#5 - Encouragement - Genocide Museum - Teaching - in 100 degrees!

STRESSED SPELT BACKWARDS IS......DESSERT!

That was the opening line from the pastor on Sunday's service. 
He went on to preach a message on "are we encouragers or discouragers"? Then he asked us which one of us encouraged someone today before coming to church ( if you did not, you had a second chance to do so after the service!) and spoke of the importance of surrounding ourselves with encouragers!


Encouragement in a Genocide Museum:
What I do know is that I was encouraged by my visit to Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum: in 1975 the former regime of Cambodia, turned this educational institution into S-21. S21 was designed for detention, interrogation, inhuman torture, and killing after confessions from the detainees were received and documented. The fact that the Pol Pot regime documented this with photographs, and letters is amazing to me. The torture tools, shackles and corpses found on the premises are now being used in evidence in trials in the United Nations. Previously this area was the Tuol Sleng Primary school and high school. (Click here for pictures and more info. on the museum.)


You must be shaking your head and thinking only Vidya could find that encouraging! I was moved to tears in the first room I entered after reading on what the old regime did to their people. It was an empty room with a blackboard, an old iron bed, no mattress, and rusty chains which kept the person chained to the bed, and an old metal box which represented the electrical shocks which the Pol Pot army administered in the torture process.


I was encouraged by the fact that our Lord brought me here at such a time to be part of the re-educational process in the redemption and rebuilding of the land of Cambodia.


I am teaching the future leaders of this country. 
It is an awesome honor to know that I am part of a team of people not only here at POR but also other organizations who are here in Cambodia to help in the rebuilding of its land and its most prized resource: the people. 


I know that He brought me back here to visit Tuol Sleng ( I visited it on my missions trip in 2009) so that if my motivation ever wavers during the tough days here, He would bring back to my memory the school rooms I visited, and my purpose for being here.


Isaiah 10:20-22 talks about the remnant of Israel. I look at the remnants that have remained after the destruction brought about by the Pol Pot regime: on the one hand you have families who have given up their children, their grannies. They have struck down family ties, yet at POR I see the community they have created between the house mothers, the grannies, and the older children to the babies. They look after each other.


Teaching and Praying:
I usually meet with my Khmer teaching assistant 10 mins. before class to pray. Today I remembered that Stacy (one of the other teachers) said that her class prayed together, so when everyone came in, ( right after one of the girls, Nary, who saw that the floor had been unswept came in and took the broom and started to sweep the floors without being asked to do so) I asked for a volunteer to pray, 2 immediately put up their hands to pray. When I said "English",they shook their hands, and when I said, "okay Khmer", they prayed while the kids bowed their heads and put their hands together in prayer, saying "Amen" once in a while in agreement! 
It was quite moving!


( Yes, I confess I peeked to see if they were all praying!) I had one more girl ask to join this class which begins at 6 at night. This class is for the lowest level literacy learners. Need to find out how she found out about the class! This cements that I need to learn Khmer: I wanted to know what she prayed! Was it "please help the teacher to teach"?


Luke 20:39: "...Some of the teachers of the law responded, Well said, teacher!" I never noticed before that Our God, Our Saviour, was addressed as Teacher. Many times I have thought of Jesus the Christ, as Physician, Counsellor, Creator, Artist, Gardener, Shepherd........but somehow the designation of 'Teacher' struck me and made me think again of this 'holy calling'. For all of us who are teachers by trade/education, or informally ( and we all are in some way), be encouraged and affirmed in your holy calling!
From mothers to lay people, we are either teaching or being taught in some way, and it is sobering as well as delightful to follow in His footsteps, to be in His school.


Hot, hot, hot!
To be honest this week, with the temperatures soaring to over 100 degrees, no air conditioning at all, the fan in my room just circulating hot air, no relief, no cold drinks, the kids still on Khmer New Year mode, only wanting to play, I had to pray and ask Him for help to remember the above!


Then in my readings Joshua 18:3: "..How long will you wait before you begin to take possession of the land that the LORD, the GOD of your fathers has given you?..." I claimed the land, that is , my classrooms, the kids in both classes, and boldly asked that He gives them a hunger to learn. 


