BARF

That, by the way, is the acronym for Biologically Appropriate Raw Food.  For those of you who wonder about my new raw cat food endeavour, here's the process:

I ring up my tuktuk driver and ask him to take me to Lucky Supermarket, which still has the best prices I've found on the chicken parts.  Yes, the Cambodians pay much less at the wet markets, but as a white foreigner, I've still not managed to negotiate prices lower than Lucky's. My biggest gripe with the supermarket is that everything comes on those damned polystyrene trays, so every batch of BARF means five of those trays go into the waste stream.  

When I get home, I start by laying out the non-meat ingredients:

Egg yolks, vitamins E and B-complex, fish oil capsules,
and virgin coconut oil, made locally by Coco Khmer

I mix all that with a cup or two of water and set that bowl aside.  Then I take my two whole chicken carcasses and rinse them thoroughly to remove any surface bacteria.

Considering that I'm a vegetarian myself, I'm a bit alarmed by how much I relish using my meat cleaver. WHACK! Off come the wings and legs.  Then I slice the meat off the body and cut it into chunks. This gives the cats something to tear and gnaw at, which is excellent exercise for their jaws and teeth. The rest of the bird goes into the meat grinder, bones and all.

It's a toss up which delights me more:  my heavy Thai meat cleaver, or my ruthless Russian grinder. It gobbles up drumsticks and backbones with aplomb. 

If I ever do this on a larger scale, I think I'll probably need to invest in an electric grinder, but this one gives at least my right arm a good workout, and there's no part of it that's likely to fail or break.  

200g of chicken livers; 400g of chicken hearts

One of the raw cat food proponents describes her recipe as "reverse engineering a mouse".  When cats catch rodents or birds in the natural world, they eat the whole beast. One of the essential ingredients of cat food is taurine, an amino acid which is highly concentrated in the eyes and brains of rodents. Chicken hearts provide the necessary taurine in this recipe, and the livers...  well, they provide a bunch of nutrients, which is a good thing, because grinding them up is probably the most revolting step in the whole process. At least the organs go through the grinder quickly.  Blech.

Then I mix it all together -- the non-meat ingredients, the chunked and ground chicken and the ground organs.  

Et voila! BARF.  

Each batch will fill five ice cube trays.  Once frozen, I empty the trays, putting the BARFcubes into zip-lock freezer bags.  

Yes, these are ice cube trays that I use only for cat food.
I don't relish the thought of BARF-infused gin.

After filling the five ice cube trays, there is just a wee bit left over, and like kids who hang around the kitchen waiting to lick the bowl when Mum makes chocolate chip cookies, my fuzzbutts are lurking just around the corner.  Maneki, of course, won't eat anything until Crumpet has convinced her it's not poisoned. Paranoia didn't pay today -- Crumpet licked the bowl clean.

nom nom nom ...

So, here are the economics of this little exercise:

One batch of BARF will feed my two cats for 14 days.

The rough cost per batch is $16.  

Time, including prep-work and clean-up:  about two hours.

My current freezer, however, can only hold two batches of BARF. If I am going to do this on a commercial scale, even small-scale, I have to invest in a chest freezer -- an expensive item, both to buy and to run in a country with very high electric tariffs. The question, of course, is how large the potential market for this luxury cat food might be.  Maybe I should make up some brochures and put them at the Agrovet Clinic, just to explain what the raw food is about, why it's so great, and contact details to obtain a sample. The vets had told me they would promote my BARF, so I guess the next step is to see how many cat people will actually pay for something that is colossally superior to Friskies... but 4-5 times the price.  As for me, I'm thrilled! My home-made raw food is about 1/3 the price of the high-end commercially canned foods and 1/4 the price of the freeze-dried raw.

Confirmation: It is not possible to herd cats.

I don't care what the award-winning EDS ad says.  It can't be done.

While I was amusing myself with the morning mopping at 5.00am, the two cats decided to push open one of the screen doors and venture onto the balcony.  They had no inclination whatever to come back inside. They're not motivated by food, so treats were of no avail.  I saw Crumpet's black tail disappearing up the stairs to the rooftop, and Maneki tore around the corner to the front balcony.  I gave up and resumed mopping.

When she sensed that the whole house had clean, damp floors, Crumpet reappeared at the door just in time to leave grimy paw prints throughout the apartment. Bless her.

