I'm Here and Alive

I've been here for almost two full days now. We've all been sleeping well, although I am sure jet lag is still at play because I'm alive, awake, alert, enthusiastic right now... and it's only 7:30. A clear sign that my body is still a little off.

After a non-eventful 12 and a half hour flight over the Pacific, we arrived in Taipei Saturday morning. The four hour layover would have been non-eventful, except that the gates at this particular airport are themed. Ours happened to be a bright pink, Disneyland-like "Hello Kitty" themed gate. No joke, everything down to the pink telephones and pink chairs with Hello Kitty's face on them. It was quite a shock to say the least. 

Here's what I wrote flying into Phnom Penh (it's unedited and I was a little frustrated by some disturbing things, so bare with it and m

e

):

"Flying over the country for the first time is an emotional experience. The countryside, and even throughout Phnom Penh, is splattered with craters full of water ranging from the size of trampolines to olympic pools, no exaggeration. These craters are the remnants of U.S. bombings from 1970-1973. Our pilots were given no targets and told to "bomb the hell out of them", and it shows that they just followed orders. It's disgusting how much Nixon's secret bombings changed the landscape of the country and their course of history, bringing to power a maniacal, paranoid leader who would unleash another forgotten genocide of the twentieth century. How resilient Cambodians are to just use these craters as their water sources almost four decades later. 

It's also perplexing and a tribute to the Cambodian people to see the impressive, expansive irrigation system and know these people built this with their own hands under  Pol Pot's brutal "Super-Great Leap Forward". They are a people, a country that has endured hell on earth with visible scars serving as reminders that here "Never Again" really is never."

This was all of course, after 22 hours of travel. But all the pent up hostility softened away upon meeting our Professor's siblings and people who work at the Documentation Center in Cambodia that met us at the airport.  We all climbed into a mini-bus (that we'll be using the whole time we are here), and had our first driving experience in the capital. To say that lights, stop signs, and sides of the road are irrelevant is an understatement. Rule and order do not rule, but are instead replaced by a cut throat, dont get hit, dont get run over mentality. The most common form of transport here is the motorbike; we have seen up to four full grown men on one bike. Two to three people per bike is the norm, but it seems to be even the familial vehicle of choice, similar to a Volvo is in the US. 

More to come as I have time to write.

But your first Tiffany-ism, as in "leave it to me for this to happen":

I blew up my computer charger, along with the power in our hotel room among others after being here for maybe two hours. Luckily, other girls use apples too and their chargers work. I will be making a trip to the Apple store upon my return.