Luke 19:48: "... and they hung on to His Words.. I asked the Lord to make me creative for the kids to stay interested in what was being taught. ( BY the way I am open to suggestions for creative ways to teach days of the week, commands, months of the year, sentence structures etc.) I also asked God for me to have a learning spirit to go along with the kids.


Learning Khmer and Tutoring:
Just got the word that I will begin formal Khmer language classes along with Jeremy and Stacy and Halina, my co teachers! We will be taught by Teacher Channak and in return we will tutor him, the accountant, the Khmer teaching assistants plus the Pastor at Place of Rescue. Pray for wisdom as we pair up and teach each other.
Thank you all, especially for this week as we had such high temps and teaching was so difficult. 
I thought, "wow how much more difficult it would have been if not for my praying partners"? 
You have made a world of difference for me here.


I will be seeing Charlene Pollock again, Got to spend too short a time with her but will see her and her team at Place of Rescue this week end. I am sorry I do not have pictures. I will have to buy a camera! But Char will be taking pictures.
(**Co-workers Jeremy and Stacey have pictures on their blog, Bacquepacking.)


Still Dancing with Him in spite of the heat,
Sister Vidya


(grateful to Lorilee and Ruby who skyped with me yesterday, on behalf of the missions committee, you both looked beautiful!)

#4 - Glimpses of the Living, Loving God.

As I was praying God showed me a picture of Him with His arms wide around the perimeter of Place of Rescue, then I see Him walking along the paths, His feet dusty as He walks and sees His children at play: 

Then He reminded me of these precious moments:

A group brought gifts for the children for Khmer New Year, one of the gifts is baby powder and before you know it, I became white! Yes part of the celebration was to put powder, or rather throw powder on everyone. Once I realized what was going on, I too got in the act. I wish I could show a video of the spontaneous laughter and joy as we began just playing, having fun and yes eating the baby powder.

Note to self: close mouth. I was laughing and bam!, one kid got me, baby powder tastes yucky!

But oh the sheer fun of it all!

It is seven o'clock at night, the Khmer worship music is put on in the big outdoor room, the meeting place, and everyone begins to dance Khmer style. It is beautiful and graceful, boys, girls, women and yes, the few men all dance traditional style. But then the boys start to put in hip hop dance steps and I laugh! I am learning Khmer dance! 

I am walking by one of the houses in the compound and a grannie calls me and I sit next to her, and she holds my hand and we just sit and smile! She says something to a house mom who comes and sits with us and smiles at me. I think I secretly amuse them but really have no idea why!

Don't you love it?

A little girl brings me 3 yellow flowers and wants me to pick her up with the universal language of holding her hands up to me! I try to hold her and the flowers as we dance together.

A foster child of one of the women at RAC comes up to me and extends his hand to dance, he is very very good! And very patient as he teaches me the steps. I cannot wait for you all to meet him when he comes with Marie Ens, grandmother, to Toronto!

So many pictures of His grace and love, His redemption and faithfulness. I pray the above gives you a glimpse of the Living Loving God who is here, He is not a far away God. 

Dancing Khmer style with our Heavenly Father, 

Sister Vidya 

#3 - Tall, 2PM, Lice and Cheers!

‘I am taller than I think’ was what went through my mind as I was talking to someone, and not looking ahead, and promptly walked into the piece of wood from the sloping rooftop of one of the houses on the compound!


I now have to remember to duck!
YES! Finally my five feet and two and a half inches is seen as tall!
For those of you who are not laughing out loud and are thinking of your poor sister Vidya’s head, it hurt, but my pride hurt more! It was the first time meeting my Khmer teaching assistant so he just looked at me and I just had to laugh!


I had asked if it was possible to open a bank account here and a couple of days ago was able to go in.
But what a way to go in:
I was on the back of a scooter holding on to the driver as we went over the bumpy road with the red dust flying up around me. I mention this because I was wearing light-coloured pants and had just washed my hair so you could imagine the sight I was when I got off the scooter!
One good thing about here is that no one even says anything about the way you look. The whole experience took me half an hour at the bank where usually it takes a longer time to get that done. I had to have my passport and a letter from Marie stating that I was working there and had to sign many papers! You have to show your passport here to get most things done! I had to show my passport with visa in it before getting my cell phone, and for the hotel! They not only look at it but print it out as my ID.
And because the scooter was parked out in the sun, it was so hot, let us say, my buns were toast!


