Marie's Rescue...FINALLY!

and I'm finally writing again. It's Nov 27 today, I started this blog Nov 22, and since then the internet has been out at our house. So, I'm a bit delayed, but so excited to tell you everything that's happened in the last week or so.
Well, we finally made it out to Marie's Rescue, and it was a gorgeous hot day, the compound is out in the country so it was so peaceful out there. Those kids, all 170 of them plus adults, have a beautiful home. I can't believe it took us that long to get out there--when I was thinking in August that I would try to get there right away. Just goes to show how long things take out here--into our 4th month and finally we visit.

marie ens rescue mission

ANyways, for those of you who don't know, Rescue orphanage is the orphanage I visited on my first missions trip, and is run by a retired C&MA missionary who's spent the better part of her life in Cambodia. When she was "asked" to retire at the age of 65, she still felt she had her best work ahead of her, so she literally retired in Cambodia, and went independent to start this orphanage. In true Marie fashion, it is growing non stop, aids homes for families, a home for young mothers needing a place to have their baby, two granny homes, with senior ladies that have no where else to go, an entire new wing now for more kids(the ones she was building when I was there before) a new school, AND the beginnings of Rescue 2, in Poipet. So many kids in need, and she just keeps getting the support she needs from the West to keep doing all this growing. She's into her seventies now, and graciously took us and a groups of staff who were interesting in visiting, around on a tour that Saturday afternoon.
She has just within days of our visit, received a family of 5 that she heard about the father murdering the mother in cold blood, so they pursued these 5 kids--the reporter who reported the story helped them get in contact. Also, she just got a 5 year old rescued from being "sold" into who knows what, so her stories never end. The kids all look well, are thriving, and enjoyed the suckers we brought them. WE were doing tongue tests to see what had already eaten one. The smart ones were stuffing them into their pockets, so when they asked for another sucker and we asked to see their tongue, it wasn't covered in food dye, so they got yet another one! We were on to them though, just pretended not to be!!! Sweet kids.
It was a blessing to have my children there to witness and be even just a small part of Rescue. IT was there that I first dreamed that my kids could step foot on Cambodian soil and see the world from other eyes. They all handed out candy. Julia played soccer with about 50 other kids in the big grass field, and Steph held babies, and played hand games with some kids. IT was fun. Maya shyed away, but eventually played with a teenager who took to her, at the playground. IT was a lovely visit, and we will return again.
Marie has a golden retriever names Suzie, that some of you may have read about in her children's book. Suzie is due any day now with her 5th litter of puppies--that whole afternoon we were there, she ran around and rolled in the dirt, I guess to relieve her of her pregnant heat. She was so filthy, they had to bathe her when we left. She was loving her freedom though, before the pups come along. A very nice dog. Her "husband's" name is Toby, and he's still a teenager, so we enjoyed him, too. The kids want to go back to see the puppies.
SO, after a great day last Saturday, we went to A rocking' Khmer church called New Life, here in town. Wow, is all I gotta say. Loud music, crazy worship--if you like that kind of thing (which I do, but not everybody does, and that's OK) it was so great. Just to see the power of the Holy Spirit among Khmer believers, when so often around the city, we see the drudgery, the poverty. IT was a blessing. And they prayed for us--the foreigners!!! The Khmer people prayed for us--it was a great blessing for me that sunday.
Interesting notes. I had to kill two cockroaches on the same day at school on Monday. Seems that after some time off, they were all out for a walk. The first I screamed only mildly as it was headed my way and then I bug sprayed the tar out of him. The second, no scream involved (cuz I was used to it by now!) I hammered with a kid's shoe, just outside my music room. Well, a few days later, as I was in the middle of teaching a gr 4 music class, I turned aside to deal with the CD. AS I turned back, I saw a few kids with eyeballs wide open, pointing to the floor.
