A Quiet Thanksgiving

"I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set aside and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens."-Thanksgiving Proclamation, Abraham Lincoln

This is probably the quietest Thanksgiving I've ever had. With nearly everyone we know out of town for the week, Eric in Korea for a conference and Gabe sick, we won't be celebrating Thanksgiving with a big meal. Also, Cambodia is unusually quiet today as we observe a day of mourning for the tragedy on Monday. It's circumstances like this that reduce a holiday to original reason for celebrating. In this case, it's gratitude. And I do feel gratitude. Yesterday I was feeling very alone as I cared for Gabe who was very ill and worried about how I would get him to the doctor or get more medicine if I needed to. I worried about who would help me if I got sick as our neighbors and closest friends are out of town. But then both Eric's and my parents called and promised to pray and one of the few friends left in town dropped by with some Sprite for Gabe. Today, I woke up feeling grateful: grateful that I feel fine, grateful that Gabe is feeling a bit better, grateful for the prayers. I also feel grateful that no one I know or love died on Monday. And I'm grateful for family and good friends, two (mostly) healthy kids and a good God. So this morning I sat with the kids and thanked God for all He does for us. It was a good Thanksgiving.

If I had to guess...

...Eric's favorite bit of being father to a baby it would be this:

Cold Snap

While you all in the States were having a Halloween week-end, we were having a three day week-end to celebrate the king father's birthday. It was a gem of a week-end. It started on Friday with a beautiful sunny day and a cool breeze. So far we have had 4 days of what the Cambodians call cold weather. It has been in the 80's every day with a cool breeze coming straight down from China. This may not seem very exciting to you, and Cambodians mostly dislike it, but for us expats, it's wonderful. It is thesubject that comes up in every conversation in the last few days and people who have been here longer than we have comment that it is something they've never experienced in Phnom Penh. The weather here is almost always between 90 and 95 degrees and humid, so this is a very welcome change. Anyway, it makes me feel like I'm in a different country. It's sort of like the first warm day after a long cold winter. You wake up, look around and find interest in life again. At the market instead of feeling sweaty and exhausted and ready to escape as quickly as possible, I marvelled at the variety of goods available and wondered why I never stopped to just browse. I felt motivated to accomplish tasks I'd been putting off since arriving back from the States. I cooked and cooked. We finally went to Wat Phnom (a large park around the stupa that houses some Buddha relics), one of the bigger tourist destinations in PP. Molly also decided to start sleeping through the night this week-end, so I felt like a million bucks this week-end.

This picture is from Gabe's Saturday soccer league. We're very grateful that some parents have organized this league. Gabe really enjoys it and it gives him a chance to spend some time away from the concrete jungle in some fields with trees. Gabe is on the right with a classmate, Sam. His coach is on the left and we hear his entreaties to "Pass de ball! (he's African)" about 100 times a game:)

Molly's second month

Even though the month is not quite over, here are a few pics of the second month. In the picture of her and Gabe, Gabe is pretending he is a tuk-tuk driver for Molly. His scooter is the moto and her rolling bouncy seat is the tuk-tuk.

Molly's first month

Traveling back to Phnom Penh

Last week we returned to Phnom Penh in stages:
150 miles on Monday
2000 miles on Wednesday
6779 miles on Friday
1433 miles on Saturday

This strategy worked well-Gabe and Molly both travelled very well.

Wedding on Koh Chang

Here's our family on Koh Chang this past week-end, where we attended a wedding. It was a trip of highs and lows. Koh Chang (in Thailand) is about a 7 hour drive from Phnom Penh. We've gone by bus to Thailand several times since we moved to Cambodia and none of those trips has been at all comfortable. Being 6 1/2 months pregnant, I hoped we could find another way. A couple of weeks ago our superintenent offered the use of his van for the trip as we don't have a car. His family had made the trip over April break and it had gone very smoothly. This was generous of him as he has five kids and the van is their only vehicle. Anyway, we weren't sure how long the border-crossing would take, but we figured if we left very early, we would make it by afternoon. Cambodia being a hot country, many people are up by dawn getting things done at a cooler time of day. We planned to leave at 5:00am, just before dawn. We didn't make that deadline, but managed to leave the house by 6:00.

