The name Cambodia is derived from Khmer, the name of the people and the language. The word is best known because of the Khmer Rouge, the communist group which took control of the country in the 1970s and managed to kill off perhaps as much as a quarter of the nation's population before being expelled by the Vietnamese in 1979.
Rouge is the French word for red. The term simply means Communist Cambodia. Even within Cambodia the term is mispronounced as kuh-MARE when referring to the Khmer Rouge. Most foreigners pronounce it this way when referring to the people and the language, as well. And why not. That's the way it looks like it should be pronounced. Hold that thought.
Khmer is a tricky language to transliterate because it has more characters than any other alphabet. It has sixty distinct vowel sounds. There are sounds in Khmer that simply can not be written in English.
The language is closely related to Thai and Lao. The scripts look similar as well. Khmer characters are more dense and hard to read in my admittedly uneducated opinion. Thai and Lao scripts are more delicate and pleasing to the eye. For instance, this is the full name of Bangkok in Thai:
กรุงเทพมหานคร อมรรัตนโกสินทร์ มหินทรายุธยามหาดิลก ภพนพรัตน์ ราชธานีบุรีรมย์ อุดมราชนิเวศน์ มหาสถาน อมรพิมาน อวตารสถิต สักกะทัตติยะ วิษณุกรรมประสิทธิ์
This is a random bit of text in Khmer:
ក្រុមមន្រ្តីសុខាភិបាលនៃប្រទេសកម្ពុជា បានថ្លែងឱ្យដឹងកាលពីពេលថ្មីនេះថា ខ្លួននឹងចាប់ផ្តើមធ្វើការវ៉ាក់សាំងជំងឺរលាកសួតនិងរលាកស្រោម ខួរដល់ទារកនៅដំណាច់ខែមេសានេះជាអ្វីដែលខ្លួនអះអាងថា នឹងមានកុមារប្រមាណ៤០ម៉ឺននាក់ទទួលបានការចាក់នៅទូទាំងប្រទេស នេះ។
The latter just looks more cluttered to me. Note that there are no punctuation marks in Thai (or Khmer or Lao). The words all run together. This is a marked difference to what I've seen for the past few months. All words in Vietnamese are one syllable. The longest Vietnamese word I can think of is seven characters long. It uses Western-style punctuation. Here is a random bit of text in Vietnamese:
Luật Hiện đại hoá an toàn thực phẩm được giới thiệu tại Thượng viện, Luật này sẽ cải thiện những nổ lực của Chính phủ nhằm đảm bảo an toàn thực phẩm nhập khẩu và sản xuất trong nước.
None of this is to say I prefer Thai or Lao over Khmer (or Vietnamese). Quite the opposite. For some reason, even though they are closely related, Thai and Lao are tonal languages but Khmer is not. I am baffled by this. And yes, this is definitely another entry in the "Things That May Interest Only Me".
In tonal languages words that are spelled the same have different meanings depending on the tone of voice in which they are pronounced. Thai has four tones. Chinese has five. Vietnamese has six.
For example, "The new wood was not burnt, silk burnt," is translated in Thai as, "Mai mai mai mai mai mai." To say it properly you would say "Mai (with high tone), mai (with low tone), mai (with falling tone), mai (with falling tone), mai (with rising tone), mai (with falling tone)."
If you don't get the tones right, locals honestly have no idea what you're talking about. Here is a two-letter word with the six Vietnamese tones and their meanings.
mà but
má cheek
mả tomb
mã code
ma ghost
mạ rice seedling
If someone said in English "My house is haunted by a rice seedling" or "I planted a ghost" it would sound like gibberish. Vietnamese would experience the same confusion if you said ma instead of mạ. As one phrasebook I read said, it is difficult for Westerners to even hear the tones, let alone speak them correctly. It's incredibly frustrating.
I went off on this tangent to point out that this problem doesn't exist in Khmer. There are no tones. Although there are subtleties to pronunciation that are difficult for foreigners to pick up on, if you get close they are more likely to understand than they would be in Vietnam, for example.
