Only in Cambodia would you ride in a train made out of bamboo

This week has been so much fun here in Battambang. I'm seriously loving outreach so much. I just noticed yesterday that we've already been in Cambodia for a month. I can't believe it... it's gone by so fast. So much has happened already, but it still feels like we just arrived. There's been so many fun memories made and i'm sure we will have plenty more memories to come. We are all having too much fun living the "Cambodian" life.

Ministries were great this week. SALT practice was a lot of fun and I feel like I'm really building long lasting friendships with the girls there. On Wednesday the main guy who started the SALT organization got back from a trip and we had our first day of intense practice. I'm definitely staying in shape while I'm here, which is good because I have been eating my body weight in food everyday. I don't know what's wrong but I'm always hungry. Luckily there is a gas station very close to the base to get food and of course the donut stands that are even closer to the base. Anyways... the orphanage was great this week too. On Thursday, Campbell and I were the only ones who went. So we hopped on the back of our translators motto and rode off to the orphanage. We brought paper and crayons and had the kids draw what God meant to them. After we were done drawing our pictures they got to explain their drawing and tell us what God means to them. It was really touching the things that they wrote and how much time they took to make the pictures really good. A little girl at the orphanage named Obe drew a heart and wrote words in the heart like "love" and some other khmer words. After they explained their drawings, Campbell shared a message and we held hands all together in a circle and prayed. Many of them have a cold right now and they asked if we would pray that they wouldn't be sick anymore. It was a really touching moment because as I was praying out loud I heard the mumbling of many kids praying to themselves. They have so much faith that God is going to pull through and as they pray it is so evident that they are talking directly to God. Campbell and I have a huge heart for the orphanage. This includes: fixing up the place, starting small groups, having weekly teachings, making the orphanage a place that they can feel excited to go home to after school, and a lot more. We are praying a lot about the future of this orphanage, even if we just plant the seed, we are hoping that other teams can continue this project.

The youth center has been a lot of fun this week. My students are getting more comfortable asking questions in class. In my conversation class we'll end up chatting the whole time. Which is perfect because the class is called "conversation" and I really get to know my students that way. In my photography class, Grace and I had our students draw different angles of a camera and label the parts. We quizzed them on Thursday and they are seeming to pick up photography terms very easily. We told them what each button is called and what its function is. That class is going to be so much fun, I'm really excited to see the pictures that they take in class. Grace and I are going to be printing out their favorite picture each week and put them up on the wall. Once we get to the last week we will put together a portfolio for them to take home. I'm so excited because one of my photography students named Ratana wants to hang out on the weekends. She works a lot, but she said next Saturday morning she wants to take me out on her motto around town and maybe out to the rice fields. It should be fun! I'm really excited about Ratana's friendship, she is a really sweet girl and always gives me a big hug before and after class.

This week has been a really fun week with our team. On Tuesday I hung out with Laura at Gecko Cafe and we chatted for a couple hours. I love my leader Laura, she's so great and always seems to be in good spirits. Even if she thinks she isn't, I always feel like I can be myself around her and talk to her about everything. I'm really grateful that she is my leader. After chatting for a bit and eating cream cheese wontons (they are soooo good!) we walked around in the market trying to find measuring cups to make no bake cookies for Laura and Campbell's cooking class. It was definitely harder than it sounds. It was very funny though. When there's a language barrier and you are trying to explain what a measuring cup is....well you could imagine that visual might be funny. After no luck we decided to buy the ingredients for the cookies and head back to base.

Many more great things happened this week but I might save those stories for when I get home. I want to let everyone know that I'm having a great time here and this outreach experience has seriously been a blessing. I know that God wanted me in Cambodia for a reason and He has definitely revealed to me why He wants me here for this time. I love the culture here and have fallen in love with every ministry I've been involved in. This week is my last week doing SALT, which I'm a little sad about but it's been a great experience and luckily I get to keep in contact with the girls over facebook. Once SALT ends I'm going to be filling those mornings in by going to a village and doing ministry there, I'm also picking up one more day at the orphanage. So I have a lot to look forward to still here. I really appreciate all the prayers that everyone has been praying for our team and for Cambodia. They are working and this nation has great hope for the future. The generation that we are working with right now are going to be the generation that changes this nation!