Getting out of the city was pretty easy and we only hit traffic once we came to the garment factory district. It's hard to appreciate the size of the garment industry in Cambodia until you see the mass-migration of workers in the morning. Most workers don't have their own vehicles and get to work by a variety of means. Many are taken by truck (the truck pictured was huge and it's standing-room only. Thousands upon thousands walk. Some are on the back of land-barges pulled by tractors. Cambodia has touted its garment industry as the humane choice of employment for its workers. I don't know if it's true or not, but I do know there are many, many jobs I've seen in Cambodia that I would not want to do, so perhaps the factories are better work environments. Anyway, you can think of these girls on their way to work when you wear your Cambodian-made clothing.

Beyond Phnom Penh, the drive was pretty. Green fields dotted by trees with cloudy moutains in the distance. We passed one small farming village after another. People were passing the time like they have for generations-planting rice, taking cattle out to pasture, planting gardens, sleeping in hammocks under the house. Outside of PP, the country feels very unsophisticated. At our one gas station stop we were served by ladies who had all worn their pajamas to work. This is convenient for the frequent nap-taking that happens between customers (and who can blame them with the unrelenting heat?) Many men wore no more than underwear (again, who can blame them?)

We made the Thai border by 11:00 and quickly realized that we were one paper short of what we needed to take the van into Thailand. After much calling back to the school, we managed to get what we needed and be on our way to Koh Chang by 1:00. When we got close to the ferry to the island we joined a traffic jam. We hadn't realized that this was a holiday week-end and thousands of people from Bangkok would be joining us for the week-end on Koh Chang. It was a couple of hours before we found out how long the line for the ferry was and when we did, I realized that it would be another couple of hours before we actually got on the ferry. At this point, I abandoned poor Eric. Even though it was a cloudy day, it was still pretty hot in the van and we couldn't open the windows as the notoriously hungry and malarial border mosquitoes joined us every time they had the opportunity. I walked to the pier where the rain and cool wind off the ocean kept the mosquitoes at bay. In spite of the wind and the constant shifting of cars it really was pleasant to sit by the ocean. We made it to the island within six hours of arriving at the ferry.

The resort where the wedding was held was really lovely and all night we heard the sounds of storms For us, who have been waiting for the rains in Phnom Penh, it was a lovely sound. For the rest of the family and friends visiting from Europe, East Asia and America, it had made their vacation less than ideal. Most had been on the island for many days and it had rained and stormed for most of that time, making the usually island activities very difficult or impossible. Thankfully, the wedding day was as perfect as it could be for the month of May. It was sunny and bright, but cooler than it would have been without the previous days of rain. Though everyone else was very hot, for us, it was cool compared to Phnom Penh (probably low-90s instead of upper 90s). The wedding was very small, but it was really lovely. With only 20 or so people, everyone contributed in some way to the wedding. Here is a picture of a fun activity organized by the Dutch contingent (the bride is from the Netherlands).

After lunch everyone headed for the pool, including the bride and groom still in their wedding clothes. The bride's dress didn't seem the worse for the chlorine:) Around dinner time Eric & I, the only guests with a vehicle, drove the new couple to their honeymoon destination.

The next day, we decided to beat the rush off the island and leave in the morning. Unfortunately, many others had the same idea. This time it was sunny and much hotter than the day we had arrived. Gabe & I abandoned Eric shortly after we realized how long the ferry line was. We waited for a little while in an open-air restaurant, but it was too hot to stay for long. I paid the cook at the restaurant to drive me to the pier on his moto. We thought we would wait there, but the only shelter was a very warm warehouse. Gabe & I got on the first ferry 10 minutes later and sailed across to the mainland. Even the Thai people were hot on our shaded ferry ride which tells you how hot the day was. Once on land, Gabe & I paid $1.50 for a ride in the back of a covered pick-up to the nearest town. The pick-up stopped at a KFC which was where we spent the rest of the day until Eric arrived. Judging by the number of pregnant women in KFC, it must have been one of the few air-conditioned refuges in town. Long-suffering Eric had to wait in line for about 5 hours. It was too hot to keep the car running so every time the traffic stopped he got out and took shelter under the trees on either side of the road. We drove the border as quickly as possible, but it was still 4:30 when we finally made it through immigration. It was a slow evening at immigration and the officials wanted to hear all about our trip.