Maneki, however, was nowhere to be found.  I searched the whole wrap-around balcony and rooftop repeatedly.  I went downstairs and searched the back and front courtyards, calling.  I went out onto the street in my grubby, sweaty kaftan, looking like an asylum escapee, wandering up and down and calling.  My neighbours in Brickfields all knew me as the resident crazy cat lady, and it doesn't seem I'll be shedding that title here.

I called out to the neighbour on one side -- he was sweeping the courtyard at the Cambodia-Singapore import-export firm.  "Chhmaa bpoa-sor!"  White cat! I pointed to my eye to suggest I was looking for such a creature. He looked around his property in a vague way which suggested that he's not accustomed to looking for cats. Stray cats come, and they go, but why would anyone seek one?  A particular one, no less. While he was trying to discern what on earth I wanted of him, I heard a high-pitched yowl.

There she was!  She was on the front balcony of the adjoining house on the other side. To get there, she had to have run a gauntlet of wire mesh, iron spikes and razor wire.

If you look closely, you can see that my landlady has fastened a wire mesh  on the inside of this semicircular grille and strung coils of razor wire around the perimeter.  Her son told me that a burglar had climbed up onto the roof of the neighbours' car port (the corrugated metal below their balcony), and managed to scramble from there onto what is now my balcony.  That's when all this deterrent metalwork went up.  How Maneki got through the mesh and onto the other balcony, I don't know, but she appeared to have no clue how to get back.

This is how I met my neighbours.  At 6.00am, my landlady rang the next-door doorbell, and the husband of the house went out onto his balcony.  The cat panicked and scrambled to the next house's balcony.  (There are three connected houses in our little block.)  Yee rang the 3rd doorbell, and a young housekeeper tentatively led me to the upper storey, where Maneki was dashing around the balcony, panting and panicked. I approached her very slowly, speaking softly.  She hissed at me and scrambled back to the middle house. That's when I concluded that herding cats is indeed impossible, threw my hands up and came back downstairs, only to collide with the lady of the 3rd house, just coming back from the market on her moto. I pray she didn't punish the housekeeper for letting a stranger in.  A mad one, at that.

I went up to my own front balcony, and Maneki came over to the grille and looked at me mournfully from the wrong side.  I sat down and began to loosen one edge of the wire mesh. When she saw that opening -- not big enough for a burglar, but plenty adequate for a cat -- she dashed through.

She finally came into the kitchen, drank a half bowl of water and retired to her favourite windowsill to sleep it off. She's not moved since, as far as I can tell.

Me? I had to run off for my daily Khmer lesson without any coffee and then had to stop on the way home to buy a nice chocolate bar for Yee, who had graciously disrupted her morning routine to run around in a futile effort to capture my cat.

I'd cherished a daydream that the cats might safely be allowed onto the balcony one day, but I now see that it can't happen.  There are just too many irresistible opportunities for further exploration, way too many of which involve razor wire. I'm going to have to develop my cat-corralling skills, because herding them is out of the question.

The endangered Asian Tigers

I fell in love with my apartment instantly, and as is too often the case with me, I tend to overlook certain practicalities when I'm smitten.  Like the sole means of access, for example.

"But it's a lovely shade of blue, and look -- I can reach out from the 15th step
and pluck a mango from the tree!"

Never mind about coming in or out after three glasses of wine, or when I have the flu, or when I have a gazillion bags of groceries...  or when I want to move in my household furnishings. I dealt first with the movers who brought my stuff from the US to KL, and although I included photos, I couldn't seem to impress upon the representative that no -- his men would not be bringing anything up the stairs.  Friends recommended Asian Tigers, and they seemed to understand that there were some challenges involved in this delivery, but they didn't actually come to do a site survey until the day before they brought the furniture. Only then did they realise that they could not use a mechanical hoist or crane because of the mango trees in the front courtyard.  So at 8.00am on Friday, 25 April, a yellow, striped truck pulled up in front of the gates, and six men got to work unloading the 54 cartons which contain all my worldly possessions. The landlady observed, slack-jawed. I think she's used to the sort of expat who comes to Phnom Penh and buys nothing but flip-flops and food for a one or two year contract period.  This production made it look as if I intend to stay a while. Maybe a long while.

"Wait, wait...  there's more?"

T. S. Eliot must have been sitting in a Phnom Penh bar when he wrote "April is the cruellest month".  It's the hottest month in Cambodia, with hellish daytime highs near 40_C/105_F.  In other words, it's not the ideal time to hoist 54 cartons over a first-floor balcony. Much cruelty to Tigers ensued.

