Counting, It, and Motodops

One little thing that I noticed is different between Cambodia and America is the way that we keep track of things as they're going. By which I mean, in America we use tally marks. In Cambodia, they use a square with a diagonal line through it. I don't know if it's standardized, but from everything I've seen, people start on the bottom left, then go up, right, down, left to complete the square, and then diagonal to the upper right for the fifth item. It's much more efficient from a how-much-does-your-pencil-move standpoint, and also easier to see if you skipped anything since it would not be a square if you did, or have no room for a diagonal, etc.

One thing that's the same is that they play rock paper scissors. When you're playing a game like tag or hide and seek, and someone new joins, they go to the person who is "it" and play rock paper scissors with them to join. Whoever loses that game is "it," and you continue on. When games start, everyone play rock paper scissors together, and you just keep going until it turns out that everyone has picked one of two options - so maybe it happens that everyone picked either rock or scissors. Then, everyone who picked scissors has to keep playing the same way until they have a final loser. If there's too many people they split it into groups.

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One thing that kind of annoys me now that I've been here for a while is the moto drivers outside of the orphanage. Before it was okay, but now that they know I speak a little Khmae and that I'll be here for a while, it's gotten annoying. Most specifically, they always ask me if I like to stare at and flirt with the pretty women who walk by, and then try to make me do that with them. And I don't really know enough Khmae to say, "Well, sure I enjoy seeing a pretty girl, or really just pretty things in general, but it's pretty impolite to stare and I know the girls in the orphanage who you do this to, and they really hate you and want to kill you, and I think you should stop." If I just say "No" they'd probably think I was gay or something, which is a huge problem in Cambodia. So I just say like "Okay, yeah, sometimes," and then stand with them for about thirty seconds, and then walk away. The worst part about it is they talk to the girls and make kissing noises at them, and sometimes walk after them a little bit. The other worst part is that sometimes the boys in the orphanage do it too.

Peace out.