Pre Service Training: The Path to Becoming a Volunteer

Here I sit, on the other side of nine weeks of acclimating to Cambodia, fondly referred to as “Pre Service Training.” PST is a required element of all Peace Corps posts, and is generally just like watching tennis: you either love it and could do it anytime, anywhere OR you freaking hate it and one more second spent watching tennis (er…in PST) is one more moment where you just want to tear your eyeballs out with your bare hands.

Luckily, Chris and I both fell in the former camp, and thoroughly enjoyed PST. 

(Now, watching tennis, that’s a whole other topic. Don’t get me started.)

Throughout the nine week process of adjusting to the weather, studying the language every day, learning the realities of Cambodian classrooms, and getting used to be in a completely different cultural situation, I constantly had to remind myself that the real work begins when we become official volunteers. During PST, you have a schedule created for you- you have somewhere to be, something to do.  You have people responsible for ensuring that you at least try to learn to speak Khmer for three or more hours a day.  You have a built in support system in the form of 20+ other Americans in your training site, and you can meet any one of those Americans at any moment of the day inside the glorified gas station that has become your sanctuary (SANCTUARY!) due to air conditioning and the promise of ice cream bars and cold Coca Cola.  If you’re bored on a Sunday, you can bet that a fellow trainee will be up for some volleyball, or a bike ride, or has a Cambodia host sister that will paint your nails for you.  At the end of training, there is a language exam meant to give you a baseline of your skills and encourage you to study and practice more to fully integrate in our new country.

I loved and relished in every one of these realities during PST.

On the flip side, I know that some of my fellow trainees felt stifled by the scheduling of our time, by the requirement that we learn the language, actually try to use it on a daily basis (?) and pass a language exam to show our competence, and completely freaked out by the general atmosphere of training.  Many a times did I hear other trainees speak longingly of “when we’re volunteers.”

And I can’t help but ask, doesn’t the hard part begin NOW, now that we’re volunteers? Now that we don’t have a host country national willing at any moment to help us arrange a ride in a tuk-tuk for a fair price, to help us remember how to say “I don’t like dried fish stuffed with pig intestine, thank you,” or to simply help us figure out what our host grandmother meant when she said “hey-oh-way?” (For the record, it’s one way of asking if you’re hungry or not.)

Granted, I’ll admit that the freshman-dorm-like atmosphere that PST took on at times was frustrating, and I did have to remind myself that for many of my fellow trainees, this was their first step after college, and didn’t I have many of the same fears and remarks and attitudes in my first six months in TFA, teaching middle schoolers?

Of course I did.

And whether you’re 21, or 26, or 46, PST is a gauntlet you just have to survive- whether you flourish, perish, or complain the entire time is entirely up to your maturity, frame of mind, and desire to succeed.  I’m happy to say that Chris and I survived and lived to swear in. We both passed our language exam, and can pretty successfully navigate situations that were terrifying two short months ago, like going to the pagoda, or ordering food, or just chit-chatting with the ladies in the market.

Here’s to the next two years, and “finally being a volunteer.”

On the merging of blogs

I have been out of the United States for nearly 12 weeks, and I am beginning to question my sanity in keeping two separate blogs for my "life" and my "life in Cambodia."

I thought having a separate "travel" blog was good because I could write about specific travel type issues and thoughts and leave this blog for my daily ramblings.  It worked well as we went through the application process, but now...

Now, my daily ramblings ARE travel issues and thoughts.  It's getting...tiring maintaining two blogs and I have wracked my brain all this week trying to brainstorm separate topics for my travel blog and here.

So I need your help. Is it a good idea to keep the separate blogs? Should I simply merge them, and then be able to update things more frequently here?

I'd love your opinion!

Also, if you're on Google reader, hop over to my site because I spent a bit of time (and money, as we buy internet per KB here) on updating the design a bit. I bought the image off istock right before we left- I had credits expiring- and finally used it.  It's a nod to my former wedding life.

Happy Friday- I'm off to bed!