It's in the transliteration that it becomes tricky. The best example is the word Khmer itself. It is not pronounced kuh-MARE. Whoever decided to spell it this way should be exhumed and beaten with a rubber hose. It is pronounced kh-ma-eh. Spoken quickly it sounds like kh-MY. Officially it's one syllable.
I don't understand why so many foreigners, and especially expats who have been in the country for years, persist in mispronouncing it. It's not hard to say it properly. Sometimes it's nearly impossible for non-native speakers to pronounce a foreign word. A common Vietnamese name is Nguyễn. If you're not Vietnamese it's unlikely you will ever say it properly. Is there a non-French speaker who can say trompe l'oeil (fool the eye) correctly?
Khmer is easy to say. Just say it correctly. It isn't pronounced the way it's spelled, but neither is Arkansas, Gloucester or Brisbane. I'm even more baffled by the mangling of Phnom Penh. It's pronounced p-NUM pen. Not hard. No one gets the second word wrong, but the first word is mispronounced more often than not. I can understand f-NOM since ph is pronounced as the letter f in English (and Vietnamese).
The most common mangling mystifies me. How does Phnom become Nom? The silent ph? This is particularly common among Brits and Aussies, but also among other foreigners and even Vietnamese.
Foreigners will always mispronounce the Vietnamese beach town of Nha Trang, which is not pronounced the way you might think just by looking at it. I was able to get around in Russian pretty well but I could never say Novosibirsk correctly. And so on. But saying Phnom Penh is not hard. If you say it incorrectly you are doing so deliberately. I find that somewhat disrespectful.
4/22/2010
4/21/2010
Welcoming party
I arrived in Phnom Penh during the Khmer New Year. I knew the city would be empty. I decided to take advantage of the lack of distractions to find an apartment. Starting a new job would be stressful enough. I wanted to have my living arrangements sorted out first.
I arrived by bus from Vietnam, checked into my hotel, and headed to my usual watering hole, Metro. The first time I went there, well over a year ago, I was walking along the riverfront on a typically scorching Cambodian afternoon. Most of the riverfront restaurants are open to the street and thus not air conditioned. I just wanted a place to cool off.
The food is a little pricey by Cambodian standards but excellent. They make a great mojito, my summer cocktail of choice. A few men work there but most of the staff is young, friendly Khmer girls. A lot of tourists go there, of course, but it's also the place where young Cambodians with money to spend go. I go there just about every night I'm in Phnom Penh. They always make me feel welcome.
I knew the place was going to be closed the next day for a Khmer New Year party. The restaurant is owned by an American ex-pat named Paul. His staff absolutely loves him. He pays them well by local standards and treats them incredibly well by any standards.
I've become friends with Raksmey, the manager there. She asked me what I was doing the next day. I told her I was planning to look for an apartment and asked her if she knew of anyone with a place to rent. She said she didn't know of anyone renting an apartment but she did ask me if I wanted to go to the party.
Hmm. Tough choice.
I thought that the restaurant would be closed and the party would be there but, as I said, Paul treats his staff well. The party actually turned out to be an entire day of activities. We met at the restaurant in the morning and walked down to the river. We hopped on a boat where I was promptly offered a beer. 8:30 a.m. is a little too early even for me, so I opted for a Coke.
I had been on one of these boats on my first visit to Phnom Penh. I had taken a sunset cruise, just puttering around the river for two hours, drinking beer with another tourist I had been hanging out with that day. On the other side of the Mekong is a small village of fishermen. Next to the cluster of shacks and houseboats are two mansions.
We wondered who lived there. Now I know! We didn't go to this house. We went to the one next to it, the one I don't have a picture of from the boat. It's actually set further back so you can't see it all that well from the river. Paul rented the house for the day from a doctor friend of his. Dude, this place is schweet....
This is the view looking from the river towards the house.
This is the view in the other direction.
This is the inside.
