hiccups & run-attack-jump-for-a-piggy-back-ride

Battambang. It’s the second largest city in Cambodia. It is about 303 kms away from Bangkok, the last city we were in before Cambodia. That’s about 6 hours away by land. Yet, we ended up taking the most roundabout way to get there. Live this day of travel with us…

Bangkok to Hong Kong: 2-hour flight. 2 hours of layover. Hong Kong to Phnom Penh: 2-hour flight. In Phnom Penh, we took a far too overcharged tuk tuk to our guesthouse. (Like I mentioned, this is the very same guesthouse that forgot about our booking and thus, forgot to pick us up at the airport like they had promised.) 12 hours later, we were at the bus station. 2 hour wait. Phnom Penh to Battambang: 5 hours. I’ll spare you from the long story of confusion and stress, but let’s just say it took us an additional 4 hours to end up where we were supposed to be – at the YWAM guesthouse.

In simplest terms, a 6-hour commute turned into a 17-hour long haul. Times like this, I think God’s got a pretty funny sense of humor.

Aside from these hiccups, we absolutely loved Battambang and its small town vibe. We met a lot of new friends and also hooked up with ones we had gotten to know in Bangkok. The pastor’s house that we were staying at made amazing meals topped off with fresh fruit. Although we only saw the pastor and his family in passing, we came to love them. During Pol Pot’s regime this family walked days upon days from Phnom Penh to Battambang in an attempt to survive the genocide. They continue to stick together as a family, living with grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins in this one home (plus all the mission teams and guests!) With all these people living under one roof, they are incredibly overprotective over all of us – wanting us to be safe and feel loved!

***********************

Our week in this city was spent with a couple of different YWAM programs. We tagged along at the base during English lessons, participated in some dance lessons, and our favorite… Jeevit’s House! Jeevit’s House is an HIV/AIDS orphanage only a few blocks from where we were staying. It’s this beautiful house found in the middle of a slum. It not only addresses the needs of the kids who live in the house, but impact the community as well.


It all started with one baby girl - abandoned, sick, orphaned, and yet beautiful. December 2007. They took her to the hospital to get her checked out. They discovered she had AIDS. In Battambang, orphaned children who are discovered to have HIV or AIDS must go through a difficult process of being shipped down to the capital city of Phnom Penh to live at an orphanage. Laura, who started Jeevit’s House, began to have a dream. She wanted to have a center where “all the children abandoned, orphaned and ravaged by this disease, rather than hopelessness and death may find hope, life and healing”. Fittingly, they named the little girl Jeevit, meaning life.

Laura doing her thang!

Three years later in March 2010, Laura’s dream came to reality. Today, while Laura is only in her 20s, she plays mother to two brothers. Ruen is seven years old and Rain is ten months old. Although they only have two children living at the house, Jeevit’s House also serves the community around it – through rice giveaways, hygiene tutorials, and just loving on families.

7-year-old Ruen
Baby Rain

Rice packages in the background

We were able to join in on a few days of their community outreaches. Rebecca and I loved it. We’ve come to realize that our love for children just naturally ooze out of us, and Jeevit’s House is in no short supply of kids! These little guys are definitely not shy. Every week, kids from the community, as well as some moms drop by the house. It’s so obvious how much they love this environment. It’s not only a chance for kids to run and play, but it gives moms valuable skills and resources to raise their children. It also helps bring the community closer, as these members come to get to know one another.

Haha. The boys loved styling her hair

We played games with the kids, colored with them, received endless hugs, and were victims of run-attack-jump-for-a-piggy-back-ride. Although by the end of the day we were completely exhausted, we loved it! There’s an exuberant joy and care-free attitude that runs with children, even if life isn’t running so smoothly.

Coloring!

Crazy boys!

HIV/AIDS is a running problem in Cambodia, and even furthered by poverty. Tragically, this means a lot of HIV/AIDS orphans – whether this is because of a death of a parent or because parents have sent their children to orphanages hoping they will be provided for. Parents who do keep their children are faced with incredible hardships! Moms who have HIV or AIDS fear that they will pass their sickness on to their baby through breastfeeding. Unfortunately, these women cannot afford to buy milk with the right essential nutrients. Instead, they buy condensed milk, which contains mostly sugar and has no nutritional value. As a result, these kids grow up malnourished with rotting teeth.

Mama and baby!

