Welcome to Cambodia, and….. – Charlie Dittmeier's Home Page

Breakfast

Here’s a cozy little breakfast nook on a street near us. It’s affordable and informal–you don’t even need to take your helmet off!

Roast Pig

Where do you get your roast pigs? We can buy ours right on the sidewalk. Don’t even need to get off your motorcycle.

Notable Quotes

Contrasting Styles

Classical Cambodian dancers

Irish dancers in Louisville, Kentucky

Sitting Alone

Early morning on the sidewalk….

CACD: 1st quarterly meeting

The Catholic Alliance for Charity and Development (CACD) is the social outreach arm of the Catholic Church of Phnom Penh. Maryknoll participates because of our projects with deafness, mental illness, and education. Today the topic was the role of technology and digitalization in serving the poor, and an amazing presentation was given by Mr. Sok Sopheakmonkol who demonstrated what artificial intelligence can do to assist NGOs like ours.

A second presentation about software and technology in monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning in NGOs was given by Mr. Art Kirby, the director of Catholic Relief Services in Cambodia.

It was quite and interesting and informative afternoon!

International Lay Missioners–March

A group of lay missioners from various countries tries to get together in Phnom Penh almost every month for socializing and talking shop and just being together in a place away from home.

The group that met today had missioners from Italy, the Philippines, Korea, Haiti, Kenya, Honduras, Cambodia, and the United States.

The format and content of the gatherings varies. Today Jesuit Fr. Ingun Kang spoke about his work with interreligious dialogue, especially with Buddhism.

Fr. Ingun is on a Vatican commission promoting interreligious dialogue around the world.

After his presentation the group continued talking and questioning with some snacks.

You can find it on the streets

Just about anything that can be grilled, roasted, fried, boiled, or eaten raw can be found on Phnom Penh’s food carts. The cart in the rear sells ramen noodles with a little meat and vegetables on top. I’m not sure what’s in the cakes roasting on the grill.

Why?

An enduring mystery for me about Cambodia is one of their driving quirks: drivers of three- and four-wheel vehicles don’t drive in the middle of the lane as might be expected. Instead it is normal for the driver to straddle the lane marker–not to center the car or tuk-tuk on the white line but rather to make sure one wheel is over the line. In this photo of a three-wheel tuk-tuk on a definitely not-crowded street, the right wheel straddles the lane marker. Why do they do that?

Homegrown

Life is simpler in Cambodia in many ways. Here a group of deaf students and their teacher really celebrate picking a jackfruit from a tree on the DDP grounds and just enjoying it together!