Dittmeier’s Own…

These Dittmeier’s Own postings are a series of photos of places I frequent and utilize here in Cambodia.

This is Jack, owner of Jack Repair Bicycle shop in Phnom Penh. He’s holding my bicycle on which he just put a new rear wheel after the rim somehow got bent. Jack’s shop is on my way to the Deaf Development Programme so it makes it very convenient to have repairs done. And he speaks excellent English which really helps when I’m trying to explain some bicycle quirk. (I don’t know where he got the name Jack. Maybe some customer called him that? It certainly isn’t a Cambodian name).

Moving in…

Most of the staff were off from work today, making use of their remaining days of annual leave, but students from our barber shop came to help the maintenance man in our new building. Probably a whiteboard is going on that wall.

Not so fast….

We moved a lot of office furniture and boxes to our new building but we have been slow in unpacking and setting up the new office configurations. Mostly that is due to moving at the end of the year when a lot of staff are taking days off, using their annual leave.

Mass on Christmas Day

For mass on Christmas morning, we moved from the small chapel (where we can seat only 100 persons) to the large upstairs church used by the Khmer community. We had to bring in chairs because they sit on mats on the floor and we had to take off our shoes as they do, but it was a very comfortable worship space that enabled us to welcome more people.

The Khmer community had copiously decorated the sanctuary for their own liturgy before ours.
In Khmer masses where the people sit on the floor, the priest presides from a sitting position instead of the usual standing position.
The sanctuary area of this church is very “busy” visually.
The Christmas crib or creche was a bit different. Made from 25-lb bags of rice, it looked something like a military bunker.

Preparing to move

We are moving our office from one building on our compound to another building and it has been a slow and complicated process. There have been delays getting the new building ready and it has taken a lot of time to empty cabinets and pack materials for the short journey.

Here the sign language department prepares materials for the move which is planned by the end of the month.

Inclusive Employment Workshop

We had a workshop today to discuss and promote inclusive employment for people with disabilities. It was quite good, much better than what I usually expect from such workshops. Soknym, our DDP director, and I attended to give more voice to the deaf community.

Representatives from industry, especially the garment manufacturers, from the Ministry of Labor, and from NGOs attended.
We provided a sign language interpreter (seated, grey blouse) for two young deaf men who attended.
Later one of the deaf men reported from one of the six discussion groups that were the last activity of the afternoon.

Graduation Day

Today was graduation day at the Maryknoll Deaf Development Programme. We had students finishing Year 2 of our Education Project and other students finishing their work in the Job Training Project. Here DDP director Sau Soknym speaks to all the students before handing out certificates.

A fried returns…

More than fifteen years ago, Fr. Hung Nguyen and I were Maryknoll associate priests together here in Cambodia. After his term, Hung returned to his diocese in Seattle, Washington where he has been pastor of different parishes. Now on a visit to Cambodia, he joined us today for our liturgy and dinner. Here he is speaking with Hang Tran, a Maryknoll lay missioner.