Happy New Year!

The biggest holiday of the Cambodian year, Khmer New Year, begins on Wednesday next week and continues until Friday. Playing games and dancing in the street started around the time I first arrived in Phnom Penh and has been going strong ever since. I've been joining in when when the opportunity arises. There's something really heartwarming in these crowds. Twenty-somethings play alongside three year olds, everyone laughs hysterically, and people dash about in games that loosely resemble tag, bowling, and duck duck goose.

To make things extra interesting, this is the biggest statutory holiday of the year, meaning that I get the week off from work next week! (Don't get me wrong. I love my work and am eager to have a positive impact here but this will likely be the most time that I will ever have free simply to explore Cambodia. I'm pretty excited about that. :) ).

I was hoping to have an update about my experiences during the unstructured interviews we've conducted over the past week to learn about the livelihoods of farmers, crop collectors, wholesalers, and retailers here in Kandal province. For those interested in the nitty-gritty aspects of both the post-harvest green leafy vegetable cycle here and our work researching it, I've posted a document relating to our plans for a systematic survey:

Basic Information and Measurement Strategy

Unfortunately, the office New Year's party begin's in half an hour. So, it looks like I've run out of time to do more than that right now.

In other news, I received two good personal responses to my hand laundry post. For those of you interested in how to actually perform this task properly as well as some of the development issues it raises, I've reprinted both e-mails with permission here.

In the meanwhile, I'm off on the early-morning minibus to Kratie province tomorrow. From there I'll probably work my way up by boat, bus, and pickup truck to Cambodia's wild North, the provinces of Ratanakiri and/or Mondulkiri.

Happy New Year!