Thrown into the Penh

I arrived in Phnom Penh on 23rd February 2011 as a volunteer English teacher for a school called (in its literal translation) Conversations with Foreigners. As the plane began its descent into Phnom Penh I caught sight of scattered palm trees, a complete variation of buildings and a legion of of mopeds, aka 'motos,' zooming in all directions. I was greeted at the airport by Soriya, the Volunteer Coordinator at CWF who showed me to our tuk tuk. No sooner had we hopped on board were we immersed straight into the hustle and bustle of Phnom Penh's evening rush hour. It was still very hot and muggy and my senses were buzzing with the constant sound of beeping from motos, tuk tuks and cars as well as the different smells of street food and miscellaneous other aromas.


After the 25 minute journey we reached the volunteer house and I was introduced to my roommate Helen, also from England, and the rest of the housemates, an assortment of Americans, Australians, a Canadian, a New Zealander and an Irishman. The students at the school were going to turn out with some very interesting accents! We stayed up chatting for a while and I had my first taste of Cambodian cuisine which was delicious and quite similar to Thai.


The next day we got up for a tour around Phnom Penh. We visited the school and had our photos taken (much to our dismay). Our group of 20 were then driven around in a convoy of tuk tuks to see the city and some of its leading attractions including the Riverside, the Russian Market and the Royal Palace.

CWF volunteers

On visiting Wat Phnom (a grassy hilltop on which lies the city's main temple and the namesake of Phnom Penh) we came across women and children selling caged birds for release at the top and trees shuffling with monkeys jumping to and fro. As we walked around Wat Phnom, we approached an elephant and its owner. For the small price of $1 I had the pleasure of feeding the magnificent creature a large bunch of bananas. As sheepish as I may have looked handing over the snack I was incredibly pleased to have managed this on my first day in the country!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oam84GyPInM

Wat Phnom

Our first day came to a close with an introduction to Khmer (Cambodian) language with our teacher Vhatana Mao where we were equipped with how to greet; 'chum reap sour' meaning 'how do you do' (accompanied by putting hands together in a manner of praying and bowing head) and self-introduction; 'soo-a sdey k'nyom ch'moo-ah Olivia' meaning 'hello my name is Olivia'.