Hello Cambodia!

Well it has been a long time. I mostly stopped writing for a while because I didn't have much to write about in regards to Cambodia. I was mostly waiting for God's timing to get here...though that time waiting was definitely not wasted. God used that time to grow me in leaps and bounds, and taught me lessons that I definitely needed to learn before I got here.

However I AM HERE IN CAMBODIA NOW! I plan to start writing again on a regular basis. It will be something I will have to discipline myself at, because the writer in me has gotten pretty lazy in the last year.

I've been in Cambodia for a little over three weeks now. My visa has been extended, my immunizations updated, and I definitely live here now. That's sort of a strange feeling. I'm used to being a "tourist" in foreign lands, even if that's not what I wanted to admit to being at the time. This time though, I'm here to stay for a while. The people on the street are my neighbors. I have a home church, though I can't understand most of what is preached and sang there yet. I have a "job", teaching Hannah and Ethan every weekday.

I live in a city called Battambang. It's the second largest city in Cambodia, though not nearly as big as the capital city, Phnom Penh. It's a pretty laid back place. There are stores and restaurants, but no "western style" super markets or fast food chains like in PP. It reminds me more of my hometown, Newnan, whereas PP is more like Atlanta... just with 100x crazier traffic!

While in PP I had the opportunity to visit Toul Sleng, which is the high school that was turned into a prison and torture center during the Khmer Rouge in the late 1970's. It's now a genocide museum, and the "classrooms" and cells have been left exactly the way they were at the fall of the Khmer Rouge. There is old rusty torture equipment and dark stains on the floors left from the blood. It gives me a strange feeling even thinking about it now, when I'm miles away, sitting here in the comfort of our house, typing on my computer, with the low hum of a fan in the background. Some of the rooms are lined with photographs of the victims. Innocent men, women and children. Old and young. All brutally tortured and killed because they had more than a third grade education. I've seen it before, on television, but seeing it in person, it hit home. I think especially after I had spent two weeks already getting to know so many wonderful people who look so similar to the people in those photos. Thinking about how my friends who are teachers at the school where I teach Hannah and Ethan everyday, or the pastors at our church, lots of people I pass on the street or see in restaurants...they would have all died if they lived under the rule of Pol Pot. It's crazy to think about. It makes me sick at my stomach.

However, mostly everyday that is not on my mind. (Thankfully, I don't know how I would make it through each day if it was...) Though I know there are people here who lived through it, who probably still think of it everyday, but they don't speak of it. Mostly I think of Cambodia rising from the ashes. Of the incredible young generation of the Body of Christ in Cambodia who are ready to do things for God's glory. I think of how much potential Cambodia has, and how much the country has moved forward even in the last ten years. I also think about a new evil, the problem of slavery. That's a "right now" tragedy that happens every day. Great things are stirring in my heart about that, and a great God appointment happened for me last night, but that's a story that can't be told yet. It's not time.

Right now my assignments are two awesome little MK's in 2nd grade and Kindergarten. That's where my focus is, and that's what I'll do my best at. Right here, right now.