I’m Already Challenged

I was reading some of the blogs I’m following and ran across a writing challenge in one of them. There were so many different places to click for information and I kind of got lost reading from one to another.  I’m pretty sure I joined the challenge (although I have no clue that anyone knows I’ve joined, what I should do next if I have joined, or how to get back to where I can find any of this out). It doesn’t start until April and I’m planning to be smarter by then. The world is just too big.  It’s a good thing no one minds if I’m lost.

 

Speaking of Rubber Bands

I was speaking (writing) of rubber bands in my last post and this thought came to mind, Rainbow Looms.  Now for those of you who are not frequently in the company of children and may not know about Rainbow Looms, let me introduce you to a new craft/toy craze that is sweeping the WORLD.  It really starts with a very simple concept of stringing rubber bands of various colors and sizes together to make bracelets, etc… but goes on to some pretty complicated stuff.  The loom itself is a small plastic apparatus with multiple upright pegs.

I first heard of it when my cousin who has a young daughter started buying rubber bands in bulk to sell in her flea market business.  Honestly, I didn’t see the draw and kind of mentally passed it by.  Later at our Thanksgiving celebration her daughter and another young guest spent quite a bit of time making bracelets.  The other girl had been doing it for a while and was making some fairly complicated patterns – these girls were into it, seriously.

But I did not know the true power of Rainbow Loom craziness until we went to Cambodia.  The Rainbow Loom “people” had donated a number of looms and bags and bags of rubber bands for us to take with us as gifts for the children in the orphan homes.  There were a few extra so one day we gave some to the university students in the girls dorm.  The next day we found out that one girl had been up till 3 a.m. making bracelets and hair bands to give away as New Year’s gifts for her friends.  There is evidently no age limitation to the fascination.

Later we took the loom project to each of the orphan homes and our experts sat down on the floor to teach and demonstrate.  Hours later the madness was still continuing… They catch on quick.  Thank you Rainbow Loom for a really fun time.

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Expert Sarah giving demonstration
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Expert Nikki teaching boys.
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Five minutes later everyone was busy.
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This is fun and we are making pretty stuff!
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So maybe we don’t really need the loom after all….
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Just a few of the finished items.

Something I Don’t Get to Do Every Day

Checking out a rubber manufacturing plant in Cambodia (please tell me you haven’t done this…)

On a recent trip to Cambodia, our small group of foreigners got to tour a rubber plant in Kampong Cham province.  Not only was this something one doesn’t get to do every day, but we almost didn’t get to do it that day either.  There were union protests taking place in the capital city of Phnom Penh and the guards at our rubber factory thought we might be coming to incite a riot.  Fortunately our tour organizer was from that province and somehow knew the right things to say. We all paid $1 to get in. This was a very self-guided tour.  This was the full extent of our supervision as we roamed the premises at will.

I'm glad they told us.
I’m glad they told us.

Rubber tree sap is white and really quite beautiful.  It’s collected a little like maple sap used in making maple syrup.  There’s the hole in the tree trunk, a little spigot and a pail.  I’m not sure how they get the sap from the grove to the processing building but once there it’s put in long storage vats and a chemical is added. The sap solidifies. It looks a lot like cheese (mozarella).

the grove in background, (bananas in front)
the grove in background, (bananas in front)
Beautiful, white, rubber sap
Beautiful, white, rubber sap
Sap in vats
Sap in vats
Solidified rubber floats to next step
Solidified rubber floats to next step
Raw, solidified rubber
Raw, solidified rubber

The long flats of raw rubber go into a drying machine where they are chopped up and dried.  I’m actually making this all up because there was no one to tell us what was really happening but we got a pretty good idea just by the looks of things. These are the drying machines.

the dryers
the dryers

The rubber is not as attractive when it is dried – yellow/brown and dense.  It comes from the dryers, still on it’s conveyor belt and drops into a compressor where it’s made into blocks.

into the compressor
into the compressor
compressed block
compressed block
block of rubber on its way to....
block of rubber on its way to….
this guy with the knife who was very busy. I have no idea why he was doing this.
…this guy with the knife who was very busy. I have no idea why he was doing this.
we got samples of rubber to take home
we got samples of rubber to take home

The blocks of rubber are trucked out to other factories where they are made into various rubber things.  Rubber bands?  I don’t know.  This is where our tour ended.  There were about eight of these long open buildings but this was the only one that was in operation at the time.  It appeared to be off-season for rubber.  This is a very warm climate and the buildings are open, as I said, and didn’t have fans – only natural ventilation.  The workers were often shirtless, shoeless and definitely were not wearing hard hats or protective anything around the machinery.  Evidently there aren’t a lot of lawsuits in Cambodia.  We were free to walk around the machinery, through the plant, touching, poking and asking questions without interference.  It was really quite interesting.

What things are still made with real rubber? Do you know?