Thankfully, Jeevit’s House stands, its desire to “help enable families to stay together and to help orphans find their place in new families” – to provide children with food, clothing, school supplies and fees, medical costs, and the ability to stay with their family or be part of a foster family.


Check out www.jeevitshouse.org! You can see pictures of all the kids they support, get more information, and possibly financially support this new organization.

unconventional charm

I have had a few friends who have spent some time in Cambodia. More often than not, they each come back claiming how they have fallen in love with Cambodia. Well, Cambodia must be pretty charming, because I have to admit, it’s stolen my heart too. At first, I couldn’t quite place why. We’ve been blessed in both the Philippines and Thailand that things have gone smoothly and relatively problem-free. Enter Cambodia, and we’ve hit bumps along every bit of the way. Places we were staying have forgotten about our bookings and confirmations. We’ve been lead astray trying to find our way from Phnom Penh to Battambang. We’ve been incredibly ripped off by seemingly friendly tuk tuk drivers charging us 20 dollars for what should have been a 9-dollar ride. Compared to the last two countries, Cambodia is more underdeveloped scarred from a painful genocide-torn past. Moreover, it seems to host the most expensive goods (probably because the US dollar is frequently used causing inflated prices).

It leaves one wondering where all the so-called charm of Cambodia is. At least for me, I think I’ve come to figure it out. I’m the type of girl who doesn’t really like the seemingly perfect, clean-cut, put together kind of guy. I love unconventional and rough around the edges. Overlooked, but once you do look, you’re strangely captivated. And that’s what Cambodia is to me.


For the entirety of our five-hour bus ride to Battambang, my eyes could not leave the scenery outside my window. I loved watching the dirt road in its magnificent earthy red, contrasting perfectly with the lush foliage of coconut trees. Behind it are modest houses built on stilts hovering over acres of rice fields. Above, dragonflies decorate the skyline. On these rice fields, Cambodian cows roam the land, and children run around trying to help their parents mind the field. Mothers rock babies on hammocks. It’s beautiful in all its simplicity.


But it’s also more than this small frame of imagery that makes me love Cambodia. Having ridden the tuk tuk (a motorbike with a passenger cart behind it) a handful of times now, we’ve gotten in the habit of smiling or waving at anyone else on the road. This gesture is almost always returned with a smile or a wave. The Khmai people are a friendly people. If given an ounce of kindness, they’ll return it ten-fold. We’ve visited a few shops, café’s, and Internet places… Each place covers their walls and tables with pictures of their family – of mothers, fathers, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, the whole deal. Although they’ve had such a painful past, they stand today as resilient, loyal, compassionate, and family-oriented.


I realize that all these thoughts may seem abstract to you, and probably won’t make much sense to anyone but me. Cambodia is unconventionally beautiful and I can’t wait to discover what other hidden charms are here. Welcome to Cambodia. Wish you were here with us!

Yes, we just name-dropped Justin Bieber

Hello friends!

Wow. Thanks for the support! Our procrastination has turned to checking and re-checking our links - numbers of group members, video views and blog views. It’s a little ridiculous and maybe bordering obsessive. I wish you all could fit in our living room and observe us get as excited with every view as teenage girls watching a Justin Bieber music video (that really is how thrilled we get about your support!) For real, thanks so much to everyone that has checked out our stuff, posted and shared links, invited friends to our group, or sent us encouraging messages and comments. We feel the love and it helps confirm for us that this project is not only real, but possible too.

A new video is coming soon! We did some filming today, so hopefully we can get it posted ASAP. Without giving too much away, let’s just say this afternoon felt awkward. I mean, it’s already kind of uncomfortable filming and watching yourself, but approaching a stranger to interview and film is just as awkward as watching the Olympic torch malfunction. Nonetheless, it was fun and I’m excited for you all to see it. We also promise more information is coming soon regarding plans for the trip. Some networking opportunities have been popping up, so we’re just trying to get that stuff worked out. We’ll let you know as soon as we do!

OH! We are participating in AdSense. If you haven’t heard of it, we are trying to make money by letting google post ads on our blog. The more views we get, the more money we make. I’m pretty sure we’ve made a penny thus far. (But hey, I’ve heard a penny stretches farther in SE Asia anyway – so every little bit helps!) We’re trying to get AdSense on YouTube too, but apparently you have to be invited to participate (and thus, we need to make YouTube notice us!) This means we need you to do one simple thing that requires you to lift literally only one finger: click to watch, re-watch, read, re-read, and share these links with all!

Thanks for the love. Until next time, let it leak and spread the word!