Doin' the dance

Some missionaries reject the surrounding culture altogether while others try to blend in completely. I prayerfully decided to waffle. Hahahahaha! That is, altho' I'm learning to "do the dance" here, now & then I throw in a new step. 'Course there are times I miss a step too.

My ministry partner Jane Truax loves the account I gave her of dealing with an old woman who was hassling my brothers about the way Ruth treated her during a dispute over rent payment (Ruth is definitely a reject-the-culture kind of missionary). That was a time I had to do the dance & had to do it very carefully. My brother Boonie, in the photo, bravely agreed to translate my words as I demonstrated all the proper body language. It was a complicated dance, but I got thru it without laughing or being spit on, thank God. Totally Cambo culture for that one....until I ended the dance with a dip. Hahahahaha! I was just so happy that peace had been restored that I reached out & rubbed her arms & even hugged her. The brother with me nearly passed out thinking I just blew the whole deal we worked so hard to achieve. Hahahahaha! Thanks be to God, the old woman received my behavior with delight & even kissed my head.

Then there was the time I stopped a trash picker to love on the filthy baby he was carrying amongst the rubbish he collected in his cart. Trash pickers are not considered people, but trash pushing trash. (I know, I know. Really honks me off too.) Not only did I make eye contact with the man & smile at him, I played with the child & even kissed her lice-infested head. Gave the guy my water bottle too. That was a totally freestyle dance there; just moving to the rhythm of my spirit. The small crowd that gathered to stare was aghast, but the man & baby smiled, & I think Jesus did too.

When one of my sisters, an older, thought it would be "sooooo nice" to have a western mom take her shopping in what Americans call a mall, I gave her a taste of it. Took her into one of the city's largest & nicest markets (like a gigantic, old-fashioned department store), headed straight for the undergarments, & embarrassed the stuffin' out of her. Hahahahahaha! That there was some dirty dancing. Hahahahahaha! Before you jump me for that dirty trick, please know I behaved very well as I bought her a nice pair of shorts in another section of the market. Srey Peck loves the shorts, but as for wishing for an American mom, she'd rather sit out that dance! Hahahahahaha!

Sometimes I have to show someone else how to do a new step too. Sopea (pronounced "soapy") is a new Cambo staff helping at the girls' house & the team house. [THANK YOU, JESUS!!!] She's a living doll who loves the children & works diligently to run their household well. In customary fashion Sopea showed her respect for my authority (When we met she assumed I am in charge because I'm white. Sheesh.) she offered me a chair & knelt in front of me, face toward the ground with her hands above her forehead, palms together. I quickly snatched her up by the elbow so we were both standing & drew up her chin so we were face to face. Before I could speak she said, "Oooh so sorry. I afraid Madame not like me." I held her face with both hands making her look me in the eyes & said, "Sopea, I love you. I am very, very happy you are here. I thank you! You must never bow to me. Never! We are sisters. We work together. I don't want to see the top of your head ever again!" We both cried a little & embraced a long time. I still have to lift her chin occassionally because the new step still feels a little awkward to her, but she's getting the hang of our little tango.

I missed a step just this week. Still feel bad about it too. Lyn is a moto driver who picks me up early in the morning Monday-Friday for breakfast & house checks. Lyn informed me (thru my bilingual brother) that he would like to go see his family out of town from Friday night to Sunday night. Very dramatically I said, "Three days gone?! Oh no! What will I do? I will miss you too much!" Lyn immediately apologized & promised to stay in the city forever. It would be hilarious if he weren't totally serious. I forgot that Cambo's don't do sarcasm, rhetorical questions, open criticism, nor a host of other communications common to westerners. That was some fancy footwork: missed a step, stepped on Lyn's toes & put my foot in my mouth all in one quick move. Ugh! It took some doing, but Lyn agreed to visit his family, believed I still like him, & trusted I still want him to drive for me. ... He did call me Friday evening to ask if he could leave at 6pm tho'. Sigh.

As far as I'm concerned for Cambodia, the dance I'm most looking forward to is the one we'll do when we "dance upon injustice." The peacemakers, the trash pickers, the orphans, the oppressed, the meek & one wild-footed barang are really gonna' cut a rug!

