I was finally able to do some travelling last weekend...a few of us from RDI went to Kep and Rabbit Island. They are little seaside/beach towns on the southern coast. Kep was beautiful- it used to be the most popular beach spot in Cambodia, before the Khmer Rouge destroyed most of the french villas, etc. so you can see the ruins of what looked like beautiful homes. And it's located on the side of a mountain so there are some great views. We then took a boat over to Rabbit Island, which is pretty much the picturesque tropical island, almost a little too so. I kept having to remind myself that this was reality when I was there...we arrived to white sand beaches, perfectly lined with palm trees, straw bungalows, a couple open air "restaurants", hammocks...it was amazing. For lunch I had crab curry on the beach with a crab that they pulled out of the water to make the dish! mmmmm!

UNC and RDI Staff

So my main task here in Cambodia is to manage a project that evaluates the effectiveness of the HydrAid (plastic biosand filter) water filter. Largely, we will do this by looking at the health impact and microbiological water quality due to filter usage. UNC is funded by International Aid (www.internationalaid.org) to do this trial in three study locations: Honduras, Ghana and Cambodia. The purpose of geographically different sites is to reduce the effect of location and cultural bias in the study in order to make the results generalizable to many areas. In each location, we'll be including about 200 households...so that means collecting and analyzing water samples, as well as interviewing each household biweekly...for about 6-8 months. At this point, I've hired and trained (hopefully) 10 Cambodians to assist on the project, in the lab and field. Much of the initial project setup is complete, thanks to the help of many people(!), so I'm excited to really get started very soon. I'm warned that life will really get crazy soon. So now all I have to do is make sure everything runs smoothly...

The picture above is the UNC project staff. I took them out for lunch...this included snails, a whole fish, some kind of "soup", fried chicken, and rice of course. I definitely wasn't a strict vegetarian when I left, but I grew to often prefer to not have meat. And really, when you live in Carrboro, NC, it is the norm to be a vegetarian so it's very accomodating to that lifestyle. Cambodia, not so much. I learned that on day one when my "vegetarian" plane meals were repulsive, and again when I began living in the village and meat is served 3 times a day. Anyway, I think that my staff are misinformed into thinking that I really like this restaurant because they always invite me to go with them. But I am honored that they invite me, and so I go, realizing, maybe, that there is more to life than good food. :)

(Check out those lovely UNC shirts in the picture.)



Some of the wonderful RDI staff.

The much awaited abode picture

Here is my bungalow, or as I like to call it, the penthouse. I have a nice view of the land, a front row seat to evening volleyball games, a 1 minute walk to work, what more could you want? Hot water is what I really want right now! You know how we say sometimes that we're having a "bad hair day", well here we say we have a "bad hair life." It's true, a constant state of dirty hair that feels like straw, but if that's all there is to complain about, we're not doing so bad. I've started showering in the afternoon to take advantage of the warmer water then and it seems to help. And there is definitely time for that because the lunch break is around 1.5 to 2 hours. They've just accepted in Cambodia what we all fight in the U.S...an after lunch nap is totally normal. How will I explain that to my next boss?

Happy Birthday!!!

Hi Nan,
I hope you have a great birthday! Here's my birthday wish to you from the other side of the world...where I've already been celebrating. It's an extra long birthday for you this year. :) It was great to talk (and see!) to you the other day. I wish I could have been home last weekend, but soon enough...until then, remember I'm thinking of you and love you!

A random addition

So this is obviously a bit out of order, but I wanted to post some recent family pictures. Our family rented a house on the Outer Banks (Nags Head) of North Carolina over New Years. It was my final family time before heading out. So, needless to say, it was a great trip, with a pretty tough ending. After first seeing Ashton and Ethan at a day old, it's hard to imagine that they will have just had their first birthday the next time I see them...