So I could update you on what on earth I've been up to since I last posted over a month ago, but I have zero idea where to begin! Sorry if you were hoping for something substantive, but my brain is waaaay too scrambled. But one running thread that has characterized the past few weeks is the steadiness and comfort that goes along with feeling more and more "at home" here in Uganda (not that this is my home... no one freak out that I'm staying here for good!). So, in case you were planning on dropping everything and spending an extended period of time in good ol' Uganda, here are the top ten signals that you've been here long enough to make the "tourist" status on your visa seem so misrepresentative of your real life...
1. Your English skills have noticably declined. Well, I take that back. Your American English skills have noticably declined, but your Ugandan English skills have sharpened remarkably. This becomes apparent when you catch yourself saying "You first come," "Sorry please," and "Good day please" (if only I could type that with the accent!!) but you can't remember common American words and phrases to save your life. I wish you could understand how difficult it is for me to write a coherent blog post, because my vocabulary has plummetted by at least 40%. I use a dramatically lower number and variety of words over the course of the day, which actually has made me realize how few words you need to really get by.
2. You get unduly exited by a hot shower. And by unduly excited, I mean over-the-moon, orgasmically ecstatic. This past weekend a series of random circumstances led me to spending the night in the beautiful, luxurious home of a couple working for the U.S. Foreign Service, and this meant having access to a hot, steamy shower that put me in a good mood for at least the next 48 hours. I swear I thanked the couple Sarah and Dan at least fifty times and offered to buy them a goat for their generosity or something absurd like that.
3. You have a mile-long stretch of children that, rather than yelling out "mzungu!! mzungu!! mzungu how are you? mzungu byeee!" when they see you, yell out your Ugandan name and call you over to them in Lusoga. This is my favorite thing, because it makes me feel like I'm part of a community rather than just a mere outsider. Of course no matter how long you live here you'll always be a mzungu, but to the people of Budondo I at least have a name of my own. And as small as that seems, it makes me oh-so-happy.
4. You have developed a wide array of creative excuses for NOT giving out your phone number to random Ugandan men who ask for your number before asking your name. The most ingenious and multi-purpose of these I have courtesy of my friend Kate: "Sorry, this is a work phone that belongs to my work and I can only use it for work." Direct, polite, and gets the point across!
5. You have on at least one occasion slipped up on your evasion tactics and given your number to at least one strange man who has then called you multiple times a day for over a month even though you never once pick up. I do not understand the mindless persistence.
6. You haven't shaved your legs for four months. For real. But don't take this one as a general rule -- it's probably just me and my lack of motivation to do anything unnecessarily extravagant with regards to my appearance.
7. You have a questionable "tan" that may or may not be a combination of dirt and sunburn. My money's on may.
8. You have a network of free-avocado-hook-ups that shower you with dozens of avocadoes at every chance they get. This isn't exactly a problem, but it can become one when the two dozen avocadoes you have in your kitchen decide to go rotten before you get a chance to eat them...
9. You litter. So much for responsible environmental behavior...
10. You have come to view toilet paper as a luxury item.
Kale bannange nmaze okuwandika. Ngenda okuwumula kati. Sula bulungi ate weekend enungi! Bye!!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Coming to Cambodia
(My CIEE program will be in Phnom Penh, Cambodia for the next 5 weeks. Just got here. I'll be taking the Khmer language, a Poli Sci course about Cambodia post-Khmer Rouge, and a History course. Here's what's up!)
Day by day
The light in Phnom Penh has a distinctly yellow quality to it, and though it might be a little cooler here than in Ho Chi Minh City, it feels like I’m simmering a bit more in Cambodia! For better or for worse, the afternoon rains also last a lot longer here, so it’s been much cooler in the evenings once I sit through the downpours. I was kind of surprised, coming from Phoenix, that life slows down as it does when it rains in places like this. I had always thought that people just trudged through it, but I guess it’s kind of hard to do that when the streets flood halfway up to your knees. Now that it’s the rainy season, I finally understand why there aren’t many pedestrians in Sai Gon and Phnom Penh!
Places
Phnom Penh was once considered the most beautiful city in Southeast Asia in the 1960s, and it shows. There’s distinctive Khmer architectural flourishes almost everywhere you look, which is refreshing after the seeing so many utilitarian buildings in Sai Gon. The city still has the narrow shop-below/house-above style buildings you see everywhere, but the sidewalks are a bit wider and there are trees everywhere. I live near the awesome looking Independence Monument, and from there you can follow a series of parks through the city to the waterfront and to the cultural sites like the Independence Palace and the Parade grounds. At night, the walkers and people playing sports animate the whole park into one circuit. It has such amazing energy that's provided by people inside it, and not the giant billboards and traffic that ring Sai Gon’s Park 23-4. (not my pictures here, for the record-- nice shot though!)