Proud to Be Silly

I was debating whether to adopt the practice of having a certain type of post on the same day of every week, which seems to be common practice on many blogs, say like Silly Saturday. .  But I decided no.  This is my chance to not copy others.  So I’m going to be silly whenever I feel like I need to be, which would be tonight.

I name things. Sometimes I name things because it is easier to remember a name than it is to remember what the thing is.  For instance, Ted.  Ted is a piece of furniture I’ve had for over 20 years. I’ve never been able to figure out what exactly Ted is but it sits in my dining room and holds dishes and tablecloths, batteries and flashlights.  Not a china cabinet, not really a buffet, it became easier to just call it Ted.  Especially when trying to tell someone like the husband where to find something in it.  “Look in the drawer of the…. of the….. that thing in the dining room!”  So much easier to say “Look in the top drawer of Ted.”  And now, after nearly a quarter century he’s finally figured out who Ted is.

I also like to name my vehicles.  They are with me for so long that they become disturbingly like family members – they may as well have names.  My last vehicle, the Aztek, was named Sunny which was short for sunshine, being that it was bright, schoolbus yellow.  I’ve had my new old car for almost three weeks now and have been unsure what to name it.  I wanted something meaningful.  Today I decided to call it LC (Elsie).  LC stands for little car which is my first thought almost every time I interact with the thing. “My goodness, this is a little car!” I think, as I try to figure out where to put my coffee cup, my cereal bowl, my purse, my workbasket, my sunglasses, and my lunch. “My goodness this is a little car!” I think as the husband bangs his head climbing into the passenger seat.  “This is a little car!” I say to myself as the pump only puts in 9 gallons on a fill-up and goes twice as far on that as the previous vehicle.

I have a daughter with the “naming gene” too.  Her present truck is named Nemesis.  We bought it for her rather hastily, without her input and she pretty much can’t stand the thing. The car she had before Nemesis was named Claire.  I know she named her very first car too but I can’t remember it’s name, Patty or something like that. I didn’t really bond with that car.

I’ve named my houseplants (because I can never remember the word “hydrangea”), several notebooks, my kindle, and my property (the oneacrewoods). I have a cat I call Gray Kitty, which is a very practical name for a gray cat.  So you see, naming things is kind of an adaptive mechanism as well as being a bit odd, and it serves me well.  I’m just sayin’, I’m kind of proud of being silly when it comes to names.

Have you ever named an inanimate object? C’mon, fess up.

Again, I Wonder

Life is wonder full, full of things to wonder about that is, and today I am wondering about the judicial system.  I have just spent three days serving on a jury, which for the most part was an interesting and pleasant time. I’ve never before had the experience of coming into a room where everyone stood until I sat down (felt very unusual) and I got to eat a restaurant lunch downtown three days in a row (also felt unusual).

This trial ended after two and a half days of laborious testimony with the judge coming down today, after our lunch break, and dismissing us.  Evidently both parties had decided to back up to a previous point where the judge alone could make a decision and he did just that and settled the matter.  It was not the decision I would have made, but of course I do not know much about the intricacies of legal proceedings.  I cannot figure out why both parties agreed to settle the matter this way and there is a lingering sense of injustice that I just can’t shake.

This is the fourth time I have been closely connected to a matter settled in a courtroom or through legal representation. I’ve felt this sense of injustice every time even though I am grateful for our judicial system – grateful we aren’t out settling our differences at gunpoint in an alley somewhere.  These experiences leave me with a disturbing distrust. Ever felt that? Have we created a system that has become so complicated that a clever (or powerful, or influential, or rich) person can find a way to do things that shouldn’t be done and make them seem absolutely legal?

I’m thinking maybe, yes.

I don’t know.

Troubling.

I think I will actively try to avoid depending upon a lawyer, suing anyone, or being in a courtroom for any reason, anytime in the future.  I’m just saying that a lingering sense of injustice can really lower a person’s expectations. Hopefully I won’t get sued for saying all this….

Does anyone have a different story that can cheer me up? I would love to hear it.

Till Death Do Us Part

Forty-one years ago we said those words, the husband and I.  I think we had a better than average understanding of what that meant, and here we are, still not parted by death or anything else. I cannot speak for both of us, but for myself, I have learned many useful things about marriage. And about men. And about the husband in particular.  

The most interesting thing is that we are still changing, and there is more new stuff to learn as that happens.  For our anniversary we are going to start a program called Prepare/Enrich (prepare-enrich.com) and our first task is to answer online questions about ourselves.  After all these years of living with the husband there are still things about his early years that I probably don’t know. And there are things about my early years that have formed my ways and views that I might not be aware of either. I am warned that there are about two hours worth of this questioning to wade through before we start the next part of the program. 

The next part is called “dating”, something we haven’t done regularly since being married.  Actually, it’s going to be double dating with a mentoring couple, and it’s supposed to be fun.  This whole concept is intriguing to me because it sounds very personal and potentially helpful.  It’s not a roomful of people at a marriage conference where no one knows what you’re thinking, it’s just the husband and I with two other people kind of like us but capable of objectivity and insight into our natures (because they get to see our two hours worth of answers from the online portion). We’ve never worked on our relationship intentionally like this before (yeah, it’s about time…) but like I said, forty-one years and we still haven’t killed each other.  Isn’t that what it means when you say until death do us part? 

