Author: Charles Dittmeier

We Grow ’em Big Here

The tropics are great incubators for big bugs and we have our share of big cockroaches.  We have so many of them that the locals just take them for granted and don’t even react to them.  They are very active at night and on any trip down to the kitchen after dark, they will be in full control–running all over the kitchen counter (where this one is) and going in and out under the backdoor.  And then on any given morning 3-5 of them could be lying on their backs dead or moribund in the kitchen, another 2-3 in the breakfast area, another few in the living room, etc.  They are just a fact of life.  I was really surprised yesterday because I was in a parking lot and one big roach started sauntering across and a Cambodian man stepped on it!  Usually it’s only the foreigners who freak out at them.

Rainy Day Scenes

It rains almost every afternoon now in the Cambodian rainy season and there was a light rain this evening as I came back across town after a wedding rehearsal.  Here is how some people coped with the wet:

If you’re on the back of a motorcycle and don’t have your own raincoat, your line of sight is rather severely restricted. Most people, like this young woman under the driver’s poncho, prefer to be dry than to see where they are going.
As the rain lessened, though, she peeked out from under the poncho.
A less common sight on rainy days is someone driving with an umbrella. You really need to drive slowly to keep it in your hand.

Nobody Else Is Using the Wires!

This is a combination shop you wouldn’t see much in the US.  On the left is a small eatery, selling pre-cooked foods selected by the customer from large pots hopefully covered with lids to keep out the dust.  Muslim customers (this is near a Muslin neighborhood) can eat with no qualms because the sign assures all the food is halal.  On the right, in the contraption on wheels made from chicken wire and shelves, the proprietors are selling all sorts of metal hand tools and utensils–machetes, axes, shovels, hoes, scythes, etc.  To protect their merchandise and their customers, they are hanging a tarpaulin to block the sun and rain.  They are tieing it to the telephone lines, probably figuring it won’t bother anyone–and probably figuring that half of them are non-functioning anyway.

Unexpected Twists and Turns

Yesterday I came back from Bangkok and was planning to post about Day 2 in the city there but when I got home there were a multitude of disruptions that prevented me from getting to this website.

The same happened again today.  I was preparing this evening to start work on a post here and Mother Teresa’s sisters called and asked me to take a mass for them across town early tomorrow morning.  That meant I had to prepare a homily so that shot the website again.

I’ll get something posted tomorrow, though!

Not So Good…

Yesterday I promised a post here, from the guest house in Bangkok, if everything was going OK.  Well, it’s not going OK so I’m going to have to leave it at this short notice and hope the new guest house tomorrow has better wi-fi.

On the Road Again

Tomorrow I have a meeting of all the Phnom Penh priests in the morning and then head from there to the airport for a trip to Bangkok for a medical exam.  If all goes well, I’ll be able to post here tomorrow from the Bangkok Christian Guest House where most Maryknollers stay.

Fresh from the Oven

When I was a kid, the Tastee Bread company trucks—emblazoned with the slogan “Baked while you sleep”—rumbled around early-morning Louisville delivering bread to the grocery stores.   This woman’s bread is also probably baked while everyone is sleeping, but she doesn’t have any truck with a logo and has to be content with singing out “Num bung,” the Khmer word for bread, to alert her customers.