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(music)
It took me a while to figure out where my family ended and my neighborhood began because
we’re just raised sort of in the Khmer culture by the entire group. And it’s just been a blast because we
don’t sit in a room by ourselves; we’re out here with multiple people.
In a world that so many people
want to speak English as the ticket to a better life, the fact that Americans are willing to come here and
learn a language that nobody bothers to learn is infinitely flattering to the people. That we really want
to live with them, learn from them and learn their language when all they want to do is learn English.
(practicing Cambodian words)
(Cambodian)
We are underneath my house, my room is there. My father built this house three years ago in three months
and these are the cows that go to the field twice a day to eat and then they find their way back on their own, usually.
This family has been so accepting and wonderful and I think a lot of the trainees feel that way.
As a preparation and introduction to Cambodia, it couldn’t have been better to
sit up with my father and have him explain what it’s like to work in the rice fields.
There’s just so much beauty in the life here that it’s not hard to deny when you have a child like this,
but to see the ninety-five year old grandmother taking care all in the same household, it seems like, for the Peace Corps
to open an office or to open a branch here, it speaks a lot of hope, hopefully for children like Srilein
and all the children that we will teach. �