Update:
thank you all a ton for your thoughts!  consider it merged and i am already feeling a bit saner! you all rock.

fotos, days 7-11, cambodian sweat featured

we continue the parade of not so great fotos, featuring my mac's photobooth this time!  for some reason, i'm thinking using the photobooth app isn't what the original creators had in mind when they created this lovely little challenge- but in cambodia, you do what you do to get it done. you know?

day seven

fruit

pineapple, how i love thee, i could just count the ways! this week, topher made my favorite combo here in cambodia- stir fried pineapple and beef.  it's so delicious with some garlic and onion.  in khmer, pineapple is "plia minoah." go ahead and call it that!

day eight

a bad habit

i contemplated taking a picture of my battered cuticles, but photos never do them justice. so here is a photo of me that probably strikes you as quite normal.  and therein lies the issue. i have a terrible, no good, very bad habit of making ridiculous faces in photos.  i just can't smile nicely. there is some terrible urge that gurgles up in my belly to my face that shrieks "don't make just any face- don't you dare smile! smirk, or open that huge mouth, or look awkward. just dammit, don't smile!" thusly, i end up with 900 photos of me doing this face. you're welcome, future children.

day nine

someone i love

now just look at that handsome fella!  i have so many photos of this crazy kid, but his passport photos just seemed more appropriate, us living in cambodia and all.  take a gander at that sweet kid on the left- that's my darling husband at the ripe age of seventeen.  the right passport is our official peace corps passport, with a photo taken just in april of this year.  i just love the look of terror/kind of terrifying look on topher's face in his first passport.  just lights my fire, ya know?

day ten

childhood memory

ok. serious moment here.  from age ten to nineteen, i had the stirrings of obsessive-compulsive disorder.  for example, i had to only use white or tan or yellow towels.  getting out of the shower, i had to lightly kick the side of the tub ten times with each foot before getting out.  i had to turn the light on one-two-three times (because odd numbers are lucky, and evens just cancel any of the luck out.) i had to make my bed the same way before school or else i'd have a bad day.

which brings us to the hair ties.  this is the last remnant of my OCD.  to this day, i still have some weird belief in odd numbers being "better" or "luckier" (but the caveat is two or ten. ten is my number from sports/life, and two just seems so happy like a pair of mates in love, eh?!), so i still have to maintain three, five, or seven hair ties on my wrist at all times.  five is preferred, seven is next best, and three is just ok.  in this photo i have four on- because the fifth is in my hair.  this is completely fine, as long as the the hair tie safely returns to my wrist post-ponytail.

now, as you might imagine, this has led to many an interesting moments in recent adult years.  many friends (mainly women) have come to notice that i wear hair ties at all times, and thus will sometimes ask me to borrow (use/keep) a hair tie.  i love being of use and helpful, and i truly gladly hand over a spare hair tie. however, i then, covertly, remove another hair tie to ensure i have that odd number.  i also sometimes have a spare in my purse just for these moments, because i really do love sharing the hair ties! i just have to honor this last strange OCD tendency.

also, you get a picture of my weirdness because, really, what childhood memory do i have access to in cambodia to photograph?! exactly.

day eleven

something blue

and this here is the blue spoon i just used to eat some nutella.  i got it from a gas station mart here in my town, and i loved it for it's wonderful usefulness spooning chocolatey-hazelnut deliciousness out of the jar for me. thank you, blue spoon. thank you.

The Canon Almost DSLR SX40- Here at Amazon. 

and on a final note, here is a photo of the almost-dslr i wished i had saved up to purchase prior to the move to cambodia.  did you know my birthday is in eighteen days? and did you know you can in no way afford a camera like this, nor get it safely shipped to you while serving as a volunteer in this here country? le sigh.  i enjoy from afar and dream of the day two years from now when i can really ask husband for this lovely little item.  it's just the perfect little gateway camera to a real dslr, don't you think?!

that gets me thinking i should do a 'when i turn twenty eight out of the peace corps birthday wishlist' post. i've never done one of those little wish list posts before, but this could the perfect time to start...

thoughts, comments or reactions?

Joining the October Photography Challenge...from 11,000 Miles Away!

I had a good internet source and an hour to spare today and I got the chance to catch up on many of my favorite blogs!  In perusing these said blogs, I found the October 2011 Photography Challenge from my fellow bee alum at Our Wired Lives and I said "I may live in Southeast Asia with my crappy point and shoot, but dammit, I'm in!"

You know, a week late.

But still. I'm in!  And here are my first six photos, in which I cheat a little bit because they're mainly from the last month or so, but from photo seven on, they will all be from the correct day!

Day One: A Self Portrait

Two: What you wore today

Granted, this is from a few weeks ago.  However, it in essence captures how I spend the professional part of my day- in a Khmer skirt, called a sampot, and a shirt I had made for me here in Cambodia.

Three: Clouds

A view of clouds from the back window of our training home.

Four: Something Green

And pink!