After lugging all of the gear from the boat from the river to the house the party began. It turns out a Khmer New Year party looks a whole lot like an American summer cookout. Here is Paul overseeing the grill.
The adorable girl in the foreground is my friend Raksmey.
The girl sitting in the white tank top is her sister Aka. The guy next to her is Ponlok, and sitting in back in the blue shirt is So Kim. It's kinda hard to tell because she is sticking her tongue out at me, but So Kim is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen with my own two eyes.
Back home I rarely spent time with people I work with because all they ever wanted to do is bitch about work. It didn't matter where I worked, it was always the same. I would try to steer the conversation to movies or the Orioles or anything else but conversation inevitably kept getting sucked back into the black hole of how much everyone hated their jobs and/or boss.
I was struck, then, by how much everyone at the party was enjoying themselves. There was no talk of work but there was a lot of laughing. What is wrong with these people... Bear in mind that a Cambodian work schedule is different than in America. People here work 10 to 12 hours per day and get two or three days off per month. You would think they would get sick of each other, that the last thing they'd want to do on a holiday is hang out with their co-workers. Not so.
It also bears mentioning that even at the good jobs people here make as much in a month as Americans make in a day. I have a friend who works in Sihanoukville. She moved there from Koh Kong, on the Thai border, where she worked at a posh resort for a few years. She speaks English as well as anyone I've met in Cambodia.
She took a job working at a small hotel in Sihanoukville. She works 10 hours per day. She gets three days off per month. She's a pretty young girl, with years of hotel experience and excellent English, working almost every day, and she makes 80 dollars a month. And this is a good job! I'll make more than that in a day as a teacher here.
Back to the party.
I am proud to say I felt a little out of place. Raksmey told me everyone was allowed to bring a guest. As most of the staff are young women, I had a terrible premonition that I would spend the day hanging out with a bunch of sleazy old sexpats. I was shocked to discover I was the only foreigner there!
The guys who carried the gear up from the boat jumped into the pool immediately but it took a while for the girls to get bold enough to get in. Women throughout Asia value light-colored skin. It's a cultural belief that goes back literally thousands of years: People with dark skin work in the sun, and thus are poor. Khmer people have generally darker skin than most Asians. Women here are obsessed with light skin. Because of that, combined with a general cultural modesty, women swim fully clothed.
In the rear you can see Raksmey sitting on the edge of the pool. She was going to wear her bikini but her co-workers told her they didn't think she should. If she were in a pool with mostly foreigners it would have been okay but since she was in a pool with mostly Cambodians it would have been in poor taste. So she wore a tshirt over top.
In the foreground is a girl in a sun hat, a men's long-sleeved shirt and black leggings. It's So Kim. Just my luck: I spend the day in the pool with the most beautiful girl in the world and she's covered up like a mummy...
A few bottles of wine loosened up the crowd. Aside from Paul I was the only foreigner there so I was a bit hesitant to join in the mix. Soon, though, I had everyone playing chicken, where the girls sit on the guys' shoulders and try to wrestle each other into the water. I hadn't played the game in, oh, 20 years.
On the downside, it's a terrible activity for someone who has had two back surgeries. It's been a week since the party and I am still feeling creaky. On the upside, I was in a pool with beautiful Cambodian girls clamped on my shoulders. No pain, no gain.
When I go to the beach I always sit under an umbrella. I didn't realize how much the sun was wearing me out. We took the boat back to the city. But the party wasn't over. There was still dinner and karaoke! We met back at the restaurant a few hours later. I was completely wiped out. I even thought about calling Raksmey and bailing out. I decided it would be rude.
We all hopped on a bus and went to a buffet restaurant. There were more people this time, but there was only one other foreigner, an Australian who sat next to me at dinner and spent half his time playing with his Blackberry. He spent the other half, in typical ex-pat fashion, impressing me with how long he's been in Southeast Asia and how much he knows about the region. I began wishing one of us would have a heart attack.
The conversation at my end of the table wasn't very lively. Normally I would have done what I could to stir the pot but I was just too tired. Plus, I was sitting opposite a television with running updates on the earthquake in China and the volcano in Iceland. It was easy to get distracted.