10/16/10
Hallelujah!
~We have a WONDERFUL new staff member!
~All the sibs have all they need to start school!
~ My visa is FINALLY valid & up-to-date!!
~ Short-term mission teams are coming in!
~ My khmer is expanding & improving! It's muuuuch easier to talk to people about Jesus when you can say His name in their language! (In case you're wondering, His name is pronounced "yay-soo."
~ Little Adam is thriving!

Help!
~ Nasty, nasty water has been thigh high at the boys' house, including IN the house, for a couple of days. The storms are way-cool, but sometimes the results are not. On the bright side tho', they have been able to catch some small fish with their mosquito netting.
~ A friend's 20 month old son has some fairly serious heath problems & we haven't the resources available to help him. Good doctors are scarce & expensive here.
~ I'm a little nervous about running the place while Ruth's away the first two weeks of November.

Personal Notes:
~ Isaac Roe, I miss you only a LOT. I love you, Son.
~ Gena Taylor, you're on my mind.
~ Lucy Carr, thank you for checking on my husband. You're a blessing, Sister!
~ Lora Sherfey, I heard you're still planning on coming. WOOOO-HOOOOO!

Adjustments

I've been here just over 90 days now. Sometimes it seems like I left the States days ago & sometimes it feels like forever ago. In reviewing the past few months, I'm taken by the adjustments I've made with & without effort & the things I can't seem to adjust to even with the greatest efforts & most fervent prayer. I'm also surprised at what I miss about living in the US. I miss complete silence & complete darkness. I'd really like to have either one for just 5 minutes. I miss the feel of carpeting under my feet sometimes. And, of all things, I miss cheese. Whoda' guessed?

Yes, yes, of course my husband & loved ones most of all, but that really should go without saying. Besides, if I say too much about it I get teary.

I've become so accustomed to tropical weather that I now refer to anything under 75*F as "jacket weather." When I'm hungry, I usually crave lumpy rice. It takes conscious effort to speak in complete english sentences & I've learned enough Khmer, the language of Cambodia, that I think it. Squatty potties don't phase me. In fact, I'm surprised to see a regular toilet outside the house & feel a little funny peeing so far off the ground. I'm so totally adjusted to cool tap water that the one time I had hot water, I had to turn it down to shower comfortably. I'm so used to being called "b'KEY" that the last time someone pronounced my name correctly, she had to call to me about 5 times before I realized I was being addressed. I don't smell the rotting trash anymore & the food smells that used to gag me stir my appetite. I feel weird when I'm with more than two people & no one's touching me ... & I instinctively touch of one of them. Hahahahaha! 45mph is frighteningly fast, but moving vehicles brushing my feet (dangling sidesaddle on a motorcyle) don't even provoke the slightest twitch. I don't have to consciously convert reil, Cambodian currency, to dollars & can count reil change from US dollars as fast as the shopkeepers (caught 'em ripping me off a few times too!). Believe it or not, I've realized Cambodians are right- barang (foreigners) do indeed smell bad. Hahahahahaha! Why, I even truly enjoy the Cambodian coffee I couldn't stomach when I got here & know the best places to get it.

On the other hand, I still don't like the drink most places try to pass off as western coffee. I still get teary eyed over beggars eventho' I see one about every 5 minutes when I'm outside the house. The storm I'm enjoying now is as fabulously thrilling as the first one I experienced (Man, I hate to see rain season end). I'm still a little put off by people picking their noses while they speak to me. And, I'm still taken aback every time the electricity, or internet, or phone service goes out. I'm still surprised when I call out "Juck sow, sohm!" (open the gate, please) at the sibs' houses & a crowd of people run at me squealing with the joy.

I seriously doubt I'll ever get over the fact that God brought a middle-aged housewife who wouldn't go more than 25 minutes away from home alone to the other side of the world to demonstrate a bit of His incomprehensible love.

10/8/10
Praise God for...
~laughter. It's a sanity saver sometimes.
~those big honkin' storms. They're still AWESOME!
~love that lives beyond emotion & intellect.
~those who will share the little they have with those who have less than little.
~the new squatty potty that convinced villagers God is a good & loving God!!