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Back at Home

Cambodia, what a time it was! This time last week I was still on the other side of the world saying goodbye to everyone and now it feels like it was ages ago. I made so many new friends, strengthened bonds with others, wandered a bit out of my comfort zone and survived. I saw God doing the things he does best – changing people.

One of the joys of travel is getting to come home again, back to a life that seems familiar but altered and fresh in some weird way.  I love being home again.

It’s taking me forever to get all my photos of Cambodia in one place and organized.  I put an album up on facebook but didn’t have the heart to tell people that it was only half of the pictures that I had taken.  The rest have yet to be posted. One thing I did take time to put up was a new profile picture of me in my tuktuk riding garb.  I was told more than once that I looked like Audrey Hepburn (when all of her facial features and hair were covered up… right, striking resemblance.) We all rode around with masks because of the dust and because of the Stinky River, aka open sewer running along our street.  It’s a good look and I’m thinking of trying it here at home.

dressing for tuktuk ride
dressing for tuktuk ride

Back in my usual Florida life I’ve been cleaning house, washing clothes, grocery shopping, going to work AND buying a different car.  Different as opposed to new.  I am now a proud Mazda owner, zoom, zoom.  It was quite an ordeal and I’m going to write about it in a different post but for now I just want to say hi to the guy who  drew up the final papers, the one and only Jim Carey.  Not really, but he did look and act just like him and can you imagine what it would be like – in a movie, buying a car from Jim Carey? I just sat looking at him and not getting over the resemblance, which probably creeped him out a little but he deserved it.  He’s a car salesman.  He did say he wanted to check out my blog and we’ll see if he did the next time I’m in for an oil change.

Have you ever toured a rubber plant?  Well, I have (in Cambodia) and there are pictures to prove it.  Check back in a couple days and you will know all about it.  I’m just sayin’ it was pretty interesting in a third world kind of way…

Eat Here

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In Phnom Penh I stay near the Russian Market and there are a couple of walk to places that are my “comfort” stops. On the list this time was Alma Cafe, a truly Mexican cuisine where you would not
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be expecting to find it. There are two specials for lunch every day,  and they change daily and are also open for breakfast. Tuesday is their day to be closed. I loved everything I ate there.  Get some fresh squeezed limeade to drink. There are things there for gluten free and you can order an awesome veggie breakfast burrito.
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God Bless South Korea

We are at  Incheon International Airport in Seoul after a safe flight from Phnom Penh.  The  Koreans are so … I’m not sure how to say what they are.  When they do something, they are so determined to do it really well. I’ve always been impressed with Korean Airlines. For example, I think most of us getting on the flight leaving Phnom Penh came from the same time zone where it was midnight.  They could have let us sleep the whole six hours in the air, but no. They wanted to give us a meal so breakfast came, at 3 am.  And I ate because I’m  in obedient mode (having just been on a mission trip).  And somewhere in the six hours they passed snacks and drinks twice. 

Ok, and as I mentioned we are now having a short layover at Incheon in the Prestige  KAL lounge, thanks to the Hunsader’s many miles on this airline.
I am grateful for warm water to wash my face for the first time in ten days. And that’s not all that’s warm.
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A tired person could easily fall asleep on the heated toilet seat with separate flushes for adults, seniors and  – I forget all that the controls had options for, but it was so extensive that they had to put a separate label on so people could actually flush the thing. Awesome.

And now I’m off to the food bar for a cup of coffee before we head out for the long flight.  Still thinking about all the people who came to the airport to see us off, the 45 minutes of hugging and gift giving, the hands pressed against the windows and the heart hand signals pointed in our direction.  What precious people they are. I’m just sayin’, it’s impossible not to love them.

Comfort Zones

I’ve been out of mine so long today that I’m forgetting what it is like to be in my comfort zone.  Loud, loud music that is not culturally familiar, much heat and little water, crowds of  people, very few of whom I can communicate with, and those I can understand I still can’t communicate with because of deafness  due to loud, loud music.  It seems that our mission team is very well organized but  somehow we English speakers are not understanding enough to prepare ourselves for each step as it comes,  (Or  could it be that God knows we would be resistant/scared/freaked out if we understood ahead of time. Yeah, that’s it.) 

We are always being asked for the unexpected.  What is the matter with us that we don’t expect to be asked to talk, lead, teach, play games, and do  physical exams on sick villagers? The excitement is building as I contemplate having to see  patients and dispense remedies, depending on an interpreter   to know what  problems I’m supposed to address… in the heat, in the dirt, under a tent, amidst confusion.  We are called on to be flexible and all we can do is proceed.  This may turn out well, it may turn out not so well, but either way it will only last about three hours tomorrow.  I’m just sayin’ I’m thankful for that and I think I can do it.