Author: Charles Dittmeier

Notable Quotes

“The One and Triune God, dear brothers and sisters, must be manifested in this way–with deeds rather than words. God, who is the author of life, is transmitted not so much through books as through witness of life.”

Pope Francis

Hey, I paid for it!

It’s common practice for friends of the ruling political party to donate $300,000 (the minimum) or more to the party and then be named as an okhna (aka rich-person-sucking-up-to-the-government). You can prefix the title whenever you write your name so everyone will know you’re rich.

Mr. KONG SOM OL went a bit further (probably gave more money) and got Blvd 2004 named after himself. After paying all that money, you don’t want to waste any of the glory so he had his whole title prefixed to his name. It makes for a useless street sign in English but this whole thing isn’t about being useful.

The Maryknoll Kitchen

I have learned after 35+ years of living overseas how difficult it is to describe realities in Asia to people who literally cannot visualize things as they are here because of their experience of similar realities in their own homes or cities or lives. People need to see and experience to really understand.

Here are some photos of the Maryknoll kitchen at our present office. I’ll try to point out some of the unusual features and differences from a US kitchen.

The Maryknoll kitchen was originally an open shed behind the rear wall of the house (the wall on the right in the above photo). Preparation of food and cooking (on charcoal in clay pots) was done on the concrete and tile counter on the left. The rear door of the house (to the right of the refrigerator in the photo) is now a door from the dining room into the kitchen which has been enclosed over the years with the sheets of metal seen above the lower tile walls. Our stove works on a tank of propane gas. Most kitchens like this would still use charcoal pots for cooking.



This is a longer view of the actually narrow kitchen, to give a better perspective on its size and shape. When we moved in six months ago, we asked the landlord to put in a real sink. Previously the concrete counter extended toward the camera, where the meal sink is now, and the sink was just a square concrete hole in the counter.

This is a view from near the refrigerator, looking in the opposite direction. The blue downspouts drain rain water off the fourth-floor roof. The little retaining barrier on the floor creates an area on the floor where clothes or large pots and pans could be washed without the water running across the kitchen floor.

This photo, from a slightly different angle, shows an exterior door that leads to what used to be a narrow walkway between the house and the wall of the next door building. When we moved in, the door was just an outside door with a metal grill. When we immediately started having problems with rats, we put glass in the door behind the grill to block them. Even with a rubber strip at the bottom of the door, there is still enough room for mice to get in, however.

Mice in the House

Almost a month ago, after spotting a rat in our kitchen I put out some poison and eliminated one rat that took the bait. Then last week two times I saw two different mice on the kitchen counter. This time I tried the glue trap which will hold a smaller and weaker mouse but maybe not a rat. I put the trap on the kitchen floor last night and this morning I found FIVE mice in the trap! I’m going to wait a day and then put another trap out. There’s never just one mouse and even after catching five, there is probably still a large nest full of them.

Morning Offering


This woman is one of the staff from a local dentist’s office. One of her early morning tasks after she opens the doors in the morning is to make an offering of incense in the little shrine high up on the door frame. This is to keep all the spirits happy.

Thumb Prints

Probably most contracts and agreements in Cambodia are signed with thumbprints rather than written signatures although the latter are becoming more popular. Today I had to “sign” a rental agreement and our director had this handy little pocket ink pad for making thumb prints.

Booster #3

Today the members of Maryknoll Cambodia NGO received their fifth injection of the anti-Covid vaccine. It was booster shot #3. Our first three injections were AstraZeneca vaccine and the last two were Pfizer. Will they offer protection against the B5 variant that is spreading?