Sunday Night Update

note *** because of a problem keyboard, i will not be capitalizing during this blog

it's sunday night at 7:29 p.m. in cambodia. this morning we went to church for the first time. the elections were today in cambodia and they go back to their home province to vote so phnom penh is pretty empty or so they tell us.

the khmai (the cambodians) are somewhat shy so when all of us foreigners showed up, and they were a little afraid to go into the church. mike lewis and i went to go out and talk to some of them and made some new friends then we all went into church. the whole service, except for the sermon, was in khmer so was unintellible to us. the missionary's wife translated the sermon into english so that we could understand. it was neat to see them singing in their native tongue. the only song i recognized was o for a thousand tongues, but all the rest were unknown. it was both neat and strange to sit by these people who are so different from us in many ways, but yet sharing the same faith.

i talked to a young girl afterwards who was studying in college and will help us with the english camp that starts tomorrow. one thing i've learned already is that it is really hard to guess ages here. because of malnutrition, the people are smaller. the girl i talked to after church i would haave guessed to be in high school. i talked to another girl named aya who i though was maybe 13 or 14 and it turns out she was already out of college. the neat thing is that she now works for world vision, which is a christian relief organization similar to compassion international.

tomorrow we start english camp, which is a little more adventuresome than i thought. we will work on nothing but teaching tomorrow, but later in the week, our english exercises take us to the grand palace, a waterpark, a zoo, and a market. roger and i and two other girls from our church are on the same team. one of the ladies has been here before and is an elementary school teacher and brought some things to help out. my understanding is that things are very fluid, as some will come with some english skills, some with no english at all, and some with fairly good english.

we are starting to get over the jet lag. yesterday during training meetings, many of those on our team were falling asleep during some of the presentations. it was really embarassing, but i heard later that those who were presenting understood our situation.

the culture shock is still something that many are dealing with. it is hard to comprehend so much of what we see. so many different emotions come to the surface - sadness over the poverty and living conditions, love for the people around us and the beauty in their faces. it truly is hard to get a handle on it all.

it is likely that you won't hear from me for awhile as our responsibilities may take us past the point in the day where we are able to get to the internet cafe. i will do the best i can to keep you updated. i was able to talk to lora on the phone today using an internet phone connection.

thanks again for your support and prayers. i hope to write with more info when i can. i'm keeping a journal so that i can remember as much as possible when i return.