Two weeks stay, the rainy season, and hiding in the hotel room

As with any first night in a new place, I woke often in the night, despite enjoying the wonders of sleeping in an air-conditioned room, mostly because I got to use covers for the first time in forever. The sound of the rain pounding on the tin roofs just outside woke me up, but didn't bother me too much, though to discover it still going this morning was a bit annoying...

My alarm went off at eight and wrestled me out of a dream about causing havoc at my old high school (which I did even while I was there, come to think of it...). I went to the café just across the street, Common Grounds, for breakfast, and was stymied by the fact that they were still baking all my favorite breakfast treats, but managed just fine on toast, eggs, and an espresso. I'm trying not to spend enormous amounts of money, so mostly trying to stick to my 10 dollar a day per diem from Cambodian Living Arts.

In any case, I met one of the supervisors from the club I'm teaching at nine, who came in a car, thankfully, and showed me how to get to the rehearsal space. It's a bit out of the way, but it's funny to note that as soon as you leave the tourist traps, the bilingual signs more or less disappear, leaving just Khmer. It's pretty sad, actually...anyway, the space is a huge room on the second floor of a hotel, with a big tin roof, tiled floors, and windows open to the outside. They open onto Siem Reap and the countryside, and it's actually quite beautiful, though the noise of the rain on the roof is a bit loud.

Speaking of the rain, apparently the rainy season is in full swing now, and September and October promise to give 25 days of rain per month, according to the club supervisor, and if the past few days are any indication, it rains all day too. Which means that I'm going to have to just suck it up and spend the next couple months being wet, or buy a couple of those ponchos.

I was going to spend this morning exploring a bit, and probably still could as it's more or less stopped raining, but I was so tired when I got back at nine thirty that I decided to just sleep, and have decided to take today easy. Maybe I'll explore when I go out for dinner, but I realized that I'm here two weeks, and it's a small city. I have all the time in the world to explore, and if I need to take a few days to adjust -- everything is still so new and confusing -- that is totally okay, and if I just chill in my hotel room, that's okay too. Or at a cafe, or whatever it may be.

It's a luxury I think a lot of travelers don't allow themselves, and goes along with my previous post about seeing the sights. I still remember my mom telling me to sleep a lot when I got to Phnom Penh because that's how your brain adjusts itself, and while Siem Reap and Phnom Penh are in the same country, Siem Reap is a whole new city and I would not say I'm comfortable in Cambodia yet.

I'm comfortable in Phnom Penh in that I know how to get around, I can more or less always figure out where I am, and I have places I go to and like, and people I know. It's not really home yet, and still remains very strange. Here, I don't know how to get around, I don't know how to get places, I know no one and I have no idea what are the good places. That's okay; I'll find some good places during the two weeks and I'll probably make sure to go back there a lot.

In the meantime, I'm going to take today very easy, still a little sick and culture-shocked all over again. I'm anxious, as I always am, for the first day of teaching a new group. I'm going to get lunch at the café adjacent to my hotel, because it's probably cheaper and I can sit and eat my noodle soup in peace, and mess around with my syllabus for the first class.