With defenses down anywhere, bad things can happen

We dodged heavy rain inside part of the NagaWorld complex before our unfortunate encounter.

As the tune will do after hearing it, ABBA’s “Dancing Queen” stuck in my brain.

I was humming it to myself when we left the NagaWorld complex, where we had caught an otherwise forgettable free show of singing and dancing on a Saturday night in order to outlast heavy rain.  The hour-long spectacle ended with the cast cavorting in the aisles and performing the Mama Mia hit.

So was I only faintly aware of

For many Cambodians, dental work takes a back seat

Some of the young Cambodians I encounter are enduring braces in a country where orthodonture and cosmetic repairs are a decided luxury.

Those fortunate Cambodians tend to be the ones who work in the service industry — the ones I see most often close up — and likely have come from families that may be poor but not dirt poor.  They usually are graduates of a university or still are acquiring higher education.  Some are offspring of astoundingly wealthy parents who make up the minuscule elite class.

With respect to individuals without resources

Mobile vendors suggest department stores on wheels

They remind me of my Uncle Herman, who was a butcher married to one of my grandmother’s four sisters.

In my mind’s unreliable eye, I remember him working from a pushcart outside a market in Boston’s Haymarket Square.  There was an associated store just behind him as well, and I’m pretty sure it had sawdust on the floor and butchers in bloodied white aprons.

I know Uncle Herman called me by a pet name that I recall was