no taxi today...

Siem Reap. Battambang. Pnhom Penh. Every day there is a row of cars on the main road waiting to take me somewhere out of here... The drivers call out their destinations as I pass. Siem Reap. Sisophon. Phnom Penh. I often call back: Poipet! (yes, someone is staying...) Poipet! (not going any place else today...) Poipet!

I live here. I've chosen this sometimes-crazy border point. So I name this city as if the act of simply saying a place might give value to it. I guess I speak it out in the hope that this city might become a Destination. Home. Community. Family..... I say: Poipet.

This morning I went for a quiet coffee on my own. I took with me the notebook that Malis and I use to write down information about people we meet during the week. Most of them don't know I'm studying them. I don't know them well but it is my plan to learn them. So I take out the notebook and study their names. Rathy. Vasna. Heng. Pirom. I think about their families. I remember some of the things they've told me in conversation. I allow their names to resonate in my mind, holding them in thought. Even though I hardly know how to bless them I lift up their names. And I hope that whatever their Destination they might find a Home there.