Ice

Red-orange esky/iceboxes/chilly bins seem to be everywhere in Cambodia. I often see people buying and selling these huge blocks of ice to use with them. They are so common that when some Aussie travellers who were here in July for only 2 weeks seemed to have forgotton that that there are other ways to keep drinks cold. They gave us their left over milk and said “Do you have one of those red eskys you can put this in?” I told her no we don’t, but we do have a fridge. This conversation took place in our kitchen, right next to the fridge!

Phnom Penh streets

Our news

This year we started going to a new church. Soeun has already begun helping with music and preaching. Its nice to go somewhere together and fairly close to our home. I'm pleasantly surprised at the amount of Khmer I can understand. Although maybe I shouldn't be surprised as the main thing I've been doing is studying the language! And there is still so much I don't understand. I've been writing about it under the topic of church on our other blog if you want to know more.

I have started helping some Khmer people teach English. Khmer teachers, Khmer kids, but all in English- they are amazing! My role is to help the teachers with their English and with class activities. My only training and experience in English language teaching is with adults, so I'm finding it challenging to think of learning activities for kids. Five year olds are quite different to adults! I'm blogging about it on the other blog under Bilingual school.

So I have been getting to know lots of new people which is both exciting and exhausting. It has been hard as I have had a cold on and off all for about a month. I keep thinking I'm better but then I get sick again. Very frustrating!

Second semester at the Bible school is beginning this week, so the students are back after a week holiday and Soeun is back teaching again. He was marking papers most of last week- one of his least favourite parts of the job. 

This semester Teacher Soeun is teaching two subjects: Intro to Preaching and Observation (as in observing the Bible)

Oh, and the project evaluation is underway!

Cambodian Pancake

Fun for you

To my regular readers/fellow bloggers here is some fun for you on Kronicle Extra.

Most deadly part 2

Thankfully the danger is mostly over now. But the loss is huge!

If you want to donate money try the Salvation Army or Red Cross

BBC and CNN- both have eye witness accounts, maps, videos, photos and other stories

Fireupdates has a map, twitter updates, photos and more.

Google fire updates

has a map and links to news updates

Most deadly ever

An unusually bad drought, unusually high temperatures and some wind. Even without the suspected arsonists it is a bad situation.

An sms I got from a friend in Victoria, Australia:

" 46 C (114.8F) in the shade. Really dry and windy." (Saturday)

As we've listened to Radio Australia over the last few days we were shocked to hear the death toll on Saturday from the fires was in the 40s, on Sunday in the 80s. Monday morning it was 108, by the time we went to bed it was 171. Its now at least 181 with people still missing.

That's more than double the death toll than what we used to call "the worst bush fires" when around 70 died.

I can't imagine what it would be like to be one of the survivors from one to the two townships that were destroyed.  Marysville and a community near Kingslake lost so much. Their family, their house, their neighbour and neighbours houses. Here is one families escape story: Terror Run

 Kinglake resident Christopher Hardy says he is devastated.

"Everybody's gone. Everybody's gone. They're all dead in their houses there, everybody's dead."

(from ABC news)

Its also been flooding in northern Australia, one family was effected by both! Dad stuck in floods, mum caught up in fires.

The Age is Melbourne's newspaper, and there is also lots of videos, photos, maps etc else where on the web. You can also find ways to help such as donating to the Red Cross.

Interact with Khmer kids online!(in English)

Rachael, an expat living here in Phnom Penh went to visit a garbage dump where people live and work, have a look at her photos here. Now she is helping kids of the dump families to learn how to use computers. 

As part of that they have a blog called A New Life.

If you would like to read what Khmer kids write about themselves, have a look! And they'd love it if you left a message too.

She is helping A New Day in Cambodia, and here is her blog post about how she got started.

Sorry, thats a lot of links. If you just look at one make it the kid's blog. If you want to find the link to it in the future I put it on Kronicle Extra, in the sidebar under "Cambodian Links".

On Kronicle Extra....

How do you say “obstetrician” in Khmer?

Harvest and Feast in our front yard! (lots of photos)

 

Baptism

On Saturday three churches got together about an hour or so outside Phnom Penh to baptise about 24 people in a river (the Mekong I think). The church we just started going to went, but I wasn't feeling well. Soeun went though and here are some of his photos.

Above is a pile of noodle type things that go in a dish of food I really like. Its kind of like a salad, they often have it at weddings.
And here are some fish being grilled. Below is a photo of some boys using a banana tree as a boat! It had nothing to do with the church day out, Soeun just thought it was interesting.
Here is the table set for lunch.

And here are some of the people getting baptised!

Shower or Sarong?

I was talking to a Khmer girl about whether or not I would go with Soeun to visit a remote village. I'd like to see more of Cambodia but I think I'll find it hard, and as he is going with a team to do a job I'm worried I'll get in the way. I'm not sure if there are toilets and bathrooms there. I'm pretty sure that my back will be sore as the roads aren't paved, and I can't imagine how it will be after sleeping on a bamboo floor for four nights.

She used to live in a village when she was young, the jungle was her toilet and the river was her bathroom. I think also people wash by pouring water over them while wearing a sarong, so you can do it in your front yard rather than in a private room. She has since lived in a town so she is not used to doing that anymore. When she goes back to the village she finds it really hard.

She told me some Cambodians see expats here and wonder why they live in the way they do, with washing machines, hot water showers etc. She said some Cambodians think this isn't good. But from her experience (going back to the village) she said she knows that once you are used to something it is hard to live without it.

That reminded me of what Soeun said when he was living in Australia. Coming to Australia and seeing how easy life was like made him realise why it is hard for Australians to go and live in Cambodia. 

Wedding in Kampot province

On Saturday we went to a wedding far far away. Find out more here.

January 7th

On January 7th thirty years ago the Khmer Rouge regime officially ended.

It was the end of about 4 years of horror for Cambodia. (I mentioned the beginning of it here,

and the genocide museum here.)

It is a controversial holiday as the saviours of Cambodia were the Vietnamese thought of as

"traditional enemies"of Cambodia. In the lead up to Victory day there was a foiled bomb plot, 

talk of tighten security and various people giving their opinion about whether Cambodia 

should celebrate this day 

or not (Were Cambodians liberated from the Khmer Rouge or invaded by another power?), 

and a cartoon. Some photos from the days celebrations

are here: Celebration of Vietnamese Invasion and Occupation. And more about today here:

The Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975 and is accused of killing millions through overwork, execution or starvation before it was ousted by a Hanoi-backed military force in January 1979.

(the KI media site has more, I took the photo in R'kiri)

Aid money in Africa

I watched a BBC thing on aid to Africa. An African was looking at how aid money was being used and found it wasn't getting to where its supposed to be mostly because of corruption. You can read about it here.

Then recently I saw this 

As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God

Missionaries, not aid money, are the solution to Africa's biggest problem - the crushing passivity of the people's mindset

Matthew Parris