a fuss about it all and in total Joanna was in Bangkok two weeks. Mostly as an outpatient. In Aust such a visit would have meant a few days in hospital and none of you would have even really known about it. But when in a developing nation, flying over to the world class facilities in Thailand is how health insurance looks after expats

Joanna is fine now. Her favourite description about the trip is, “except for the surgery and stitches it was a great adventure!”

Which just goes to show she is rather silly. Monsters know that going to hospital is meant to be scary but instead Elmo is jealous as Joanna, once able to move about okay got to be a tourist and see temples, the palace and national museum and about a million art galleries. Elmo thinks Joanna might have exaggerated but the point is that Joanna did lots of arts and cultural things in the last few days when her wound was getting treatment but she lived as an outpatient so had freedom to explore. Elmo would have liked to see the artwork. Being Joanna’s travel mate for over 10 years now, Elmo has learnt to love art nearly as much as she does.

Elmo also has seen the dress and shoes she bought so as to go to the Thailand Cultural Centre for a orchestral concert that played traditional Thai music but with western instruments. Joanna would have looked real pretty in the outfit. Pity not much need to wear pretty shoes and dresses with sequins here in our dusty town.

So Elmo happy to hear Joanna’s travel stories but glad that next real holiday when Joanna plans to explore our northern neighbourhoods in Laos that Elmo gets to go. No staying at home ever again for Buddhist retreats either, just in case Joanna ducks over to have additional holiday time like she did in Bangkok!

Dust - red fine dust

Dust

So just how dusty is it here? I lived in dusty places in Aust and I have seen too many dust storms for my liking. In western NSW it was nothing to see a storm of dust literally roll towards us obliterating the horizon and visibility quickly becomes nothing. It then continues on its path. That race to close up a house as one watches the plumes of dust is unforgettable. Ahhh the sweet memories of living in country Aust!

This dust is completely different. It’s a pervasive persistent living with dust. Everywhere. The fine red dust is kicked up from all the unsealed roads in town as we walk, moto or drive cars about. The dust comes through our unsealed timber homes and settles on all. No exaggeration, a table can be wiped over and 20 minutes later a fine layer is there again. Lifting any item, comb, book, phone or whatever from a table top means seeing the imprint of the shape left on the table as the dust has settled around the shape. Very artistic at times but of course it sometimes saps one’s good humour living in this dust.

Sitting on my balcony here, I can see the dust flowing down the road in the wake of a moto rider. It is a mostly still day so at least the dust is not being whipped up and around today. Leaving a beer open and unattended for too long means you get a mouthful of dust. It pays not to look at the surface of a cuppa tea, as of course we drink all this dust. It’s the smell of dust that is most noticeable. Picking up the mosquito net too quickly for eg, when getting into bed releases all the dust and the smell always amazes me. And don’t even think about the impossibility of keeping dust out of beds!

Clean dust:

A comforting fact or myth told by all expats here, is that at least we are breathing in clean dust. A newcomer settles into their new placement comes along to their first Friday night social drinks and can’t help but mention their personal struggle with getting used to the red dust and people will chorus, “but its clean dust!” Like that helps get used to the red dust in one’s eyes, ears and nose!!

There are so few pollutants here and so few cars and the little 100cc motos are everywhere but in a tiny population of 17,000 the effect of vehicles is minimal. So as I ride through red mists of dust on my own moto I comfort myself that it is healthy dust!

At 5pm as we all leave from work, the dust is so bad that the main road through town looks like its dusk as the dust generated sits in the still air completely blocking out the sun. its nothing to be peering 5 metres ahead to see what is on the road and all because of the dust.

On my little residential road its not like that. Constant dust is blown about but not so visible. The signs of dust exist in that all trees are covered with red film on the side that faces the roads.

But I will never complain about the dust as the opposite that comes with wet season is the mud. And I never enjoyed the lack of mobility that comes with the mud. At least with dry roads for the 6 months of dry season, travel is easy. Well there are pockets of thick fine dust to scooter through but rarely will we slip over - just like 4WD in sand I think, except with 100cc. In wet season my work office is on the road considered the 2^nd worst track in town and so once the rains begin it is a slippery water logged slippery clay base. One week last wet season (April – Oct) there were 7 staff with major leg injuries – not from traveling to remote villages but just trying to get to the office!!! So I breath in all this dust happily as I remind myself that soon I will be struggling to stay upright on my little moto in ankle deep mud.

So who wants to come visit me … after such an enticing description?