You know, it's amazing, what your brain can think in a fraction of a second. In slow motion, as my eyes looked to the floor where they were pointing, my brain thought all of the following things: "Oh, what are they pointing at with such excitement? IT could be anything. But, it could also be another cockroach. If it's a cockroach, then I'd better not even take the time to look, but just get quickly out of the way..." SO, I can blame my brain for the scream that ensued, followed by a huge leap in the opposite direction. I think it took me 5 minutes to stop everybody from laughing, including myself, as all the students were pointing at was my paper that had fallen to the ground! Unbelievable. You probably had to be there, but at the time, it was really funny.
Dean's currenly in Hong Kong, for a ASCI inservice. Most of the staff went, but I gladly stayed home with the kids, and we're enjoying a girls weekend. I had work to finish up for the school, which most of it is all done now, so YAY! It's exciting for me.
Dean took my camera, so I wasn't able to take a picture of the cute little baby rat that the kind custodian caught in my Gr. 1 room. We saw evidence of him in the cupboard where he had been eating paint pucks (apparently yellow is a favorite flavor!) and sure enough he was here this morning when I got to school to get some work done. (There's no classes for kids Thurs and Fri). His little beady eyes, I felt sort of sorry for him. So did Robert, our custodian, as he couldn't really bring himself to kill him! The little cutie ended up running away before Robert could get him. So, I guess when he returns, we'll have a class pet! ha
There's a terribly cute little girl we see on our morning drive to school, who runs around the street where her mom in cooking at a restaurant. She is one of the many who often say hi to us on the way to school (same route, save white people, everyday). I had a couple little articles of clothing that didn't fit Maya any more, just some undies, a skirt, 2 tops, and I've been wanting to pass them along, but wasn't sure how they'd take it (rich, white people... You know.) ANyways, I got up the guts and just gave them the small bag of clothes, hand motioning in english, while they hand motioned in Khmer! THey were so incredibly thankful (That little mite is often wearing just a shirt that is oversized, and of course, it's filthy), and I even saw her in the underwear later that day. Apparently underwear is just a hot commodity for kids--not alot have it and if they do, they don't have the outerclothes, and that's all they wear. And that's just the girls. Most, and I mean many, toddler boys, just run around completely buck. Between them and all the men that take leaks on the side of the road, I've had my fill of male paraphernalia for a lifetime. NO need for sons anymore, I've seen it all now! haha Just jokes.
Well, must be off. Julia fell off her bike pretty good yesterday as I was racing her home on our last stretch of road (nice!) She hit her brakes in loose gravel and has two knees with no skin on them now, and lost a good deal of outer skin on the palm of her hand. "But I saved my head..." was her quote. No more racing. ANyways, they're at a friend's house and I will go pick them up, supper, blackout, and another day.
Bye the way, the weather is really nice now. THe rain is mostly over, and there is a cool breeze in the sunny mornings. SOme kids call it "cold" but it is just gorgeous. The kind of weather you just want to be on a beach with somewhere! Well, Lord willing that will be our CHristmas this year. IF we can find something cheap to book. Not minding ONE BIT missing out on all the Christmas hullabaloo this year! No shopping, no cards, no baking. OK, I might try to bake, and we will have parties and guests, but no shopping, now that's a treat. I will save up all my Christmas shopping to May, when I want to bring home luggage bags full of goodies for everyone! So, have fun those of you that love the busy-ness of this season!!!
xo,
L
PS I'll get Dean to get picts up soon.
PPS Steph's Khmer is actually starting to help us out with tuk tuk drivers! IT was so exciting the other day, when I didn't have a hot clue what he way saying, and Steph calmy stated, "he's saying, ''Go home.'" SHe could understand! Yay! IT was a crowning moment.
Bye for now.

