...Just another story for the blog...

a blown power box at the new school...the consistent running out of water in the building...girls covered in cement dust after volleyball practice....Dean turning 41...Maya getting her first stitches...

Could all this happen in just one short week in our time here in Cambodia? Yes it can and yes it did!

From mayainjured

First week at the new Logos! Truly it went really well, despite some predicted setbacks. The traffic was OK, as parents had to park a ways out and walk to drop off and pick up kids. Not everyone was happy about that, but you can't please everyone. There is a PA system installed for names to be called at the end of the day to come to the gate for their ride home. Complete garble on the first day, so by Wed, it was replaced with our very efficient, well working and loud old system that we had at the old Logos. SO, by mid week, everyone could actually hear their names being called and report to go home! Improvement.

Power, that powerful word. We expected some troubles, and all day Monday, the power was on and off. (Sucks when using computers, cuz you can lose stuff.) By Tues, it went off late morning and stayed off for the rest of the day. The prob was not the limited power in the area, but rather, we blew the main power breaker coming into the school. By Wed, the powers that be (note the pun) declared almost an all out ban on air con use, which was draining the most energy, and asked us to use none or just one per room. This worked much better, and we had power all day for the rest of the week. The school is located outside the city, so there's lots of wind and airflow, and the design is such that if windows are open, the breeze is quite cooling and not as much air con is needed. It also cooled off a bit by the end of the week, so that has helped too. However, with the breeze comes the dirt, and that is coating everything, but at least it's better than no air flow and no air con, and a cookery. So, we learned as we went, that's for sure.

Water. There is one tiny little hose that brings water into the entire school building. It is then pumped into tanks on the roof, which then flow down. I'm not sure of the exact physics, but the tiny little hose could not filter enough water into the tanks for the use required on Monday. That meant we ran out of water from the taps and to flush toilets by mid day. It didn't help that when the guards outside shut off a certain tap, it actually turned off ALL the water flow into the school (they thought it was just their own hoses or something!) Kind of funny, but that got remedied quickly. Tuesday, they started to put in anther pipe to pump more water in, and it definitely improved throughout the week, but occasionally there would be no water on the top floor, but flowing freely on the main! Still working on that a bit, but as with the other issues, things improved throughout the week.

From Shalom Church has first service at New Logos. Pastor BJ from Action International leads worship

What else? The gym floor that got grinded/sanded down for a smoother surface caused the girls first volleyball practice on Tuesday afterschool, to be "dust"ball! With every step, jump and landing, the dust rose up and covered the girls. Not great for lungs. Dean asked for the floor to be power washed to clean it off, and found to his amusement that the "powerwash" was nothing more than a garden hose and a few guys with brooms! ( I couldn't help but think of my mother "hosing!") But still, this week saw the following: a roof put up to shade the playground, computer desks installed, internet up and running, more tables for the library, the small kid's pool up and running, the large pool getting less and less green every day, photocopiers working and the laminator found... I mean, does it get any better than this??? Things really were coming together while classes resumed as much like normal as they could.

So, Dean turned 41 on Thursday, and it was not quite the party it was last year, but he got a lovely "cambodian" birthday present from his family of kettle chips, Starbucks coffee (purchased by our friends who just came back from KL) and a toblerone! (Western treats!) He spent the better part of the day with a "birthday boy" badge pinned on the front of his shirt, and when so many kids were wishing him happy birthday and asking him is he really was a "birthday boy," he thought he'd remove it! Dean and Dan ran most of this week, like crazy, trying to keep staff happy, parents and carpools running smoothly and the pick up at the end of the day as practical as the mayhem could allow. Lots of parking lot attending, dealing with workers and running around to classrooms, asking if everyone was OK. Needless to say, they're pretty beat today (Friday) and will need a good rest this weekend. I guess Dean will rest after hosting a volleyball tournament tomorrow, where S & J will play their last tournament on the same middle school team.

And finally, probably the story you've all been waiting for... poor Maya. That little sweetheart had her birthday last weekend, but I'd promised her she could take a cake in on Friday of the first week of school, to share with the class and have a little celebration. Thurs night it was whipped up, and Friday, she carried it into the school, placed in on the wood coffee table in the office until time to go to class. Now, Maya's mother, who is also on staff :) was on duty Friday morning, chatting with another teacher, when she started to hear her name being called loudly by other students, from the office. There stood Maya with blood all over her mouth and shirt, crying and screaming.

I ran to see her. She was apparently running to see her cake and tripped, landing with her mouth on the corner of the wood table. As the blood got washed off, it was apparent that her bottom lip was split open pretty good, and I was sure some stitches would be needed to close it up. Found Dean, he took one look and agreed, so maya and mom were off to the hospital, at 8 in the morning, during rush hour traffic. I won't go into the details about the trip there, as May was really ok, she'd settled down a bit, had a cloth on her lip, and actually fell asleep a bit in the car from the shock. But it took me nearly an hour to get across town, when the return trip took about 20 or so minutes!

