lessons learned, [part b]

Months ago, I began reflecting.  I shared the first part of my reflections, mostly around living in Cambodia and working as a Peace Corps Volunteer.  This time around, I've written what I feel like I learned about myself these last few years.  I read somewhere, a long time ago, that your brain reaches its adult development actually-developed-stage somewhere around 28.  Which, funnily enough, is just where I am.  So maybe I'm actually at a point where I can process and internalize all the learning and growing I've supposedly been engaged in?  Maybe.  But this is my current best attempt.  As I've learned, I still learn every single day.

....

And then there's what I know about myself, because of the time I've spent in Cambodia. Namely, humility is where it begins and ends. True humility- being humble in the face of adversity, of frustration, anger, miscommunication, misunderstanding, embarrassment- is really, incredibly difficult. It can be painful and disheartening.

Human truth: I have a small amount of knowledge and often, I'm guessing-and-testing what I'm doing the majority of the time. I have a small set of skills in a small set of areas. What I know compared to what I don't is a semi colon compared an entire novel.

[what I know : what I don't :: 1 semi-colon : 300 page novel]

Coupled with humility is patience.

Both I learned to a great extent as a PCV. Everything- EVERYTHING- takes time. Patience is practically a pre-requisitive to living. Patience in people, projects, myself. Patience to allow others to think, respond, change, grow.  Patience to give myself room to develop, learn, adjust and create.

Patience.

Also, turns out, I'm an incredibly passionate person (ha! for those who know me.) With that characteristic, sometimes my emotions are too quickly expressed, too easily seen. Living within a culture in Cambodia where it is best to not reveal one's feelings so readily or quickly, I learned (or, I've begun learning how) to control my reactions, responses and feelings. I'm not perfect, but I'm more likely to withhold my immediate emotion and let myself get more information before I make a permanent decision on my reaction. 

Life is, honestly, 80% reaction.  And I actually have complete control over that eighty percent.  Which is the majority of my life, in fact. 

Finally, communication is not the art of convincing others: it's sharing, listening, disagreeing, learning and sometimes it's complete silence.  Communication does not mean being heard; it means hearing.  And damn it, but that shit is hard.

...

Of course, there is also the lighter side of it: what my PCV peers feel like they 'learned about me' while working alongside me in Cambodia.  And perhaps it should offer me some greater insight into how I'm perceived and continually remind me that I ought to try a bit harder for that humility thing (erm, people thinking I am consistently judging people/events is probably not the best way to exhibit or grow my ability to be humble.)  But these assessments of me also make me smile, which is a worthwhile thing.  So...there's that.

And here's this:

I am, apparently...

Most likely to be thinking how she could have better organized this event

Most likely to be baking

Smartest

Most Professional

Most Evocative of Hermione Granger


and really it's that last one that, if I could really embody smart, brave, loyal Hermione, life would be all good.

What have you learned about yourself recently?

spaces, recently

I've always been more of words-person: pictures are great and all, but it's doodles of words that I'd use during school.  But I think visuals are helpful here as I try to think about what the last five weeks have been and looked like.

I must say: the new group of trainees are not only fantastic, but they are getting it good with their training digs.  Air conditioning and comfortable seats? Best location for weekly 'hubsite' days EVER.

Sweet!

Swapping training ideas and daily occurrences has been a pleasure with this woman:

And leading training sessions in this swag of a place has been, honestly, amazing.

Those chairs are usually arranged in a much more conducive-to-discussion manner, and these fancy seats pictured below are not usually present when I'm up there, pacing and talking.

In an effort to provide some color in the very bright and somewhat sterile place, I've gotten in touch with my teacherly-poster-making roots and created some super fancy (ha) reminders of why we're (me and my beautiful trainees) there everyday:

the goals and core expectations of Peace Corps Volunteers:

My own goals for their technical training:

Mix those in with some basic reminder posters of the topics we've covered, and these guys:

And you've got yourself a pretty fancy training space.

And each evening, I head home, weary of talking but invigorated by my trainees, to this place:

'home'

Yes, that is NCIS on, and how did I never realize how ridiculously engrossing those weird cop-law-justice shows are?

Also, a pretty sweet purple bathroom, yo:

And these two spaces have been the entirety of life here for this woman.

the abandoned _________

Despite life moving at a rapid pace the last three weeks, there still seems to be an alarming lack of things to report.

In fact, everything settled into such a rhythm that I eventually took my camera out of my bag and realized: what would I be taking a picture of?  And of course, as I write this, I am wishing I'd had the foresight to take a picture of the two rooms that have been my life the last two weeks: my training space where I lead about seven hours of sessions each day with 29 fresh (and pretty fantastic) new trainees and my hotel room where I eat, sleep and plan said sessions.

But good things that I didn't yet share? That guy up there got home, safe and sound.  And he's been having a grand time, though he kindly doesn't regale me too much with many stories of the awesomeness of the U.S.  Funnily, Topher did take a trip to visit my parents and our dog, while I watched from afar.  As strange as it was to have my husband with my parents without me there, I think everyone had a great time, dog included.  I am already looking forward to visiting them myself when I return next month, and bringing the el puppito back home with me. 

