February 19, 2006

grateful in seattle

the saying holds Truth -- distance DOES makes the heart grow fonder.

i've been gone from seattle for more than 5.5 months to return this past week for two weeks of rest, relaxation and a lot of catching up with family and friends.  one week has eclipsed.  another, will be savored until my departure to phnom penh on the 26th.

the day after my arrival, rajana society thru a special khmer conversational group (kcg) in which i was the special guestspeaker.  in near freezing weather, i felt the warmth and tingly jitters by the love of old friends reunited in one space and time.

"its great to see that you have not changed," smiles one friend. 

"you still have the same goofy humor and quirky personality that we all love about you," adds the voice of a childhood friend.

on a deep chill saturday afternoon like today, its hard not to get sentimental to these comments.

Posted by phatry.derek.pan at 09:08:10 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) |

February 03, 2006

post gong chi fa cai

i actually met another living legend that same week on sunday, the 29th. you can see the pictures as re-told by john week's webbed feet, web log. it was the 74-year-older, mr. svay ken.


moving forward.

this past week saw phnom penh morphed into a ghost town. from 6am to 6pm, traffic was a breeze as many families left town to celebrate chinese new year. streets were decked in communist red and yellow chinese signs marking the special occasion. most of the traditional khmer phsars were shut down. but my cafe spot was still alive and kicking!

continuing forward.

this week saw more power outages than usual. the city has been experiencing a shortage of electricity and has had spurts as early as brunch time to dinner. just take thursday night. while enjoying a happy herb pizza on the riverfront with friends, the lights went out! the municipality of phnom penh has publicly commented that these occurences will be more frequent in february but vow that the problem will cease to exist by june. for the most part, this is not affecting my daily routine.

as for work with the post, i've been swamped with story ideas pitched by friends. i won't go public with them yet, but i'm excited to be working on them before my departure to seattle on the 9th. i'm thinking about working on a story about the "brain drain" of khmer singers who has found america their new home. but we'll see. family and friends will be first priority during my mini vacation.

i've been teaching the khmer alphabet to a local khmerican. after a little over a week, she has all 33 consonants and just last night, we jumped to the first five vowels. she's a pretty fast learner and in my disciplined style of teaching, i am optimistic that she can get all the consonants, vowels, independent vowels, diacritic marks, and subscripts down by end of the month. but i shouldn't tell her yet; that the khmer alphabet is the world's largest alphabet system according to the guiness book of world records.

its 1215am, and the whip of 8am, i must begin my day at the national theater for more interviews. which means, its time to count sheeps.

baaa, baaa.
Posted by phatry.derek.pan at 23:25:37 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |