Went to a wake this evening. Sophak, my language tutor, her mother passed away suddenly today. Apparently she fell down some time ago and suffered some sort of fracture and got a cast recently. For some strange reason she went from not so well to really sick, after being prescribed some medicine from the hospital. The kind of medical care in this country..... Sigh. I don't know....

Sophak received a phone call probably some time during lunch. Her neighbour told her that her mom wasn't doing well and she should come home right away. So she rushed home. Sadly, before she could get home, her mom passed away. I can't imagine how she was feeling as she received the dreadful call to go home. And how bad she must've felt when she found out that her mom passed away before she could get home to her. What do you say to someone who has to deal with the unexpected death of a loved ones? Dealing with death is painful enough, let alone a sudden one. Such a tragic and freak ...... incident. My heart goes to her. She's one of the sweetest person I've ever met. Always gentle, caring and patient, soft spoken and loved by everyone. So petite and cute. You just want to hug her when you see her. I don't think anyone can say anything harsh to her.

I always enjoy my lesson with her, because she's so patient. It's a great arrangement. I take lesson from her and she does TOEFL class with me. You can tell, she's someone who's genuinely interested in wanting to make a difference for this country. Passion, that's it. Working not because for money (which is rare here), but because of the desire to want to make an impact.

I'm always amazed at how Khmers handle situation like this. Be it death or birth or weddings. Always a laid back attitude, as if nothing better/worse could happen. At times it almost seems.... resigned... She seemed surprisingly composed to me at the wake. I probably wouldn't even be able to speak if I were to go through the same thing.

I'm never good at situation like this. Lack of words compounded by my quiet nature. I guess maybe silence is better sometimes. Some things are lacking in this country, but there're a few things that are not: weddings, births, deaths and illnesses. Those and NGOs....

Tis been a sick week at RDI. One by one, we all got sick. Well, not all, but quite a few of us. This is one of the reasons why I'm up at 5:30a.m. blogging. When you keep having to run for the toilet every 5 minutes, there's really no sense in getting back to sleep. 5:30 isn't exactly early but my usual waking time is 7-7:30a.

I think I probably managed to get about 3 hours of sleep. For that, I'm grateful that I slept a whole lot for the past few days. The past few days have become a little blur to me, the memories seem to diffuse into one long day. Everything seemed to happen in one day but upon digging deeper and with some effort of concentration, they're actually separate occasions on different days. Fragments of memories seem to weave in and out. It's probably the aftermath of the fever. At one point, my temperature hit 39C and I was beginning to feel delirious. People coming in and out of my house. Judy took such good care of me by giving me cold compress, keeping me company, fetching me water, etc... Now that she left for Hanoi for 2 weeks, the house's starting to feel empty again. Can't imagine how I survived for 6 months before she came.

Last Thursday or Friday, Sophie (a Dutch student) started to feel unwell. Diarrhea, vomiting, and maybe fever. It was strange to see Sophie to be so withdrawn and sedated as she's usually very cheerful and brings joy and laughter with her positive attitude. For some unfortunate reason, she left the country for the weekend, feeling ill. She was sick throughout the weekend. The good thing was that she checked in to a pretty good hotel at a bargain. Actually before Sophie, Judy my housemate fell ill too. She vomited 7 times in a day. Think maybe she had diarrhea too, but she lost about 2-3kg just from vomitting. She was really sick. That probably knocked her out for about 2-3 days??

I became the next victim, although I'm not sure if we all suffered from the same illness. On Tuesday, I started to feel lethargic and guess what, I had no appetite. That is very unusual for me, as I almost always eat what's in front of me. Ate some bread for breakfast with vegemite. Ate a half bowl of soup with rice for lunch and shortly after lunch, I felt the uneasiness around my chest. Later on I found out that it was the prelude to .... days of vomiting, diarrhea and fever.

Fast forward.... It's now Saturday morning, one day after I woke up at 5:30a.m.. I don't think I have ever been so violently sick before. Pretty interesting experience. Last night, I decided to ask Ming to make me some more porridge. I thought I should just have that, since the night before when I had porridge with the pork, my stomach turned into non-stop gas generating factory. The whole night, I felt like there're bubbles in my stomach all the time. My stomach didn't settle until about 1a.m., just before the non-stop diarrhea started...

Anyway, so, my porridge was there. And then I saw the ming's famous fried chicken. They look soooooo good. How can I resist Ming's fried chicken?? By now I was really getting sick of my stomach. I thought, since my stomach is not working well anyway and whatever I eat, it's spitting right back out (I couldn't even eat an orange nor the re-hydration drink safely!), I might as well eat something I enjoy. So I ate the chicken....with the porridge. Almost immediately after dinner, I felt ill, as if I was going to collapse. Went to the lab to get something and after diarrhea-ing whatever's in my stomach, I felt better.

By then, Suar, came to the lab to look at my err...... stool sample, in the parasite lab. I almost got to see what's under the microscope when the phone rang. International call. 3 times. But alas, no matter how fast I picked up the calls, they got cut off. Waited and waited and hoping that the stupid network will have mercy on me for once. In the meantime, I was trying to send some e-mail for Judy, but the network is soooooo slow that it could drive anyone to tears.... It's only a 3MB file!!???

I sat there thinking surely it can't get any worse.... There's nothing I can do but to endure. This is life. Things happen. Sometimes you get sick, sometimes your e-mail don't get through, sometimes you miss an important call, sometimes you get frustrated, sometimes people don't like you.... The list goes on. But whatever it is, life always has a way of getting you. So, move on! It made me laugh for some reason, just thinking about why things can be so bad. Once I laughed, it made me feel better. And I remembered, all the smses and messages on msn asking how I'm doing. J even activated some 17 people to pray for me. Poor J, she became the messenger for different people, but it warms my heart that people care, even from afar.

Despite all the vomiting and the numerous visits to the bathroom, and the feeling of hot and cold alternating, I still managed to do things that made me happy. Like, looking at the face of my stupid dog. I don't know why Bo Bo always have that innocent look on his face! Now that I know, at least when I leave, someone nice will take care of him. And I watched an episode of Coffee Prince.

This morning I read Psalm 139 and I was comforted by it.

1 O LORD, you have searched me
and you know me.

2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.

3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.

4 Before a word is on my tongue
you know it completely, O LORD.

5 You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.

6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.

7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?

8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,

10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"

12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.

14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.

15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,

16 your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

17 How precious to [b] me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!

18 Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake,
I am still with you.

19 If only you would slay the wicked, O God!
Away from me, you bloodthirsty men!

20 They speak of you with evil intent;
your adversaries misuse your name.

21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD,
and abhor those who rise up against you?

22 I have nothing but hatred for them;
I count them my enemies.

23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.

24 See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.

Thank God I'm alive and have all four limbs intact. Health is not to be taken for granted. Do things that please God while you can.

Things I do for fun when I'm bored to entertain myself and it's hot outside. Ha ha ha...