The internet connection is really bad so I can't upload any pictures. But they will be up on facebook shortly!

Youth Center Starts!

Hey guys! So this week has been crazy busy but has been so cool. The youth center finally started on Monday and I've really been enjoying it. I'm teaching two classes. The first class is "Conversation" and I'm teaching that with my friend Kat. Then I'm teaching a "Photography" class with my friend Grace. Both have been great so far. I was a little nervous to start teaching because I've never been a teacher before. Going into my conversation class on Monday (which was my first class of the day) I was supposed to have 7 students. After waiting 15 minutes only 2 students showed up that barely spoke english. It was really funny to try to communicate with them. We somehow managed though. We got the basics down and started simple conversation starters. As the week progressed we got more people permanently in the class. We now have 6! I prefer a smaller class because it will be really easy to build relationships with the students. We also got a translator, his name is Seeyum and we have so much fun. He is the hired translator for our team and has been to family dinner on friday nights with us. He's part of our team now which is really fun. He's such a happy guy and so helpful. If we ever need something he knows exactly where to buy it and he helps us communicate with tuk tuk drivers and our students. The photography class is a lot of fun too. Grace and I have 3 students in our class, we had 2 students until Friday and then another one added our class. They will get a lot of one on one time with us which will be really good for them. This last week they've just been getting used to holding a camera and taking pictures. We've gone over some few basic principles of lighting and they seem to catch on real quick. I can't wait to start projects with them and start posting their photos up in class. One of the perks about teaching at an openly Christian school is that we get to pray at the end of class and talk to them about God whenever we want. My students range in age from 18-21 and they are all pretty open to the Bible. I'm so stoked to see what God does with them during our time here. Even though there's the language barrier, they still manage to share prayer requests at the end of class to us and pray with us. I know God is going to do some awesome things, I seriously can't wait to see. Please pray for my students!

After my photography class I have about an hour to hang out with the youth center kids. I met two girls who have been teaching me Khmer! I've learned how to count to 10 confidently: muoy, pee, biy, boon, pram, pram muoy, pram pee, pram biy, pram boon, dop. They've taught me a lot of sayings and words, but it's so hard for me to grasp. Khmer is like no other language that I've ever heard of before. They don't understand why I can't say some things because they're alphabet is very different than ours. They are so cute though. Everyday they ask me what I want to learn and they write it all down for me on paper. I got into a conversation with one of the girls and she was telling me that she is a Christian but her whole family is Buddhist. I asked her if she has talked to them about God and she said she had but they didn't believe. She barely speaks any English but we still somehow manage to have conversations. I've hung out with these girls everyday and have really enjoyed becoming friends with them. I can't wait to get into further conversations with them about God and talk to them about leading small groups in the youth center and getting them plugged into a church. I don't even know if the other girl is a Christian, I'm hoping we can have that conversation this coming week. Yesterday we went on a walk with them down the road to some street vendors and had boiled corn and some other goods. We aren't really supposed to eat from the street vendors because they aren't clean and the water has a lot of bacteria. But... it's hard when the girls buy you things that they insist on you eating. My friend Jess was with me yesterday and we just prayed over our food before and ate it. Praise God that He has kept us healthy!

The SALT program and the orphanage have been really good this week as well. I started teaching English after soccer practice with the SALT girls and that's been really cool. I'm turning into a teacher, it's so strange. I surprisingly really enjoy it though. I really enjoy SALT a lot, and the relationships with the girls has been growing. It's so easy to make friendships here, once you pay anyone special attention they are hooked on you. I love it. This week at the orphanage we taught the kids some songs like: "Jesus loves me", "Father Abraham", and some others. They get a kick out of them, but learn so fast. They were all singing the songs in English by the time we left. They taught us the songs in Khmer as well (well they tried), we are still learning. :) We have a lot of plans that we want to do with the orphanage, and I can't wait to put those plans into effect. They are such cute kids, I'm going to have a hard time not wanting to adopt all of them.

So this is a typical day in my life here in Cambodia.... I wake up at 6am but don't get out of bed until 6:30, have a quiet time with God until 7 then go to breakfast. Then at 7:30 I have work duty until 8. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays I leave for SALT practice at 7:30 and I'm out there until 11. Normally our team has worship everyday from 8-9 every morning and I participate in that on Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays. I go to the orphanage on Thursdays and Fridays until about 11:30. Then there's lunch at 12:30 and I have my conversation class from 1-2. Then we have a meeting from 2:30-4. Then my photo class from 4-5. We are supposed to hang out with the kids until 6 at the youth center and we pray at 6ish to wrap up the day. Then dinner is at 6:30! We are all wiped by the end. I go to bed by 10 every night (if you knew me you would be very surprised). It's super busy, but soooo good. I love being busy. We are definitely spending our time well here in Cambodia.

Last night we had a "family" dinner, we have them every Friday night. They've been a lot of fun and are a really nice way to end the week. Our team is bonding super well and we are having a lot of fun together. It's such a blessing. We sent our amazing leaders on a retreat night/Saturday to a hotel nearby so that they could have a little rest. Jess and I came home from dinner and watched a movie and ate nutella and sugar crackers. Which have been our new obsession. They are so good. We will try and bring back some bags full of them. Another thing that's really good are Cambodian donuts. There's a stand 2 minutes away on bike from our base and we get them a lot. They are only 12.5 cents! They taste really good with nutella or jelly.

Some funny things that have happened this week.... two girls from our team (Sharon and Katie) got locked out of the house last night while they were on the roof. They spent the whole night up there chatting and laughing. They were such good sports. We heard them come in at 6:45am this morning and we all were so confused where they had been. When they told us they got locked out we felt so bad, but they just laughed and actually enjoyed it so much. Soooo that was something silly. We also have a couple lists in our room that have grown, the first list is "Quotes from Cambodia" and the second list is "Only in Cambodia..." and you have to fill in the blank. For example: Only in Cambodia can you valet park your bike. Only in Cambodia do you get a spray tan from dirt from riding your bike down the road. Silly things like that. The list is getting very lengthy. We are having fun with it.

Okay that's it for now! Thank you for your prayers, I'm loving it here. I'm so happy I chose Cambodia for outreach. Love you guys!

Having fun at SALT practice

The kids at the orphanage singing some songs we taught them.

"God is love" in Khmer

Team Cambode after our family dinner (minus Mama and Papa Fry)

Cambodia!

Hello everyone! We've spent two weeks in Cambodia already and I can't believe how fast the time has flown.

Okay so where to start....

We left Kona a couple Sundays ago and after a full day of traveling we arrived in Phnom Penh. We ended up staying at a hotel instead of the YWAM base for the first couple days and it was a nice surprise. We got to enjoy the luxuries of air conditioning, warm showers, and a nice queen size bed. We explored Phnom Penh for a couple of days and got to know the history of Cambodia. Our tours that we took were pretty heavy because Cambodia suffered from a genocide in the 1970's and we went to a few of the killing fields. It was good to go to them so we could understand the culture a little better and really pay respect to the older people of the land because they went through this tragedy.

After a couple days in Phnom Penh we went off on a bus to Battambang. We arrived there and went to the YWAM base to settle in. All of our team members were pleasantly surprised by the base. I think we all went in with really low expectations of Cambodia; that we would be living really badly, and that the food wouldn't be that good. It was nice that we went in with low expectations because we all have been counting our blessings. The base is really cute and nice. There's two bases, the first one is where a lot of the staff live and our cafeteria is in that area. They also have a pond with a classroom in the middle, a basketball hoop, and a volleyball court. The second base is where we stay. It is four stories high! The first story is the kitchen and living room, the second story is where we stay (10 girls to one room!), the third story is where our leaders stay and it has a really cool open roof, and the fourth story is where we hang all of our laundry (it is the very top rooftop!).

A couple days after we got to the base and got all settled in we went to go purchase our bikes. They are so cute, and all of us might be a little obsessed with them. They are these cute vintage bikes that were only $35. We each got bells and baskets on them and we have a lot of fun ringing our bells. The traffic here is crazy. There's pretty much no street rules. Everyone does whatever they want. People are riding on the wrong side of the street, not stopping at stop signs, passing cars, and the list goes on. Pray for us that we stay safe on our bikes! I think a lot of us have gotten used to the crazy streets, but it's so funny. It would not fly in the U.S. to be driving the way they do here. I think the most people I've seen on a motto (motorcycle) is five people. Of those five people it's probably a mom, dad, two kids, and most likely a baby sitting on the drivers lap. We've had fun riding around on the mottos and the tuk tuk's (which are little carriage cars, like taxi's). The food here is so cheap and sooooooooo good. You never spend more than $2 on a meal and it will normally fill you up. A normal Cambodian meal consists of rice, vegetables, and some type of meat. The meat can include anything from chicken to frog to dog. You name it, they have it in a dish available to buy.