Two stayed on the ground, and four came up to the balcony with a stack of ropes and nylon cables. When I could bear to open my eyes and actually look at what was going on, I was suitably impressed with the strength of the fellows doing the hoisting and the knot-tying ability of the older guy on the ground. Not a single carton dropped and smashed, and the balcony railing survived, as well.

The Empire sleigh-bed headboard, baulking under the lip of the balcony.  Tigers leaned
WAAAAY out over the railing to free it and yet did not take a header into the courtyard.

Next came the piece that gave me fits of worry:  the early 18th-century pine sea captain's trunk, which weighs several hundred pounds empty.  Because the knotsman knew it would get jammed under the balcony, he attached a guide cable to it; his colleague pulled the trunk out away from the building while the four men on the balcony nearly perished hauling the thing up.

Notice the smile on the face of the fellow holding the guide line.
The four blokes on the balcony will exact their revenge on the next job, I'm sure.

For my Chinese friends, I would like to note the carton number on the pine trunk that nearly immobilised FOUR Asian Tigers, permanently.  (You know the crew leader in KL was Malay, right? No Chinese person would assign this carton number, and certainly not to the heaviest, bulkiest item in the lot.)

Unpacking and removing all the packing materials was part of the deal, but alas, hanging the artwork was not.  

The landlady's son has a handyman-friend with a power drill and a ladder, so I hope to have everything hung properly before the week is out. One day I'll think about replacing the shiny, synthetic, sea-foam green curtains that hang on every window. But not today. 

Beautiful Shoes

Feet. I never gave much thought to mine until they became my primary mode of transportation. When I'd been in Malaysia only a short time, I awoke in the wee hours one morning with a stabbing pain in the ball of my right foot. Because my mind does not do its finest work at 3.00am, I immediately diagnosed myself with gout. And my imagination took that ball and ran with it, knowing perfectly well that my body would never run again. Not with gout, oh no. Look what happened to Henry VIII -- he had gout, and it made him so irascible that he divorced and beheaded two more wives as a result. And what of me? I don't have servants! If I can't walk all over town to buy food, I'll starve. By 3.30am, I concluded that suicide was an appropriate response to this state of affairs, and then I fell back to sleep, my foot still burning. Before visiting a clinic the next day to confirm the end of my life as I knew it, I decided to Google gout, and I learned that, statistically speaking, I'm more likely to be killed in a water buffalo stampede than I am to suffer gout: Being a female vegetarian who drinks moderately pretty well assures that I will not turn into a modern-day Henry VIII.

I looked down at my right foot, wondering what else might give me that shooting pain and immediately saw the answer:  my new shoes. I'd bought a cheap pair of shoes from a local shop a few days before, and they were squeezing my big toes.  On that day, I realised how critically important my feet are to me, and I vowed never again to capitulate to my penny-pinching habits and buy cheap shoes. Mind you, this was not license to run over to KLCC and buy a few pairs of Jimmy Choo stilettos.  No -- I committed myself to buying decent quality shoes that would keep my feet healthy.  Flat and boring, but comfortable.

The two pairs of shoes I brought to PP with me -- a pair of Teva sandals and a pair of Skechers flats -- were already well-loved when we arrived here, and they're beginning to show some wear. I've looked all over the city for decent shoes, and although I haven't been to the City Mall yet, I've come up with nothing. A few people suggested to me that I have some shoes custom-made, and I dismissed that idea, since I associate custom-made shoes with dress shoes. Wrong.

Today I went to Beautiful Shoes on Street 143. The family has been making shoes for generations, and now their relatives' shops span the whole block. They have hundreds of pairs of shoes of every shape, style and colour, and catalogues in case you still need more design ideas. I found a pair of sandals with nice, thick soles that I liked, and another pair with an upper design that caught my eye.  I explained what I wanted to the shoemaker, and he sketched it out on his pad. Then he sat me down to measure my foot. I haven't had my feet measured since my mother took me to get my Buster Brown mary janes for school when I was a tot.  Remember this?

The Beautiful Shoes man didn't have a tool like this, but he went even further, outlining my foot on his notepad and measuring its circumference at various points with his tape measure. I just have the sense that these shoes will fit me like none I've ever had before.

They'll cost $20, and they'll be ready in two weeks.

