Days - 13,14 The Floating Fishing Town

Day - 13, 14

There was no break to rest after serving the orphanage. We adjusted 5 days in a row this week! The good thing is that my body is now able to take on a high volume of people without being sore. Our next stop on the trip was only about a 20 minute trip to a fishing village right outside of town. This village was very interesting because all the houses were built 20 or so feet off the ground to avoid the water from the floods. We didn't know where we were headed until our bus took an abrupt turn off the road and went down a steep decline. We came to a stop at a school which looked a little funny... Oh that might be because it was a floating school equipped with two small floating classrooms and a floating basketball court. It was an unbelievable sight! We set up our tables on the basketball court. It had a tin roof and was supported by a wire fence all around that let in a cool breeze. The basketball court had no lines and had a wooden floor that was close to raw wood. The greatest part was that the hoops were probably about 12 feet tall making the average 5'5" Cambodian look even smaller. The village head had promoted us to the town a few days earlier so we were expecting to see a lot of people. The first day we saw mainly school children and women. It felt a little slow even though we saw about 200 people the first day. Papa Khauv and Hungs father made a run to get a flyer printed up to promote us to more people. At one point I felt like we were running a children's daycare center because the kids would stick around and play with us after their adjustments. They only had school half day so the other half of the day they were free to run wild while their parents were at work.
The second day here we had a larger crowd of people. We saw 299 this day making it our busiest day of the trip. We had a few stroke patients today and one woman who had a piriformis injection which put her into so much pain that she couldn't walk or move her leg. Kim and Nate worked on her and managed to get some motion back in her leg. It took forever to get her onto her side to adjust her low back. This type of thing was hard to watch because she was hurting so badly... I think she was thankful that we took care of her. It was so much fun adjusting all the children. Personally I saw close to 20 kids each day. Some would laugh hysterically after there adjustments while others seemed stunned coming to the table not knowing exactly what to expect. Phil had the best child because he came to see us running in naked. We had to wrap him up like a taquito in a blanket before he was adjusted, but hey we didn't refuse anyone from getting checked. Kim really tried to connect with the girls giving a group of them French braids. Many of the girls had never combed their hair before so she worked really hard to get them ready for their braids. She became grossed out after we showed her that they all had a large amount of lice! Chris gave me some floss that he had in his bag and I taught the kids how to use it. They need some dentists out here badly to teach them simple hygene and donate toothbrushes and paste. Everyone was missing or had rotted teeth.
All and all this was a great place to end the trip. The weather was perfect here (mid 80's which is cold here so everyone came to see us in sweaters and pants) and we had a very friendly and responsive atmosphere.
After dinner both nights we all went out for ice cream at a gellato place called the blue pumpkin. Wow was it good. I picked out cinnamin the first night and coconut the second! I love ice cream. After dessert many of us decided to go shopping at the night market or out to pub street for some drinks. Both of these options were geared specifically for tourists and were nicely rennovated compared to the Russian market that was quite gross. It's funny here is Cambodia because they have the same items everywhere but everyone tries to convince you that theirs is real or better quality then their neighbors. So we laughed when we found shirts that said "same same but different". I haven't really bought anything yet because yes it's alllllll crap. Everything won't last and is made as cheaply as possible. I've been trying to find some decent items here but it's hard. On the streets of the night market there were food vendors selling interesting items. One was grilling partially hatched chicken eggs. Yuck!
Our last night here was a blast because we went out to celebrate Christmas. I'm not too into the whole Christmas thing but ill still go out and have a good time. A group of 6 of us went out dancing. Amy refused to dance so we picked her up in a chair and put her up on a raised platform in the middle of the dance floor. It was priceless! We all danced the night away and made it back by Tuk Tuk safely to get sleep for our 6 hour bus ride back to phnom penh. I'll be sad to leave this city but I know there is so much more to come...