Arn's Home: Swimming in Cambodia

I have never seen someone as happy and proud as Arn was while showing me his new home, which should be completed in a month. I wrote about Arn earlier here.

Sitting on the banks of the Mekong, his brick home (designed by him) will house a small recording area for his music, a small stage for children's music productions and, on the roof, a red-tiled party area where he plans on holding bashes complete with traditional Cambodian dancers.

It is one of the coolest places I have ever seen, and VERY peaceful.

He and I were on the roof of "Arn's Party Barn" and watching the kids swim in the murky river 2 stories below... I asked Arn if he wanted to swim with the kids with me

"Holy **** brother, what a good idea!" he said in his usual colorful way.

The Mekong is muddy.... really muddy and it is not the cleanest water in the world. But we couldn't resist swimming with the kids for about 15 minutes (I miss my own so much!!).

Arn surfaced at one point and said "Do you hear the crying under water?", which kind of freaked me out a bit honestly... so I submerged to hear the oddest chirpings which sounded like dolphins or something... lots of them. No idea what it was... the kids just said "FISH!" in Khmer (the Cambodian language) when Arn asked them.

My wife, kids and I just watched "Open Water" together before I left... so this was enough to put a damper on my enthusiasm for the group swim, although I played it cool for about five, terror-filled minutes :)


Arn and I then sat on the wood deck of his temporary home while his new one is built and just listened the sounds of the kids swimming in the river below as well as those of the small village behind us... hammers banging in the distance, an occasional moto would go by, mothers were calling their children from the river for dinner. A young boy brought me a flower to welcome me.

After a while, Arn got up to help one of the kids plant a fruit tree near the entrace of his home and I stayed to absorb as much as I could of the serenity the scene offered. ... honestly, it all felt like a page from near the end of Herman Hesse's Siddhartha, and I the visiting old friend.

Arn is happy here, it is paradise for him, and he so deserves it.