As I walked home, I reflected on how quick I'd been to dismiss the advice to visit a Cambodian shoe-maker. And why? Yes, the shoes on display in the window were nothing I'd wear. (Orange patent leather just isn't my thing, but hey! Maybe I should give it a try.)  I thought the price would be exorbitant. Now I realise, though, that if you can describe it or show it, they can make it, and for a very reasonable charge.

Years ago, my friend Rose and I took a trip to Hanoi, and we stopped in at the city's premier silk tailor shop. A French couple had arrived with a manila folder full of photos they'd clipped from magazines and catalogues. This was an annual trip for them:  they would pick out photos of all the clothing they wanted throughout the year, and then bring them all to the tailors in Hanoi, select fabrics, double-check their measurements in case they'd changed from the year before, and then return after a week or two of sight-seeing to collect that year's wardrobe. This kind of custom craftsmanship has become an unthinkable luxury in much of the world, and I need to learn to embrace it here. Even more in Indochina than in Malaysia, the tailors and shoemakers are superbly skilled and reasonably priced. And there is nothing in the world like slipping into a garment that fits perfectly. I assume the same is true of custom-made shoes, but I'll let you know in a couple of weeks.

Night sky

This is my rooftop terrace, to which I have sole access, since I stay in the upstairs apartment.

I hastily snapped this photo on the day that I came to look at the apartment with the realtor, taking just a moment to giggle privately to hide my glee.  ("I found it! I found it! Yup, this is the one."  Actually, Jacky the realtor would have been equally gleeful, since I think he was growing weary of hauling me all over southern Phnom Penh on his little motorbike...)

It's the hot, dry season now, and I have no inclination whatever to spend time on the roof, even under the canopy, during the daylight hours.  At night, though, I have sat or lain down on this terrace and just marvelled. The air is cooler, I can hear night birds, bats and geckos, but best of all, I can see stars.

Even when I had a small balcony in KL, there was just too much light pollution to see anything but the moon when it happened to enter the patch of sky I could see from my vantage point.  In my last apartment, which I did love dearly, I had to peer out through louvred windows to see a narrow strip of sky visible over the tops of the high-rise jungle that was closing in fast.  

Phnom Penh is still a blessedly low-rise city, and it has minimal light at night, so I can look up into a vast inverted bowl of dark sky and pick out at least a few constellations as I did when I was a kid.  It's a fine thing.

Phnom Penh is a long way from LA

... in every sense, not just geographically.

One of my friends in KL quipped that my blog posts make it sound as if I'm living in LA. He's been to Cambodia and knows the realities here, so I know he's joking, but it made me realise that my posts have focused on the positive aspects of living in the Phenomenal Penguin -- on the places, people and things that will keep me sane. But let's be clear:

I have chosen not to photograph or talk about the Cambodians who drag carts through the streets to pick through rubbish for anything they can recycle or sell, their filthy, scantily-clad or naked children sitting in the cart amidst the salvaged refuse, while the military men and politicians roar past in their enormous SUVs, further coating everyone with grime and dust.  I have not photographed or mentioned the dead cats in piles of rubbish at the streetside, nor puppies sitting in the hot sun in bird cages with no water.  When I go to the hospital to donate blood, I see benches full of parents with limp, sick babies.  

I'm not in denial -- I'm very acutely aware of Cambodia's poverty and injustice and grief, but I'm also aware of the country's sense of hopefulness and progress over the years.  

I won't give you photos, but I will share some illustrative numbers from the CIA Factbook. Here are the 2013 figures for GDP per capita:

US:  $52,800

UK: $37,300

Malaysia:  $17,500

Cambodia: $2,600

Got the picture?  

Happy New Year, Cambodia!

Monday - Wednesday, 14-16 April, are the three formal days to mark the Khmer New Year, which is the nation's biggest holiday.  And yes, Cambodia is now entering into the Year of the Horse, just a bit later than the Chinese do.

Last year I made the mistake of coming to Phnom Penh at Choul Chhnaam Thmey (opening of the new year), and was shocked to see how much of the city simply closed its doors.  Businesses, of course, but restaurants and markets and shops, too.  Only the Khmers who are unfortunate enough to work in hotels or guest houses work on these days. Some businesses will indeed close for the whole week, giving their staff plenty of time to go home to celebrate the new year with their families in the provinces.  My language school is one of these -- it will be over a week until I make my next linguistic gaffe.  I've spent the last couple of days frantically stocking up on food and necessities for the cats and me.  Even the foreign-run restaurants close, because they invariably depend upon Cambodian staff to operate.