Five: From a High Angle

New friends from the inside of an elevator in Phnom Penh

Six: Low Angle

My first "frozen" drink ever in this country. A Pina Colada!

I'm excited to see what else friends in the challenge have taken!

Official & Have Awesome Shirt to Prove It!

A week ago, 59 Americans starved for cheese, air conditioning and anything but rice descended upon Phnom Penh for five days of fun and our official Swearing In as Peace Corps Volunteers!

Though the days were marked with great trainings, the real focus (sorry PC Cambodia!) had to be the food. Fellow trainees and I had been planning these five days of western food with great care. Priorities included Mexican, Italian, good breakfasts, cheesecake and in general all types of food that we won’t get for two months after we move to permanent site.

Eating delicious western food!

With our goals aligned, we pursued these ends to great success.  Some (ahem, Chris) may have suffered the ill effects every single morning of dairy products on their system, while others were quite able to eat a pizza, and then a cheeseburger, and then a chocolate and caramel tart and wake up refreshed and ready for more come daylight. Sorry husband! J So worth it though, no?

CHEESE!

After four days of cheese and more cheese, the time arrived for our official swear in as volunteers.  For the momentous occasion, fellow trainee friends and I had “wedding shirts” made.  These special occasion shirts are a bright or white color and made of the most uncomfortable polyester fabric imaginable, and covered in sequins and all manner of sparkle.

You know you want a shirt just like these!

They are, put simply, awesome.

So donned in these beautiful, albeit uncomfortable Khmer clothes, we took our solemn oath and became the official fifth group of Peace Corps Volunteers to enter Cambodia.  You can read an official news report here! I’m famous!

After one more day in Phnom Penh (and a few more meals centered around, what else, cheese), we backed our bags and bussed it to our new permanent home. 

I haven’t dived deeply into our permanent home due to a desire to play it safe, but know that we’re in the same province in which we did our training, living in the provincial town. Because I work in analogies, imagine this:

• A province is to Cambodia as a state is to America.
• A provincial town is to Cambodia as a state capital is to America.
• A district town is to Cambodia as a “larger” town is to America.

We live in a provincial town, though of the 25+  provinces in Cambodia, our provincial town is not the largest, nor the most modern or populated.  It IS the most populated, modern city in our province, but many other provinces- like Siem Reap, where Angkor Wat is, or Battambang, also in the North, near Thailand- have much larger provincial towns, with commodities similar to Phnom Penh.  Commodities meaning western food, access to reliable travel out of Cambodia and the like.  Our new home has two small universities, a teacher training center (where I work), two high schools, many primary schools, and one “western” food restaurant- called GFC, where you can buy fried chicken, fries, and something resembling pizza and burgers (though the pizza apparently has no cheese and comes with small shrimp. Hrmmm...)

But the kicker of permanent site is our home. Our abode is nothing like either of us expected when we joined the Peace Corps.  As a married couple, the amazing Peace Corps staff works incredibly hard to ensure we have a small semblance of privacy.  They worked wonders for us.  

We are living in a small home on the same land as our host family’s home. Yes, we have a separate home/building all to ourselves.  This gorgeous home has a gas stove, “running” water (we still bucket flush, but WOAH! A shower head!), a refrigerator and even a washing machine.  

We also have a small room for guests with a separate bed, and our own common room space with a small television.  

In PC, there’s a term for this- “Posh Corps.” It took Chris and I a few days to adjust to the guilt we felt settling over us when we visited our home a few weeks back.  But now, we’re reminded that everyone’s situation is different, we appreciate our good fortune, and are looking forward to many visitors, Peace Corps and family alike in our guest room!

*You can read this post, plus another one at my Travel Blog at www.marshmellowtravels.blogspot.com 

Pchum Ben and Saying Goodbye

In the final week of training, we enjoyed our first Cambodia holiday with our host families.  Pchum Ben is a fifteen day holiday, wherein Cambodian pay respects to their ancestors and the local monks by offering food and thanks in a variety of traditional Buddhist ceremonies.  For our family, Pchum Ben meant a two hour Sunday morning spent offering food (rice, tea, etc), money and prayers to some of the monks from our nearby wat (pagoda) at our family altar (like a mini pagoda across the street from our house).  Chris and I were in many ways the spectacle for the extended family in attendance and our grandmother made sure that we sat close to the monks as they prayed for health, safety, a good harvest and general well being of our “family.”

A week later, our grandmother’s three grandchildren were staying with us and roused us at four in the morning to attend one of the biggest ceremonies of Pchum Ben- the offering of food and water to ghosts in various places around the local wat. 

