About a month ago, I moved to a new continent. (photographs at the end!)
…but along with that simple yet daunting feat comes;
-the heartache of leaving our beautiful home, hosts, and friends
-leaving ministry we’ve worked alongside for the past three months
-watching our beloved team leaders wave goodbye to us at 3 am
-abandoning all a familiarity in exchange for abrupt uncertainty
But as Cass says, “it’s a mindset”.
You see I could’ve chosen to linger in my sadness, mourning what I had lost, but instead, I choose to see moving thirteen hours ahead and thousands of miles away as an adventure, and oh what an adventure it has been!
I went from almost being able to hold a conversation in Spanish, to saying ‘akun’ which means ‘thank you’ in Khmer because that’s literally the only word I know in this language. I went from taking a fifteen-minute public bus ride to San Jose and having most things within walking distance to driving forty-five minutes one way by tuk-tuk and still being in the ‘middle of the city’ and utterly lost. I went from living in a quiet neighborhood on the outskirts to living smack dab next to an international airport in a commune that believes in boom box level karaoke at all hours of the night. Oh, and middle of the street weddings pretty much every day! Wild! Rad! Living at a constant level of the unexpected is about the only predictable thing here.
I’m in a whole new world. *cue Aladdin*
-and I am SO excited about it! New food to try, new people to meet, new languages to learn, new opportunities to love like God, new pictures to be taken and all the markets to scour! Moments of rest, moments of chaos, moments of going with the flow, and moments to have it all planned out.
this is the World Race.
actually- this is life!
It shouldn’t matter if we’re in another hemisphere or in the next city over, it doesn’t matter what our days look like if we’re sick in bed, fighting on the front lines both physically and spiritually in a foreign country, in the middle of an excruciating lecture at school or if you’re in an office cubicle. When you find those sacred moments with the Father, doesn’t matter where you are; you’re home, you’re safe, and you’re so deeply loved. THAT is the deeply rooted truth I have chosen to walk in and out throughout the rest of my life. I choose to live each day to the fullest; not necessarily pack it to the brim, but seek out all the joy, all the purpose and pick up my cross to follow Him.
So now; what you actually clicked on this blog to find out… what am I actually doing in Cambodia?!
Tuesday through Friday we spend the afternoons partnering with Cambodian teachers at ACE American Academy- a wonderful primary school run by two alumni 11in11 gals who are also our hosts! We spend part of the morning walking the streets of our community saturating it in prayer; fighting for Jesus’ name in a culture that has never heard the Gospel!
Around dusk, kids from all over the neighborhood know to gather at our front door, back door, and even side windows announcing it’s time for soccer in the street! This time is meant for us to deepen our relationships within the community so if sports aren’t really your thing (aka me) we walk around town talking with the men and women who work at the street vendors we get our lunch and coffee from, we invite them to community events the school puts on and take the time to exchange stories from our lives and speak the universal language; laughter!
Our apartment building backs up against Cambodian seminary school! We’ve been spending Tuesday and Thursday nights in their uppermost room, singing praises and sharing in culture.
Saturday looks a little different; our squad of nineteen splits into two and either stay to work on community projects like painting the schools or going about 45 minutes away by truck to the provinces with the ITCS students to put on English classes and a VBS for the kids that would otherwise not have access to such things.
The days seem long but the weeks fly by,
It seems like just yesterday that we touched down.
Before we know it, our feet will be covered in the red Swazi dirt.
But for now- I choose to live here, in the now, I choose to relish in the moments I have. Instead of the moments I have not.
All my love,
Gemma