Aside: Our car actually got hit twice in that trip, if you can believe it. First time, I felt such a small nudge from behind, that I thought, "did I just get hit?" Waved to the guy behind me and he gave me the sorry wave! Then, I got wedged between two cars and one of them slightly sideswiped the side of our car trying to get past me. Hard to believe, eh?

So, we went for the first time to SOS, an international hospital with foreign doctors, a very safe bet for good care out here, and I didn't care what the cost would be, as we have good insurance. I just thought with her face and her lip, I wanted a good clean stitching, for future healing. As she fell asleep in the car, I could see more closely that there was actually a large laceration on the inside of her mouth, too! Her teeth must have gone right through her lip. It looked pretty nasty.

The care at SOS was great, we got in right away (which I have noticed is what happens when you're actually paying for medical care out here! No waiting!) and the doctor agreed that stitches were necessary. Options: local anasthetic or the "woozy" drink that would knock her out a bit, then the local anasthetic. Either way, there was a needle involved and we decided to go for it and just "help" Maya deal with the stingy pricks of the needle. Help in this situation, meant calm her down as much as possible, then hold her as still as possible while the medicine was administered.

From Maya falls at Logos and splits her Lip. Les takes her to SOS hospital

She screamed blue murder. It wasn't fun, but we all stayed calm, and I think she will forgive me one day! I was like 4 inches from her face holding her arms down while another nurse was holding her head still, while I watched the doctor insert a long needle into the open wound. Reason #476 that I am a teacher and not a nurse! Then the fish hook to pull two stiches through the flesh. Reason #477. The anasthetic didn't seem to make too much difference, as Maya was pretty upset during the stitching too, and she had to be very still (which she wasn't) so it was pretty tricky. As soon as it was over, she just wanted to get out of there and go back to school. She stopped crying quite quickly and was up and ready to leave. ? You see, birthday cake was waiting for her at school. This was the motivating factor, and by around 11 am, we were back at school, I was getting ready for my next class and she was participating fairly happily in her class.

She was still a bit out of it, I could tell, for most of the day. She couldn't use her bottom lip really, so was sucking up spit. It was swollen (still is, of course) and just looked sore. But she was so brave, and we all told her so, and in 5 or 6 days we'll have to do it all again to have the stitches removed! haha. The doctor did not stitch up the cut on the inside of the lip, as she said it would heal perfectly fine inside the mouth. I asked a couple times and she was confident, and even by the end of today, it was looking better.

I tell ya, it's a good thing I've been there, done that with two other kids already! So officially, all our kids have had stitches somewhere on their face! I was there for Stephi's two, and Dean took care of Julia's lip stitch when she was about 4. SO, now Maya's joined the party! All of our girls have also had general anasthetic for some kind of surgery or test AND they've all had head lice, ALL when they were in their first year of schooling. Weird, hey? Well, at least they all haven't had emergency, life-saving laparotomies! One is all I can hand of that..

So, there's something to be said for experience...

Our plan for the weekend is to R E S T. I hope this happens. The week, although it was nothing of the physical stress for me (Lesley) that it was for Dean, was still tough for me mentally. I think just the whole getting back to school after a break (you know, getting into routine)was tiring, but the expectation that the school would be "done" by now and there's still so much that needs "doing" was hard for me to get my head around. Just a bit of a loss of enthusiasm, although I can sense that rallying again. I just have to be PATIENT and not forget the positive side of all this. I have very much enjoyed having a humungus music room (4X the size it was in the old school!) where was can sit a whole class in a circle and still have room to move around and play games. It was a fun week that way.

From Trying to make a kid's ride work in Cambodia. Dan Hein pushes the unit.

ANyways, thanks for listening, and thanks for your prayers for us and the new school. Please keep praying. The school is a building, and yes, it's nice and there is still lots to do, but all in all, it's still a building. There are so many students, and staff serving there, that prayers for the hearts and lives of those kids and the staff are still coveted. Our school also sits at the end of a road where we see alot of people living very basic lives and small local children often gather outside the school gates to play. There's a tremendous opportunity to make a difference even in small ways, just outside our gates!

PS And yes, there are even what we all think are Maya's "teeth marks," indented in the wood of the table in the office where she fell! She was complaining that her top tooth hurt, and we'll have to monitor it. It didn't feel too loose, but it was definitely her top teeth that broke her fall. Ouch! Good thing they're all babies and are eventually coming out anyways. :)

See all Pics

Bye for now, all.