The road beyond the border goes through a large national forest in the Cardamom mountains. It is a lonely drive on winding roads and people usually do not recommend driving it at night. With darkness only 2 hours away, we realized we'd have to stay the night at the border. The best accomodation option was the casino right over the border. Gambling is against the law in Thailand so the Cambodians have built a large casino and hotel right over the border. Although it was depressing to see people gambling for 10 hours at a time, the hotel was on a lovely, lonely stretch of beach. Gabe enjoyed playing in the surf and we had a gorgeous sunset to end a pretty uncomfortable day. Oddly enough, this was the only time we were in the ocean on our island week-end.

The next day we left early and made it back in time for Eric's afternoon classes. We also came back to a house with no electricity, but that's another story.

Dangerous job

As many of you know, this has been an unusually hot, humid and long hot season. Because of the heavy usage it has gotten during these months of temperatures near or above 100 degrees we needed to have our air conditioner serviced. As part of the service, this guy is topping up the coolant in our unit. Because the air conditioner is on the second floor in our bedroom, the outside part of the unit is about 10 feet off the ground. Two guys came on a motorbike balancing a large metal case containing this tank, a compressor and some other very heavy equipment between them. I had only a stool to offer, so this guy climbed up to the top of the wall using only his arm strength, cleaned the whole unit and then hauled this tank up and balanced it on his knee while refilling the coolant. I have to think that if these guys were on some of the reality shows that involve physical challenges they'd have no problem.

Gabe and his little sister

March and April

I don't have any pictures of March. There wasn't much exciting happening in March. Hot season started and we just plugged away at work. Most of March is spent thinking about the long break in April and what has to happen before the break, then preparing. The 2nd of April we left for Thailand to attend our group mission conference. This is an annual get-together for the members of our regional group. It's always good to reconnect with members from other countries and to hear what God is doing. We arrived on a Friday night and were shocked by the traffic we encountered. We had planned that we would have 2 hours to get from the airport to the train station in another part of Bangkok. Our taxi driver pronounced this impossible and told us we'd be better off driving 2 hours north to the next train stop and embarking there. The heavy traffic volume was due to the large protests happening in Bangkok. Lots of people were coming into town to join the "Red shirt" protests. Thankfully, the traffic thinned out and we made it to the train station with one minute to spare. Then the train was 1 1/2 hours late:)

Conference was a really nice time and Eric, especially, enjoyed the chance to see some of his former students before they graduate. One of the sad realities of our life is that these students become sort of like family over the years that we get to know them and then we never see them again. It is rare for us to ever see them again once they leave to start life in their home countries. This was a particularly sad year as we said good-bye to a boy from New Zealand who lived with us for a short time. We have known him since he was 9, have gone on many vacations with his family and he was part of our family. It's hard to know when and if we'll see him again. Sad:( This year's graduating class also included our next-door neighbor and Gabe's favorite baby-sitter since he was 3 (the same person) On the plus side, these are some spectacular kids and it's wonderful to see the people they've become. We're excited to see what they'll do with their lives. Here's a picture of us praying for the kids at conference.

After conference we spent a few days in Chiang Mai and then headed back to Bangkok. We stayed down in the city center for one night. We were a bit nervous as we were in the heart of the protest area and just a few days before many people had been shot during the protests. However, it was the New Year holiday and everyone, including the red-shirts, was celebrating. Here's a picture close to our hotel. As you can see, it's water-play pandemonium. Poor Eric went to check his e-mail at a cafe and this is how he looked when he came back.

