Cultural differences

Battambang, Cambodia is growing on me more and more each day.  Suddenly I feel overwhelmed by the reasons: the people, the food, the bike rides, ....the people!  God has really melted my heart about the people here.  I love the khemi people, they are so ....indescribably kind and open minded, eager to know me, eager to smile and just so darn cute.  They are joyful over the little things that I usually take for granted or feel haughtily entitled to.  

A few cultural differences, though, are that they don't like it when you touch their heads.  Any part of their heads, it is considered extremely degrading since the head is the most top and sacred part of the body. So for someone who loves to stroke people's hair, I have had many a moments where I stopped my hand mid air (before touching someone's head) and placed it strategically on their shoulder haha.  

They also share everything!  So if someone buys one piece of fruit, they offer a piece to everyone.  This one is kind of difficult for me since I like to buy in bulk to save having to go to the market again, i like to buy a few groceries to have in storage, but their culture of sharing makes me feel really stingy sometimes.  So I share sometimes, but sometimes I just hide my food if I'm saving it to have throughout the week of classes.  Once in a while someone will catch me getting food from my hiding spot and I feel them giving me the stink eye, but maybe I'm just imagining it.  

Another cultural difference is clothing.  I'm a scandal here with my dri fit leggings!  They don't find it appropriate to wear tights (even if worn with short over them or with shirts long enough to cover your butt and thighs).  So I have to resort to wearing pants or skirts that cover up to my ankles.  Knees and shoulders are scandalous here.  I don't usually wear tank tops so I'm good there, but apparently my go-to American apparel leggings are too "revealing".  Which sucks bc they are like my most comfortable clothes to wear.  

Relationships with the opposite sex are also a lot more conservative here.  Couples don't hold hands, don't kiss, and don't show any sign of physical affection here.  I find that sort of unhealthy, but there are times I find it progressively positive.  The fact that they show affection in other ways aside from physicality is pretty inspiring.

Week 2 is done.

I am just falling more and more in love with living here, or maybe I'm just adjusting haha because I still miss my comfortable lifestyle from time to time.  (Mostly at night when I am scratching my 29 bug bites like a feral creature, waking up to surprising scars and bruising).  

But praise my cool God for making me stronger with every struggle and acclimation. 

J