The Khmer (Ka-my) language looks really beautiful. I think if I were to ever get a tattoo (most likely) I would get something in this writing. It sounds really neat too, it's been a little difficult to learn because the only other language I've ever tried to learn is spanish. At first all my Khmer words had a tad bit of a spanish accident to them, but I'm getting better. I know how to say "what is your name"---on chu mo aye. In the Khmer language it looks a lot more beautiful than how we try to spell it in english.

So, when arriving to Battambang I got pretty overwhelmed because there's just so much to do here. I really had to spend a lot of time talking with God because I can't spread myself too thin. There's so many ministries that I want to get involved in but in order to make relationships I need to invest in only a couple. Fortunately, our team as a whole is involved with many ministries and we are pretty spread out throughout the city. Ever since I watched the "Sex and Money" documentary (look it up online if you have never heard of it), I felt really called to sex trafficking. I came to Cambodia wanting to do justice in that area. When we found out that we probably could not get into that ministry while we are here I got a little disappointed and asked God why He would put it so heavily on my heart if I were not to do it. He definitely answered my prayers the next day. I found out that a girls soccer ministry that I'm going to be involved in three days a week takes girls that have been trafficked or have been in prostitution and teaches them how to play soccer and teaches them english. It was such an answer to prayers! I went this past Friday to their first practice and fell in love with the organization. It is called S.A.L.T. (Sport and Leadership Training). There are about 40 girls out there daily playing soccer and they are all so sweet. A lot of them came up and introduced themselves to me speaking the little english that they knew. Then after that they will hold hands with you, hang on you, and hug you at any given time. I love it and I can't believe it is so easy to form a friendship with them. Then after practice we go to the international school and teach them english. It's such an awesome organization.

The other two days of the week I'm going to be helping out at an orphanage. I went last Thursday and fell in love with it. The kids there are so beautiful, nice, and loving. They love that we come to spend time with them. After playing a few silly games with them we prayed for them and played some games outside. They love to play volleyball and soccer, so I'll probably be playing a lot with them during those two mornings a week that I'm there. Currently in Cambodia, Americans are not allowed to adopt Cambodian children. Supposedly early next year that won't be a law anymore. I'm really praying that the government will grant that freedom for others to adopt from other countries. Cambodia has a lot of orphans and I know many want to adopt but currently are not able to. I'm excited to build relationship with these kids at the orphanage and fix up the place a bit. We will be having bible time there too. The ages at the orphanage range from about 7 years old to 21 year old and there are about 20 kids there. One of the kids (bellow) had fun wearing my glasses.

So that's how this week has looked so far! Saturdays are our days off as a team and we have been enjoying them by going cafe hoping and discovering new places in Battambang. Tomorrow we are going to church at the RAPHA house, which is a house that protects woman who have been trafficked into sex slavery. I can't wait to go. And on Monday we start working at the Youth Center every afternoon. My teammate Kat and I will be teaching a conversation class with 8 students and my friend Grace and I will be teaching photography! We have translators for both classes, it should be a lot of fun. I've never taught before, but I know God will equip me. I'm excited to build relationships with my students as well. They are a bit older (in their teens) and a lot of them are buddhist (only 2% of people are Christian in this country). We have a "Christ-based" class once a week that we teach, and we've been brainstorming about ideas for that class. Can't wait to start this new ministry on Monday. It will be going for 8 weeks.

Some silly things that have happened to us....

-There was a wedding that blared music for 3 days straight.

-We can't ride our bikes more than a block without getting a "dirt" spray tan. (It always seems to trick us cause we actually think we got tan and then soon realize that it's just dirt).

-We have about 12 fans going in our room at night.

-Bartering... that's always fun.

-The traffic, I just laugh every time I go out on the street.

That's it for now! I'm going to really try to blog more often than I did in Kona. Thank you all for your prayers.

A street in Phnom Penh

A boy at the orphanage who had fun wearing my new glasses

The beautiful Khmer language.