Driving lessons.

Venerable Vandong now has a bobblehead in his car. It nods yes as he abruptly slams on the brakes, only to release and do it again. We are inching closer to the makeshift garage under the pagoda. Release, slam. Release slam. My head bobs too. This is a monk's driving lesson by night.

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Late last week we were slowly ambling in the direction of town. I didn't look over at him much then, but the robed driver seemed to be tense.

"How do you feel?" I ask.

"Uh... maybe not good sometimes," he says. He laughs and his entire body shakes, his enormous head waggles, and his eyes almost shut completely.

A slow SUV is in front of us, but at first Venerable Vandong does not pass. I don't say a word. He sits with his face leaning in and both hands gripping the wheel. He finally builds courage and we slide around the black Lexus. Cars like this are still a strange and sore sight for my eyes in developing Cambodia. I understand this Lexus just as much as I understand monks that own a car they cannot drive; a car in which they install a new stereo, plush seat covers, a bobblehead, a pine tree air freshener, and a second air freshener in an overly glamorous perfume bottle that sits glued to the dash.

"Maybe the driver the same me," he comments, looking back to his passing maneuver. Venerable Vandong continues his monologue.

"When you drive so slow, many people call you a 'tourist driver,' he says. He laughs jovially with most of his comments.

Now we are going faster. As we pull into town he slips the car in between two pedaling girls and I catch a glimpse of a petite figure on the bicycle nearest my window.

"Oh, very good," I tell him, commenting on the tight squeeze he just moved through, "but maybe better for me if you would have bumped the beautiful girl. Then I could have stepped out of the car to help her. 'Are you alright?'" From the passenger seat I mimicked lifting a fallen girl from the ground.

Venerable Vandong shakes with laughter and then runs with the joke. "Where is your house?" he says. "What is your phone number? Please give me." He shakes again, straight from the belly.

I had to laugh, not just at his joke, but the combination of all these vivid images of life in the past month: the bobblehead dog he most likely personally picked, monk's comments about the mysterious opposite sex, and now driving lessons in Kampong Cham.