Charlie Dittmeier's Home Page
Happenings in the Maryknoll world, especially in the Cambodia Mission Team.
Today, in place of our regular Wednesday meeting, members of Maryknoll Cambodia gathered to decorate the Maryknoll office and to decorate some Christmas cookies. And then we had a wonderful spaghetti meal together with a couple colleagues who usually join us for liturgy and dinner.
I went to check what the tech wizards at Maryknoll had done with the video I sent them about DDP—and it didn’t come out the way they said it would! The proposal was for me to send a video that they would edit into three sections for the Saturday, Sunday, and Monday before tomorrow’s Giving Tuesday.
Instead it looks like they used the whole enchilada, all 26 minutes of video except for some transitions and introductions I had included.
You can take a look at: www.maryknollsociety.org/givingtuesday/
Something in Firefox or in the Maryknoll webpage won’t allow me to put a clickable link here so you will have to click on the address above and then copy-and-paste it into your browser address line. Sorry about that!
Thanks for any help you can give!
I’m not that familiar with Giving Tuesday (that started after I left the United States) but two weeks ago the Maryknoll priests group contacted me to say they wanted to feature the Maryknoll Deaf Development Programme here in Cambodia in their Giving Tuesday appeal. I made some videos for them and they were supposed to start posting them over this past weekend.
Here is the link: https://maryknollsociety.org/givingtuesday/
There was a still photo there when I checked on the weekend but I encourage you both to take a look at the videos (we were trying to explain more about deafness) and to make a donation. We are in a bad situation because of reduced donations to our funders because of Covid-19.
Maryknoll Cambodia celebrated Thanksgiving on Wednesday this year. We normally meet every Wednesday and have a woman who cooks for us on that day so to fit everyone’s schedule, it was easier just to celebrate the holiday a day early. No one would notice here
This is the dining room in the “new” Maryknoll office we moved into a week ago. This used to be the kitchen (see the water pipe still sticking out of the wall beside the microwave) but for some reason they moved the kitchen through the door and outside, under just a tin roof. We used to keep this window and door open but found rats can enter the outdoor kitchen and then hop through this window and door into the dining room and the rest of the house.
This is the kitchen now, outside. Notice the door with no glass or screen so that cats and rodents can easily come in. There is enough room for them to squeeze under the door if they don’t want to jump through the door.
This is a window on the side wall of the now dining room. We asked the landlord to put screens on the windows and he did. They are plastic screens and as soon as the first rat heard we had moved in, he chewed through the plastic (see the corner) and started going through the food in the dining room. As a consequence we now keep the windows closed and locked.
To try and reduce our rodent problem, I have set a rat trap in the now kitchen, hoping to catch whatever might come under the door in the background.
Because we have always rented our Maryknoll office rather than buy land (difficult for foreigners in Cambodia) and because our numbers have changed, we have moved quite a bit. 2021 will be remembered as one of the years we made a move. Click here for some scenes from the action.
Finally the big moving day arrived. We recruited our motordupe and tuk-tuk drivers to help out for the day, and then all that rattan furniture went on to the big of a rented truck.
Tomorrow, Wednesday, August 25th, there may not be a posting here on the website because I’m not sure how soon and how easily I will be able to set up everything in the new place. Also, although we ordered in advance, I don’t know if the wi-fi will be installed and ready to go. See you Thursday for sure!
Tomorrow is moving day for Maryknoll Cambodia. On Wednesday we move from our old office on Street 320 to a smaller building. So far this week we have been packing and gathering furniture. It’s interesting to note how much of our furniture is rattan, the choice of foreigners because it’s light and easy to move and not so expensive.