I think Yee, my landlady, and her family will stay here in the house.  First, they may be natives of Phnom Penh (quite unusual), and second, with her severely handicapped daughter and now bedridden husband, I don't think travel is viable.

There was a lot of last-minute work going on, though.  The linemen from the electric company were sorting things out on a corner near me.  It's quite common to see men on ladders tinkering with the electric cables, but only the fellows in the blue overalls are legit.  The others are just hijacking their neighbours' electricity supply.

"Not that wire, you buffoon -- THAT one!"

I got a haircut yesterday, Saturday, at a salon run by a Cambodian woman who studied her craft in Paris. I'm not entirely comfortable with this place -- there are many minions hanging about and acting obsequious. Soklen, the woman who cut my hair, wielded a pair of golden scissors and behaved like an overlord to those who swept up and shampooed.  On the other hand, the countless salons that offer cuts for USD2-3 cater to Cambodian women who all wear their hair long and straight.  A cut merely entails trimming the ends. I think Soklen gave me a good cut, involving two or three pairs of scissors and clippers and what-all.  I may let it grow out and then go to a men's barber shop and see what comes of that.

As I walked home today, Sunday, the last day before the official holiday begins, the streets were already quiet.  I happened to pass this shop, and the first thing that caught my eye was all the people lounging on lawn chairs.  As I got closer, I realised they were all waiting as their motorbikes got a thorough cleaning.  

Very posh, indeed... The bikes start at the left, where they're hoisted off the ground for a good hosing and scrubbing, and they end at the right, where they get a vigorous buffing. And comfortable seats for the patrons, no less! This is the life.  

The crone at the city gates

Many years ago, I heard a fable, and it goes like this:

A traveller approaches a city's gates, and seated outside them is an old woman.
"Hey, old woman," said the man, "What kind of people live in this city?"
"I'll answer your question," she replied with a smile, "but first tell me about the people in the city you've left."
"They were horrid!" he exclaimed. "Thieving, deceitful, cold-hearted, and I couldn't wait to be away from them."
"Oh," she said sadly.  "Well, I'm sorry to tell you this, but that's exactly the sort of people who live in this city."
He snorted derisively and moved on.  A few hours later, another traveller approached the old crone.

"Excuse me," he said, "but can you tell me about the people who live here?"
She smiled.  "I'll answer your question, but first tell me about the people in the city you've left."
"Ohhhh," he sighed, "they were wonderful!  Kind, generous and honest, and it's broken my heart to leave them."
"No worries!" said the old woman. "That is precisely the sort of people you'll find here."

As I got ready for the move, I recited this fable like a mantra, as a prayer that the people I would find in Phnom Penh would become as priceless to me as those I was leaving in Kuala Lumpur. It's too soon to tell, although the early signs seem promising.  Especially as a lone, middle-aged female foreigner, I've drawn tremendous solace from my Malaysian friends who were gracious enough to allow me into their circles despite my pasty skin tone and odd habits.

Most of my friends remember that for my birthday last year, one of my Malaysian buddies, a skateboarding, animal-loving, lunatic-lawyer, Wong Ee Lynn, invited me to jump off a cliff.  And I accepted.

Yes, that's a brahminy eagle to the right of us.

The week before the move, Ee Lynn arranged a gathering of kindred spirits at a gorgeously designed jungle retreat an hour or so outside of KL.

The cast of characters:

Well, at the left, there's me, the one with white hair.  Next in line is Poh Lin, sharp as a razor, polyglot editor and a woman who consistently pulls rabbits out of hats, thanks to her social network extraordinaire. The lady in the center is Dr. Rangamal, whom I adored the instant I met her. She is pragmatic and frank, and if I ever need surgery, I would want her holding the scalpel. Ee Lynn, the instigator of this marvelous outing, is the fourth in the row. On the far right is Nicole, who has given her all at Selangor SPCA for years and has blessed me with kindness and compassion, as well. Nicole is setting off on a new career now, too, so this felt like a celebration (?) of many transitions.

Ee Lynn beat me to it:  She posted an eloquent account of our retreat with some great photos. Check this out if you're curious about "Our cosy little jungle shindig" ...

http://www.covertoperations78.blogspot.com/2014/04/our-cosy-little-jungle-shindig-in.html

Something smells fishy...

On certain days, it stinks here.

