To the Bykota house - Day 5

After a good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast at the hotel, we were ready to go to the Bykota house! We went in the Tuk-tuk (pronounced as tak-tak) driven by T.R!


This is a Tuk tuk! In singapore terms, it's like trishaw + lorry + van = Tuk-tuk :D

After meeting the Benz family at their house, we were ready to go over to the Bykota house :D We decorated the Bykota house for Christmas.. Cutting paper chains, blowing and tying balloons, pasting here and there :D Have to salute Danielle for doing such a good job at planning the decor! :D




seeing double? That's edmund playing with one of the kids :D

After that was lunch at Mark's house :D and then... we were ready to wrap presents for the kids at the Bykota house :D Boy were there many gifts :D Presents many many! :D


after wrapping, we went over to the Bykota house to perform our skit for the kids while Paul had a discussion with Jason from New life church with regards to the village plans :D It was about the humble birth of Christ. Ben did a good job explaining everything, and i think the actors did really well too! and thanks to Sopheak for translating everything :D the kids were so cute and spontaneous when we asked for volunteers ( to be sheep, cows and horses in the manger :D ) Mooo Moo!

Ben and Steven then shared their testimonies with the kids! Thanks for their spontaneity :D

Mark asked us to have a discussion with the kids about Singapore so we did :D the kids had a lot to ask about us . Heh heh, Steven and Enid did a good job in answering the questions :D

And after these, we proceeded to Mark's house for their first birthday party with the kids! :D The december babies were little Bee and Mekerah! :D Ohh the homemade cake smelled terrific :) i happily helped in decorating the cake in the kitchen :p

Singing the birthday song :D

i think i'm getting too slow for games :D


That's little Bee in front of the cake! He's little and cute :)


That's Mekerah :)

After the party, we had our dinner, and while the boys stayed with the folks in Mark's house, the rest of us (the adults) went back to the hotel. Tomorrow was our last day at Phnom Penh, and the schedule was more free and easy :) So up to now, our mission is more or less accomplished :)


Up next! Places you should visit in Phnom Penh!

Day 4 - Bye bye Tung Kea

We were awakened by the "mooing" of cows in front of the church hall windows very early in the morning. The roosters were comparatively softer to them. So while it was still dawn, all of us were already awake. The villagers had woken up very early to collect the rice harvest (ard 4am?) , so we could see piles of rice plants tied up outside the church hall... and tonnes of cow dung from the cow. -.- what a way to wake up. haha. The villagers had been worshipping in the pastor's house since 7am i think :D ooh and we had to push the van cos the battery ran out of power and we had to charge it...

Ben: Yes, it's a great workout in the morning. :D Anyway spending the night at the village wasn't too bad. Apparently we didn't go during the period the insects comes out to play (around March?) so it was pretty uninterrupted sleep. It was quite chilly at night though.


oh, i have to add, because the water in cambodia is so dirty, we have to brush our teeth and rinse our mouths with bottled mineral water everywhere, even in hotels. So today we happily brushed our teeth anywhere we wanted and just spat it out anywhere else cos there were no basins in the village :D

Ben: Yeah, we had to conserve the water too. I managed to use 1/4 of a bottle to brush my teeth when others used the whole thing. BTW, did anyone not brush their teeth that day?

Breakfast was porridge and eggs with fermented beans. The porridge tasted wonderful cos it was straight from the fields..and err ( we try to forget the fact that cow dung co-exist beside these rice plants that the villagers had collected ;p) yea :) Steven loved the porridge :) I think it tasted like oatmeal :)

First on the agenda today after breakfast was the second round of walking to a different part of the village to pray for the families as well as some plans that the church were embarking on. We headed south this time, and it got increasingly harder to walk about as the paths were very small, just a tiny path in the midst of the rice fields and ponds and dung and the houses were alot further.. we prayed with the pastor over a plot of land which the village church was interested in buying to build houses for the widows in that area, and for his brother who was not a christian. I must say that we are thankful that even though many of the villagers didn't believe in Christ, they were very open for prayers of blessing and we trust that when we plant the seeds, God will grow the seeds into trees in His time.

We had opportunities to pray for many sick people - there was this man who had a very swollen stomach and he rested in his hammock; in fact many of the villagers were suffering from bad stomachs, which was not surprising due to the unhygienic conditions and the lack of education in these medical aspects.

Ben: We had a short discussion about bringing some doctors on the next trip but we'll see how God provides. The medical expertise would certainly go a long way to help the villagers there.


