Dec 6.

Today was sweet for connecting to my people.

I had breakfast with Neissan and Jarnha at a place called the Boddhi Tree. The restaurant was really nice, but the location was strange...right across from the Toul Seng Prison Museum! The museum devastates your soul, and I'm in a decent mood, so I'll save that topic for another post. I ordered, as I have a habit to do, the best meal on the table. My "big western" omlette, trumped Jarnah's poached eggs and bruschetta, and Neissan's "Boddhi sunrise" pancake. I'll admit I only beat Jarnah's by a small margin, and that I had to order a toasted baguette on the side, but still - the food was enjoyable. The discussion was varied, but centered on the ups, downs, and arounds of our respective travels and Baha'i service experiences. Later, Jarnah and Neissan organized their class, and I entertained myself playing with colors in photographs.

I later went for a (nonexistent) orientation for my new job...the guy forgot about our meeting...and I forgot his name! So after some minutes of confusion at the front desk, and my superb solution of calling the boss, everything was solved. Besides this event, these guys seemed pretty organized - they even gave me whiteboard markers for my class! So that looks like it's ready to go...I still have to call my $5/hr friends and let them know that I am unavailable to teach at their school, hopefully that gets done tomorrow.

After the meeting I met Jarnah again at the Russian Market on my way back home...and we ended up having some tasty "coffee with sweet-milk" (known as Vietnamese coffee to us Canadians) for 50 cents, and some nice conversation for free. Then I met up with the papa - we went for overpriced Lebanese food to reassert our 'arabness', and had a nice walk through the public parks on the way there and back. cool aside: in the park there were giant screens with photographers' series' projected as a slide-show with selected tunes to accompany. It was very random, but also very nice.