I've read advice that you should visit potential apartments and houses a few times, at different times of the day and maybe once at night to see if, for example, there's a karaoke parlour just next-door that slumbers through the day and rocks all night.  

The day after I arrived, I couldn't escape the odour -- if I had to guess, a noisome mixture of sauerkraut and decaying seafood. 

Every few days, I've now noticed, the neighbour across the street spreads out a new batch of prahok on the sidewalk to dry in the sun.  

What is prahok? A salted and fermented fish paste.  After the fish is either crushed or ground, it's laid out in the sun for a full day to dry, then packed into jars with salt and allowed to ferment for as long as three years.

In truth, I wouldn't have turned this apartment down because of the prahok smell, but on the particularly hot days when it's most pungent, I wish they'd give up their fishy business and just plant a durian orchard instead.

Phnom Penh dentistry and premature despair

Today was my first Khmer lesson at LEC (Language Exchange Cambodia).  As I walked there, it was the city's dental signage which caught my attention.

This is hardly an inspiring sign, but at least it's fairly clear to everyone, whether or not they read Khmer, what's on offer 50m to the left.

A wee bit down the same street, we see this sign.  What's more, it's not the only one of its kind in the city -- when I was visiting PP with Vinca a few years ago, we saw at least one other just like it, and possibly more. 

I ask you:  Does this sign make you want to see the dentist? Doesn't it suggest to you that he'll be putting your crown or cap or bridge into place with a Phillips-head screwdriver, novocaine optional? The dentists of Cambodia desperately need help with a re-branding exercise. The owner of an eco-lodge in Koh Kong once told me that one of her staff refused to get treatment for an abscessed tooth until he was too ill to work. With signage like this, is it any wonder Cambodians live in terror of dentistry?

I arrived at LEC and went up to the third floor, where rattan partitions separate each student-tutor pair.  My M-W teacher, Srey Rath (pronounced Ru-aht) is 24, recently married, and o-so-cheerful. In our hour today, we covered forms of address (dependent upon the person's age relative to ours and gender), greetings, a few pronouns, and a handful of common questions/answers.  She's a good teacher! She held up a series of photos of Cambodians of varying ages and both genders, cycling through them until I could get all the addresses right. We practiced a few dialogues.  We went downstairs, and she had other teachers practice greetings and salutations with me.  

I walked home, talking to myself in bad Khmer the whole way, and once home fell onto the sofa in a fog of nausea and despair.  I couldn't even remember how to ask someone's age! I kept confusing Khmer and Malay forms of address. In Khmer, Paun Srai is the address for a younger woman, but I persisted in saying Puan Sri, which is how one addresses a titled lady in Malay.  

I have done this all my life. I am absurdly quick to panic and despair, and I hate that about myself. Wailing to the cats that I'll never master this horrid language after my first 1-hour lesson is just the latest example. (Mind you, I didn't give myself any points for telling Srey Rath that I am 52 years old in Khmer, having learnt the numbers on my own from a book.) There's nothing for it but perseverance. I just have to loosen up, laugh at my mistakes and persist.  

It could be worse. I could be the owner of this Toyota SUV. I hope no one was in it when the roof caved in. 

The cat's pajamas

My catty friends know that Crumpet has had a long-standing problem with over-grooming her hind-quarters to the point at which her haunches and the underside of her tail are all but bald.

I have consulted multiple vets who have suggested it might be a flea allergy, a food allergy, a topical allergy, mites, a hormonal imbalance, or stress.

Over the three years she's been with me, I've treated the cat for fleas, mites and any other small parasite which might choose to reside upon her. I changed her diet, put her through a full course of acupuncture and a short course of steroids. I added various supplements to her food. I increased her play time and tried to eliminate stress from her already pampered and lazy existence.  I showered her with love and praise, and when that failed to reap any results, I took to calling her Baboon-butt, thinking shame might do the trick.

In the last couple of months, she's gone to the vet for vaccinations and microchip, watched the household go into disarray, with bits and pieces disappearing as I sold them, and the rest disappearing when the movers packed it up. Then I put her into a carrier for the long drive to the airport and the great adventure of flying in the livestock hold of a jet, letting her out of the carrier into a home that looks, sounds, tastes and smells like nothing she's experienced before.

This is the result I would have predicted:

Mais non!  It seems I had it all wrong. Who knew that stressing the cat to the max would solve the problem? The Crumps is once more decently and fully attired. I hope it lasts, because I'm not about to pack up and move every time she resumes this pernicious little habit.