Jana and the Bats

On Friday, we had Jana and the whole YWAM team over for dinner. Jana did warn us that they could eat a fair amount of food, and let me tell you, they didn’t disappoint. We decided to have a big vat of chicken curry with sweet potatoes and corn on the cob.
Before the whole group showed up we needed to get some corn on the cob. Just around the corner from our house, there is a local guy who sells the corn on the cob from his corner vendor area. Well as it was nearly 5:30 pm and very dark at this point, by the time I showed up on the moto he was long gone. So now I had to try and find another guy who sold corn somewhere in the hustle and bustle of the market area which was about 1 km from our house. I got pretty lucky, as I came to the main road, there was a guy who was just starting to take his umbrella down from his portable corn vendor. However, as I approached, he let me know with both hands waving that the shop was closed for the evening. So for the next 20 minutes, I drove all around the area trying to identify a place that sold corn on the cob. I was having no such luck. As it always seems to go, I decided to go around this one back street that was very dark, when I could finally see a vendor.
I pulled up and she was happy to see me as she greeted me with that big warm(at the same time fatigued) Cambodian smile. I asked for 15 corn. She only gave me 10. When I asked for 5 more she simply said no, as she had no more to sell me. I paid $.25/ea. I thought that was a good deal. As our place is hard to find (Partially because there are 2 houses, in completely different areas with the identical street name and house number), I decided to call Jana and see if she wanted me to meet her at this one spot where I could then lead her group to our place. When I called, they were clearly heading for the wrong house location. For the next half hour(with the hot corn on the cob safely under my moto seat) I waited for them to get to my location before I could lead them to our place.
As I was waiting for Jana, I was sitting on my moto under the Red Anchor Beer Sign in front of the Long Beach Hotel (at 1 star hotel at best). I looked up and there was a small bat moving around me and going in and around the traffic. This bat was really starting to annoy me as he came at me a number of time. I was initially thinking the last thing I need right now is rabbies. Anyways, to my amazement the bat landed on the road. I couldn’t believe it as I thought it was going to get crushed by the oncoming motos. Through the moto headlights I saw that it started to crawl on the ground (Do Bats crawl?). When I suddenly realized that it was not a small bat at all, it was in fact a giant cockroach that was at least 5 inches long! Well I had to laugh and be slightly disturbed at the same time.
SIDEBAR: Speaking of a good laugh, on the way home from school one day this past week Stephanie noticed a live crab outside of our house. As we live very far from the ocean and away from any salt water, we all figured it had fallen out of someone’s street vendor cart. As we toyed with it, the crab was very strong, feisty, very hard shelled and about 4 inches in body diameter. Julia decided to rescue it and place it in a cup of water with some random table salt sprinkled in. Well with the commotion our family caused with the exciting crab, our neighbor (maybe trying to rescue the crab too) came out and told us that it was a fresh water crab from the reed filled lake behind us. Our neighbor went on to say that the crabs will start to come onto land and that it is a sign that the rainy season is over! Anyways, Julia did not place it in the salt water, actually she didn’t want to rescue it at all, but rather she placed it in the back courtyard area where she later admitted she didn’t know where it was (interestingly enough our neighbor's dog is back there). Now back to our original story….
We finally got Jana and the team to our place where we had a really nice evening talking to them and finding out about their ministry time in central Cambodia. I could tell the group had spent a lot of time together as they acted like brothers and sisters more than teammates. (That is a good thing by the way- they were all very close). As the team had a 9pm curfew the time was short but enjoyable. Some of them left with Mangos in hand and we wished them well as they were shortly off to Switzerland for debrief.
The next day we were off with a large group of people from Logos School to show them Marie Ens orphanage, hand out candy to the kids, give fruit to the grannies, and play with the kids. I will save that for another day. Some of the pics are from Les's grade 1 class and also from the orphanage visit. Blessings. Dean

Siem Reap and the Amazing Race?

Well a number of you informed us that Siem Reap was a pitstop in the latest Amazing Race TV show and you asked if that is close to us. It is a 6+ hour bus ride from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap (if all goes well). We decided we wanted to see Siem Reap and the Angkor Wat temples, and with a holiday break scheduled in mid-November and with the temperature outside becoming more moderate (about 28-30C as a high) it seemed like a great time to go.
(We found that the last time we had a break, we just stayed at home and we started to think about some of the comforts of home a bit too much, so... this time we did not want to do that.)
We went on a bus on a Tuesday, and like I said earlier, if all goes well, we get there in 6 hours. Well, things didn't quite go that way. Our bus driver hit a van and crushed the van's back end on the highway. For some reason the van was stopped dead in the road and for another unforeseen reason, our bus driver seemed to have very little breaking ability to stop abruptly. In the end, the bus was not going too fast when he hit the van, but he popped it a good 5-10 feet ahead. We waited there for an hour as the two drivers finally figured out that the best plan of action was to tie the back trunk with a rope and drive to the next town where the van driver could get it replaced? Seriously, every guy and his dog was thinking he could bend the back trunk back to its proper shape. The trunk did not move, but that didn't seem to matter. The next guy thought he could do it.