Petition God for...
~the salvation of those precious thieves. They are worth praying for till Jesus comes!
~His favor upon the newbie, a rejected 1month-old Ruth named Adam.
~mercy & the grace of salvation upon Adam's mommy.
~me to be granted the courage to keep loving wholeheartedly. It hurts sometimes...real bad like.
Special request! Please pray with us during the wicked holiday of appeasing damned souls & evil spirits. We can feel the weight of evil increasing & are seeing the influence in people. The holiday lasts two weeks with the biggest ceremonies being held this weekend, 8-10 October.

Personal Notes:
~Isaac Roe, I love you more now than ever before.
~Lisa Turner, the pain is about experiencing love from Michael's side of the story now (ref the book you gave me).
~Nancy Rodenbeck, FK. :o)
~Everyone, internet, phone & electricity is skitchy again. Sorry for the delay in communications!

Teamwork

There's another aspect to my "job" I haven't told you about yet. I play hostess to visiting mission teams. Sometimes teams stay here at the team house where Ruth & I live & sometimes they stay elsewhere. Sometimes they're here for a couple weeks, sometimes they're here for a few days, & sometimes they just pop in for a few hours. My duties depend on where they stay & how long they stay. Whatever the circumstances, my first duty is to inform my sibs & the housemoms of a team's upcoming arrival, lest they refuse to open the gate & call in security (that'd be me. Hahahahaha!)

The first team I met came out of Singapore & they stayed here for one week. They held daily workshops for our older girls here at the teamhouse. They were a lot of work. I prepared & maintained the team house, arranged transportation, obtained supplies, set up their meeting room & even pulled a hairball the size of a well fed fieldmouse out of their drain for them. In addition, I kept track of everyone's emotional & physical health, meeting those needs as best as the Lord enabled me.

This week we've had two teams in. Both Roo's. The first team was a "pop-in" team, meaning they popped in to play with my siblings for about an hour. Very simple job there. I just met them at an easy-to-find location, directed their bus driver to the girls' house (in the Cambodian language! How cool am I?) & hung around until Ruth got there. The second team is also a youth team who popped in. They popped in for about half a day tho' & came well prepared with a variety of fun, interactive activities.

In addition to popping in, the second team held clinics at two villages LIA supports near the Vietnam border. Some of the team members provided pharmacy services handing us the meds we called for (Ruth & I did diagnoses with the help of a couple of my sibs providing translation), some administered eye & ear drops, some cleaned & bandaged wounds. Outside the medical treatment, some played guitars, some did face painting, some blew soap bubbles, some played games & some prayed for those we treated. This was a pretty simple job as well; I just gave directions now & again to achieve & maintain organized work. Oh yeah, I also sat outside the door of a primitive shower (basically an outhouse with a large container of water & a metal bowl for pouring) talking to a girl who was afraid to be in the shower area by herself. Hahahahaha!
Next week we have a Missions Adventure Kiwi team coming thru a Youth With A Mission (YWAM) base here in Phnom Penh. They'll be staying at the YWAM base, so there's no prep for me to do here. They plan to spend several mornings playing with my sibs. My job will be to hang out at the girls' house with them & to lead them in helping with the kindy classes here at the team house.

The greatest task I have as team hostess is answering questions. Teams have lots & lots of questions. Questions about the Kingdom of Cambodia's culture, about my siblings, about LIA, even about what I'm doing here (& how to properly use a squatty potty, especially where there are no tissue or towels. Hahahahaha!). I believe every question we ask is actually an effort to understand ourselves, so altho' answering the questions directly is easy enough, I need to raise questions about the questions to be of real service. For example, when someone asks how villagers who have virtually no material goods can seem so content, I have to question why s/he equates having stuff with being content. I could simply say, "Most of them don't know there's more to be had," but what good would that do? A direct answer like that barely satisfies the curiosity, let alone reaches the soul. In order to be of any lasting value, I need to fashion their curiosity about others into a springboard to consciously questioning themselves. Direct answers give information, but direct questions give insight.