In the meantime, while we were moving from place to place, the little village kids followed us around, and they were very sweet; they plucked flowers for some of us as we were walking :) flowers are called "ga" in Khmer :) Even though we can't communicate, it was something that touched us deeply - holding hands with the little kids, smiling at each other - things that just melt your heart :)

Ben: Lurong was really happy to have the village kid hold her hand and walk with her. I have an entire video clip to prove it!



On our way back to the church we saw a monkey kept by a family and it was blind in one eye! And.. we passed by a snake -.- the village pastor chased it off. Paul say green bamboo snakes are very venomous -.- snakes are called "Sa Tan" (similar to Chinese) in Khmer. Interesting.

Ben: Yeah that was near the Chinese household, so there are chinese in Cambodia. Anyway the most prominent religion in the village, and around Cambodia in general, is Buddhism. While walking around the village we noticed quite a number of shrines and temples. But it's good to know that there are a number of churches being planted and growing.

After that, we had a leaders' training- which got delayed cos a lot of the villagers wanted to collect more rice plants from the harvest. Paul shared with the leaders and we laid hands and prayed for them after that...

Then... it was time for our last meal at the village! It was a very nice meal :) we had vegetable soup with pineapples inside, stir fried onions and fish cooked over fire :) after a satisfying meal, we were prepared for the church service. :D

Ben: Yes that was the best meal at the village for certain!

The service was a very simple one, but it was nice to hear familiar songs - even in villages ( songs like "my life is in you, salvation belongs to our God). Paul preached about Jesus calming the storm in Mark, and we prayed for many of them - many of them were concerned about their children, their problems and their faith.. after a long service ( because of the translations needed), we were ready to go back to Phnom Penh.


We went for an early dinner at A2, a taiwanese restaurant which sells bubble tea. I loved it when we went there last year so we had to go again. Haha. Good cheap food at ard 1.50 Us per meal and err 1.50 Us per bubble tea drink also. then we went to Mark's house to pick up our luggage and headed back to the hotel.

Ben: A2 kept messing up our orders! >.< Likely due to the language barrier.




By then the sky was already dark, and many of us were very tired. We had an early night as we were all very tired from the work that day and the lack of sleep -..- ooh! and we happily bathed in the hotel shower; many of us didnt bathe at the village yesterday. (oops) in fact, i didn't pee, shit or bathe to be exact. HA HA. it's a public secret. i think i slept the earliest...... zzz..


Up next .... working at the Bykota house !

Off to the Village! - Day 3

It's time for us to set out to go to village "Tung Kea" located in the province of Takeo today! We woke up really early for breakfast, and packed up to get ready to go to the village which was 2 hours away from Phnom Penh. We had never been there before, so we did not really know what to expect. Our goal was to take a look and survey the place, as we were considering if we want to adopt this village. Also on the village pastor's agenda was for us to evangelise from house to house and to pray for the families. So here we go!

On the way to the village, we passed by some other villages, and the road was really bumpy. Most of them were sand tracks. There were no paved roads. Also, we can see that it is harvest season! The fields are beautifully golden from the rice crops which were ready for harvest. However, the workers are so few, and even little children were harvesting. Looking around, we can also see how skinny the cows were, they almost looked like goats!

Ben: Skinny cows makes the beef quite tough in Cambodia. Very chewy.





This is what the village church looked like :D


Do not be deceived! The church was the ONLY cement building there... the rest of the village were more of kampong-like houses which moved when you walk inside!




This was what one of the better houses looked like on the inside- we had our meals here :)

Ben: Yeah, some of the houses look like they were made of straw actually. Ok, may be in straw, but those thin strips of wood you find on baskets.

Once we reached and unloaded our stuff, we started with the women's ministry :- Paul shared about how it is important to be a woman of good character.

Ben: His message was that true beauty is a good character and that women should pursue the real beauty and not just outward appearances. Since everything Paul said had to be translated, the message took quite long. Ah the pains of not being able to speak the local language.

We then had our first lunch, which was prepared by the pastor's family ( i think). Because we come from a country which food is always clean, we had to pray really hard before we eat our meals - anywhere in Cambodia because the water is not drinkable. However, as we were eating at the village, we had to be extra prayerful. The first meal we had was better than what we expected actually, it was fried beef ( very tough cos the cows are sooooo skinny) and rice and... vegetables.

Ben: I still remember when I saw our 1st meal at the village, no thanks to the flies. They were landing all over some of the uncovered vegetables. Of course I didn't eat any.



After lunch, we went out made a trip to the families in the village to pray for their needs... (wah the walk was very long)





We then came to this house. The pastor told us that the couple in the house had moved away as every night for 3 weeks a fire will appear and surround the house. The lady who lives there will also hear voices calling her name at the same time, so she was so frightened that she went to stay at her relative's house. When she came over from her relative's place, she really had a very fearful look in her eyes.