First class: The heat is intense and the classes have no fans. I was introduced to my class of 18 kids and given the lesson 3 seconds (no kidding) prior to the class, and was asked to teach with the principal or former teacher in the classroom. The idea is to have no Khmer spoken in the class, only English, but that is not always possible. But the first class went well. The curriculum is simple and the kids know how to write and spell but not communicate.
But this is where I thought of all of you back home. The Khmer assistant was told that I was the only one who was going to teach, that since the Khmer assistant could not pronounce the English words, only the English teacher ( ME!) is able to teach the students the pronunciation!
Ha! I was thinking of how you all would react on hearing that!


Prayer Request: The curriculum does not match the semester timeline given, so I have to be extra creative in stretching out the lesson plan, so please pray that I am able to do this in a fun and relevant way for this class. This class is taught between one and two in the afternoon.


Second class: I was given a class of 8 students: these students are at the lowest level in their class so they were pulled out and given to me. That was wise. I had 15 minutes for the first class since there was a meeting for the whole school, so I only had time to get their names and introduce myself. I asked the Khmer teaching assistant to meet me 10 minutes before the class to pray over the students and the class.


I had no base level from which to compare their literacy levels so I asked them to name something they liked and told them how honored I was to teach them with Poeune who is the T.A translating for me. I asked them to create a ‘name’ for our class as we are a team, and role modeled that it was a good thing to ask for help if they did not understand the lesson. ( I found out saying yes to everything was a norm even when they did not understand! They were too afraid to ask for explanations). I explained how I was asking P for help.


Next class they came up with our team name, 2PM, which is a name of a band! Anytime they see me outside of the class they shout out "2PM!" much to the puzzlement of others!


Prayer request: Class begins at 6pm but the lights do not come on until 6:30pm in the classroom (night time), so half hour is wasted since you have to write the words down and they cannot see your mouth as you form the words.


Yesterday I had the class outside sitting on the ground, trying to ignore other kids milling around! Need to spend time in creating lessons to match the literacy level of this class.


High point: each student had named one thing each liked. P and I printed out each item, for example, one liked cats and another pigs, etc. After trying to teach a lesson on the difference between first name and surname, one asked if they could give a first and last name to their picture!


As I am waiting to go into the capital city where I am now writing this, five kids are sitting with me on the swing across from the AIDS houses. These kids have AIDS. Yet this morning they were my teachers. I was learning the Khmer for flowers, pant, t-shirt, etc. As I am repeating and writing down the words, two kids are trying to listen to my iPod which is attached to my pants and they are pulling at the earphones and my pants! But one kid is moving to the worship music. Another girl from my 2PM class pulls a little girl onto her lap and begins to search her head for lice!
Yes, then she finds one to show me.
I immediately try to move but alas I am sandwiched by another kid who comes to sit next to me! Even now as I am at the hotel I am scratching my head!


Went to the International service on Sunday with Marie. 
Please pray that I would find another service closer to the hotel where I would find community and be fed in His Word.


It takes me an hour to come into the capital city but it is the only time I can write this and get time away. The kids are constantly poking their heads into your windows, or knocking on the door, so there is no privacy. It is good to be in air conditioned building with a normal toilet!
Most importantly, I get to go on the roof top here to praise and pray for the land of Cambodia.
My room at POR has become my roof top for now. Everyone gets up at 5:30am and by 6am, kids are already outside so there is no alone time with God. I have to use my room instead.


Walked into the hotel’s little restaurant and the three servers immediately said "Good morning Vidya!" Felt like Norm from the show ‘Cheers’ or being at RAC! I have written their names down and I am learning to talk with them in Khmer.
The whole city is preparing to celebrate the Khmer New Year so most people are going into the countryside to be with their family and village.


Thank you for your words of encouragement and prayers. I want you to know how much that means to me. You are definitely my Hurs and Aarons. I sense when you are with me especially this past Wednesday which was a tough day with the heat and trying to teach creatively at the same time.


MY love to you all,
Dancing with Him in Khmer style ( The kids all dance at 7 at night, with Khmer worship music --so I dance too!)

Sister Vidya

#2 - The Trini has landed!

Sharing Easter meal with Marie Ens and friends.
(Photo credit: Marie Ens)

The Trini has landed in the kingdom of Kampuchea!