In my mind, helping to answer these questions-the real questions-is my greatest task where teams are concerned, but I reckon in their minds my greatest task is either handing out tissues & hand sanitizer at squatties or getting rid of the "eeew" that clogs their drains.

Praise God for...
~encouraging words. There is real power within them.
~treats in the mail. There is real power in them as well.
~clean water. Access to it is a gift. And, believe me, it tastes better than the polluted kind.
~people who still believe they can make a difference in the world.
~friends who are in it with you even when they can't be there with you. (You are more powerful than you know.)

Petition God for...
~the salvation of the dear souls who nabbed my bag.
~the salvation of the misguided souls who stole my ID.
~the transformation of perverts' hearts. They need healing as much as their victims do.
~insight & energy to minister to teams.
~favor with Immigration as I try to jump thru the final hoops to get my visa squared away.

A BIG HONKIN' THANK-YOU TO:
~the Tues morning group for the Bible!
~Diana Hester for the Levi's!
~Grace & Mercy Ministries for the missions donation!
~Bill Parr for apples of gold in settings of silver!

Personal Notes:
~Isaac Roe, I love you. The folks in Sihanouk Ville are asking about you!
~Kelly Stanley, yeah, it's like that both ways. I appreciate you too-honest, I do! :o)

Fill 'er up

I finally took a much needed break! I've been running on fumes the last couple of weeks & just didn't have it in me to go much further. I spent the weekend on the coast in Sihanouk Ville with friends who live there. Boy oh boy, did I get a good refill! I was so well loved that I am filled to overflowing again!

Especially after leaving the last depressing entry hanging here for so long, I want to tell you a little bit about my wonderful holiday. The whole weekend was absolutely grand, so it's difficult to choose highlights, but I'll do my prayerful best. I didn't take any photos because I know a camera simply cannot do justice to the experience. A diminished image seems an insult to it. The images are engraved in my heart, where they carry the full impact of the moment tho'.

First of all, it was incredibly heartwarming, & actually mindblowing, to receive the unbelievably joyous greetings I was given. Lots of squealing & squeezing, kissing & carressing, hand holding & happy tears. I could not have been welcomed with any more excited glee if I were carrying a big, carboard Publisher's Clearinghouse check! Where everyone really needs & everyone wants me to fill those needs, it is a soul-refreshing blessing to be desired for no more than my presence.

I have become acquainted with my friends thru doing business with them. A few operate the guesthouse I stay in & a couple others are tuk tuk drivers who've introduced me to their family (of 18 members living together in a small, three-sided house they built themselves). God has given us such sweet soul ties that I am not considered a customer anymore & they are by no means service providers to me. Sopha (so-FWAH), the 15 year-old guesthouse hostess calls me Mamma & we cry on each other's necks when we meet & when we part. Mr. Sothea (so-TEE-uh) the guesthouse manager told me, "you are very-good-to-warm-my-heart friend." Ditto to Mr. Sothea. Ly, the most darling & precious friend I have in Cambodia, drives a tuk tuk for a living. He expressed the greatest honor & deepest love by informing me-& showing me!-that I am no longer a customer or even ordinary friend but a no-pay friend.

