Some Angkor Pics

Here are some photos from my three-day trip to Siem Reap province... the woman in the pics is my friend/housemate/coworker Theavy, the man is her brother, and the little boy is her son Sokun. :)

Happy New Year! :)

Hi everyone,

Happy Khmer New Year! Cambodians count years in the same way as the Western world, but their traditional new year is a big deal and they celebrated it all last week!

The majority of Khmer people go visit their relatives or their home province during this time. Those who are Buddhists make ceremonial visits to 5 temples, offering sacrifices and burning incense. For Christian Khmer, it can be difficult when visiting relatives because of family pressure to visit the "wat" (temple). 

Since I obviously couldn't go visit my own family for the week, I went with some friends on a three day trip up north to the province of Siem Reap. Siem Reap is famous for the ancient ruins of Angkor, dating back to the 9th century. It was so cool for me to go there, since I have wanted to see Angkor since I was about seven years old and saw a picture in the encyclopedia! I'll be posting pictures from the trip soon, the architecture was amazing. :)

This past month has been busy in many different ways. There was some government paperwork that we finally completed right before Khmer New Year... basically it is an agreement with the Cambodian Ministry of Social Affairs, to recognize that In His Steps is working in Cambodia and submit our plans for the next three years. I'm glad that the application is completed; now we just have to wait for it to be processed! Please pray that we have favor with the government so our application can be approved.

My English classes with some of the Sak Saum girls have been going well... so far we've been covering things like simple verb conjugation, likes and dislikes, and general vocabulary. This week we're beginning prepositions.... all this sounds very systematic and formal but actually it's mostly conversational and simple. It's important to keep things simple, because English is a hard language! English speakers in Cambodia have much better job opportunities, so it's an important skill to teach.

Lately I've been working with Joanne (our New Zealand staff member) on cataloguing our Sak Saum products. All the profit from the products goes back into helping the Sak Saum women, but in order to sell the bags we have to market them more! Fortunately all the products are beautiful, and practically sell themselves whenever they're shown in the states. :)

This morning at our weekly staff meetings (Sak Saum women also attend), I had the opportunity to do a teaching on worship with our Russian staff member Svetlana. We both got to share about different aspects of worship and some of our own testimonies. Svetlana demonstrated a beautiful worship dance while I sang, and then we had a fun time introducing everyone to a simple Hebrew dance so they could all join in! 

Our directors Eric and Ginny will be returning from the US on Friday, so please keep their trip in prayer. I missed them while they were away (they're kind of like second family to me!) and am glad they'll be back soon. 

Angkor pictures will be posted shortly!

God bless,

Emily

Zoo Trip!

Hey everyone, here are some pics from our orphan program's recent field trip to the zoo! None of them had ever been to a zoo before so it was a great experience for them!

Emily

(New Post Coming Soon!)

Goodbye March

Hello everyone, 

March is almost over and I can't believe how time is flying! I've been keeping pretty busy and am not quite sure where this last month is gone...

Since I last updated you a lot has happened! On Sunday, I went to the wedding of a Sak Saum woman named Pieng. She married a man from a different province, a farmer. Their engagement was quite a bit different from what Westerners are accustomed to... the families meet and agree that their two children will marry! It was kind of sudden by my standards, but Pieng was a very peaceful and even joyful bride, and plans to tell her husband, new relatives, and community about her love for God.

Pieng will still be involved with Sak Saum to a degree, and Ginny plans to employ her as a sewer even though she no longer lives in the city. I look forward to seeing her when she comes and visits every other month.

Ginny and Eric are leaving tomorrow for a short trip to the US so they can get some paperwork in order for taxes... While they're gone, I'll be starting an English conversation class with some of the Sak Saum women who are getting to an intermediate level. We'll be meeting three times a week... just had our first class today! 

To start, we'll be practicing verbs and conjugation. Fun stuff... just kidding :P. Actually it's at times like these that I'm so glad I don't have to learn English as a second language. It's quite difficult to explain all the different exceptions for conjugation and spelling!

This week I'll have to stock up on some groceries because in April most stores shut down! Throughout the country! That's because for about a week, the Khmer celebrate their traditional New Year. But since most of them go back to their families homes for an extended visit, nearly every business shuts down or severely limits their hours! So... I'm getting prepared. Should be interesting!