Anyways, we finally got to Siem Reap. The city is nicer than Phnom Penh (PP) in many ways. There are very nice looking hotels, due in part because of the number of international tourists who come to visit the temples. Don't be fooled though, its still Cambodia. What I mean by that comment is, this country is trying to develop its tourism trade, but they "just don't quite get it yet" (the quality standard is not totally understood, i.e. cleanliness, food handling, tourism in general). We are getting use to it, we just have to laugh and go with the flow. There are a few very nice hotels, and the standard is apparently excellent(at $350/night) but overall, the industry is still trying to understand the standard and expectations of developed countries.
We stayed in a pretty good little place for $30/night. (We got a good discount from someone who knew someone...you get the picture). We left PP in part because at this time of the year, the whole country celebrates the end of the rainy season with the water festival. The Water Festival is a celebration in PP where the country seems to converge on the city swelling it to 3X the population. We were told to get out of town because it is too crowded. It is also a chance to give thanks to the river gods for the fish etc.... We would rather give thanks to the God who is the River of Life.

On the night we arrived, we went to a dinner that showcased local Khmer cultural dancing. It was very enjoyable as we had not seen anything like that since we had been to Cambodia. At the end of the show the performers permitted anyone to come up and pose with them for photos. These dancers are short compared to us folks.

We went to the temples on the first day. We hit the big three: Angkor Wat, Bayon, and Tam Prom Temple. There are many other temples, but we didn't want to push our luck with Maya. Maya and the girls all did well. We left for the temples at 7 am and got back around 12:30. That is a fair amount of walking. We had a guide show us the ruins. If you have never been there, it is worth a look, the temples, hindu at first and later buddist, are amazing structures. Our guide tried to tell us that the largest temple, Angkor Wat took men 35 years to build and required 4000 elephants to help move all of the sandstone in the process. That is alot of elephant dung.

I enjoyed the open space of the temples, a refreshing change from the PP city life. Just having a chance to walk around was a nice option too. (Even if it was with Maya on my back for a good portion of it). Steph and Julia liked Bayon temple the most because it had many different areas to explore. It is the temple with the many faces of Buddha all over it. It would have made for a great game of hide and seek.
The Tam Prom temple is the temple with all of the trees running through it. This temple was also used as a key location for the "Tomb Raider" movie. ( I want to see that now!) I liked this temple too because it somehow represented this idea to me that God was slowly breaking down this very, seemingly indestructible and impenetrable, solid rock structure with the simplicity of the trees. (Very large trees mind you). Maybe a small metaphor for the simple way Christ's message is building up and growing in this buddist country?
After we finished with the temples we got back to the city and had a good rest. Later that afternoon we went to a market area. This market area was so nice compared to PP. There was no chaos at this market. The vendors still use the standard lines, like "Please sir, buy somesing" or "Buy a T-Shirt, please Sir", but it all seemed so civil compared to PP. Nobody is tugging on you. The market still has the over-powering smells of unrecognizable foods, but it is so much cleaner and orderly too.
Afterwards we went home and enjoyed the hotel TV.
The next day we went to see the "Floating Village". This village is accessible by boat tour only and is located on the Tonle Sap lake. This area is also featured from the Amazing Race. This entire village literally has every structure floating on top of the water. The school, store, police station, the gym, and all the homes float on water. I was impressed that some people owned pigs! Thats right, floating pig pens.
The boat we toured on is a big noisy diesel powered boat. The seats are wood but a very thin cushion is placed for our enjoyment. (Thats what I mean about the idea of "standard"), we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly and chuckled about the cushion.
Most of the people were in the process of reeling in the day's catch when we went through the village. Everyone is hitting these nets with a stick while these very small sardine like fish fall into an awaiting basket below. Later that day we saw these fisherman taking their catch via their little boats and preparing to sell the fish in the market.
Near the end of the tour we docked at a floating store. Inside this store there is a crocodile and fish farm. Random people were feeding the fish regularly with some sort of fish meal. When the food was dumped into the fish pen, the fish would splash and churn in a frenzy.
Julia wished they would have fed the crocodiles while we were there. The crocs moved about as the water level of the floating pen moved up and down with the changing weight of the people coming on board to view them all. The odd child would throw something at the crocs to try and stir up some rage. The crocs did not show any emotion as the empty water bottles or pencils were directed their way. There was a partially eaten chicken carcass dismembered and floating in the pen but no croc showed any interest in eating that.
Shortly after we left the floating store, we got back to shore and ventured back to a different market. This market was even more civil than the other one. The funny thing is that we don't really buy anything at the market, we just go there almost just to move around and enjoy the civility.

