My host sister has told me something that will forever stick with me. No matter who you are, you find comfort in seeking those out who are similar to you. If you think about it, when you are traveling and you hear someone speak the same mother tongue as you or hear an accent that sounds all too familiar, you feel a sense of togetherness, no matter if you really know that person or not. (Hence, one time I asked someone at the Library of Congress if they were from Texas because their accent sounded like my great uncle’s, and he said he was and I automatically felt more at home). I reflected on what she said and she made a good point, which I referenced two weeks later when my friend and I saw a tourist at the market in Phnom Penh and he told us “hello” with a smile on his face although I did not know him at all. But when you are in a place that is different from where you grew up (for example I am about 3 plane rides and 24 hours away from my family’s home) it makes it more difficult to have a feeling of belonging. I won’t sit here and tell you I am the only non-Cambodian in my town: there is another PC volunteer but I do not speak with him very much and there is an expat from another country who lives across the street from me who we see once a month. But at the same time, these past couple of months for me have been finding my comfort in a place I did not know a year ago, and feeling a sense of belonging in a place that I did not grow up in. Instead of only thinking about the US and what is going on thousands of miles away, I have embraced more of being a part of my new, Cambodian family in a way that overlaps with my family back home.
The same goes for when you compare something you experience now to a previous experience you have had, such as how my host sister reminds me of my mom, my little siblings remind me of my brother and I, and my extended cousins playing with my siblings reminds me of my cousins from about 10 years ago. I think I have adapted to my host family so well because I see my host family as similar people to my family in the U.S. I have still adapted to my new surroundings a lot, but it is so much easier to do so when it all reminds you of a memory. We even have started watching movies together on Friday and Saturday night outside on my computer, which a movie night is something my family used to do when I was a kid. (We have watched some of the Fast and Furious series-aka “See You again” according to my little brother, Pacific Rim, and Home Alone). That is to say this blend of the new around me is riddled with old memories, and with that I have felt at home.
Outside of my family life, it was nerve wracking in the beginning biking around the town alone. In the beginning, and now just a little less, many people called me barang (foreigner) and pointed me out. It didn’t help that I was biking through town on my neon yellow, Peace Corps issued bike, styled with a green helmet. Step two in feeling a part of the community, instead of an outsider, was to get to know the community. I will admit that the first weeks I moved to my new town, I became sad when I had to fill out the site contact form (aka the emergency form/list of people PC can call if they can’t reach you). On the form, it asked me to fill in the contact information of three neighbors and also at least 3 friends. The neighbors thing is a complicated situation because we do not talk to most neighbors. I did not know the expat neighbor at the time so his contact info didn’t go there, and the rest is history. But then when I got to the friend part, I was sad. How was I supposed to make friends if all I did was go to school and go home and maybe bike around town. And how do you make friends while you are in motion?? Even to this day, my best friends are my two little crazies aka my two younger siblings, and an 8th grade boy/my birthday two who lives at my house and is also like a younger brother to me. And so at first, feeling a sense of belonging is hard.
However, I would like to thank my love for coffee and snacks and my mother/host sister’s want for me to always look my best that has made me find more of a place. If you think about it, from wherever you are reading, the sense of being a regular somewhere usually makes you feel good. People know you, they know your order, they sometimes know your life story. For example, in Atlanta I went to the Read Shop for coffee for years starting after my parent’s divorce all the way to when my mom moved to Texas. Through all those years one of the baristas saw me through some highs and lows and the sense of being a regular made me feel like I could always go there. The same has applied for my town. I think the first time I felt as a “regular” is when I pulled up to the fruit stand lady on my own (because before I only went with my sister) and she said to me “what do you need today Alex?” SHE KNEW MY NAME. She knew my name, and although I had only been there three times, it felt nice she knew me (and now she knows I usually buy 1-2 kilos of oranges and maybe some bananas). She even asked me where had I been when I was gone for a month for a training in Phnom Penh/Vacation. Similarly, I have my three spots where I go get coffee and it is always the same three kind people who greet me. At the Noodle Place next to my school, I always get a coconut coffee, and when the man who works the coffee station in the back sees me, he knows that that is the only thing I get. I know him the least but he knows my order well and they know I come usually at least once every weekend. There is the kind lady on a side street in town who sells coffee and tea and my order regularly changes, but she always asks me questions. For awhile she didn’t even know I was a teacher (because I come on the weekends) until I came to her booth one day afterschool to get a tea on my way home. She always asks me what I am doing today and during Khmer New Years she asked about all the fun things I did. She is always my go to stop when I walk to town with the students at my house. Finally, there is the lady across the highway near our house. Since I live next to the high school, many students go to her to get coffee and snacks, I go to her because she is within walking distance from the house and I usually take my little siblings there to get a little snack. The other day I was there getting a drink and a truck pulled up and two people got out. They were asking about me since it is kind of random that a foreigner was at this small coffee stand. To that the woman responded to them “you know she speaks Khmer and can hear you”. If you can imagine what a word hug felt like, it was that. Despite it already being very warm here, I felt this warm feeling that she stood up for me about speaking Khmer. And this is at the same stand where she asked my siblings a month ago if I could speak Khmer because I only let my little siblings order (which I let them order because they like to do it). So thank you coffee addiction for letting me know this people (but no thank you to my lowering bank account).
Similarly, there is a waffle lady across the street from our school and she always knows that I buy 6 waffles (for the fam). She also always asks what I am up to that day, and sometimes her neighbor seller gives me fruit. As well, the lovely people at the bookstore I go to to get school supplies used to host a Peace Corps volunteer many years ago, but it feels like they know me well (and they usually see me scrambling to buy stickers for my little kiddos at school).
Finally, my ladies at the nail/hair salon. In the beginning, I found this place as a refuge for me and an excuse to go into town. I have become really busy with a lot of projects and so I find myself working a lot during the week (and weekend) and either resting during the weekend or working, therefore staying at home. However, in the beginning, I had nothing to do and I felt like I knew nobody/nothing to do. My sister showed me where the nail salon was because she said “You have to look nice when you go to Phnom Penh” (this was for when I went to Phnom Penh for one day to go get my COVID vaccine). After she showed me the place, I found myself going back there, less because I want to always have my nails done (although they do look really nice and I get a good deal to have a gel manicure) and more because it is a place I can hang at for hours (literally hours, on a slower day I was there for 4 hours). The ladies talk to me, ask me questions, and I get to listen and practice my Khmer with other customers. They also asked me where I had been for the one month I was gone.
All of these people, who see me as a regular and not a barang passing through town have made being in the community so much better. But all of this took time. I am going into my sixth month at my permanent site. It took me 6 months to become a regular at a couple places. And so although that contact form, which still haunts me when I filled it out the second week I got to my permanent site, was not filled out with 3 friends, I now feel not as down about it as I used to. I am still working on getting a friend, although I did meet one of the daughter’s of a teacher at my school and she teaches English at a foreign language school. I think fate is in my favor because when I walked to town last week, I saw her and I said “we should get coffee sometime” and so after her exams I am committed to meeting up with her.
Going from being a Peace Corps Trainee to a Peace Corps Volunteer is when I would say I started to feel alone but then figuring out ways to find a place to belong. During PCT, you are with other Americans, going through training together, experiencing the same things, being able to debrief and talk about things together. But once you move to site, you are own your own to figure out how to make friends. It is the PCT bubble that pops.
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