On the weekend Soeun preached at a school a few hours out of town. He often preaches at church, and the Bible school, so usually to groups of Christians he knows. But this was to a group made up of many non Christians as well as Christians. It was hard to prepare as he didn't know them. He ended up having to change some of his illustrations as he went.
He stayed over night and preached the next day too, so he got to know them a bit. He was surprised to find they knew how to sing one of the songs he wrote, and they were surprised to find he was the songwriter.

(It turned out the students from the Bible school who work there had taught this group one of Kimsoeun's song.)

Previously in side bar April in Cambodia

This month Khmer people welcome the new year angel. Each year one angel looks after the country, and Khmer New year is when they swap over happens. April 14th, 7.30am is when it will take place this year (took place). It was so surreal the first time I experienced it,

http://khmerkronicle.blogspot.com/2009/04/surreal.html

to find out more. Everyone (well, not Christians) put up a table like this with food and flowers for the angel, and each year the angel wants to eat a particular thing. I think last year it was blood, this year it is milk.

New Year traffic

This photo is from
http://ki-media.blogspot.com/2010/04/caution-urged-for-travel-on-holiday.html
as they report about traffic at this time of year "

"In only three days over last year’s celebrations, 52 people were killed and 233 seriously injured in more than 500 accidents, the National Committee for Traffic Safety said in a statement Wednesday."

We saw an average of one accident per hour on our trip, and there were other chalk markings on the ground to show there had been accidents earlier on in the day.

(I can't seem to do links today.)

Happy New Year

This is the hottest time of year! Actually this year it seemed to start at the end of Feb, a month early, so by now I feel like we have been hot for a long time. Lots of people (including us) find it hard to sleep so we're all hot, tired and grumpy! Some of the students have been sleeping on a wet towel on the the floor. It's even worse when the power goes off- no fan!

Anyway, also at this time if year people are playing khmer new year games and dancing. This photo is of this years decoration in the hall at school.

At the top of the side bar you should see a photo and explanation of what happens at Khmer new year.

When Soeun was young he lived in a village. All of April was one big holiday. They finished one rice cycle in March and they didn't start the next one until May. It was so hot they rested during the day and played games at night. But for city dwellers these days it is a three day public holiday.

Death in Cambodian Buddhist Culture

More hearts and other figures of speech

There is a Khmer pop song around these days with a line "two hearts", I'm told it means unfaithful. I thought that was interesting as in Hebrew "two hearts/minds" means you are telling a lie. While in English being in 2 minds about something means you haven't decided yet. And two faced in English means you are a hypocrite.

A heavy heart in Khmer means you are persevering, while a light heart means you aren't standing your ground. Maybe like a feather in the wind, it is light so it gets blown around easily, while a heavy rock will stand firm.

If a room is messy, in English we may call it a pig sty (sp?) as pigs are known for being messy. In Khmer they say a "pig's nest". Yes , nest as in what birds live in, it is not what they call pig's houses, but they think of nests as chaotic and messy. So to emphasise the point they say call a messy room a "messy dwelling of a messy animal" .

Easter Saturday

By Friday afternoon last week we were both feeling hot and exhausted, as you may guess if you've read the previous post. This time of year is so hot, so sleeping is hard, which makes everything harder. And KS had been busy with all the funeral stuff.
It was so nice on Saturday to wake up to an overcast rainy day! It turned out to be such a nice, quiet and cool relaxing day, with nothing hard to do. Most hot days I just do the minimum to get through the day, but on Saturday I had spare energy to cook hot cross buns!

In Australia I normally know Easter is coming as there are school holidays on the way and eggs and buns in the shop. In China I knew Easter was coming as the church spends heaps of time preparing for a big long Easter service. Also because it is the beginning of spring, when the grey of the last half year begins to end. The leaves and flowers start coming out, the coal dust in the air clears a bit, the birds start singing, the blobs of spit on the ground melt.......

But here I don't really notice it at all. Churches don't always celebrate Easter on Easter Sunday (they don't have Christmas on Dec 25 either). The biggest thing on the Cambodian calendar happens in mid April (New Year), so Easter tends to get a bit lost.

I did notice on Sunday people were burning things in big cans out the front of their houses. I guess it must have been a Chinese special day- I think grave sweeping is on at this time of year?

A Christian funeral

Kimsoeun's friend's dad died recently after being sick since around September(the last week and half he has been waiting for this). Kimsoeun left school after lunch and spent until dark in the family's district

When KS got back last night he said he was encouraged to see that the church members had taken over the preparations. I think one of the things that happens on the first day is the washing of the body, it's a community event. Often Christians end up having a Buddhist funeral as the relatives will start all the things straight away, but sounds like the church members were there already. The family (father and siblings) are not Christians, but they didn't protest. (I guess that must be hard for them, if they have certain beliefs of what needs to happen to the body to have a good next life.)



