I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that I shouldn't do any big shopping trips to the supermarket. I push the cart around, shoving items into it that I think I'm going to eat, but then they end up sitting in the fridge and slowly ageing. It's because Cina and Vuth, who live across the road and are my landlords, constantly phone over to invite me for lunch. I try to wiggle out of it sometimes but they won't have it. It's always interesting food and totally different to what I've have outside. Today was no exception. I was introduced to mother's prohok (that's how the word sounds). For some strange reason it's called Cambodian cheese. The dad said, "In Europe you eat a lot of cheese; here we eat a lot of prohok", so that's maybe why it's called 'cheese'.
At other times I've eaten prohok in commercial establishments but this was made by mother, and daughter Cina vouched for its quality. It's quite a challenge as it has a strong, unusual flavour which is mainly due to the way it's made. Mother makes sure she buys the best fish and she puts them in a large earthenware pot, along with salt and spices, to ferment. Her prohok is then mixed with minced pork and other ingredients. It's not touched for a year so you can imagine that the smell is a bit of a challenge.
There's no way I can refuse to eat it as dollops are put onto my plate and then I'm given a demonstration on how to eat it. We have to pile rice onto the spoon, along with the prohok and some greenery. It helps in a way to reduce its potency. I tried to get rid of my dollop in one go but Vuth took have of it off the spoon and so I had to eat two spoons full. It didn't stop there either as even more was put onto my plate because I agreed when I was asked if it was yummy.
I've never known a people eat so much fruit; it's on the table at every meal. For lunch we had oranges; the green variety. Some are eaten by being peeled while others have a circle cut into the skin at the top and then the fruit is squeezed to get out all the juice. Cina, who is one of the slimmest people on the planet, ate six of them.
Earlier, I'd promised young friends that I'd give them a party for all the work they did clearing out the house before we handed it over to the new people. A group was created on "Messenger" and ideas went back and forth. When I left the house I thought it was finalised as a pizza party but we ended up at a soup place. About 10 of us were there and they had hired a room equipped with karaoke. We had our own waitresses, who kept bringing in food on small trays, and this was added to a large pot of broth sitting on a hot plate. There are noodles, thin slices of meat and fish, shrimps, mushrooms, greens, various noodles, dumplings, corn and various other foods. I can never eat more than two or three bowls but the skinny Khmer go on merrily eating.
While we ate, the microphone was passed around so people could sing whatever came on the screen. Towards the end the chairs were put away and the dancing started. Because people are so busy, inviting them out for a meal is a sure way of having time together. I heard about upcoming weddings and the fact that Sreypov has been chosen to go to Japan for two months of nursing training; she works for a Japanese hospital in Phnom Penh and on her return it will mean promotion for her. When we left, Sotheavy mentioned to me that Singapore has great chocolate so I presume she wants me to bring some back when I go tomorrow.
