Criminy! Not again!

Sorry, it's been awhile since I posted. Again.

When I started this blog, I was like, "It's gonna be the BEST BLOG EVER!! I'm gonna post twice a day, all about my life, and IT WILL BE AWESOME!!"

That was before I got slammed with hypothyroidism and lost the ability to care.

Now that's mostly gone, but instead, my internet has been severed. I was using the people's downstairs, and they've all moved out. My landlady offered to share hers, but I know if I get the internet back, I'll never get off it.

I value my freedom as much as I value my right to blog. I'm a recovering internet-addict, and I'm going to keep it that way.

Unfortunately, this means I can only blog at restricted times of the day. In uncomfortable internet cafes. For a price. So that's annoying, and conducive to nonblogging.

Plus, I've been sick again. I'm not sure what it is, but I can tell you where I got it. Ever since last school term, I've been eating at the Happy Guesthouse. My tuk-tuk driver and friend works there, so I patronise the place for lunch. And I really like their fresh fruit and vegetables. And I pick up parasites from them.

Anyway, today as I was going to school, I suddenly got a massive attack of something that felt like I was about to puke. I ran home in horror and fear, so it's cost me $30 of class time, in addition to the ever-inflating price I must spend on albendazole tablets.

Dammit all.

It Just Keeps Getting Better!

Well, haven't posted anything for awhile, my peeps. That's because I've been sick.

But wait, you say. You've been sick since December. NO STATUS CHANGE.

Over the last seven or eight months, I've largely had thyroid problems. But this time something attacked my intestines.

I dunno what it is. Parasite? Giardia? But it's been eating away at my innards for the last week or so, complete with nausea, headache, indigestion, and a fever that forced me to skip out of school on Friday. Not to mention the incessant crapping (lol, just in case you wanted to know that!). And for the record, this is the first incidence of foodborne illness I have experienced since I arrived here.

I haven't bothered to get it fixed, largely because 1. I no longer trust doctors--any doctors--with my health, and, more importantly 2. because this is the first escape from biting hunger I have experienced since December.

So although it's annoying, I think I'll probably let it flourish in my intestines for some time. I'll blog about more stuff whenever I get better, which, at this point, I'm starting to think might be never.

Roaches Are Gross to Eat

I have never eaten a cockroach, but I almost did today. The worst part about this is that I thought I was ordering a pork chop.

There's a small, half-formed grocery store down the road from me. It has pretensions of being a much bigger, more important store than it actually is, and I like their selection of produce. Plus, it's refrigerated and air-conditioned.

So, I was at this supermarket today, and outside the supermarket is a restaurant called Black Canyon Coffee, which apparently serves Thai-Western fusion food despite its Wild West logo (even though this is Cambodia and all.) Because I was in the middle of an intense sugar crash at the time (this was like 11 am because my digestion is so pathetic these days) I sat down and ordered food. Most of it is ridiculously cheap, and I guess what you pay for is what you get.

It was so nice: a large pork chop and fries, a small salad, and four little squares of toast--all for $3.95. I took one bite of the pork and discovered a young cockroach, broken up and flattened, lying just under the slab of meat.

As someone who habitually eats the ants that get into her sugar, I was less troubled about the fact that there was a roach under my pork chop, than I was troubled by the question, Why there was a roach under my pork chop.

If it were a fly, that would be understandable. Flies get into things. The same with ants--I haven't met a person in this city who doesn't have a problem with the ants. Moreover, having worked in a bakery, I know that insects can get into flour and grains sometimes.

But a cockroach? On a pork chop? That's a pretty serious health violation there!

I stared at it so long that finally the wait staff came over (like literally the entire wait staff).

I pointed to the roach and simply said, "This is not good."

Waiter (after sheepishly taking the plate of rejected food): "We are SO SORRY. Would you like to try something else?"

Me: "No. I really don't. In fact, I don't ever want to eat anything from here again."

And so saying, I backed slowly towards the door, then walked out the door, down the road, and directly to the bottle of antibiotics sitting on my dresser. Because lord knows what else that poor pork chop, plate, fries, or salad had on it.*

The moral of this story is, Don't eat at Black Canyon Coffee.

*This is actually the first egregious violation of health standards I have encountered in my 7+ months here.