So there has been lots of mom time for me lately both Khmer
and American though I have to say there work choices are very opposite. My host
mom has been taking me on the winter melon truck runs lately, which has been
possibly, even to Khmer for me. Most of the kids at this garbage dump/ river
where we pick up the fruit are about 6-12 in age pretty sure all stopped going
to school and have skin disease etc that deff need attention and desperate for
money. They throw the melons, which for someone of them are bigger, then they
are sort of sad to watch to make about 2,000 R 50 cents per truck which is
about 2000 fruit. Now it shocked them to see someone like me and I also counted
my self as there equal to help them out so I would stand in line and help throw
and catch watermelons/ winter melons to speed things up. Now its hot I mean
like 100 degree in the sun hot and I have finally given in that wearing long
sleeve shirts is better with a kroma over my head to the average person walking
by they might really have no idea there is an American behind my now ant worker
motif. I tend to leave for the garbage dump/lake at 10 and I guess I should
fill u in y I call it a dump well its where the floating villages are so
surrounding the land area is where everyone dumps trash and on top of that cows
roam free trying to steal fruit with the toxic looking water so it’s a real
mess. Well once we get there its about lunch time so my host mom always packs
us lunch ill give you a hint I always have to eat this with every meal ahh u
guessed it RICE and a fryed egg etc and a watermelon for after. Then we spend
the next couple hours just wating the boat people tend to lie and say a time
but its off by about 3 hours or so. By the time the boats come my host mom is
already off wondering solo for a 2nd boat so she can squeeze even
more fruit into this truck. In the mean time I am the entertainment where every
person can line up in a row and ask me the same inane question of where is my
husband kids why do I come here what do I mean I live in Cambodia blah blah
blah. However a few times I have had some funny convos some of the younger
30-40 year olds like to see what type of bad khmer words I know so one day I am
sitting with them and they are all telling me why khmer men suck and I agree
with them and inform me who is divorced why etc. then the conversation turns to
this one divorcee and they are like but she is so hungry in Khmer “clean” and
im thinking o she had no money for rice and assumed I would be asked for money
but not so after I say o you don’t have money for food they are burst out
laughing. I am clearly missing the joke so I sit around and im trying to figure
it out and they finally tell me like basically no she is horney. So I just joke
back with them and say o just play with ur self and they were dying bc they did
not except me to play speak back and go further then they went with there ot
sopheaup Khmer aka not polite Khmer but they appreciated it I think. Finally
its time for the tossing work aspect of this trip not going to lie it wears me
out im on uneven ground catching uneven heavy object with what always feels
like not enough water in me to sustain my energy. However eventually after a
few times of my visit I think some of the kids who were left out got sort of
mad at me for taking what they deemed there job so eventually I had less of an
active role. After my mom’s visit this also slowed down the work I was allowed to
take on bc everything that was hard work was deemed to much and that “if my mom
saw me she would pitty me and cry” I kept saying no its okay but my host mom
did not want my real mom to be sad so I was told no to things I was doing in
the past o well. Now on the way home this one time physics finally caught up to
the reality of the situation and all the tires popped from to much weight aka
the truck does not like having 2500 watermelon’s in the bed of the truck. We
were not to far from home so I walked back I would have taken a moto but it was
on the high way and peace corps doest allow us to it sucks in times like that
when shit goes wrong. Well when they finally get the truck to the house its
like 3am and im pretty sure no one in my family slept that night. Well the next
day is when the shit storm came people can not go on no sleep and not fight
however what happened that next day was pretty much not culturally allowed and
I had o idea what to do. So jentee and my host mom get in a huge fight I will
not go into details bc I know you the reader like when I keep things up beat so
while this next part is sort of sad its deff funny if ur not in it. Well my
host mom is so angry like I never seen her soo pissed and face losing in my
life. She starts to pack her bags to go leave with no money and tells me she is
going to be the same as a crazy person and just wonder around at night. She
will not talk to anyone but me, which is bad bc my Khmer skills cant handle
angry mom lol. Well before I know it she is drinking beer she doest drink bc
she goes to the wat and when ur old in Cambodia ur not allowed to drink so one
beer and she would have been gone but she proceed to chug 4 in a row by her 5th
I tried to take it from her like this is bad. I go to eat lunch when jentee see
her trying to re drink and at this point jentee is like you have to take care
of her she will not talk to anyone eles so I stop eating lunch run back up to
the house to sit with her for the rest of the day playing babysitter. Anyways
she is telling me how much none of her kids care about her and that they don’t
care how poor she is because she gave them all her money. Then she proceeds to
go look for something to write with luckly it was chalk so it could be later
erased to write in khmer on the all how her children don’t help her etc and the
only person who loves her is me and veiou. If this could not get any more
whacked out she wants to make jentee to pay for making her lose face and is
telling me how she is going to run out into the street naked and kill her self.
To top that off she then gets her secret money stash and all her gold jewelry
gives it to me in a sock making me promises not to give it to jentee and tells
me that after she dies to make sure she has a good funeral sort of a day and whatever
is left is for me yea really. At this point she is three sheets to the wind and
keeps re saying the same shit and is now starting to yell at my host dad who is
trying to fight back but I send him away saying now is not the time which I
guess he was grateful for later because he thanked me later on. Well jentu is
someone who can handle her better however she was refusing to talk to her until
finally I convinced her that she could tell her off if she is that mad at her
and jentu handled it much better then I would bc I just cant not fight back
when people say crazy shit. Jentu kept trying to feed her to sober up but she
would not stop bitching and freaking out telling them how I was the only child
who mattered I kept trying to tell her that I am not better then them that I
fight with my mom and don’t keep my mouth shut. Finally me and jentu got her to
lie down to take a nap. Then I went to go deal with jentee who was soo upset
about this whole thing and they all used to freak out a lot more for me to see
stuff like this however now they just sort of accept that I will see this shit
happen and are less worried about losing face. As im talking to her telling her
you know its not your fault bc my mom was saying really crazy whacked out not
nice things about her she starts to hysterically cry so I talk to her for a
while at least this convo can be in eng though I think for her sake I tried to
mix it up I don’t know about u but if im in a freak out mood I don’t want to be
thinking in my 2nd la. Luckily this weekend I had meetings so I was
able to escape bc that next day my host mom was still supper pissed but by the
time I came back home she was really sick from drinking days later and had
chilled out. I guess its true what they say mother daughter relationships are
the most complicated relationships there are. Until next time peace out from
the other side of the world!!!!!
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| i know you would not believe me but that kid is like 6 and he is the one in charge of all the kids |
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| the garbage dump/lake |
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| some the the kids who are put to work |
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| this water is a health hazard. |
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| the cow stealing fruit people are always chasing them away. |
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| a floating house from the floating village |
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| the family that lives on this boat i think this is who we bought the fruit from. |
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