Yesterday (Friday): I woke up and wasn't feeling too good. My cough has been getting progressively worse, and I'm starting to question if it is related to the exhaust fumes or if I'm really getting a cold or something. Regardless of how I was feeling, there was a house that needed to be finished!
When we got to the site, the skilled local laborers were beginning the process of installing the roofs. None of us were allowed to work on the roof and I'm glad. In my short stint of working part time for a contracting company, I could tell there were some safety concerns that would have been questionable in the U.S. The steel beams were only tack welded and not welded all the way around. The roofing sheets being very light would not put enough pressure on the beams to collapse them. This wasnt a concern for the life of the roof, more of a concern for the life of the workers installing them! They were climbing around like monkeys on these beams and I was just waiting for bad news to happen; luckily no one was hurt.
We basically finished the house and I was given the pleasure of installing a kitchen counter-top in the back of the house! I believe because we were so far ahead of schedule they gave us some extra projects to do. I was more than happy to do it because the only other option was cleaning, and for those of you who are friends with Kianna (my girlfriend), you have probably heard by now about how skilled I am in the art of avoiding the dangers of it. In my book a bottle of Windex is much more dangerous than a circular saw and an assortment of sharp hand-held tools!
I had the pleasure of meeting up again with my new German friends Alex, Christian and Lydia; we finally went on our adventure to eat the tarantulas! If I did this post right, there should be a picture of the receipt! There are two main parts of the spider: the legs and the body. The legs were crunchy, like a mix between beef jerky and over-done french fries! After the crawlers, we had another great meal and after that met up with some more friends at a local concert to see the band Dengue Fever. This being our last night, we went out in style! The fare was delicious, the dancing was fantastic and the company was exciting! But after a week of 90 degree weather and then a full night of events, my physical body was on the hunt for my hotel mattress. It was one of those 'fall asleep before my head hits the bed' kind of nights.
Today: it's been a very long week, very long. It's been fabulous but it's been long! We went to the site for the last time today to have a ceremony for each of our residents. It will be very hard for me to express how emotional it all was; after all, this happened after we had just spent a week roaming around the city seeing poverty that is nothing like to poverty we would see back home. The emotions that we were all feeling were so mixed - they were so layered. It was a happy moment in the sense that we were helping a family by giving them a safe and secure place to live. It was a house that was in all meanings of the word their Home. They own this now, and through Habitat for Humanity, they will now be helped to started a business to give their lives some focus other than rummaging through trash to find food and things to sell. One of Habitat for Humanity's slogans is "we are not a hand out, we are a hand up!"
We were sad that there are still so many families living at the dump site; over 20% of the population in Cambodia live below the poverty line. We almost feel guilty, especially considering how much more we could probably do.
We didn't want to leave our residents, but at the same time we couldn't wait to get home. All day I felt as though a group of gladiators surrounded me as they were playing tug-of-war with my heart.
The ceremony was beautiful! We all said a few words, going around the room letting our resident how humbled we are and how much we love them. Waterfalls people, waterfalls. There wasn't a dry eye in the room but as we confronted the reality of our departure up front, we quickly jumped into dancing and singing in honor of the family that would be living in their new home. I was very lucky this week in that I had representatives from 7 countries in my small group! During the house dedication, we all went around and sang songs that were popular from where we were from. Because a lot of well known holiday songs are in English, I led the group in a variety of Christmas songs: deck the halls, Rudolph the red nosed Raindeer and Jingle Bells were a few of them!
At the end, we cried and hugged as we fixed to leave our new family members behind. It was tough, but the stay was long enough. I missed my previous family; I missed my beautiful girlfriend Kianna and our wonderful daughter Keira. I'm very much looking forward to seeing them. Throughout the week, it's been very hard thinking about them and not being able to communicate outside of Internet texting sporadically. Cambodia is literally on the opposite side of the world (12 hours) from Boston, so in a very real way I was as far apart from them as I could possibly be in this world. That fact dug a hole inside my chest that lingered since I left last Friday morning at 3 a.m.
Right now: I'm on the plane going back home! I'm anxious to finally be able to sleep in my own bed. Despite going over 700 mph right now, it doesn't feel fast enough! This trip has been a total pleasure to be on. I've made unbelievable friends, I've done some great work for people who are seriously marginalized, I've had awesome adventures and experiences and I've learned a lot about Cambodia. I hope to do this again.
The end.
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