Cambodia Ministry Updates

–         On the weekends we are able to interact with the children through soccer and other church activities. This has been great for my pride because I am a horrendous soccer player. The church rents out a “field” next to the church on Saturdays and Sunday afternoons.   This “field” is roughly the size of a basketball court…and is covered in SAND! It definitely has made for some epic soccer battles so far. We’ve been blessed to have members of another team on our squad come play as well. By far the men take it a bit more seriously and have often come backed bruised and/or covered in sand. We try not injure too many kids if possible! I do recall one day when one of the teenage boys, Peseth, was kicked in the shin, and nailed with a soccer ball in the face AND chest.   All in all though the games allow the kid’s time to be active and just be kids and it keeps them out of trouble.

–          We’ve also gotten the opportunity to work in a soup kitchen in the city. The organization that we are working with is C.H.O.I.C.E, a non-profit organization that helps feed the homeless and offers supplies to needy villagers. We met the contact, Brett Medlin, through our Tuk Tuk driver/city guide/honorary team member, Vuthy. Throughout the month we have gone in the mornings before class to prepare roughly 60-80 lunches for the homeless and needy in Phnom Penh. We generally cook up a monster batch of rice and soup and offer them in bags on the street. Each person generally has a card with a number that they present and in turn they receive a free meal and clean drinking water. It’s incredible to see the joy in people’s faces as women, children, the elderly and the disabled receive a good meal.

 In addition to this, we take leftover meals to one of two places: a local AIDS hospital or the local children’s hospital. Both locations are heartbreaking. In visits to the AIDS hospital we’ve seen people in the last stages of life as the disease ravages their bodies. The hospital rooms are a far cry from what we have in the U.S. Most of the time the patients are sleeping on a thin, hard mattress, and the rooms are hot and without air conditioning. One woman that we recently visited was rail-thin and very weak. She didn’t have the strength to speak and hardly responded when one of my teammates asked to hold her hand.   We were able to pray for her, and sing her some praise and worship songs.   By the time the next team visited two days later, she had died. Many team members, including myself, had a very hard time processing this because death isn’t a regular occurrence in most of our lives, and I’ve found that we often hear about the AIDS statistics, but seeing these people really faces to the numbers. Although it was tough to go it was a blessing to be able to offer these people our time, encouragement, prayers and a meal.

 

After visiting the hospital or handing out food on the street most days we headed over to the children’s hospital. The site was often very chaotic. Nearly a block and a half would be strewn with mothers and fathers holding and caring for sick infants and toddlers. We were told that because the hospital offered free services, people would come from villages and wait hours upon hours to seek help. It was sad to see sick, crying children sitting out on the hot pavement. We would often walk into the crowd and try to give out the bags to needy people although it was tough because we never had enough.