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This is not a particularly gripping anecdote, but I feel obligated to provide closure to the previous posts about my experiences learning to drive my new moto… 

So the day before yesterday, I had plans to meet a friend of mine in order to replace the battery in my moto.  He never showed.  I phoned.  He suggested (to my dismay) that I just drive up to his house, and we would then go deal with the battery problem.  This was to be my first moto-powered mission– the first time that I had ridden the moto with an actual task in mind beyond just tooling around the neighborhood.  I was pretty nervous about it, as it was farther than I had ever ridden before.  Plus, the route involved a couple of very busy roads and a traffic circle.  Long story short– I made it, and we replaced the battery so now the electric starter works.  I took a wrong turn and added a second traffic circle to the route, but I still made it.  In fact sometime during that trip, some kind of confidence sprung up which prompted me to ask myself what the big deal had been all about.  So, now I am mobile.  Unimproved gravel roads will be the next project.  Hopefully, coming this weekend.

Pictured above is a mechanic who is set up across the road from the Moil Village Restaurant, outside of Phnom Penh somewhere past Steung Meanchey.