My first puzzling experience as a no-pay friend came at the house of Ly's friends when they were reluctant to accept money after preparing me a costly & elaborate feast. As I've said, food is the most precious commodity here. Giving someone food is like handing over your checkbook here. When I asked Ly about he said, "When you in Cambodia maybe one year or two year, you will know Cambodia way. Some must pay, some not." He explained that no-pay friends are entitled to everything you possess or have access to & they are never obligated to repay the cost or even return the favor (tho' out of mutual affection they usually do). As we talked more about "Cambodia way" my heart warmed when he said, "You good friend, no pay me & no pay my friends ." On his word, I am entitled to anything or everything his family & friends have or can lay hold of...without owing them anything in return! Thing is, part of Cambodia way is that you cannot earn that kind of friendship. You cannot give & expect to receive in return. No-pay friend status is given me (& others) because, as Ly explained it, "I know your heart. I see your behavior. You no pay." It's a matter of character. My character, yes, & I am indeed incredibly honored, but moreso Ly's character & I am indeed incredibly loved
.
At one point in the most wonderful weekend I've lived since I don't know when, Ly took me to a secret beach. That is, a place unsullied by the tourists & hawkers & the awful, ugly, noisy messes they make. Ly really does know my heart & proved that clearly when, as we stood on the shore, he softly said, "You can like the sea & the islands & the beach," then walked away to leave me in much-needed solitude. I walked in & out of the water along the shoreline for a long time praying. When I finally squatted just beyond the water's reach, all talked out, I began to truly "like the sea & the islands & the beach" & God whispered in my spirit rather nonchalantly, "I spoke all this." I was got. I was overwhelmed with who God is as if I'd just heard the truth for the first time. He spoke all that. Wow. Then He really blew me away, "Just let Me love you. Humble yourself to receive. Just let Me love you." I squatted a good while longer taking in the message. Ly approached & squatted next to me for a long time. We just liked the sea & the islands & the beach together in silence. We simultaneously rose & headed back to the motorcycle. Down the road a short piece he broke the silence, "You can be happy now? If you happy, I happy. You no happy, I cannot happy too."

I replied, "Jaaaa, I am happy now."

His thrilled response was, "Ooooooh SO good! I am very, very happy! And you speak Khmer! Make me happy!" ("Ja" is the female "yes.") We both laughed loud & long just out of sheer happiness.

Ly also took me to a secret waterfall during "the wonder weekend." We had SUCH a blast with the 20 or so Cambodians there. We laughed & splashed & hooted & slipped around & played behind, in front of & right smack in the middle of the awesomely gorgeous & powerful waterfalls. Being the obvious newbie there, everyone wanted to show me tricks & thrills to enjoy...& to take photos of me. Hahahaha! After playing long enough to get chilled, I sat on a flat, dry spot in the sunshine away from the crowd. I sat in amazement at the beauty & power of the falls, of the One who created them-the One who spoke them, the One who gave me no-pay friend status just to love me.

A quick tutorial from Kelly :-)

Becky asked me to let everyone know how they can "Follow" her blog and leave comments.

To become a "Follower":
1) Go to Sign In (upper right-hand corner) and create an account.
2) Sign in, and then the "Follow" button appears in upper left-hand corner.
3) From then on, if you sign in to Blogger (or through Becky's blog), you will have a Dashboard that shows new posts from all the blogs you are following.

You can also register for a Google account (free) and use Google Reader to read all the blogs you want to follow. All you have to do is type in the blog addresses at the top left under "Add a subscription." It's a simple way to manage and stay up on multiple blogs that you follow.

OK, to add a comment to the blog (i.e., respond to Becky's questions or simply send a message), click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of each individual blog entry. It will say "0 comments" or 1, 2, or however many there are.

It will give you an area to write your comments, but be sure to click on the "Comment as" pop-up menu to choose an identity -- which just means to enter your name, email address (optional) -- or use your new Google identity (I think that's the simplest). Then click "Post comment" and you're done!

Gladness and Grief

Today has been the roughest day I've ever had in Cambodia. Yes, even worse than the day in February we were deathly ill. Muuuuch worse than that. I hope I'll never have another like it, but I reckon if Jesus keeps me 'round here I will. Sigh.

Altho' the "issue" has been on-going for almost a month, I haven't been at liberty to speak of it to anyone except Ruth & a couple of government officials. This morning our involvement was ended, so I can finally speak of it...in a vague sort of way anyhow.

A guy came by late one night packing lies & three small children. He said he wanted the children to stay with us temporarily because they were in danger of being kidnapped and/or hurt by some wicked fugitives who have a grudge against him for "busting" them. It didn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out the guy was telling tall tales, but three littles clearly needed a safe place to stay, so what could we do?

I kept them in hiding here with me at the team house until we were confident there were no predators creeping around the place (knowing the neighbors & having neighbors who love to gossip about strangers in the neighborhood was SUCH a blessing). We could not risk the safety of my siblings if someone really were following the guy & the children. Once we were convinced no one was lurking about to do harm, we moved them to the girls' house where all the other littles live.