Later that night we watched a Cello player perform on behalf of a children's hospital and talk about the poor state of hospital care for Cambodian people. It was also a nice chance to see something musically cultural. It was too much for Maya as she fell asleep in Les's arms. We froze to death as someone put the aircon on a low level, actually Steph sat on me just to get some much

needed warmth. Finally, Julia was so cold that I suggested that Steph sit on Julia and the two of them could warm each other up. It worked well as they cuddled each other up during the show. We went to a coffee shop later and just let Maya sleep while we had a some food.
I will skip ahead to the last night, when as we were just leaving dinner to go to a night market, we met Jana K and her YWAM team also visiting Siem Reap! We were so amazed that we would see each other in this location. Neither of us had spoken to each other for about a month because she was off in another province. Anyways, it was good to see her and the whole team. We want to invite them all to our place for a dinner sometime in the next week.
Well we had to leave Siem Reap the next day, and in fine cambodian style, once we were on the bus we were informed that we had no working aircon or washroom for the 6+ hours back to PP. Some of the travelers were less than impressed, we just had to laugh as we opened up some windows. Oh Cambodia!

By the way, completely random, the last picture was just great, as someone was transporting 3 live pigs on a Moto. (My first question is, "how did the guy get the pigs on there in the first

place?" You just have to love it!

Blessings Everyone.
Dean

Brian Doerksen's Heart

This was just SO cool, I had to write right away. For those of you who know Brian or think he might be interested in hearing this, please forward our blog to him!!!
Today (Sunday) we went to Shalom, the house church that most of the Asian hope and alot of Logos kids and families go. It is run by two Action International families from America, and the Canadian arm of Action is the umbrella association we are here in Cambodia with. The worship team is made up mostly of Korean high school students from Logos, drums, guitar, keyboards. They are pretty good, if I don't say so myself. The singing is lead by one of the pastors.

There we sit on a fairly average Sunday morning, worshiping at a house church for an orphanage in Cambodia, being lead in worship by Korean missionary kids, and what do you know, up pops the words for Your Love Makes me Sing, by Brian Doerksen. Everyone knew it, of course, and it was so great to sing. But I just wanted to yell out, "Hey, that guy Brian is from the same city we are from half way around the world!" "Our kids went to the same school as his kids!" I was totally proud, and all excited! I'm sure this isn't news to Brian or those who know just how international his name and music has gone, but I was none the less, just plain ol' excited and thankful in a funny way for Abbotsford, and the many times I've had a chance to hear Brian live!
Thanks, Brian Doerksen, for your heart of worship that has touched lives far and near, and just for affirmation and confirmation to you, is being sung in house churches in Cambodia, where the name of Jesus is being exalted! Halleluja!!!
God is so cool.....

Life and stories...