Saturday evening movie date

I awoke yesterday with a phlegmmy cough and decided that after my morning cleaning orgy, I'd take it easy. I spent much of the morning on the sofa with the cats and the Kindle, spirited away to Walker Percy's Louisiana.

By the afternoon, though, I felt that I really should make an effort to do something, so I booked myself a seat at The Flicks for the 6.00pm showing of "The Invisible Woman".  Around 2.00, I got an email from a new friend, Kathleen, asking if I might be interested to see "The Invisible Woman" at The Flicks at 6.00.  I knew I liked this woman from the moment I chatted her up as she wheeled her flat-tired bicycle down Street 63, and then again when she came up to introduce herself properly after a church service last Sunday. Kathleen is from Ottawa, about my age, working for an NGO, and she lived in KL for about ten years, but the decade before I was there.

I arrived at The Flicks a bit early. As I came up the stairs, I met the Cine-cat, whose name is Piri-piri.

"You could spend $3.50 to stare at a screen, or you
could gaze upon ME for two hours for free.
Up to you."

I drank a soda water on the balcony with Piri-piri until Kathleen arrived.  Then I got a glass of wine (a crisp French vin blanc), and we went into the "auditorium":  Maximum seating, about 25, depending upon how cozy you want to be with your neighbours.  The lower two tiers are just large cushions, suitable for sitting, lying or sprawling, Roman orgy-style.  The upper two tiers have cushioned rattan love seats with side tables between them for food and drink.  In the love seat next to us, a woman with a shaved head and many tattoos was sharing a bucket of popcorn with her chihuahua. The food menu is extensive -- all sorts of vegan goodies from Kn'yay, the restaurant next-door, plus pizzas, pastas and sandwiches from elsewhere.  There are no obnoxious ads before the film, nor (sadly) trailers for coming attractions.  There is only a single message, "If you wish to use your smart phone, we will happily pause the movie til you've finished. We'll then remove you and your phone from the premises."

The film is based upon Claire Tomalin's book about Nelly Ternan, the lover of Charles Dickens.  Ralph Fiennes directed it and played Dickens. Gorgeous film, and now I need to dig up a copy of the book.

After the movie, Kathleen asked if I might want to go somewhere for a drink, and we decided to try the Terrace on 95, just next-door.  It's a 1930s house, converted to a very chic guesthouse.  We had lime sodas and fresh spring rolls on the terrace.  It was too dark for my little camera to take a decent  photo, so I've borrowed one from their web site to give you an idea.

For those of you who said you'd like to come visit but would prefer to stay in a guest house, The Terrace on 95 would be a good choice.  It's only a few blocks away from my place and is next-door to The Flicks. For better or worse, it's out of the usual tourist area by the riverfront.  It's really elegant.  

Let's drink a toast to banking birds and bamboo bikes...

It's been a productive couple of days!  Yesterday I walked to Street 468 to check out the Language Exchange Cambodia (LEC).  I need to learn Khmer, and although it's possible to hire private tutors to come to the house for the same hourly rate, I decided it would be better for me to get out for lessons. It's about a 20-minute walk from my place to LEC.

Cambodia's government was recently ranked the most corrupt in ASEAN, bumping Myanmar out of that coveted (?) position. Still, there are signs of hope and voice.  There is a Centre for Media Freedom next-door to the Jesuit-run cafe. (I don't think they're affiliated, but who knows?) Yesterday I spotted the Cambodia Centre for Human Rights.

I know, I know -- I can't and won't get involved in politics, but I can at least observe signs, can't I?  

Lest anyone watching me photograph this sign deduce that I'm some radical element, I turned around and took a shot of the lovely house just across the street.  Damn! I lopped off the peak of the roof in the picture. I am rubbish as a photographer, always have been. There is plenty of poverty and squalor in PP, but there are a few beautifully maintained/restored French colonial properties, too.

I finally arrived at LEC, and I signed up for a one-hour class on M-F mornings, starting on Monday, 7 April. As I've mentioned before, between the long and short forms of each vowel and the ridiculously compounded dipthongs -- I heard one today that sounded like oh-ooh-uh -- there are over 60 distinct vowel sounds in Khmer.  Oh, and the LEC manager informed me that regional variation is rife.  My teacher on Mon-Wed is from Takeo Province, "and she says things differently".  I'm not sure where Mr. Thur-Fri is from.  So in addition to speaking at the level of a 2 year-old, I'll now speak at the level of a 2 year-old from the sticks. I thought of asking for the teacher who speaks "BBC Khmer", but I think she might have missed the reference. We'll see how this goes.