Hope you all are well, God bless!

Emily

Some Women in our Sak Saum Program

It's a Beautiful Day In the (Saang) Neighborhood... :P

So sorry that posts have been sparse...

Some exciting things have been happening at our Foundation Center in Saang! Over 17 people have gotten saved in the past week, an awesome harvest for our staff there that have invested a lot of time and love in people's lives. I'm looking forward to going to Saang tomorrow for their weekly youth Bible study... in the past we've had about 40-50 students each week, but their numbers are growing to about 70! Very exciting that people are engaging with God and not just observing. :)

Everything else is going pretty well, I just started an ISOM (International School of Ministry) class with a bunch of the staff; it's an extensive Bible and ministry course that we are doing each Thursday morning. I'm sort of facilitating the class and taking it too... looking forward to learning a lot!

On Tuesday I taught a two-hour First Aid and Safety class for all our staff and the women in our Sak Saum program. There is not a lot of teaching on this subject here, and a lot of misconceptions about how to care for injuries... people can develop gangrene and need a limb cut off simply because they were never taught to clean and protect a small cut! So it's a really important topic and I enjoyed educating the staff about it. It was fun to see them practicing bandaging each other's "wounds" and tying slings out of kramas (a common regional scarf that they used for practice). 

Actually the timing for that class was perfect, because that night one of the teachers on staff, Solomon, had to care for his brother after a moto accident! Fortunately his brother is recovering just fine.

Hope you all are well, feel free to comment or e-mail me!

God bless,

Emily

Long Overdue Update

Hi everyone, sorry for the long delay... I wanted to tell you about the youth retreat as soon as we came back but it's been pretty busy here.

The retreat was awesome (those who know me know that I don't italicize lightly!) and it was big blessing to be a part of it. We ended up taking over 26 youth from Saang district (a very poor area about 20 minutes away from the capital) to Sihanoukville, a beach town in southwestern Cambodia. The youth were so excited to come! I think that for those of us who have grown up with a wide range of experiences and education, we can't truly comprehend the excitement of seeing something like the ocean for the first time.

We arrived at Sihanoukville after a long and tiring bus ride. There are certainly some features along the way that do not exist in America! For instance, at the "rest stop" (essentially a few toilets and some food vendors selling deep fried bananas, sticky rice snacks, and hard boiled eggs), we drove over a mountain that has a whole section of "spirit houses" along the road.

Spirit houses are small shrines to dead ancestors and spirits (even though Cambodians are generally Buddhist, they have absorbed a strong animistic and ancestor worship influence). People traveling over the mountain believe that if they offer sacrifices at the spirit houses, they will have a safe passage over a slightly dangerous road. Needless to say, our group did not stop and make offerings!

Anyway, during our first day at Sihanoukville, we took the youth to the beach, went to dinner, and then had our first worship and teaching session with Jocelyn from NY. She shared about hearing the voice of God. Even though the youth that we brought are all Christians, many are new believers and very young in their understanding. It was awesome to see their expectancy and eagerness to hear from God.

The second day was jam-packed with activities from morning until night! After breakfast we had two teaching sessions, one from our intern Daniel and one from me. Daniel shared his testimony and I shared about God communicating with us about himself and our relationship with him. Daniel helped me with some visual aids and examples, and I really enjoyed doing the teaching.

We all took a lunch break, then returned for teaching sessions from new staff member Jo and from our director Eric. Both were very good. Afterwards, some people rested/napped, and others headed to the beach. I opted for the beach and really enjoyed hanging out with the youth. Some of them made sand castles and others played volleyball or went swimming.

That night after dinner, Jocelyn spoke about intimacy with God, and then our other director Ginny shared about making a choice to draw near to God. We ended the night with a time of prayer for the youth. It was awesome to see their response to the Holy Spirit and open hearts to what God was doing in them!

There was a time of testimonies before heading home the next morning. I was so encouraged to hear each person speak about what they had learned, and how God had spoken to them during their trip. It was such a cool time. :)

Anyway, we arrived back in Phnom Penh last weekend, and have been keeping busy ever since! Hope you like the pictures!

God bless,

Emily

P.S. Please keep my finances in prayer this month! Trusting in God...