I have learned that a rice cooker is quite multi-purpose and can serve as a great tool for boiling water for pasta and that cheese and crackers is a more than an acceptable meal for a grown woman.  I mean, if that said woman is me, of course, and Topher isn't around to chastise me.  I have also learned that I and my fellow short-term-contracted-staff-member drink FAR too much Coca-cola and neither of us harbor any qualms at doing so.  We're not proud, of course; it's a simple, straight forward fact that we both require approximately two cans of the sweet, dark liquid to operate properly each day.

And that about sums it up.  Mix in a good bit of Law and Order: SVU and/or NCIS each evening as I plan (HBO magically disappeared from the hotel channel list) and a strict avoidance of the 'what job should I be searching for?' question, and you've got yourself the last few weeks of this gal's life.

But what I really need to know is:

What should I really be looking forward to about America in five weeks?


And,

go!

a new kind of wine...

While in Siem Reap visiting Angkor Wat for the third and final (for a while, at least) time, Topher and I went on an adventure with four other Volunteers: rice wine tasting!

Now, usually rice wine is not something you 'taste.'  If you're me, it's something you avoid.  It burns, it's not delicious and it's typically only offered by already-drunk men at weddings.  It also might kill you, as it can be homemade and then sometimes stored in bottles once used to store terrible, deathly chemicals.

I digress.

This rice wine is being produced safely and deliciously by a couple in northern Cambodia.  And the best part is that they are infusing it with all sorts of fantastic things.

At our tasting, we sampled every single flavor- from mango and green chili to banana and cinnamon.  Other highlights were a coconut pineapple and green tea orange.  Yes.

I never would have guessed but my favorite was coffee and anise.  Anise, like black licorice? Which I typically hate? But it's amazing.  Topher's fave was the banana and cinnamon (you could not have designed two flavors he likes more.  And in one bottle, alcoholic and all? Done.)

The bottles are also hand-painted with some sweet Cambodia scenes by some local young artists. 

And of course, these hand-brewed, hand-painted and hand-bottled flasks of wine were just twelve dollars each.  Which I don't think is a lot, but I can't really tell anymore? So, you'll have to let me know in the comments if that is actually a great deal or I'm nuts.

I'm excited to bake with the banana cinnamon and add some of that coffee anise rice wine to some Bailey's!

Have you ever had rice wine?

and they usually only make fun of bachelors...

If there was an award for least likely to eat correctly unless someone else is cooking for them, I would, hands down, win.

I am not proud of that fact.

However!

I am proud of this grocery trip's outcome:

Wine, diet coke, cereal, ice cream and all-the-cheesy-chips-bag.

It's ever so strange being here in Cambodia sans-Topher.  I often don't know what to do with myself when I turn to say something to him...and he's not there. 

Plus, there is no one to eat my yucky pretzels from my otherwise perfect bag of snacks.

Go ahead, tell me what you really think of my grocery store decisions.

july

It's July.

JOOOOOO LYYEEEEEEEEEE.

That's how I've been saying it my head all week long.  Slowly and methodically and disbelievingly.

A lot has happened in July thus far. So much that I haven't really taken a moment to fully process it, and thusly, write about it here.

So let's recap:

We visited Angkor Wat one final time.  I got so many braided string bracelets, I feel like I've got good luck and health going for me forever.  Which I'm so celebrating and counting on!


We left our provincial site in Takeo.  We said goodbye to our family.

We ended our time as Volunteers and officially became Returned Peace Corps Volunteers.


This ending involved a lot - too many- goodbyes with fabulous people, including these women:

This guy had to go home, without me.


I may or may not have hurt my toe somewhat badly.

I have, and continue to, work endless hours preparing session plans for the incoming group of Volunteers.   There are no fun pictures, because it's me, at a computer, typing and occasionally staring as I think something through.  Maybe it's a lot of staring? I can't really tell.  (I talked about what I'm doing in Cambodia while Topher is home here.)

And I've been working alongside this awesome woman, who is managing the health education program side of training for the new group.  (Cambodia has two main programs- English Teaching/Teacher Training and Community Health Education.)

It still doesn't seem like 2013 could actually be half over, but I guess I have to believe the tick of time.

How has your July been thus far, world?

all the emotions

Life since last Monday has been an intense whirlwind.

From cleaning our entire house and finishing packing all on Monday, saying goodbye to our final (for now, from me), to then diving headfirst into all the beginnings of my new position and just beginning to resurface to prepare to say goodbye to Topher, I'm FEELING ALL THE FEELINGS.

Feeling them all so much that I'm really not even in a place to begin to process which ones I'm feeling at which moments, and I'm not really at all emotionally prepared to bid farewell to my husband and a large portion of the Volunteer friends I've made this upcoming Wednesday.

Tonight, as I vigorously typed away on a tab in my excel planning document, my host mom called. 

Just to say hello, ya know?  Catch up.  Ask me if Chris would be returning to Takeo before he headed home.  Ask if I was too busy or taking time to rest.

Tuesday, our final day at site as Volunteers, was more than I imagined.  Hilarious, loving, and bitterly, sweetly sad.  I wish there was a better way to explain how it manifested than to say 'everyone was crying as we climbed into our taxi' but that's the simple reality of the situation.


Less than a week after pulling away, and I'm already looking forward to returning during some downtime on Sunday evenings to visit my Khmer family.

A family meal is a family meal is a family meal.

Family portrait time.  Happier than we look, I swear.

The last meal of delicious fried pork ribs, large ant and larvae, small fried fish, and yummy soup made with chicken we had leftover from a grocery purchase in Phnom Penh.

I will forever be trying to make those kids laugh.