This morning Sopheak, the landlady's son, arrived at my door with the paperwork from "the Authority".  I thanked him profusely, reimbursed him for the fees he incurred.  (He explained that when his father went to the Authority, they never charged him anything, but the father is now ill, and the son evidently hasn't got his clout.) But no matter -- the papers were what the people at Acleda Bank wanted to see, and they opened my new bank account.

Just a note about money in Cambodia:  There is a local currency, the riel.  USD1 = KHR4,000.  Or inversely, KHR1,000 = USD0.25.  The largest riel note printed at present is 10,000, which amounts to USD2.50.  In other words, I would need a wheelbarrow of riel to pay my rent. So Cambodia uses US dollars, and instead of coins, they use riel to make change.  I sort of wondered what kind of bank I might find here.

Acleda is a real bank. The young banker pounced on the fact that I signed the application form with my middle initial, but I'd not signed my passport with it. She had me add a note to the application to affirm that both signatures are mine.  The person next to me could not write her name, but the banker pulled out her magnifying glass to compare today's thumb print to the one they had on record.  My ATM/debit card is on order, but meanwhile, they set me up for smart-phone banking, and I can make withdrawals from their ATMS using my phone. Cool, is it not?  I can also use the phone to top up my mobile SIMs and pay my electric bill.  Best of all, Acleda has the widest branch and ATM coverage in Cambodia. I did get nostalgic for a moment, thinking of opening the account at Maybank, but there are only two branches in the Kingdom and -- get this -- my Malaysian Maybank card won't work in Cambodian Maybank ATMs.  Why not? "Oh, it doesn't work!" the clerk told me.  Yes, I got that.

So while the Acleda staff were bustling about with my reams of paperwork, I had a good long time to contemplate the bank's logo. I assume this bird, whatever it is, has some honoured role in Cambodian mythology.

To me, it looks like a roadrunner, native to the southwestern US.

Which of course brings to mind the Roadrunner, eternal nemesis of Wile E. Coyote.  I hope the Acleda roadrunner can keep my money safe from any and all avaricious coyotes.

When I got home, I found an email from Channy, the lady at Mekong Designs telling me that my bamboo city bike will be here in about a month. Yay!  I'm really excited about this.  The bamboo bike is more durable, shock-absorbent, and water-resistant than its metal counterparts. The NGO was started by a French-Belgian group in rural Vietnam, and in addition to the bamboo bike project, they train para-veterinarians to serve the rural areas in Indochina. They make road bikes and mountain bikes, too, but mine will be the city bike with the double tube frame (l) and the rear rack (r).  

Although alcohol is absurdly inexpensive here, especially compared to Malaysia with its sky-high sin taxes, I really haven't felt like drinking any of it. I think there are a few reasons.  First, the heat. The heat in Malaysia never really bothered me much, but I'm suffering here now.  This is the hot/dry season in Cambodia, but KL is also a furnace at times. Go figure. Alcohol, though, just adds to the heat and dehydration problems.

When buying wine in KL, I half-seriously referred to myself as a "connoisseur of the barely drinkable".  Well, for heaven's sake, when a bottle of rot-gut costs USD12, I felt quite smug to come home with anything even tolerable. Here in Phnom Penh I can buy a bottle of good wine for half that. I bought a litre of Bombay Sapphire gin at the Lucky Supermarket for $11.  Does this make me want to drink more?  No. Oddly, drinking seems less special when I haven't paid so dearly for the wine or gin. 

This evening, though, when I looked back on what I accomplished during these past few days, I thought a drink on the balcony might be nice.  I know I've mentioned my balcony and shamelessly shared photos of it, but I shall be obnoxious and put up yet another one.  

Mark G, you were the one who told me about Pink Gin (gin and bitters).  I remember picking up a small bottle of Angostura Bitters in the Village Grocers' Wine Shop in Bangsar and nearly swooning -- the price was about RM90 (USD30 or so).  So I bought a large bottle today for $13, still marveling that it costs more than a litre of gin -- what on earth is in that concoction?!  

Never mind.  With my first ever Pink Gin, I toasted bank, bike, and all the many blessings that have come my way -- friends at the top of that list.  Cheers, dear ones!