this past sunday, davine's family invited chantha and me over for dinner.  so after church, i had lunch with chantha at her place, and then we headed over to davine's house.  davine lives with her husband and kids in a multiplex with her parents, two sisters, and grandfather.  her kids are sooo adorable!  and her husband works for the cdc and went to ucla, so he speaks very good english.  he was a surgeon before, but because of the way hospitals are run in cambodia (if you need treatment or surgery, you have to go out and buy all the supplies and medicine; hospitals don't stock any.  so basically, if you're poor or you don't have anyone to go get supplies for you, you can't get any treatment), he got tired of watching patients die, so he moved over to public health.  it was interesting to talk to him about the country, politics, etc. 
 
so anyways, we had a good time...and they cooked a major feast.  even broke out some red wine...which i was only able to finish after my ice had melted and watered it down.  (yes, they put ice in their wine, and yes, i don't particularly like red wine).  so we had khmer curry, hog plum salad (i'd never seen that vegetable/fruit before, so chantha looked it up and the translation was "hog plum"), this amazing soup i must get the recipe for, and lotsa crab.  somehow, everyone else was able to eat crab just using their fingers and teeth, but they gave me a nutcracker to work with...you can just imagine the mess i made.   this one time, crab went flying...i'm not exaggerating.  so embarrassing, but they were so great about it, assuring me not to worry about it because i was with family.  for dessert, we had an array of fruits that i had never had before...some good, some...well, not bad, but not especially good, either. 
 
after stuffing ourselves, chantha and i went back to her place where i spent the night again.  we talked about religion again, going into the differences between buddhism and christianity in more detail.  i was able to share more fully than before, but at the end of our talk, chantha just said that she believes that religion is good because it helps people do good things.   however, in the course of the conversation, i found out that chantha had a neighbor that was christian and actually spoke to her about it a bit, which is how she knows about certain aspects of the faith.  also, davine's family once rented out one of their apartments to missionaries...hearing that made me excited...once again, there are no coincidences, and to think about what part i'm playing in their lives, that they've been prayed for by others...
 
one thing i can't really figure out is that chantha seems to like spending time with me.  whenever she had free time after work (tuesdays and thursday 'cuz she takes english classes monday, wednesday, friday), she asks me if i want to go anywhere, do anything, and we usually end up having dinner and taking a little drive around the city.  she's invited me over to spend the weekend at her house again, and she's also invited me to move into her house for the last month and a half.  i originally told my landlord that i'd be there for two months, so i need to check with him to see if it's okay.  there are a few issues...it's farther away, and not as accessible, so i won't be able to spend as much time with phan bun and julia.  i'm also a bit fearful of what kind of witness i would be.  oooh, and no cable, washing machine, or refrigerator.  the pluses...it'd be cheaper, i'd be able to spend tons of time with chantha, and she'd do most of the cooking...oh, and i'd have help with any insects...hehe.  this might be a moot point if my landlord holds me to my contract, but i'm praying about it. 
 
in closing, (i don't want to make this a shorter blog and disappoint y'all...hehe) i'd like to leave you with a few observations:
 
- there's no valet parking here, but there are parking attendants that move cars without actually driving them...people leave their cars in neutral, so you see men just pushing cars around.
 
- competition here is brutal.  chantha and i were driving past a taxi station, and she pointed out to me two taxi drivers that were literally pulling a woman in opposite directions to try to get her to come to their respective taxis.
 
- if you want to travel or live abroad, you must be at least 6 feet tall and blond.  seriously, why are so many ex-pats tall?  julia must be at least 5'10", and compared to most ex-pats i've seen, that's on the shorter side.
 
- not only is burping totally acceptable, but so is picking your nose.  chantha and i had dinner today, and this woman at the table next to us was going at it...though at least she was using a napkin...which is an exception.
 
okay, that's long enough.  will report more observations the next time i need a space filler.  hehe.