The guy called periodically with excuses about why he couldn't retrieve the children yet & finally asked us to turn the children over to a nanny he hired. Ruth asked a trusted friend who's in the know about the guy & we found out our suspicions were right on the mark: the guy is the fugitive & the only people following him are law enforcement agents (from at least two countries & about 5 agencies). Then we were really in it!

The guy is not the natural nor adoptive father of these precious littles, so if we kept the children, we were part of a kidnapping ring & if we passed the children on to someone else, we were part of a human trafficking ring. Just having the children in our care labeled us "associates" & possibly "assessories" to the guy. Oh don't you know we were praying our hearts out!! Besides, & truly beyond, the legalities of the situation, we had three littles who needed loving care & protection....& a few medical tests to reveal if they'd been sexually assaulted, HIV-infected, or suffered any STD's. (I know, I hate to think toddlers may have such problems too, but here it's not uncommon.)

Thank God our trusted friend was able to clear us with a contact at the US embassy, who was able to clear us with a contact at the Ozzie embassy, who put us in contact with a westerner-run Non-Government Organization that rescues children trapped in human trafficking (foreign rescue NGO, aka the only good guys in this country with any real power). who in turn agreed to help us resolve the mess with the local government & place the children in a safe & wonderful foster home until the real parents can be located & checked out (the parents may have willingly given up the littles or sold them & so not be fit to receive them back). The NGO man, a real sweetheart with a lot of backbone, took the littles & me to the proper authorities today to turn the children over to the foster home people.

Funny thing, altho' the littles showed absolutely no attachment, indeed no emotion at all, toward the guy who claimed to be their adopted dad who, according to him, saved them from certain disaster & death, 5 minutes after I met them they were on me like white on rice. God does stuff like that. He let them know that I was a safe place to land, I reckon. The guy claimed they could not speak, so I was surprised when they spoke eagerly & cheerfully & frequently to me. For some reason they spoke only to me tho'. Go fig. God does stuff like that too. But, that blessing made today all the harder.

I had to put the children in a tuk-tuk with yet another complete stranger (who knows how many times they've been thru that already), smile at them, & tell them, "It's OK." They will be OK, but at the moment none of us were OK. I'm still not OK. God, I hope they are.

I'm sooooo glad they're safe & on the way to a stable & loving home, but I'm also grieving. Grieving over the fact that littles suffer confusion & fear & heartache & bodily pain & soul-scarring trauma because wicked adults are willing to put them in harm's way for pocket change.

Lord Jesus, come quickly! Can I get an "amen" somewhere?

9/2/10
Praise God for...
~people willing to risk themselves to prevent others from being put at risk.
~the privilege of eating every day. It is a privilege.
~"big rain" that settles the dust & lifts the spirit.
~the moto driver that enjoyed being caught in the storm as much as I did. We had a blast, especially thru the butt-high flood waters.
~people who ask, "What do you need?"

Petition God for...
~the salvation of those precious souls who nabbed my bag
~the salvation of those who nabbed my ID..
~the capture of & mercy toward the wicked perv you'll read about in this entry.
~more reliable LIA staff

Personal Notes:
~Deb, thanks sooo much for the Thirst! It really makes a difference!
~Judson Baptist Church of La Vista, NE., THANK YOU!!!
~Grapevine, you've just got to learn some hip-hop moves. You'd love it!
~Isaac, I miss you big.

Bong

It's official. I am LIA staff. Cool beans, huh? I think so. The pay's nothing to bank on, but the benefits are priceless. The only title I hold here is Bong, which means elder sibling (Yeah, the language is that thorough. Moreso than ancient Greek even!) As Bong I have authority over & responsibility for my younger sibs, but I also get to enjoy the commaraderie of being "one of the kids." In other words, I get to boss them around & hear their secrets. Hahahaha!

I love every one of my little brothers & sisters very deeply. God has given us genuine intimacy with & sincere affection for one another. I do some stuff for them, sure, but they're for me as well. Really. Just tonight, a few of the children gave Jame & me a big bag of fruit simply to love on us. Waaaay more fruit than we can eat, to be sure. We each took a little & Jame will give the rest to the poor children in his neighborhood. A bag of fruit (I don't know what it's called, but it's delicious) may not sound like much to people who give each other new clothes, video games & cars, but here giving food in any amount is a HUGE gift. Not to mention the fact that fruit is a treat, not part of the ordinary diet. So, to receive a big, honkin' bag of it.... Wow!