Wealth
Some of the people on the program say that the people in Phnom Penh seem less materialistic than those in Sai Gon— a little more dressed down, from students to street vendors— though we get the sense that that’s not exactly the case. On the one hand, Cambodia is a whole is poorer and more rural than Vietnam. Phnom Penh, which is much, much smaller than Sai Gon or even Hue, has poverty and deteriorated neighborhoods that are much closer to the surface. Still, even when I was exploring the other day, I kept seeing Lexuses parked in these same neighborhoods! We had always heard jokes from the Cambodian students about how there
are more Lexuses in Cambodia (population 14m) than in Vietnam (pop. 85m), and it’s sadly true. You see the SUV’s driving through Phnom Penh every minute with “LEXUS” emblazoned across the side very conspicuously. The most powerful also have no license plates, which, true or not, makes them appear above the law. Apparently you often see no-plate Lexuses and Range Rovers parked outside Phnom Penh’s boutique stores on Saturdays as generals and police chiefs take their mistresses out to shop!
In a way, I think I’m just a little uncomfortable being in political capitals in Southeast Asia. The corruption and opulence that lingers behind closed doors just seems to leak out into the streets, and it’s especially revolting considering the poverty elsewhere. In Sai Gon, the modal share of cars was only about 2% and they weren’t as nice, so I don’t think it bothered me as much. Moreover, I think that Sai Gon’s ostentatious wealth was powered by tourists and foreign business interests; here, most foreigners are ex-pats in NGOs or with the U.N., so the wealth seems more likely to be coming from the government alone— kind of a sad thought.
The upside is that I’m more encouraged than ever to travel off the beaten path to the rural areas of Cambodia, especially now that I have my S.E.A. legs a bit (hardy harr harr). Don’t worry ma, I’ll take my malaria pills and lots of pictures!
Day by day
The light in Phnom Penh has a distinctly yellow quality to it, and though it might be a little cooler here than in Ho Chi Minh City, it feels like I’m simmering a bit more in Cambodia! For better or for worse, the afternoon rains also last a lot longer here, so it’s been much cooler in the evenings once I sit through the downpours. I was kind of surprised, coming from Phoenix, that life slows down as it does when it rains in places like this. I had always thought that people just trudged through it, but I guess it’s kind of hard to do that when the streets flood halfway up to your knees. Now that it’s the rainy season, I finally understand why there aren’t many pedestrians in Sai Gon and Phnom Penh!
Places
Phnom Penh was once considered the most beautiful city in Southeast Asia in the 1960s, and it shows. There’s distinctive Khmer architectural flourishes almost everywhere you look, which is refreshing after the seeing so many utilitarian buildings in Sai Gon. The city still has the narrow shop-below/house-above style buildings you see everywhere, but the sidewalks are a bit wider and there are trees everywhere. I live near the awesome looking Independence Monument, and from there you can follow a series of parks through the city to the waterfront and to the cultural sites like the Independence Palace and the Parade grounds. At night, the walkers and people playing sports animate the whole park into one circuit. It has such amazing energy that's provided by people inside it, and not the giant billboards and traffic that ring Sai Gon’s Park 23-4. (not my pictures here, for the record-- nice shot though!)
Wealth
Some of the people on the program say that the people in Phnom Penh seem less materialistic than those in Sai Gon— a little more dressed down, from students to street vendors— though we get the sense that that’s not exactly the case. On the one hand, Cambodia is a whole is poorer and more rural than Vietnam. Phnom Penh, which is much, much smaller than Sai Gon or even Hue, has poverty and deteriorated neighborhoods that are much closer to the surface. Still, even when I was exploring the other day, I kept seeing Lexuses parked in these same neighborhoods! We had always heard jokes from the Cambodian students about how there
are more Lexuses in Cambodia (population 14m) than in Vietnam (pop. 85m), and it’s sadly true. You see the SUV’s driving through Phnom Penh every minute with “LEXUS” emblazoned across the side very conspicuously. The most powerful also have no license plates, which, true or not, makes them appear above the law. Apparently you often see no-plate Lexuses and Range Rovers parked outside Phnom Penh’s boutique stores on Saturdays as generals and police chiefs take their mistresses out to shop!In a way, I think I’m just a little uncomfortable being in political capitals in Southeast Asia. The corruption and opulence that lingers behind closed doors just seems to leak out into the streets, and it’s especially revolting considering the poverty elsewhere. In Sai Gon, the modal share of cars was only about 2% and they weren’t as nice, so I don’t think it bothered me as much. Moreover, I think that Sai Gon’s ostentatious wealth was powered by tourists and foreign business interests; here, most foreigners are ex-pats in NGOs or with the U.N., so the wealth seems more likely to be coming from the government alone— kind of a sad thought.
The upside is that I’m more encouraged than ever to travel off the beaten path to the rural areas of Cambodia, especially now that I have my S.E.A. legs a bit (hardy harr harr). Don’t worry ma, I’ll take my malaria pills and lots of pictures!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
