Category Archives: Just About Life

lifestyle, daily stuff, marriage, relationships, raising kids, mixed marriage, multi-culture

Living in Phnom Penh: Break Time!

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Yup, were having a few days holiday again so its break time. It’s the King’s birthday and the holidays extend up to three days. My daughter has been asking me why its three days and she has been musing whether the Queen Mother went on labor for three days. Ha! I don’t really have an answer to that.

We decided to stay in the city instead of running for a short vacation in the province. Mainly because the heat is unbearable! I hardly ever go outside coz I always get migraines. But during this break, hubby tells me we’re doing some more DIY projects inside the house. (and you can hear me groaning loudly in protest..) So, I think the holidays will be spent looking for foam rubber grips, painting our newly installed cabinets, cleaning.

The horrors!! This ain’t a vacation, if you ask me. But even if I’m dreading breaking into massive sweating, I’m still looking forward to spending time with hubby and the kiddo. I only wish we could  a coffee break every now and then..

Coffee Time - Brown Coffee Cambodia

Anyway, Phnom Penh-ites enjoy the long break! It’ll be awhile again till we have a long one..

Living in Phnom Penh: Suorsdei Chanam Thmei!

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or Happy Khmer New Year!

You’d say, whoa! were halfway through the year and you’re just celebrating new year? Yes, my dear friends, Cambodia (as well as Thailand, Laos, Myanmar, India and Sri Lanka). You can check out this wiki article why these countries celebrate new year at this time.

Anyway, this is a very festive affair for Khmers, with most of them preparing an offering table brimming with fruits, drinks, flowers and snacks. A lot of them also hightail it to the provinces where celebrations are all the more festive.

For us, foreigners here its a quiet time. With the city less congested, and very quiet. Most businesses and markets are also closed. So this isn’t the best time to think of shopping or canvass for a supplier of wholesale catalog printing. No one will attend to you. Even most restaurants close for a few days.

Holidays extend for several days and right now I’m really catching up on… rest. See, I had to force myself to leave the couch and write this post. Oh, the things I do for this blog. Hahaha. We do have plans to go out of town but we’ll wait until the hordes come back and the seaside town almost empty for us to enjoy.

Khmer Curry and Nom Pang

Also, for the past two days, our uber generous neighbor keep giving us bowls of Khmer curry with French baguettes. It’s sooo yummy and a Khmer staple during the new year. Usually its eaten with the baguette (nom pang) or with fresh rice noodles (nom ban chouk)..

Living in Phnom Penh: Summer Time!

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I was reading a friend’s blog and she had me on her blog list with the latest blog feed featured. I was shocked to see my last post for this blog was five weeks ago. Wow! Five weeks!! And I have never gone from blogging that long. Even when I was on travel, I always made it a point to drop by and blabber a bit even if just to talk about indoor wall fountains for your home. So what’s up with Lui in Penh this March?

To be honest, nothing much. Really. I’m just not coping that well with the extreme heat here. Were averaging 35° here in Phnom Penh (some days even hotter!) and not even a spatter of rain in the horizon. There’s also constant power cuts around the city. Thank God, the area around our house isn’t that badly hit. We get an hour or two power cut per week at most. But I know some areas get daily power cuts from 1 hour to as long as 10 hours. I feel for them coz its really hard to be without at least a fan these days.

I also celebrated my birthday two weeks ago. Ha! It was a quiet but very happy celebration. I just did what I wanted to do. You know, gone are the days when I want to have a big party with lots and lots of people. Nowadays, my birthdays are spent doing what I want. I decided I wanted to be pampered. So I did zero chores, I was literally like a queen hahaha. And I did not cook. Nope, I didn’t touch the stove, not even to boil water. I also indulged myself and went online shopping like crazy. That was my gift to self. And since I didn’t want to cook, we ate out. In three different restaurants in a span of 2 hours. So it was a simple celebration, but I was really content. What mattered most was that my family was with me.

I’m counting the days till summer time is over, and while I dread torrential rains I just wish we could have just a few minutes of rain here. Dear heavens! I’m getting cooked here already! My husband kids me, of course, that Phnom Penh is like a free sauna. True. Just go out and you shed gallons of sweat. I should take advantage of this freebie, no? But I’m no masochist.

So Phnom Penh folks, stay indoors, keep hydrated. Buy truckloads of watermelon. That’s the best advice I could give. Hahaha. And hopefully, I won’t be too lazy and blog more often from now.