As well as church members I think pretty much all the students went as I and a staff member were the only ones at dinner last night.

Soeun went to preach there this morning, and will go back tonight for the burning of the body. When he's back at work today he'll be getting ready for the program of Jesus's death tomorrow- lots of death this week.


The coffin says : Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.

His 3rd year sts were eager to know what he was preaching from, as he has set some of them homework to prep a sermon for a funeral.


Update Sunday 4th: After the Good Friday program we found out another family in the community had a family member die. Then a few hours later we found out two more people had died. So some of the students who had been busy with funeral programs all week have to spend this weekend, not resting has they had hoped but helping people with funerals.

Last night was another it-is-too-humid-to-sleep-night, until 2.30am when it began to storm! This morning is cool and dark and wet. The market was very muddy this morning.

An artist in Sydney has blogged (her own pictures and thoughts) about her experience serving homeless people in Australia :Homeless people floating between harsh reality and sweet fantasy,

another m'kiri pic

About Cambodia

Of course there is heaps on the net about Cambodia, here are a few sites that might be useful and interesting:

Cambodian Culture
This one always come up when I do a google search for something about Cambodian culture- it has lots of photos and short simple explanations for things in our everyday life. Exploring this site will give you a feel for what it is like to live here, though expats eyes.


CIA factbook on Cambodia

NEWS

The News in photos- John Vink

Phnom Penh Post
Daily news paper

KI Media
Dedicated to publishing sensitive information about Cambodia


Air Asia- budget airline

Kimsoeun and a group of friends spent the other day at the hospital. One friends father is sick, and another friend's aunty is sick, as well as someone from a friends home church. Actually the father was sent home from hospital last weekend as there was nothing more they could do for him, so it sounded like he doesn't have long to live. If he had more money he could go to Vietnam or Thai for treatment. Anyway he's back in a Phnom Penh hospital now. The aunty doesn't want to be there, she is hoping to find someone to take her back to her province.

In other news, we have finished writing a 2 page thing about our future plans. We have been working on something for almost a year now, and it's got to the stage we can write something that sums it all up. Plus we made a new prayer card- we started working on that a few months ago, I was hoping to send it out in Nov, but it's a little late. First we had to take a photo that we both looked normal in, then we had to find a photo shop that prints clear enough photos. I went to at least 5 before we found an OK one.

It is so hot and humid! Hard to sleep and hard to work! Drinking lots.

Culture shock

There's lots of differences between Australia and Cambodia. Some things like the fact that Australian cities have parks and other outdoor spaces people can use and Cambodians ones don't. The people look different, the food is different- one Aussie wrote on her blog about what it is like to be an Aussie living in Phnom Penh. I keep meaning to, but she's done such a good job for now you might like to read her thoughts.

You can read a bit of it here, and a bit more here:
Talk about a change of scenery! From civilised afternoon drinks in our lush garden in inner-western Sydney, I found myself back in an airport where the electricity kept cutting out, experiencing that sensation of sweat dripping down your back within two minutes of stepping outside, and taking in the whiff of 'the black lake' (i.e. the open sewer around the corner from home) as the tuk tuk made its way through the crazy traffic home.

The last time I went to stay with a family in the province I noticed I was stressed about different things than in the past. When I first started visiting I felt disorientated as their house is quite different from anything I've ever lived in.

I don't know how to do things. For example, there are no sinks. So where do I clean my teeth, and where do they wash the dishes?

I guess I'm used to cleaning my teeth there now, and I can understand more of what people are saying, so those original stresses aren't so stressful.

After a recent visit I realised the stressful thing was that I have such different assumptions/ views etc.

Somethings I have grown up thinking are wrong- they do without thinking.
Things they assume are beautiful are actually really ugly to me.
Things that are normal to them are totally foreign to me.

In all these things they have no idea (as far as I'm aware) that I see things a different way, or even that there is a different way to see things. If they knew how I saw them I think they would be embarrassed. Which probably means that the way I live/act/thing is strange to them, so there must be things I do that they think are weird/wrong etc, and I'm not even aware.

There have been occasions when friends have pointed things out to me, but unless I have a friend to tell me I wouldn't know.

In year 11 and 12 I did a subject called "Society and Culture". I often think about what I learnt in that class "different, not wrong". It's helpful as I sometimes find myself wanting to tell people they are wrong!

I'm still not used to seeing people drop rubbish on the ground so often, so casually, so unashamedly.

sparkle, noise, food

Some sparkle......

...a big tent...

..some changes of clothes...

...some noise...

...and some food.

When there are too many empty cans on the table, just start throwing the rubbish on the floor.


There are heaps of weddings on these days!