Thank you, my prayer warriors, for your prayers, I felt it! From the day of departure when I got back my OHIP which was taken away the Friday previously and reinstated just hours prior to leaving, to the packing of the suitcases and farewell off at the airport, I knew you were praying! 

I could say it was the Dutch connection or the Trini connection which got me special privileges. I was able to check in my baggage without having to wait in the line, and got to take all of my luggage even though I was way over for each, but in reality it was the Holy Spirit connection! 

You all prayed and through an old friendship at Cathay Pacific the above occurred. Plus, eight hours within flight, I began to feel hungry and all of a sudden the flight attendant, to whom I was introduced by the Dutch and Trini women, appeared with a tray of goodies from first class, with the china and silver forks etc! I was so surprised! I ate it all up and I had room to sleep because there was no one sitting in the middle! 

The young man who sat on the aisle seat, (I had window seat) had taken sleeping tablets, so midway in flight I was contemplating how good I was at hurdling! I was trying to estimate jumping over him to go to the washroom, but thought I would end up on the laps of the person across from him, so began to pray for the guy to wake up! I was humming loudly and then physically dancing to music while seated, in the hope he would feel the vibrations and wake up, (tricky thing to do when one HAS to go to washroom!) but he did move and I immediately pounced on the opportunity to get out! He helped me with my carry-on luggage and logistics of figuring out how to get the food table out in front of me!

Had opportunity to share with Hyacinth, the flight attendant, on where and why I was going to Cambodia. However, did have mini panic attack within the first 3 hours on flight. Was feeling claustrophobic, could not get seat belt off, and it was so dark and my thoughts were, “Wow, I am really leaving everyone and it is just me!” 

Then I put on my praise worship music ( thanks to you and you know who you are!) and felt His peace descend on me. I realized that this would be the first of many times that Satan would try and take away my reassurance from our Lord Jesus Christ re: His mission for me and how He would provide for me at POR! 

Layover: 6 hours and no, I did not miss the flight or get lost at the airport so specific prayers were answered! But it is weird to have 'lost' a day! As I am typing this at 10 at night, it is 10 in the morning, Wed. morning, but Thursday for you all! Second flight went smoothly, visa was given for one month, so I have to renew it each month! But then waited for luggage. Half hour went by and still no luggage! Then one of the porters came and waited with me and I slipped him some money (technically speaking not supposed to give money, who knew?) and it was he who remembered he saw a hockey bag and another bag in the lost and found area! 

Got bags and went out to see Marie Ens' smiling face! 

Place Of Rescue: Within first hour of arriving at Place Of Rescue, a woman came crying to Marie: she was pregnant, had fallen, and she was afraid that she would lose the baby and be sent away from Place of Rescue! We prayed over the lady, the baby and Marie reassured her that she had a home here. Within minutes, went to praise service set up by the kids and their leaders: they were praying all together and doing action songs. Left early since jet lag was now catching up on me, and promptly saw 3 huge black spiders in bathroom! Killed two, one got away, and then the top of shower head broke in half so had to scoop cold water with bowl from a barrel of water to take first shower here! 

Was up early at one in the morning. I went outside in the pitch darkness with flashlight: got my worship music on and stood in the middle of the playing field and rejoiced with the Lord. 

Beach Lime: Everyone was up early by 6am to go to the beach: this is a yearly treat for everyone.

Picture this: 6 huge buses with about 300 kids, grannies and care givers! 

At the end of the day they all sang praises and prayed on the beach with the tourists and rest of the visitors looking on. Watch us. Click on the link below. See if you can spot me. (Clue: Far top left - My blouse is orange.)
(*lime - Trini term for hanging out! )
https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=3631963326535

Good Friday: returning to Place of Rescue; a 4-hour drive; tired, the solar generator has not kicked in yet for the lights, so waiting on that; very hot, have to go in to the capital to get groceries.

I showed everyone the laminated copies of prayer sheets: thank you all for partnering with me.

Prayer requests: 

• to find that place of prayer and worship: everything is built flat here: no roof tops as in Phnom Penh.

• Meeting with teachers; wisdom where I would fit into the teaching schedules.

• Quick ear to pick up language: would help in forming community here.

• Internet access: doing this from a hotel but no access at Place of Rescue yet!

Still dancing with Him, 

In partnership with you, 

Sister Vidya