Becky=Blessing

My friend Becky is here in Cambodia for 3 weeks visiting me. It is a blessing to have her here. She gets to see some of the work I am doing. We have also taken some time to travel around Cambodia. She brought s suitcase full of stuff for me from many people back home it was so nice. Thank you. We are enjoying are time together.

Continuing on the road to recovery

I was released from the hosptial today-feels nice to be out of the hospital room and to actually do some other things. My eye sight is not quite back to normal yet but I am seeing improvements. I will be in Bangkok for a little longer, on other meds and have more check ups. Thanks for remembering me in your thoughts and prayers during this time.

Bumrungrad

I finally found the location of the computers at the hosptial so I get on line and out of my room. Being at the hospital is not all bad especially when I can sit using free internet while drinking Starbucks coffee. I was amitted to the hospital on Friday because of a MS symptom to the left eye causing pain and blurry vision. The pain has since subsided and my vision in the left eye is slowly improving. They only have me on the meds for 6 hours out of the day so it nice to get out and wander the hopspital instead of being cooped in a bed all day. My eye sight should return to normal - I will probaly be dischared from the here in the next few days but will need to be on oral meds for awhile. Through this God is good I have seen his hand at work in a number of ways. The prayer of my heart is that I would find everything I need in Him - I am touched by how he has poured out His comfort upon me and my desire is to help comfort others.

Christmas Chaos

Yesterday I had the privledge of teaching Cambodian Children at one of the churches. It was somewhat crazy but a blessing to. What I was told to prepare for was 1 hour so of course I prepared for a hour and a half to be safe but the teaching time ended up being 2 1/2 hours long. A young man I know stepped in to help me praise God because he was able to explain things that were difficult for me to do when it was needed it different ways. He also helped to fill in the time. It was very hot in the room and the kids energy was all over the place. Needless to say when the time came to recieve Christ all of them prayed -my prayer is that their little hearts are sincere and that the seed that has been planted is on good soil. Those who really meant it God would help them share this exciting news with others and help them to grow in faith.

Sorry So Long

My computer conked out on me before Christmas and I wont have it back until Feb. Therefore I have to go to internet shops in order to do many things, because of this it is hard to take time to post on my blog. Just want you to know that if you don't hear much of me it is for this reason.

An Unlikely Sight

I saw something when I was out in the province that continue to give me culture shock or at least experiences that suprise me. Take a look at this picture.
Can you see what this little girl has? A big knife that she is balancing fruit on.
No Khmer person around was concerned about this.

Jackfruit

I have seen the fruit on trees and when it is whole, I have also seen the fruit when it is already out of its peel. Today I got the experience of helping to take the fruit from its peel.

You need to peel and discard the skin. Before cutting open the Jackfruit we had to coat the knife and cutting board with a cooking oil on account of the latex. Unripe Jackfruit especially exude a lot of sticky latex.

see the white that is the latex it is like taffy that sticks to everything.

I was really suprised how difficult it was to take the fruit out and

afterwards my hands were sticky even after washing for a long time.

the fruit if you find the pieces like the picture above pieces that are not

too slimy the fruit tastes good and kind of has a flavor of banana and pinneapple,

very different from DURIAN.

Exotic Eating Experience

One of the Sunday School teachers that has studied with me invited me to go out to eat with her and her family. She took me to a place called Neo Suki (Japansese food -Suki Soup). There is this big hot pot in the middle of the table that they put a vegetable broth in. Then you order meats and vegetables -when they come they are raw then you put them in the broth and let it cook-then eat. You may be asking what is so exotic about that? Well they order things like squid, seabass and even jellyfish among other things. It actually tasted pretty good and I had a good time with good company.

Language Evaluation #4

Today I had my fourth language evaluation - I was very encouraged by the feedback I got from the Khmer evaluators. They said some very good things about my conversation skills, reading skills...most everything was very positive. They did say that there are some words/sounds that I need to be careful with, but that I continue to make progress in the language. It is nice to hear, because sometimes I don't feel like I am progressing - it is hard for me to see, but that is one reason we have the language evals to help us see that we are moving forward. Thank you God for giving me the ability to hear, speak and read this language which was once so foreign. God it is because you have enabled me and helped me to be diligent in studying and using Khmer.

Eating Loosens the Mouth

Yesterday I took the three girls who I teach out to eat. We spent the whole morning at the restraunt which was pretty empty. We ate a little in the morning and then studied together. After studying we ate lunch together too. I noticed that our time studying together was good, probably because of the food. The girls seemed to be open to talking more than usual as we looked at the death and resurrection of Jesus and how this impacts our life. I was really encouraged by the questions that they asked and the discussions about the importance of what Jesus has done for us. Thank you for always remembering our meeting times please pray as this week we read and study John 1-2 I am challenging them to spend time in God's Word each day and to put into practice some of the things we have been studying about the Bible.