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:)