Cambodia - Week 1...The Journey Begins

First arriving in this unknown place there was a definite sense of anticipation, uncertainty and to be honest quite a bit of shock at myself. I was actually here in Cambodia, a trip that had been only talked about and imagined previously and now I was actually here...and I would be staying here for 6 months! I must be crazy right?!

Me and Aurore (another gapper) arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia at 12:00pm on January 17th (Local time, GMT +7hrs) and been travelling for 30 hrs by this point. Thankfully our journey had been pretty smooth coming over and no trouble along the way. Driving back in the traditional transport of a Tuk Tuk I got my first glimpse of Cambodian night life which I have to say for the capital was quiet and nothing even in comparison to Saturday night in Middlesbrough town centre. However going out to any sort of club or bar is not culturally accepted at all and many of these people going out are very much classed as outcasts, and scandals within society.

The second thing that hit me was just the amount of poverty even in the capital city it was so obvious and on show that people needed help but didn’t seem to know how to help themselves. It hit me all at once that where I had come was thousands of miles away from the comfort of England and my home town in every way possible.

Boy selling food by the riverside to make
to make money for family.

Over the next week we had various trips to different parts of the city and saw day to day life and let me tell you it is busyyyy! Everything is chaotic and messy and unorganised and hot!! everything that I realised isn't me in any way. I love to have structure and some sort of order or plan or sense to things and from the traffic to the way of life and religion of the majority there is none of that. We met children as young as 3 selling items on the street to get some money, why in today’s world this is acceptable or becoming the norm in places like this is something I don’t think I’ll ever understand. Even right up to teenagers they are, like Britain, very unhappy with the way they look and many girls have commented on how beautiful I am because I’m white and how they’re not beautiful. If only they knew that the fact is they were created in the image of God, the most beautiful thing in life.

So as you can see there is a lot of healing that has to be done here and thank God that a lot of people want to help this country and God is sending people to this field whether it be short term like me or a life calling I strongly believe God uses every person to sew something into at least one life just simply by showing a light and showing the love that some of these people have never experienced before. World Horizons and their team here in Cambodia is one of many organisations here working to help the people of Cambodia. 

Some of the ways the World Horizons team are doing outreach is through a children’s orphanage called Care for Cambodia (CfC) where they have been taking in children that have been abandoned by their parents/guardians some being through very traumatic lives even though they’re only so young. The orphanage brings them to a place of safety where they will know they’re loved, as well as medical care, clothing, food and education provided. Secondly there is Beracah which is set up to house teens/young adults who have come to the city from different provinces for education and had no-where to stay, they have their own church, which I now will also will be going to and for a group of people of which not all are believers they are so lively and happy during they worship. Finally there is morning star which teaches children in the area English and music and also aims to bring the Christian message to the kids. 

*This is not a child from within the CfC orphanage

I’ll be involved in all of these projects in some way as well as helping with a project to do with human trafficking at some point. So as you can guess busy busy busy! 

Soooo as guessed there are prayer points...
1. I live with the Beracah girls so it would be great for my relationship with them to grow as the weeks go on
2. That God will give both me and Aurore inspiration of the right thing to teach and best way to teach it for the students
3. That I will get passed the stage of missing home and people so much and will enjoy the time I’m here as much as possible.
4. That I will speak up if there is a problem and learn to be open with the team.
5. For the team themselves – day to day life here seems highly stressful for foreigners especially if you aren’t very capable in the language and there seems to be a lot of stress within the team at the moment due to different decisions that need to be made. So pray that the stress will be released, that the retreat next week will run smoothly and that people in the team will communicate feelings and thoughts in the best way possible and they will always remember what their main focus of this mission and what the centre of their lives should be.

I love and miss all friends back in the England/Wales/USA....and any other country I can’t think of.

Helen
xoxo