Living in Phnom Penh: An Eventful Start to February

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Why is it that when its a busy or an eventful time, I can’t be bothered to blog? Which really just makes me believe that I would make a lousy journalist or a news type of blogger. I’m more of a write and review about 4 post lifts online blogger than a current affairs blogger.

So what made the start of February eventful? For Khmers and Cambodia expats, at least. It was time to say goodbye to Cambodia’s revered King Father, Norodom Sihanouk.

King Norodom Sihanouk's Funeral Procession

King Norodom Sihanouk’s Funeral Procession © Amazing Cambodia

In an emotional funeral and cremation ceremony spanning several days, Cambodian’s laid their King Father to rest. I so wanted to join the festivities, but alas! I had a crazy bout of asthma and so was ‘confined’ to just watching everything on TV. And of course, checking out live feeds out of twitter. This was something I would have wanted to be actively part of. Sigh. I just had to content myself with being an spectator.

impressive ‘gate’ to the custom made cremation site © Amazing Cambodia

Veal Preah Meru

Veal Preah Meru, the cremation site © Amazing Cambodia

Thankfully, there are just really a lot of awesome tweeps, photographers around who generously shared their thoughts and snapshots of the event. Here’s a few links to blog posts and photo collections.

Photographs on this posts are courtesy of Amazing Cambodia. Check out their Facebook page, they have some great old photos of Cambodia as well as event photos.

LTO Cambodia also have put together a day to day series on King Sihanouk’s funeral, a great read specially if you are interested in the ceremony details. Cambodia Daily features the Final Journey of King Father Norodom Sihanouk and how a Nation Bids Farewell to its Beloved King.

These sites also have wonderful collection of photographs for the event…Funeral Fit for A King, Norodom Sihanouk Final Goodbyes, Phnom Ben, Thomas Cristofoletti..

Just Checking In

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And so I’m here in the Philippines for the holidays. And finding it so hard to find time to blog.

For two main reasons. The internet is crappy. I’m using just mobile broadband and I could never get satisfied with it. I think its just enough for checking email but definitely not for blogging.

And my second excuse? The holiday frenzy. It’s just unbelievable and I find myself sucked into the feverish excitement Pinoys have for Christmas. Everyone is shopping, eating, shopping, eating, shopping. It’s just crazy. Hahaha. I think I’ve sort of forgotten how it really feels to celebrate Christmas here. Festive, fun, busy, and full of parties.

Last week, we were in Manila, and I tried to brave the malls to do a bit of shopping. And I gave up. I think the half of Manila was in the malls, and even free spirit knee walker were selling. Sigh. I guess, I’m not cut out for too much of that frenzied shopping.

Thankfully, were now here in Albay province and its a whole lot less crowded than Manila. And its not polluted too so I could breathe easy.

But having enumerated my complaints, I’m still over the moon about spending the holidays here. There’s nothing really like being home and being with loved ones. And yes, I’ve been reliving my childhood memories of going to simbang gabi (midnight mass), eating a lot of puto bumbong and bibingka, hearing Christmas carols from neighborhood kids.

Well, its just pretty awesome..

Living in Phnom Penh: Got Caught

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I’ve had a really eventful week. For a change.

This past week, I’ve been running around, doing errands. Also, my friend and I are planning on putting up a small business here and we have decided to visit ‘competitors’ {hahaha! as if!} and check out their range of products and see if we can find some niches with not much available items here. We set aside a day to do that, drove around the city and did our stealthy research. Lol.

After that we got really hungry and we decided to have lunch at Mike’s Burger along Russian Blvd..But driving along that road is a bit tricky coz they now have barriers in place so we had to find a way so we can get to the right lane. Now, there are lots of small streets there and we eventually turned into a small street, no signs at all there so we drove on. Only to be stopped in the corner by a traffic police, saying were on a One- Way Street.

I was a bit exasperated since I seriously didn’t see any signs saying that. But the police pointed out a faded arrow on the street. Fine. So, my license out {my pristine, pristine license!} and the cop said he needed to get it, submit it for a ticket and reclaiming it would be a hassle. If we wanted to have it easy, we just needed to payout. He said $5. But we told him we don’t have that amount. In fact, he saw that we just had $2 and a couple of riels. He said that’s okay. So, I got my license back, just like that.

So there goes my first traffic police incident. I’m usually a very careful driver {yes, my speed limit is below 40 kmh, ok?!} but this time I really admit I was at fault. Sigh. They say there is always a first time for everything. But I do hope that’s the last time I get caught. And I’m also thankful the police officer was actually nice.

One lesson learned: Don’t keep a lot of money in your purse. I think it really helped that when he saw that my small purse just had a few riels. I figured he pitied the poor me. Ha!