Charlie Dittmeier's Home Page
Today is the summer solstice, the longest day and shortest night of the year in the northern hemisphere. The weather is really hot in many countries this year because of climate change, and it’s certainly hot here in Phnom Penh. One enterprising vendor is taking advantage of that, offering all sizes, shapes, and colors of inflatable pools. From what I have seen around town, business has been good for him!
Greetings… I have a big Maryknoll transition coming up at the end of June. The Maryknoll Society (priests and brothers) are no longer going to renew my contract—they say I’m too old–and I am going to move my contract to the Maryknoll Lay Missioners. I want to explain more about that in upcoming posts but I need first to make two requests:
1. My present e-mail address–cdittmeier@maryknoll.org—will no longer be valid after 30 June 2022. Instead my main address will become cdittmeier@gmail.com. Please go ahead and change my address NOW in your e-mail lists so that we can keep in touch.
2. Many people have supported the deaf ministry over the last 35 years by sending donations to my Mission Account administered by the Maryknoll Society. Like my e-mail address, my Mission Account will cease functioning at the end of June so please do not send any further donations to my Mission Account at Maryknoll, NY. Again, more about that to come.
I had planned to initiate this transition process at the beginning of May but that planning was BEFORE I had kidney surgery, BEFORE I got Covid, and BEFORE the Maryknoll Society e-mail server started acting up after a security upgrade, choking off my e-mail communications.
I’ll be back with more about what’s happening….
Rats are very much a part of life here in Phnom Penh. The local people see them as something to live with but the foreigners try to eliminate them. Click here for some pictures about rats at the Maryknoll office.
I just spent several hours online trying to complete some paperwork for Maryknoll. It took a LOT longer than expected and now it is really late and I need to get up early. I’ll be back tomorrow! Sorry!
One of the things the Catholic Church can do in a mission context is take the lead when new situations are encountered or society gains a new awareness. Such an area in Cambodia is autism. So much is being written about autism in the US and there are so many programs set up to work with children with autism. It’s a rather new issue in Cambodia—the awareness of autism, not children with autism who have always been there.
Many of the Catholic parishes now have programs to help children with autism and their parents, and today at the quarterly meeting of the Catholic Alliance for Charity and Development, a subgroup working on disabilities discussed an upcoming program to be presented by an experienced practitioner from Australia.
I posted some photos from the Maryknoll house in Bangkok while I stayed there for almost two weeks. Brother John Beeching was one of the pillars of the Maryknoll Thailand community throughout the years, until his recent retirement to Maryknoll, New York. His influence is shown in many ways, but especially in his sense of the artistic and his ability to apply it practically in a setting. He has an affinity for Chinese style and that is shown throughout the Bangkok house.
The room where the Chinese motif is most present is in the dining room where there huge plaques on one wall, a variety of vases on another, and even Chinese-style table decorations.
Throughout the house, though, John’s touch is present. Below, on the left figures adorn the floor and wall. On the right, another vase and a figure are on a hutch.