Another evening a few of my brothers could see that I was upset about something despite my best efforts to conceal my emotions. I've learned that when you know someone's heart, you have only to see their cheek to know how they are feeling. My brothers know my heart, for sure. They rallied round me like you would not believe. Merely recalling their concern & compassion overwhelms my soul.

Even the littles show their love for me in the sweetest, albeit strangest, ways. Here grooming one another is a great sign of affection. So, when the littles show me their toenails need clipping or their ears need cleaning, I know I am well loved. When they nit pick me (literal nit picking) & scrape the dusty crud out of the inner corners of my eyes, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they absolutely adore me.

I have no doubt that my brothers & sisters would do anything & give everything for me. And, I for them — same, same, no different.

Mostly what I do for the children is pay attention as a real bong should. Easily, 2/3 of Cambodian communication is done thru facial expression & body language. I suppose that's a fact on an international level, but here the unspoken communication is far more complex & far more important than I've ever heard of happening anywhere else. For example, it makes a big difference which direction your eyes move while you're speaking. I'm not just talking about up or down, I'm talking about diagonally up to the right, quickly to the left, a glance at the ground. Eye movement is just one way of communicating. Eyebrows is a whole 'nother thing. As are the mouth, the hands, the feet, shoulders, etc. (If you're thinking about coming over, no worries, it's understood that foreigners are poor communicators & Cambo's don't hold much against you. Hahaha!)

I am finding the children & I speak less but communicate more. Ain't that something? For example, this evening I asked Srey Pick why the older girls didn't attend a youth meeting they were very excited about this morning. She slumped just a bit with hands folded in her lap, glanced slightly downward to the right, then downward center. I asked again, "Srey Pick (saying a person's name in conversation is also a big deal & sometimes the only thing that needs to be said), why you not go to youth? Srey Pick, why?" She looked me in the eye for a few seconds, then glanced straight left, then downward to the right again as she leaned back in her seat. I had my answer; a full explanation including how she was feeling about it. I can't tell you the reason because part of the message was a request for confidentiality. Hahahaha!

I do other stuff for the children too, but none of it would mean nearly as much as it does to them without the "real-bong" factor. It's really the lifetime committment between us that makes the other stuff deeply meaningful. Like the recent boys' underwear purchases I made. Lots of people have bought my sibs unders & my sibs have been thankful, but there's something different about their bong taking them to market. Others have given unders because orphans need underwear. I bought unders because my brothers need underwear.....Calvin Kleine knock-off underwear that hangs out of the top of their low riders all cool like.

Photo: Big, hairy grapes

8/29/10
Praise God for...
~His astounding mercy
~His constant provision for every single need
~laughter. It does a body, soul & spirit good.
~the FABULOUS service work my brothers & sisters are joyfully doing
~His grace that turns intended harm into actual good
~young lives transformed by the loving Spirit of Jesus
~the realization of LIA's 2-year prayer request for a kindie (preschool) program here at the team house

Petition God for...
~the precious & treasured souls of the guys who snatched my bag
~redemption of the cleverness of the people who stole my ID. Their intelligence & ingenuity can bring God a good deal of glory once they know Jesus.
~ridiculously obvious direction in the decisions I need to make
~increase in trustworthy & sincere LIA staff

Personal Notes:
~Turner Family, God's peace & joy to you! You & yours are on my mind & in my heart. I also want you to be assured that your investments here are paying off in HUGE & ETERNAL dividends. Thank you soooooo much for your support. You are literally changing Cambodia. I can see it happening! Glory to God!
~Peg Miller, my big honkin' response to your concerns was lost in the email hijacking. Here's the short version: OK, I'll pray with you about it with an open mind. Thank you for being real. Thank you for caring for my family. I love you too.
~Isaac Roe, it's an honor to be your mom. I love you, Son.