Master of Ceremonies

* Thursday. Today was the moving in ceremony for Project 7. We have been working on this for the beginning of our time here so even in this little time we have achieved a couple of successes and have seen how excited the family are about moving. So we took our usual trip into the village: through Siem Reap, up the SH6 and first to the market to buy some food to contribute to the ceremony feast. We bought a fish which was still slightly alive. You can't get fresher than that! On the way back to the tuk-tuk, I felt a big wriggle and the fish jumped out of the bag and tried to bite me! The bag wasn't tied tight enough! Needless to say I dropped the bag and the fish flapped around on the floor. Obviously to the mass amusement of the whole market. It was worth it for all the laughing! Poor old fish.

So with the fish FIRMLY tied into the bag, we headed off to the village. As we approached the house site, we could hear Khmer music belting out. We walked down to the house site and loads of people were standing, sitting, laughing and preparing food.

The mother of the house was dressed smartly and there was a few other fancy looking dresses as well. The ceremony was about to begin. In the absence of Aaron, who was on a sunset morning at the Temples and running a little late, I was whisked into the precession next to a girl holding an umbrella over me. The lady of the house lead the precession in dance, around the house 2 times to a Khmer fiddle (who even had a pick-up on it so it was very loud). The walk was meant to scare away the spirits who may be living in the house. Ame and Bill lead behind me. Each of us carried food gifts that we would eventually take into the house.

Next, me and my new lady friend ascended the stairs, one at a time, stopping on each one whilst the master of ceremonies chanted a few things. At these ceremonies they mostly have a Buddhist monk to administer the religious stuff but as you can buy 2 wise men for 1 monk, 1 wise man was there because of budget.

Once we were in the house, everyone followed on up and sat on the floor for the main ceremony to begin. Luckily Aaron arrived just in the nick of time, and we fast tracked him to the front of the ceremony. He then took part in some weird part of the ceremony where a couple asked for money to buy the house from him. Everyone donated money into the hands of the couple. (The mother of the house got to keep all the money which is good).

Amy was dragged in to be Aaron's wife and they were "married"! Hope that's not too legally binding!

The house was bought for $2 and then deed was done. All very surreal but an amazing once in a lifetime experience.

Then the feast began (at around 10:00). A selection of pork, chicken, noodle, and fish dishes were brought up for the men (and Amy) to eat.

We also partook in a little rice wine. After about 4 shots of the foul stuff we were all a little merry and enjoying the atmosphere, despite the massive language barrier. You could see how excited the children of the house were.

We got a couple of photos with the family outside the house. Aaron gave one of the boys a wind-up lattern as a present which he loved. He also had a little book for the daughter from a previous volunteer who really helped shape the house.  In the photo below you can see Bill and Aaron on the left with the mother of the house, me and Ame on the right with the two local builder lads Pek and Soon, and Ray on the steps.

But as there's loads of work to be done for Project 8, we symbolically headed up the road to new site. There is still a little odds and sods to do on Project 7, but there was a little feeling of out with old in with the new. The family at Project 8 currently live the 4 of them in this:

It's cramped, too low off the ground and fragile. In the next few weeks we will have them a house. We did some plaining and chiseling today on some of the beams that will make the structure of the new house. We did a good job considering how sleepy we felt after the booze and food.

After returning to the Guest House, we again showered, had a smoothy (and also an ice cream!) and went to the pool. Not sure what we will do this evening for food, but once again, it will be an early night for the last day of our first week.