In past years Gabe has often been scared by the water fight, but this year he took is water gun everywhere he went and really enjoyed Songkran.

We returned to a quiet and steamy Phnom Penh 2 weeks after we left. It has grown steadily hotter as the weeks have gone by, but we now have only 5 more weeks of school until we can take a break!

February pics

Here I am, trying to get caught up on blog posts again. To summarize-February was a month of being sick with amoeba and other digestive diseases for the whole family. March was busy preparation for April, which is sort of like December in America. Khmer new year (in April) is the biggest holiday of the year and everything sort of shuts down during that time. Most people travel and even if you stay home, it's too hot to get much of anything done. So here's February. We did manage to enjoy many things that happened in February in spite of the illness: "Spirit Week"-It wasn't actually called spirit week, but it didn't really have a name, so Spirit week is the best equivalent of what it actually was. The entire week was a competition between three "houses" made of up of the students from preschool-12. The houses were randomly assigned and had kids from all grades in them. I assume that the idea of competing houses comes from the time when kids went to boarding school and lived in different houses. Anyway, school mostly went on as usual with competitions at the beginning of every school day. One was a crazy hair competition and Gabe decided to shave a mohawk. It looked pretty crazy and the next day we had to shave it all off because his hair looked like it had been cut with a weed-whacker.

The last day of the week was a sports competition day. Gabe won a green ribbon for his house in the long jump. This competition was held far outside of town at a college campus and many of the students spent a good part of their day watching the crazy foreigners run in the hot sun. I'm always amazed that the kids can put so much energy into competing when it's so hot. We did go through hundreds, if not thousands, of bottles of water that day. For this day, lots of kids who are part of Hope's distance learning program came in from the provinces to take part.



Also during February we had camp week. This week is designed for the older students to do the field work portion of their classes. However, they have programs for the younger kids as well. Eric went to Rabbit Island and Kep with his kids. Rabbit Island is beautiful, but very undeveloped and the accomodations were very basic. In spite of this, they seemed to have a really fun trip and I assume, got their work done. One of Eric's ice-breaker activities was to have teams design a rain-proof shelter and a sea-worthy boat for the 7 dwarves action-figures. Some went above and beyond and designed entire resorts for their dwarf.

Kep is a town on the edge of a national park known for its natural beauty. 100 years ago French colonialists built villas and plantations here and made it into a little Riviera for themselves. The Khmer Rouge hated that sort of thing and destroyed it. The ruined and blackened mansions tell 100 years of history very succinctly.

I didn't get any pictures of it, but Gabe had a great camp week as well. Preschool to year 3 stay at home for a day camp. They had a day of all art projects a day of all water play and at the end of the week, a year 1-3 sleepover. Gabe had a great time and it was one of the highlights of his year

Antipodes

I have some pictures to post, but instead I'll post this useless trivia. As a kid, didn't you always wonder, "If I tunneled straight down, where would I come out on the other side of the world." Now we can know the answer to that question. The answer, in my case, is somewhat disappointing. If I had tunneled straight down from my house just outside Chicago, I would have ended up in the ocean somewhere between western Australia and the French Southern and Antarctic Islands. Now if Gabe decides to take on this venture and tunnel straight down from our house in Phnom Penh, which I don't think he will as we have only cement to tunnel through, he would end up just south of the Pui Pui Protected forest of Peru which apparently is a mountainous jungle crisscrossed by streams and torrents. Even though it is of no benefit, it's nice to think of such a lovely jungle just below this urban jungle.

The Superbowl

Gabe was talking to Grandpa & Grandma on Sunday (Saturday night US time) and they said, "Tomorrow is the Superbowl." Gabe pumped his fist and said, "Yes!!!" I said, "Gabe, do you know what the Superbowl is?" He said, "Yes, it's a big soccer game where one team wins a cup."
No, son, that's the World Cup.
Eric, worried about Gabe's Americaness, determined that Gabe would get up at 6:30 the next morning to watch the Superbowl with him. Gabe actually enjoyed it and pretty much changed his alliance every time points were scored.