Sorry for the delay in updates. Life carries on and gets busy with work and then you realize it's been a week or two without any word! So sorry about that.
We are doing well, and still grinding through the regular work weeks. The girls are doing well at school, and I can't even say that Maya is doing well--she is doing unbelievable! Her little mind is like a sponge right now, and every song, letter, number or whatever that is being poured into her head is just expanding exponentially! It's so cool to see her recognize letters and phonic sounds, and sing songs about everything. Really, this was our kid just three months ago, who couldn't make it through the first few weeks of school, and prior to that, was having all kinds of developmental assistance in Canada before we left. Just a late bloomer I guess, but boy, is she blossoming now. We're pretty impressed and thankful.
We are all doing about the same, I guess that's another reason for the lack of news, because, Thank God, there isn't really much news. Just lots of work! We have experienced a rather nasty part of Cambodia just recently, as our power has been going out a little too regularly and for quite lengthy periods of time.
The first night it happened, it went out just before Maya fell asleep, so the sudden plunge into darkness caused her quite the panic attack, and it took a long time for her to settle. Funny, how I had candles on hand, because only a few weeks before, I had bought them for Canadian thanksgiving (and never used them.) Seriously, we had never lost power for more than 2 minutes in the evenings, and even at that it was pretty rare, now suddenly it had been happening more regularly and for longer! I guess it was because we had been bragging to others about how great our power was at our house. rats..
Anyways, so that night it was out for about 2.5 hours. Now, it is easiely +30 at night, inside the house, where the air flow is less. No power means no air con--OK, I could live without that. but it more tragically means, NO FAN either! This, I was not prepared for. I have realized after even just trying to sleep that one night for a couple of hours with no air flow, how incredibly spoiled I was in Cambodia, to have the comforts I had and how much I rely on them. Just when you get to thinking, "ya, I'm handling this Cambodia thing pretty well," well, then the electric goes off, and God shows you just how much you still really need him. haha