We took the bus to a big karaoke place in the center of town. I decided to pass on karaoke. I thought it would be bad for me to go and be a wet blanket. I might not get invited out again! Paul, the owner, bailed too, so I didn't feel too bad.
It was quite an auspicious beginning to my life as an expat in Cambodia.
I arrived by bus from Vietnam, checked into my hotel, and headed to my usual watering hole, Metro. The first time I went there, well over a year ago, I was walking along the riverfront on a typically scorching Cambodian afternoon. Most of the riverfront restaurants are open to the street and thus not air conditioned. I just wanted a place to cool off.
The food is a little pricey by Cambodian standards but excellent. They make a great mojito, my summer cocktail of choice. A few men work there but most of the staff is young, friendly Khmer girls. A lot of tourists go there, of course, but it's also the place where young Cambodians with money to spend go. I go there just about every night I'm in Phnom Penh. They always make me feel welcome.
I knew the place was going to be closed the next day for a Khmer New Year party. The restaurant is owned by an American ex-pat named Paul. His staff absolutely loves him. He pays them well by local standards and treats them incredibly well by any standards.
I've become friends with Raksmey, the manager there. She asked me what I was doing the next day. I told her I was planning to look for an apartment and asked her if she knew of anyone with a place to rent. She said she didn't know of anyone renting an apartment but she did ask me if I wanted to go to the party.
Hmm. Tough choice.
I thought that the restaurant would be closed and the party would be there but, as I said, Paul treats his staff well. The party actually turned out to be an entire day of activities. We met at the restaurant in the morning and walked down to the river. We hopped on a boat where I was promptly offered a beer. 8:30 a.m. is a little too early even for me, so I opted for a Coke.
I had been on one of these boats on my first visit to Phnom Penh. I had taken a sunset cruise, just puttering around the river for two hours, drinking beer with another tourist I had been hanging out with that day. On the other side of the Mekong is a small village of fishermen. Next to the cluster of shacks and houseboats are two mansions.
We wondered who lived there. Now I know! We didn't go to this house. We went to the one next to it, the one I don't have a picture of from the boat. It's actually set further back so you can't see it all that well from the river. Paul rented the house for the day from a doctor friend of his. Dude, this place is schweet....
This is the view looking from the river towards the house.
This is the view in the other direction.
This is the inside.
After lugging all of the gear from the boat from the river to the house the party began. It turns out a Khmer New Year party looks a whole lot like an American summer cookout. Here is Paul overseeing the grill.
The adorable girl in the foreground is my friend Raksmey.
The girl sitting in the white tank top is her sister Aka. The guy next to her is Ponlok, and sitting in back in the blue shirt is So Kim. It's kinda hard to tell because she is sticking her tongue out at me, but So Kim is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen with my own two eyes.Back home I rarely spent time with people I work with because all they ever wanted to do is bitch about work. It didn't matter where I worked, it was always the same. I would try to steer the conversation to movies or the Orioles or anything else but conversation inevitably kept getting sucked back into the black hole of how much everyone hated their jobs and/or boss.
I was struck, then, by how much everyone at the party was enjoying themselves. There was no talk of work but there was a lot of laughing. What is wrong with these people... Bear in mind that a Cambodian work schedule is different than in America. People here work 10 to 12 hours per day and get two or three days off per month. You would think they would get sick of each other, that the last thing they'd want to do on a holiday is hang out with their co-workers. Not so.
It also bears mentioning that even at the good jobs people here make as much in a month as Americans make in a day. I have a friend who works in Sihanoukville. She moved there from Koh Kong, on the Thai border, where she worked at a posh resort for a few years. She speaks English as well as anyone I've met in Cambodia.
She took a job working at a small hotel in Sihanoukville. She works 10 hours per day. She gets three days off per month. She's a pretty young girl, with years of hotel experience and excellent English, working almost every day, and she makes 80 dollars a month. And this is a good job! I'll make more than that in a day as a teacher here.