Once again, Chris and I proved quite the spectacle for the hundreds of Cambodians gathered in the darkness.  After a bit of praying, incense burning, and general hilarity as I observed Chris trying to sit properly on the hard ground, the ceremony of throwing food for the ghosts began. So, covered in the smoke from the incense, Chris and I proceeded to walk three times around the wat, shaking bottled water and throwing fruit in eight distinct places around the wat for the ghosts to enjoy. 

Ending our training with our host families during the week of Pchum Ben was bittersweet- our final days were spent with many people, in a formerly quiet house that was louder than we’d ever heard it, enjoying food and being pressured to drink beer.  You know.

Our grandmother was so happy having her grandchildren, their spouses and children all around, and when the day before our departure arrived, it became clear that all of the children- Chris and I included- would be leaving the same time the next day.  I was shocked to see tears spring to our grandmother’s eyes and slip down her cheeks, especially as we gave her the small gifts we had bought for her to thank her for the previous two months.  She made us promise to return to visit, and made sure we knew that we were now her “goan”- children- too and she loved us as she loved her other children.

There aren’t many more words about this topic- saying goodbye was harder that we imagined, but we’re lucky because our permanent site is in the same province and just thirty minutes away from our training village and our Cambodian grandmother. 

an update

it's amazing to me that we have now officially been living in cambodia for seven weeks. that's nearly fifty days people!

let's visit the basic stats, shall we?

two days in: i was questioning my ability to truly last in a country wherein i never stopped sweating. there may have been a fifteen minute freak out moment upon our arrival in our training province hub site, in which chris had to take over carrying luggage, help me unbutton my soaked shirt, and aim the fan directly at my face.

update, forty nine days in: the heat is still delibating at times, but it's more of a fact of life now rather than a cause for freak out. yes, i still drip six days out of seven; yes, there is rarely a moment that you can't see the sheen of sweat on my forehead and chin; yes, you can count the number of days i have lasted with my hair down all day on one hand and yes, it is stifling at times. But, it's also less frustrating, and easily solvable with a quick bucket shower or five minutes in front of a fan, or ten minutes sitting in the shade.

i will add though, that sweat (and thusly, i) have nearly ruined one bra already and desparately need new camisoles.

one week in: i could say hello, my name is kate, i am from america and i am a teacher in stilted and probably questionable khmai.

update, forty nine days in: i can't exactly speak for the questionable sort, but i have definitely progressed from a two year old child to perhaps a four year old child's language ability. i now catch between 30-50% of the words being said (if i understand the general context) and nearly 70% when i know the exact topic and am listening very intently. i pick up humor, can use it (kind of), and feel somewhat confident that sentences i create are generally clear and more than half the time correct. my vocabulary is definitely still incredibly limited (thus, if you plopped me down in a conversation randomly, my understanding would probably be very much less), but i (and i believe the same is true for chris, if he doesn't mind me speaking for him) love learning the language. we all took a practice language test about a week ago (our real one is in, gulp, one week) and chris and i, it seems/we hope, will pass the real one. we have to be at the novice high level, and we both placed in the intermediate level- chris at low and me at mid. we've heard though that most volunteers usually test a step lower than their practice test, but of course, because it's me, i am bound and determined to keep my intermediate mid. wish me luck. dammit.

two weeks in: chris and i discovered a scale at a restaurant/hotel near the temple where we study, and stepping on that scale were astonished to find we'd both dropped just over two kilos, or five pounds each.

update, forty nine days in: chris is wasting away, and i am just plain getting less fat. we've both lost about fifteen pounds at this point, putting dear husband perilously close to his freshman year of college weight, and getting me ever closer to the coveted pre-marriage weight. le sigh. we still eat a lot of rice, but it seems that overall, we eat less and are moving more on our bikes. all those diet fads can fade away, but there may be a rush on cambodia visas once women discover that moving to a tropical country where you sweat a pound a day, have very limited access to snack foods, and have to bike at least five miles a day may just be the secret to a healthy lifestyle.

seven weeks in, i can honestly say it's truly fantastic to have a husband to serve with. especially since that husband is chris. we haven't spent this much time together since college (and even then never 24 hours together!) and it is honestly one of the best parts of this experience. we laugh at the absurdities of life, study with each other, and in general have very minimal issues with each other as we navigate this new world. cheesy, but true. and on that note, expect an update in a few days with pictures of our permanent home which we are currently visiting!