A couple nights ago, it went off around 9. It did not go back on until about 10 the next morning. That meant, we attempted to sleep the entire night with no air con or fan, and quite frankly, Dean and I shared a couple hours of sleep between the two of us and that was about it. We are so not used to that intense dead air. Showers are cold, because the electric water heater is nott juiced up. The kids were fine, as Julia often sleeps with out even putting the fan on, and kids don't use their air, but for heaven's sake: It was tough on us old folk!
We asked our landlord about it, and he said they have never had this problem so bad before. So, apparently, he has had the line changed to the same line as the chairman of the electric board, who happens to live a few houses down from us! (that tells you a bit about our neighborhood!). We have had no problems since, and it is SO easy to take for granted so quickly. It's a good lesson, really. God allows these kind of silly little trials, so that we don't get too dependent on the things that don't really matter! haha. It was an interesting time, to say the least.
We have another holiday week coming up next week, Tues to Friday off. This is water Festival time, and apparently PP gets absolutely insanely packed, as people come to the city for the Festival. PP is insanely packed as it is, so we are planning to go to a different city, Siem Reap, for a few days.
And yes, for all you Amazing Race fans, that was the city, Siem Reap, where the team went. I did not get to see the show, much to my chagrin, as it is my fav. tv show, but I've heard all about it and for some of you, it seemed quite interesting to watch. That is our life right now--the stuff you saw, the roads, the driving, the garbage; that is exactly our everyday life. You really get used to it fast, too.
A couple of interesting things we have have seen recently. Some dead end roads close to our house are being paved. This means the main road we have to travel has had sand, gravel and then concrete carried over it, so it is unbelievably dusty and dirty right now. We HAVE to wear masks on the bikes, because the air is filled with grit. We've watched these teams of guys shovel out heavy gravel by hand and with baskets--no large machinery, and then pave this road by hand--no cement truck, just bags and bags of cement, mixed by hand, poured by hand, shaped by hand. What incredibly laborious work! It was amazing, really. It was a fair chunk of street, too, maybe about a kilometre long! Seriously!
The rain, which has been alot lately, although is supposed to be letting up soon, really fills and floods this main road, so the pot holes have gotten so much worse. people set up big branches in them to warn others not to hit them. The drive to school is alot of swerving to get out of the pot hole way. And these are not just any ol potholes, they can be up to a foot deep. It's nasty! No calling the "City" to complain and ask to get them fixed. Locals pile brick or whatever they can (logs of wood) to fill in and repair the road themselves.
There is a demolition crew taking down a house right next to Logos, which is beside Maya's preschool building, which is also my Gr 1 and the K classrooms. It's noisy, but the worst is the falling brick and concrete that they have nets set up to catch, so that it all doesn't fall on the kids in the playground. Huge bangs of falling house can be heard throughout the day and billows of sooty dust fly. And here's how they do it: a whole bunch of Khmer guys bang away at the house with sledge hammers. Yup, that's it. No wrecking ball, no imploding, just more grunt labor. They are all over the house, at the very top, sitting, climbing, standing, hitting underneath where they are standing with the hammers. No hard hats, no restraints, nor work boots. I did read in the paper, that although there are no official statistics (how would they ever collect them?) it is estimated that one construction worker a day is killed in the country. Amazing.
I was at the school Wed. evening for choir--it had been pouring rain, and when it stopped and I left, I could see fire light coming from the shell of this house, and could hear all the guys talking and laughing. Apparently the wrecking crews just move from job to job, living in the ruins they are taking down while they are working on the site. Not a pretty job, and these guys looked pretty rough and dirty. Where do they clean after working that kind of labour all day? We see many people bathing in the street, just dumping a hose on themselves, or scooping water from a bin. Washing their body, hair--you gotta clean somewhere, right???
Finally, on the topic of water and washing, we were driving home in a van from a group get together last Friday, when the heavens again opened and we drove through a terrential storm, rain was flooding the roads (there's not alot of drain sewer systems here--some streets, but not everywhere.) Every adult we could see on the sides of the roads were hiding out, trying to get away from the rain, and every child we could see, was playing in the downpour! The most unbelievable was two little boys, Maya's age or younger, "frolicking" if I could call it that, in the water collected on the side of the road. Yes, the road we and many others were driving on. These 2 boys were laying on their stomachs, "swimming" in brown street run off water, right next to the moving traffic--not an adult in sight, and they were having the time of their life! The water was deep enough they were pretty much totally immersed! It was yet another unbelievable picture of cambodia. These 2 little boys laying on their stomachs, swimming in the street...
Today, I walked down to the corner store after school. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw a head poking up from what looked like a 2 foot, by 2 foot opening in the sidewalk. A young man, maybe 14ish, was standing in the sewer, in sewage water up to his chest, trying to unclog the drain! It actually took my breath away--they had moved the lid off the sewer, and had jumped in with a tool to unclog the drain! Although it was mostly probably rain run off, it certainly didn't smell too great, and we had to walk around him, his chin was just above the surface of the sidewalk, and he had some buddies there. He was in such a small space, filled with water, it just looked so dirty and dangerous. On my way back, there was another guy on the exact opposite side of the street, doing very much the same thing. And the two of them, squeezed into this little sewer manhole, working at digging out who knows what, to drain the street. It was something else, I tell ya.
I keep thinking this is the last thing, but this REALLY is the last thing. Seeing as it was the King's birthday last week, there seemed to be alot of "parties" going on, weddings, or whatnot, where people set up tents that take up half the street, then they play music all day and all night non stop, really loud, and, well, I guess, party! The noise is incessant, and can be deafening, depending how close or far you are from the good time. Lots of food, big instant kitchens set up, tons of people cooking in massive wok type pots. It's quite a thing to watch. Anyways. The worst part is, I think they run prayers in the morning, or for most of the day, before the music and the actual party starts with the food (I'm pretty sure most must be weddings.) So, there is this speaker on a microphone, who, in a nonstop, monotone voice, repeats prayers, or chants or something extremely repetitive, apparently without breathing and with absolutely no infliction in his voice, to the point of monotony. This goes on for hours and all you hear as a constant drone in the background is this voice going on and on.... When we come back to canada this summer, we'll all show you what it sounds like, cuz it's really strange. We basically had to get out of the house to have a break from it.
So, those are some thoughts, and stories for now. I'll be more spiritual next time. No big spiritual thoughts right now. Looking forward to yet another break, as they are coveted times. We hope you are all well, and write comments on the blog, cuz I keep looking for them and we don't get too many! Send e-mails, too, as they are always appreciated.
Take care!
L
:)