Back to the party.
I am proud to say I felt a little out of place. Raksmey told me everyone was allowed to bring a guest. As most of the staff are young women, I had a terrible premonition that I would spend the day hanging out with a bunch of sleazy old sexpats. I was shocked to discover I was the only foreigner there!
The guys who carried the gear up from the boat jumped into the pool immediately but it took a while for the girls to get bold enough to get in. Women throughout Asia value light-colored skin. It's a cultural belief that goes back literally thousands of years: People with dark skin work in the sun, and thus are poor. Khmer people have generally darker skin than most Asians. Women here are obsessed with light skin. Because of that, combined with a general cultural modesty, women swim fully clothed.
In the rear you can see Raksmey sitting on the edge of the pool. She was going to wear her bikini but her co-workers told her they didn't think she should. If she were in a pool with mostly foreigners it would have been okay but since she was in a pool with mostly Cambodians it would have been in poor taste. So she wore a tshirt over top.
In the foreground is a girl in a sun hat, a men's long-sleeved shirt and black leggings. It's So Kim. Just my luck: I spend the day in the pool with the most beautiful girl in the world and she's covered up like a mummy...
A few bottles of wine loosened up the crowd. Aside from Paul I was the only foreigner there so I was a bit hesitant to join in the mix. Soon, though, I had everyone playing chicken, where the girls sit on the guys' shoulders and try to wrestle each other into the water. I hadn't played the game in, oh, 20 years.
On the downside, it's a terrible activity for someone who has had two back surgeries. It's been a week since the party and I am still feeling creaky. On the upside, I was in a pool with beautiful Cambodian girls clamped on my shoulders. No pain, no gain.
When I go to the beach I always sit under an umbrella. I didn't realize how much the sun was wearing me out. We took the boat back to the city. But the party wasn't over. There was still dinner and karaoke! We met back at the restaurant a few hours later. I was completely wiped out. I even thought about calling Raksmey and bailing out. I decided it would be rude.
We all hopped on a bus and went to a buffet restaurant. There were more people this time, but there was only one other foreigner, an Australian who sat next to me at dinner and spent half his time playing with his Blackberry. He spent the other half, in typical ex-pat fashion, impressing me with how long he's been in Southeast Asia and how much he knows about the region. I began wishing one of us would have a heart attack.
The conversation at my end of the table wasn't very lively. Normally I would have done what I could to stir the pot but I was just too tired. Plus, I was sitting opposite a television with running updates on the earthquake in China and the volcano in Iceland. It was easy to get distracted.
We took the bus to a big karaoke place in the center of town. I decided to pass on karaoke. I thought it would be bad for me to go and be a wet blanket. I might not get invited out again! Paul, the owner, bailed too, so I didn't feel too bad.
It was quite an auspicious beginning to my life as an expat in Cambodia.
4/20/2010
Brushes? We don't need no stinkin' brushes
I still have not gotten used to the typical Southeast Asian bathroom arrangement, where the shower is in the same area and often directly over the toilet. One bathroom arrangement I have warmed up to is the toilet hose.
Who wants to buy a toilet bowl brush? Who wants to touch it? Where the heck do you put it? (Or hide it?)
Here most of the toilets have a small hose and nozzle next to the toilet. You don't have to use a toilet bowl brush to scrub away any lingering ... stuff. You use the hose and blast it away. It's sanitary, easy to clean and, heck, I'll say it: more fun!
Who wants to buy a toilet bowl brush? Who wants to touch it? Where the heck do you put it? (Or hide it?)
Here most of the toilets have a small hose and nozzle next to the toilet. You don't have to use a toilet bowl brush to scrub away any lingering ... stuff. You use the hose and blast it away. It's sanitary, easy to clean and, heck, I'll say it: more fun!
