A group of P2Pers and local Khmer went for a action-packed few days in the Provinces recently. 4 Aussies, 4 Khmer, one Kiwi, one Yank, and one fearless, faultless leader, the Brit! We visited Battambang and Sisophon, with a few village stops on the way and Angkor Wat on the way home.
Under the guidance of the schedule organizer, Vong, our task was to try and infiltrate his organizational mind with limited skills in either language and 
find out what on earth we were doing next. We were constantly surprised as we turned up to a local school with 200 children waiting for us to expound to them the delicate and finer details of the English language. I exaggerate slightly, we did usually have 48 hours advance warning of what we were supposed to do, the only vital informations missing was how much English they spoke, whether we had any translators, or even how old they were! So, the majority of our planning was adapted on the spot anyway.
We've all had regular feelings of 'oh crud, what am I going to teach these children' and then an hour later thanking God that somehow we pulled it off! One school's English teacher needed Loy to translate to us!
We also had plenty of Gospel preaching to do. We had many encouraging experiences. One family had been studying the Bible for many years, for 3 times a day, starting at 4 am! Another group in a village and never heard of the Bible before and couldn’t even read Khmer apart from one man! We encouraged him to read out loud to the rest of them, we pray that they are actually doing what we asked. We also had a seminar to a group of 70 people, mostly fr
om the local university. Everyone we met was so happy to see Westerners taking an interest in their lives and community and we all felt as though we were valuable to them. Our group was wonderful and we all gelled really well together, almost certainly because we faced many challenges together, many of which we had never faced before, including eating a whole fish with its head still on and its eyes still in.
Since the trip all the Aussies have left, leaving the fearless and faultless Brit as the only P2Per left to fend for himself amongst the long-timers. We currently have the LCDI outreach students for the weekend and we are preaching them to the bone! And they still want more!
As well as this, my alarm has been going off at 5 am this week to get to the dorms by 6 to give a class! Fun times!
Best regards, old chap. What what! Tally Ho!
Simon (the fearless, faultless Brit)
Comments
Good Luck,
Jonno