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ka-rumpup (excitement)
I woke before the sun had announced its appearance on a fresh, cool Saturday morning. Climbing out of bed and pulling out my bike, I longed to see what lies beyond my little village that I explored upon my arrival the previous afternoon.
As I pedaled past the sparse wooden houses built upon stilts and out towards the rice fields and lanky palm trees, the dark, low-hanging clouds in the distance began to perk up, preparing themselves for their dramatic twice-daily performance. I glance to my right (to the east, which in Khmer poetically translates to the birth-direction), and see the sun peak through the dark mass of clouds to illuminate my little slice of Cambodia – my tiny speck of the world that I would now call ‘home’ for the next two years.
The open sky engulfed me, vast and clear and expansive. As I pedaled on, I doubted to myself whether our little sun could actually fill up that whole wide space around me. Whether I could fill up this uncertain and expansive space I have created within. Will my new community fill the hole formed when I left behind my family and friends at home? Will my work as a health volunteer fill my need for personal fulfillment and success – will it actually make some sort of tangible difference?
Spoiler: the sun did, in fact, light up the whole sky. Who would have thought?
It’s been about two weeks since I was sworn-in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer and dropped off in Pursat province. I live with a very sweet Muslim family (part of the Cham minority ethnic group in Cambodia) consisting of Mai, Pok, a seventeen-year old brother who is going back to Phnom Penh soon for school, a sixteen-year old sister who works in Malaysia, and a nine-year-old brother. The surrounding neighborhood is comprised of my grandparents, my many aunts and uncles, (15 sets, although not all live in our village) and all of their children.
I don’t really feel ‘at home’ yet – there are a lot of people I don’t know and don’t feel comfortable around yet, although it has only been two weeks. I’m working on it though - the kids love to take me to ‘dao leing’ – walk play – around the village, and the women sitting in front of their houses invariably will pull up a chair and invite me to “ankoy leing” – sit play. I try to make awkward small talk while the kids squirm anxiously, and the host is merely amused at my presence and the fact that I’m trying to speak Khmer. After a couple minutes of this, the kids whisk me away and we keep walking, always ending up back at my Om’s (older aunt) house. In the afternoons, she sits with my Mai, making num ansom cheyk, a snack made by rolling banana in sticky rice, wrapping it in banana leaves, and grilling it. Sometimes I help her, but can never quite match her beautifully wrapped nums with my own crooked or sparsely covered ones. She accepts them anyways, and jokes that we should start a company.
My first day at work at the health center two doors down from my house, I arrived early and was sitting in the waiting area along with the patients that began to gather. After perhaps 45 minutes, the staff started to filter in and one of the midwives grabs me and motions for me to follow her – she gives me a white coat and sits me down next to her at the registration desk. At this point, a large crowd of mothers with small children and soon-to-be mothers are gathered in the waiting area, chatting and laughing and gossiping. The midwives begin taking papers and asking questions, filling out forms and prescriptions. I sit there - amidst all of the organized chaos of the health center on a Monday morning after a week of holiday - and watch timidly, unsure of what to do with myself but knowing that everyone there (staff and patients alike) is watching and judging this new barang (foreigner). The midwife to my left looks over and sees that I am not doing anything (although I would argue that watching the goings-on of the health center is definitely a form of learning, and thus doing something) so she tosses me the pink book - what is essentially the mother’s bible in Cambodia. She opens it to the pages about early child nutrition and breastfeeding, and tells me to educate all of the impatient mothers sitting across from us.
“Uhhhh….” I begin, a strong start. I’m unsure where to start as I’ve just been almost literally thrown headfirst into my new role. ] Sure enough, I get through the content well enough with my rough Khmer and even manage to ask some questions and make it a semi-discussion. “Ok”, I think to myself, “I can get through the next couple days”.
The next couple days were village outreach days – meaning, I get to ride on the back of the midwife’s moto to different villages. We worked as a pair; she performs an ante-natal care checkup to the pregnant women that come to our makeshift station at a designated house in the village, and then she sends them to me to teach them about nutrition, danger signs during pregnancy, and the important do’s and don’ts. She helps me with my Khmer if I get stuck or am unable to answer a question. We make a good team. It’s fun, and we get to hang out and practice Khmer/English with each other. But, I’m not quite sure why I’m there because she can absolutely do everything I am doing, and do it more thoroughly and effectively. She keeps telling all of our patients that I’m smart and I know a lot, but my two weeks of maternal health training really has nothing on her specialized college education.
This actually echoes a sentiment that I’ve heard more than a couple times from educated and uneducated Khmer people alike - that Westerners are very smart and clever and hardworking, and Khmer people are not. This makes me extremely uncomfortable as of course it was intended as a compliment towards me, but the fact is that there is this deeply ingrained negative stereotype of their country compared to others. It’s true that there are very many successful Westerners and that our standard of living and education is much higher than that of Cambodia, but to say that Cambodian people are not as smart as Westerners is to erase the massive gap in privilege and opportunity that exists (as well as very different cultural values), and, of course, the fact that Cambodia is still recovering from a massive and destructive genocide. It’s sad that Khmer people see Westerners as superior – but, then again, most of the world does as well in one form or another because of the profound impacts of colonialization.
But anyways – to get back on track.
It seems that I have automatically acquired some sort of newfound authority because I am white, and I wear a white medical uniform. Sometimes the patients and villagers even think I’m a doctor. I don’t feel like I deserve this prestige yet. All of my staff at the health center are much more knowledgeable than I (and can speak fluently with patients…), while I’m still stumbling through both the content and the language – although, to my credit, I am improving quickly with both. I suppose that I’m just trying to feel out my new workplace and try to understand what my role can be, and where I can be most effective in creating positive change. Over the last two weeks, I’ve been observing, helping the staff with patient flow, and beginning to create a niche for myself, slowly but surely. It’s coming along, and I’m beginning to settle into my new role and get used to the newfound respect.
As a Khmer proverb goes – drip by drip will fill up the basin.