4/19/2010
The bootleg channel
I was watching a movie on television in Phnom Penh. It finished and the end credits were rolling when it suddenly stopped. After a short commercial I was looking at the menu screen for a DVD movie. It took a second for it to register what I was looking at. It's a broadcast television channel showing DVD movies! Here's a crappy photo of my TV just before the new "Twilight" movie started. You can see the orange cursor on the "play movie" menu option.
Funnier still, they show illegal DVD movies. Some of the movies are bootlegs! One night I watched "Precious", which was still in theaters in the US at the time. Today "Avatar" was on.
Funnier still, they show illegal DVD movies. Some of the movies are bootlegs! One night I watched "Precious", which was still in theaters in the US at the time. Today "Avatar" was on.
4/18/2010
There goes the neighborhood
My apartment is just around the corner from the hotel where I always stay. One of the many reasons I love the hotel is its location. This is the view out my kitchen window. The green patch just beyond the building in front is the Plough Field. Walk a block to the right and you come to the National Museum. Walk a block to the left and you come to the river, where all the action is. In the center of the picture you can see a golden spire in the distance. This is part of the Royal Palace.
The king and I are neighbors!
4/16/2010
Happy New Year, Part 3
First there was the New Year on December 31. Then there was lunar new year, widely known as the Chinese New Year but called Tet in Vietnam. Now there is Chaul Chnam Thmey, the Khmer New Year. It's also the Thai New Year, or Songkran. Got it? Yeah, me neither.
I start my new job on Monday. I wanted to get to Phnom Penh and get settled. I knew it would be a ghost town because of the holiday. Folks here either go home to visit family or go to the beach.
(Fun fact: In Vietnam when people talk about visiting family they say they are "going to the countryside". Here they say they are "going to the province". )
I had an admittedly crazy idea that I would show arrive in the city and then head to the beach in Sihanoukville the next day. Everyone I talked to just laughed when I mentioned my plan. I would be lucky to find a hotel room, they said. A friend here took his children and indeed did have trouble. I'll wait a week and go when the hotels are empty and the rates are back down to normal.
In the meantime I'm laying low and resting. My last week in Saigon completely wore me out. I was making the rounds to see all my friends before I left. I was going out every night, which I normally don't do. And after months of not getting enough hours at my school they decided to pile extra classes on me before I left. Amazingly I was paid in full for all my classes before I left.
My first day in Phnom Penh was exhausting. More on that in a separate post. My poor old body just conked out. I spent the past two days vegetating, watching whatever crap movies happen to be on TV and sleeping whenever the mood hit me.
I wanted to find an apartment before I started classes, too. Ideally I'd like to find a place close to my school but I really don't know where to start looking. And because of the holiday it's also a bad time to look for an apartment.
I asked one of the girls at the hotel where I always stay if she knew anyone who has an apartment for rent. Her aunt! The hotel is on a small alley street which ends in a sort of cul de sac. Apparently her family owns the whole neighborhood. I had an idea of what I should expect to pay. The price was right. The place is like a hotel room with a small kitchen. Jackpot.
I start my new job on Monday. I wanted to get to Phnom Penh and get settled. I knew it would be a ghost town because of the holiday. Folks here either go home to visit family or go to the beach.
(Fun fact: In Vietnam when people talk about visiting family they say they are "going to the countryside". Here they say they are "going to the province". )
I had an admittedly crazy idea that I would show arrive in the city and then head to the beach in Sihanoukville the next day. Everyone I talked to just laughed when I mentioned my plan. I would be lucky to find a hotel room, they said. A friend here took his children and indeed did have trouble. I'll wait a week and go when the hotels are empty and the rates are back down to normal.
In the meantime I'm laying low and resting. My last week in Saigon completely wore me out. I was making the rounds to see all my friends before I left. I was going out every night, which I normally don't do. And after months of not getting enough hours at my school they decided to pile extra classes on me before I left. Amazingly I was paid in full for all my classes before I left.
My first day in Phnom Penh was exhausting. More on that in a separate post. My poor old body just conked out. I spent the past two days vegetating, watching whatever crap movies happen to be on TV and sleeping whenever the mood hit me.
