Looking at America From Cambodia via Australia

I remember America. I have not spent such an amount of time in this place that I have forgotten where it is that I have come from. After an intense, sudden, and dramatic change in one’s lifestyle, it is easy to forget. I have been in this country for over three months now, but for some reason it feels like I have been here much longer. I remember America with as many memories as I can call to mind, but I do not pine away for hamburgers and the golden shores of California every night. This is so despite the fact that these memories do make for excellent daydreaming. Rather, I remember America because I am excited about what is happening over there right now.

When I receive news about what is going on in the world, it is most often by FM radio. Other sources of information come by mail, which I receive once a month, and by sporadic access to the Internet. However, these are not as readily available as the information I receive wirelessly. In the north of country, the only radio station that broadcasts on the FM band in English is Radio Australia. The reception is clear on most days, although I usually have to do some frequent adjustments to the antenna. Picking up stations on the shortwave band is rather unreliable and only available at night, due to the sun’s rays hitting the upper reaches of the atmosphere, and this makes the Australian news station my only readily available source of information about the world. When I am preparing for school in the morning, the program that is usually on the air is called Connect Asia, which has some information about Cambodia or the region of Southeast Asia. It is through this program that I am able receive the latest updates about the dispute over the current border dispute between Thailand and Cambodia.

Other than this particular one, most of the programs that Radio Australia broadcasts are about Australia. As a frequent listener to this station, I have learned that wallabies are a frequent cause of traffic accidents in the northern territories, and that there is a great environmental controversy surrounding the building of a pulp mill in Tasmania. On occasion, there are some brief snippets about America. However, this changed completely on the day of November 4th. The entire day was dedicated to covering the US presidential election, and there was barely any other news about the rest of the world.

When Radio Australia announced that Barack Obama was expected to win the election, I was sitting motionless next to my radio. I had just returned hastily from the school to have lunch after the morning’s session of classes, and I was eagerly anticipating the frequent updates. I listened to both John McCain as he gave his concession speech, and to Barack Obama as he gave his victory speech. When the time came for lunch, I told my host family and the other teachers who ate with us the news of what was happening in America. They had no idea that the country was even having an election, but they were happy that I was happy at its result. I kept the radio turned on for most of the day while I did laundry and other household chores, and listened to whatever program was on.

On the whole, it seemed that the Australian media welcomed the news that Obama will be the next US president. One program featured a panel discussion with listeners calling in and sharing their views, and most of the comments had to do with how Obama might treat the Australian-American alliance. There was also some discussion about how the election of a black man as president of a predominately white nation was symbolic of what America represented to the world; this dream of not being a prisoner of your social class. At least for now, the new administration fits in exactly about what the Australians, and probably most everyone else in the world, judge American culture to be.

As an American living abroad, I could not be happier with the news. When I have traveled over the past eight years, I have continually been ashamed of America’s standing in the world as an arrogant, bullying, and blundering superpower. I am relieved, to say the least, that I no longer will have to prove to every foreigner I meet that not all Americans are like George W. Bush. I also imagine that the American talking heads are raising the same points that their Australian counterparts have discussed on the air. That is that while there is this euphoria surrounding the end of the Bush presidency, there are a lot of expectations placed on the shoulders of our new man in the White House. Some of these expectations may be realistic and reasonable, but others may be not.

Much remains to be seen what will happen in the next four years, but I am personally very excited about Obama’s plan for the Peace Corps. Our budget was cut dramatically recently, and there has been a lot rumors flying around about what is going to happen to us poor PCV’s. I am sure that some of us have imagined some nightmarish situation where the Peace Corps tells us what the true ramifications of what the budget will be. I myself dreamed one night of getting a text message on my cell phone that read, “I’m sorry to inform you that due to recent budget cuts, we will no longer be providing medical treatment for some of the more costly diseases such as Typhoid or Malaria. Please see the nearest practitioner of the more cost-effective treatments, such as traditional medicine, instead.” I woke up with a start, for the traditional methods of healing in this country frighten me to no end. I am therefore very grateful that Obama was elected because of his commitment to service, and because of his plan to increase the size of the Peace Corps to 16,000 people. I imagine that that would mean more money for us for things like secondary projects, grants, teaching supplies, etc.

I have faith that things will change. Perhaps even for people like me.