Other Changes...

I was writing about changes, and I must say that even though my hair has adapted, the rest of my body isn’t faring as well. It’s not because I don’t work well with the culture – in fact, it may be too comfortable. Three things about Cambodia: they don’t plan, they are always late, and they love to eat… the description in my personal ad. Every tendency I should probably change is totally accepted here. The people love that I eat all of their food with enthusiasm, and it really is delicious. But consider the daily diet: bread or rice and egg for breakfast, coffee with sweetened condensed milk (a LOT of it), rice and (something) for lunch, mango for snack, rice or noodles and meat for dinner. Sugar, added sugar, sugar disguised as healthy grain, natural sugar, and salty meat. I can’t eat anything with flour in it, so that helps my cause, but I have definitely thrown out plenty of empty sweet milk cans. I’m pretty sure I have tripled my chances of diabetes. Long story short, I got on the back of my friend’s moto, and as he swerved to gain balance, asked how much I weighed. In my defense, he barely breaks a hundred pounds. I hadn’t even considered stepping on a scale at that point, because I was certain that the equator would melt off any extra weight that was hanging on. I don’t need to go into details, but I was inspired to check out the prices of a local gym.

I would like to inform you that I am now an honorary member of Muscle Fitness, which resembles the weight room at Selkirk, or maybe Average Joe’s (Dodgeball). It’s so great. I bought a coupon book – twelve visits for twenty dollars. There aren’t many foreigners at this place, which I like, and they have all of the necessary equipment… except the big blue jumping machine (has anyone seen a contraption like that outside of Ranger territory?) There are two ellipticals, but I only allow myself to use one – the other is held together with pieces of masking tape, and there’s a sign in front of it that reads, “If a guest breaks the machine, a guest must be responsible to paying for machine.” I don’t want to be either guest. The people of Cambodia have been celebrating Khmer New Year, so many businesses and homes have prepared gifts for the monks, which include fruit, biscuits, drinks, flowers, and burning inscence. (I didn’t understand the system, so almost swiped an apple and a Diet Coke from the table in front of our hotel.) The gym embraces this practice, and there’s an extra shrine in the corner for good measure, so as I gasped for air during my mock run on the duct taped treadmill, I inhaled the drift of burning sticks. Workouts are kind of deceiving here, too – it only takes about forty-five seconds to work up a good sweat, so I feel entirely too productive in eight minutes. It looks like I completed a marathon, but I really only made it four and a half blocks. Exhausting.

Another real problem is the combination of age and concrete – both of which are attacking my back. I know I’m not that old, but I have not been kind to my discs. I tried playing a pick-up game with some Chinese exchange students at a nearby college. I showed up with my team - three women, ages 30-50 – and we joined a gang of twenty year-old guys. I don’t know how it worked, but it did. Hilarious. They ran circles around me, and I shot 15-foot jumpers. Then I tried to play defense and broke in half. A week later, I thought I was good to go again, so played volleyball in the school driveway. It’s the best way to hang out with the other teachers – we laugh at each other and pound the ball into the base of the palm trees. But I keep trying to play in my new fancy black sandals, which have the same support as a piece of cardboard. Every time I land on the slab of rock, I can feel every vertebrae fuse together momentarily.
I tried to work out the spasms with a traditional Khmer massage, but there was nothing relaxing about that – in fact I think it probably snapped a couple important tendons. This small, unassuming woman walked in, and I had no idea how much strength she possessed. She was easily half my size, but that didn’t stop her from lifting my entire body off the ground. I was involuntarily thrown into a blind karate match – she was kicking my calves and dropping her elbow into my back like a trained ninja. At one point my legs were thrown into the wall behind my head, and I stopped to thank God for long limbs, because they certainly would have hit the crown of my head otherwise. At one point I was laughing so hard that I lost the ability to sit up, and Stone Cold did too. We both fell over giggling, trying not to disrupt the serenity. My friend was next to me, and kept saying, “what’s wrong with you?” She was accustomed to this form of torture and somehow found it enjoyable.
So that’s the update on the flipside. Still trying to find balance.