We prayed for deliverance, and in prayer we took down an altar in their house which they had obtained from the temple .... actually to be quite honest, i was quite fearful :) after taking down the altar, we thanked God and blessed the house. After visiting some more houses, we went back for the youth party- which turned into a children's party.

Ben: Since it was harvest season, a lot of the youths had to work in the fields.

We were told to plan games on the spot -____- but thankfully we had planned some games for the kids at the Bykota house so we could use those games also! Thanks to our translators, Con and Dan ( i dont know their full names ). And the kids are VERY good at games!

Ben: We played a game called "Freeze". It is a game where the kids are suppose to stay absolutely still when the music stops playing. Of course we threw in some distractions in the form of Ke Wei and Edmund, but the kids were just too good at it. We had about 7 winners and even when we told them they won, they still refused to move!





After a long day, we waited for our dinner. dinner was.....vegetables and U.F.O (unidentified Food object) which smells like cow intestines actually.. culture shock...........................

Ben: I took one bite and that was it for me. The rest of my meal was rice and veggies.

After dinner we were supposed to get ready to sleep cos there was nothing in the village at all and it was all dark. There were armies of insects in the church hall. ARMIES. We attacked them with BYGON! BE GONE! And also tonnes of repellent haha.. But when i went out and looked at the stars.. .they were so amazing! They filled the whole sky, simply beautiful!

Ben: Lurong was going "WAH!" and we could all hear it from inside the church. But the stars were really amazing. When I see such stuff I remind myself that though such things are beautiful, God is so much more.

Even though we had really good floormats and also blankets, sleeping on floor mats at night was rather uncomfortable and it was so cold at night.... Also, one of our poor teammates caught diarhorrea... but we salute him cos he never ever grumbled :)

Ben: Yup, I guess they village stay gave the team a great opportunity to talk to each other and share our experiences. I benefited and learnt alot from what was shared that night. We talked alot about our experiences with God and how He has been molding and shaping our lives. Also, the good and the bad experiences from the different churches we come from and some of our personal theological beliefs. I just liked how the conversations we had were open and honest.

Up next, village stay part 2!

The Smell of Trash Fills the Air - Day 2

After having a good breakfast at the hotel, we had our first devotion and practised for the Christmas skit that we had planned for the kids at Bykota house:


Then, we got ready to meet Mark and his family to go to the nearby petrol station to purchase milk before we head to the rubbish dump. We bought ALOT of MILK!!! Approximately 150 i tink!


Ben: We should have taken a photo of the shopkeeper's faces. They were like Woah! I think we cleared most of their stock actually.

Compared to last year, we walked much further into the rubbish dump, and as I looked at the heaps of rubbish, i can't help but be shocked at how much the heaps grew, and how hard it was to live there in the midst of all the smoke from the burning of the rubbish there, and of course in the midst of the stench from all these rubbish.

The families who live there make a living out of these rubbish. Kids as well as adults dig through the piles of rubbish to look for things which they can sell. Unfortunately, even in this place, there is corruption, as men in trucks will always go there to get the "good stuff" from the rubbish first, which leaves the families who live there with less things that they can sell. These trucks sometimes even run over people who were sleeping on the ground.. We had gotten many packets of milk,but it ran out quickly as there were too many people living there - old people and little children also.

Ben: The kids were really happy to get a milk packet. They would be smiling from ear to ear, then they would look at the packet and say "Orkun" which is thank you in Khmer.

After the trip to the rubbish dump, we went back to wash up - the stench of the place stayed on our clothes and our shoes.....

We had our lunch, and went to our next destination- the Mark's house! They had moved to a bigger place now because of the number of children there and it was great to see the children again! Mark and Rhonda gave us a short briefing and also updated us on what had happened since last year.

Ben: It was all new for me though, since it was my 1st trip. Though the new place is suppose to be bigger it felt quite cramp to me. Kids all over the place + pets.


We had a discussion with the kids about the rubbish dump as many of them had gone there with us . We talked about the need for God's love, education and choices ..

Following that, the children got ready to decorate the house with paper-cut snowflakes :D




cut cut cut, cut cut cut.....

Ben: I don't recall cutting anything actually...




We went to the Mediterrean restaurant for dinner with Mark's family :D

Ben: I liked the layout of the place. It has a roof top dining area that is really cool! The downside of that is extra ingredients on the plates.





Then, we had to prepare for an early night as we have to wake up really early the next day ( 6am P.P time) to get ready to go the village!