I wanted to find an apartment before I started classes, too. Ideally I'd like to find a place close to my school but I really don't know where to start looking. And because of the holiday it's also a bad time to look for an apartment.
I asked one of the girls at the hotel where I always stay if she knew anyone who has an apartment for rent. Her aunt! The hotel is on a small alley street which ends in a sort of cul de sac. Apparently her family owns the whole neighborhood. I had an idea of what I should expect to pay. The price was right. The place is like a hotel room with a small kitchen. Jackpot.
4/02/2010
All you really need to know
I haven't been pleased with the school where I've been teaching in Vietnam. I had misgivings about taking the job. At the time I must admit I was a bit desperate. It was just before the lunar new year, the biggest holiday in Asia, and schools just weren't hiring. I didn't want to go into the holiday without a job so I took it. I knew the job came with a certain amount of baggage, but it turned out much worse than I had anticipated.
I didn't want to slag the place while I was still working there and I really don't want to now. I was trying to think of the "telling detail" to describe the place. This is a term from my days as journalism student. Rather than describe something in detail, you find the one thing that best sums it up.
For instance, as I write this I see a couple tourists walking down the sidewalk. Of one I would say "he's the kind of guy who walks around with a cigarette behind his ear". From that one detail you get a pretty good idea of what kind of guy I'm talking about. Then again, I could just say he's a douchebag.
The problem with the finding the telling detail about my school is that there are so many of them! I wanted to write a post that began "All you really need to know about my school is ..." but there were too many candidates. Here are some of the contenders.
* I wanted to submit my resignation as soon as possible. I made the decision on the weekend. No one I might need to talk to was in the office so I sent an email. I asked that they call me so we could work out the details.
All you really need to know about where I work is that I sent my resignation email on Saturday morning but they didn't call me until Wednesday afternoon.
* Teachers are not allowed to use the photocopier. Often you'll want to print out song lyrics, crossword puzzles, etc. You have to fill out a sheet explaining how many copies you are making. This I can understand. They don't want teachers using the photocopier for personal use. I get it.
However, I can not understand why they put the security guard, of all people, in charge of the photocopier. This is usually an otherwise unemployable young man who knows as much about operating a photocopier as he does about flying a fighter jet.
Photocopiers are temperamental creatures. They need to be regularly maintained and lovingly cared for. This one has been treated as well as Michael Vick's dogs. It simply never works. It's operated by men who truly, honestly have no idea whatsoever of how it works or how to fix it. They can't let me help. If they did they would "lose face", which really is a big deal.
One particularly comical/infuriating episode occurred when, after 20 minutes of watching a young guy randomly opening and closing doors on the machine without success (go figure) an older man stepped in to help.
Mr. Frying Pan, meet Mr. Fire.
The new guy's solution to the problem was to take out the stack of paper and, with an ostentatious flourish, shuffle the paper like playing cards. This, of course, would be on the short list of "Worst Things to Do With a Malfunctioning Photocopier".
He couldn't get the paper to back into a neat pile (again, go figure) so he mashed it into the paper drawer and tried again. Whaddayaknow, it still didn't work.
The rule officially applies to all teachers but Vietnamese teachers, of course, don't have to go through all this. They can use the machine whenever they want and copy the entire phone book if they so desire.
Most of my classes are with kids and three hours long. It's hard enough to plan a lesson for that length of time. It's even harder when you have to have a Plan A (if the copier works) and a Plan B (if it doesn't). I should also mention that there is a computer.
One.
The computer looks like it predates the apple. I don't mean the apple, the computer, I mean apple, the life form. It's reliable, however. You can bet the eternal souls of your children that the day you need to print it will have fallen prey to the computer virus du jour. Then there's the printer itself...
All you really need to know about my school, then, is that if you need materials for class you can use a computer that doesn't work to send files to a printer that doesn't work to copy on photocopier that doesn't work.
* Ok, I've been rambling. Or venting, I must admit. So here it is, the telling detail about my school.
