The rainy season is tapering off and 4 of my Cambodian in-laws are staying with us while helping with various construction projects.
Bye Bye Neighbor's Trash Heap 🚯
Living within a wildlife sanctuary inside a national park, dealing with trash heaps is not something you'd think you'd have to deal with, but this is Cambodia. Even though everyone in the village pumps water from the same river, it hasn't stopped everyone from creating massive trash heaps behind their houses. When I witnessed my neighbor's trash heap topple over like a scene from the movie Idiocracy, I decided we needed to do something about it.
We recently moved into the cabin and have been trying to experience it from the "guests'" point of view. Taking personal responsibility is not something most Cambodians are good with, and I hate to say that, but that's my opinion after living here on and off nearly 15 years. Getting my neighbor to clean up her trash heap is out of the question, and I purposely bought land upstream from nearly everyone because I am aware of most people's lack of willingness to deal with garbage and pollution.
Lack Of Responsibility 🤬
The irony is that this neighbor pumps water from the river only centimeters away from where her trash heap juice flows into it. It's a very solvable problem because people here all drive motorbikes and cars to the nearby towns daily and could easily bring along a small bag of trash on each trip like we do, but nobody cares enough for that. I feel more than blessed to live in such a beautiful place, and even though not a Buddhist myself, if I were I think the bad karma of disrespecting nature would haunt me. By looking at the above pic, can you tell how the my nephew-in-law is suspended in the air?
In Cambodia the only solution to this is to build a wall and pretend it doesn't exist, so that's what we did. I don't want visitors to combine Cambodia's most beautiful view with a massive trash heap, but in a sense that's kind of the paradox of this country. Anyone likely venturing out this far likely already has a more realistic sense of how things work here, so I'm not overly concerned about it, but still wanted to block the view a wee bit.
What Trash Heap? Where? 🕵️♂️
In the end I decided on a wall in the same style of our fence, staggered pickets to allow some air and light to pass through, but enough to block the view and also provide some wind protection for a future corner kitchen. We also put up a gutter to make to stop the wind from the blowing the rain back in when it falls off the roof. It's already a much more usable space, and I think guests will enjoy the new sense of privacy the balcony now has.
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Return from 🛖 Cambodian Cabin Renovation Project 🪚 The Trash Heap Blocker 🚯 to Justin Parke's Web3 Blog