I am not a pushy tourist who expects and demands everyone I encounter to speak English. This is a business, however, with one purpose, to teach English. Virtually every Vietnamese employee there speaks English well. There is one notable exception.
I should have known what to expect after my first visit. The school has several campuses but if you are applying to be an English you need to deliver your resume to the HR office at a particular building. Just so we're clear, this is the building where all foreign, English-speaking teachers are told to apply.
The receptionist there does not speak English!
That's really all you need to know.
I didn't want to slag the place while I was still working there and I really don't want to now. I was trying to think of the "telling detail" to describe the place. This is a term from my days as journalism student. Rather than describe something in detail, you find the one thing that best sums it up.
For instance, as I write this I see a couple tourists walking down the sidewalk. Of one I would say "he's the kind of guy who walks around with a cigarette behind his ear". From that one detail you get a pretty good idea of what kind of guy I'm talking about. Then again, I could just say he's a douchebag.
The problem with the finding the telling detail about my school is that there are so many of them! I wanted to write a post that began "All you really need to know about my school is ..." but there were too many candidates. Here are some of the contenders.
* I wanted to submit my resignation as soon as possible. I made the decision on the weekend. No one I might need to talk to was in the office so I sent an email. I asked that they call me so we could work out the details.
All you really need to know about where I work is that I sent my resignation email on Saturday morning but they didn't call me until Wednesday afternoon.
* Teachers are not allowed to use the photocopier. Often you'll want to print out song lyrics, crossword puzzles, etc. You have to fill out a sheet explaining how many copies you are making. This I can understand. They don't want teachers using the photocopier for personal use. I get it.
However, I can not understand why they put the security guard, of all people, in charge of the photocopier. This is usually an otherwise unemployable young man who knows as much about operating a photocopier as he does about flying a fighter jet.
Photocopiers are temperamental creatures. They need to be regularly maintained and lovingly cared for. This one has been treated as well as Michael Vick's dogs. It simply never works. It's operated by men who truly, honestly have no idea whatsoever of how it works or how to fix it. They can't let me help. If they did they would "lose face", which really is a big deal.
One particularly comical/infuriating episode occurred when, after 20 minutes of watching a young guy randomly opening and closing doors on the machine without success (go figure) an older man stepped in to help.
Mr. Frying Pan, meet Mr. Fire.
The new guy's solution to the problem was to take out the stack of paper and, with an ostentatious flourish, shuffle the paper like playing cards. This, of course, would be on the short list of "Worst Things to Do With a Malfunctioning Photocopier".
He couldn't get the paper to back into a neat pile (again, go figure) so he mashed it into the paper drawer and tried again. Whaddayaknow, it still didn't work.
The rule officially applies to all teachers but Vietnamese teachers, of course, don't have to go through all this. They can use the machine whenever they want and copy the entire phone book if they so desire.
Most of my classes are with kids and three hours long. It's hard enough to plan a lesson for that length of time. It's even harder when you have to have a Plan A (if the copier works) and a Plan B (if it doesn't). I should also mention that there is a computer.
One.
The computer looks like it predates the apple. I don't mean the apple, the computer, I mean apple, the life form. It's reliable, however. You can bet the eternal souls of your children that the day you need to print it will have fallen prey to the computer virus du jour. Then there's the printer itself...
All you really need to know about my school, then, is that if you need materials for class you can use a computer that doesn't work to send files to a printer that doesn't work to copy on photocopier that doesn't work.
* Ok, I've been rambling. Or venting, I must admit. So here it is, the telling detail about my school.
I am not a pushy tourist who expects and demands everyone I encounter to speak English. This is a business, however, with one purpose, to teach English. Virtually every Vietnamese employee there speaks English well. There is one notable exception.
I should have known what to expect after my first visit. The school has several campuses but if you are applying to be an English you need to deliver your resume to the HR office at a particular building. Just so we're clear, this is the building where all foreign, English-speaking teachers are told to apply.
The receptionist there does not speak English!
That's really all you need to know.
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