Arrived safe and sound

I made it here safe and sound. I have a very nice host family. There is the mother, a full grown son (who is the coordinator for the volunteer program here in Cambodia), an older teen age daughter and then a son who is in his early teens. Apparently, there is also a grandson who lives here for the most part as well, but he is visiting his other grandparents, I think.

The older son and the daughter speak english very well, but the mother doesn't. The language that is spoken here is Khmer and the alphabet is completely different. It is more scrollie, kind of like the Hebrew language. It is interesting looking at signs and having no clue as to what they say.

My travel here took a little bit longer than anticipated. The flight from Vancouver was delayed by about an hour. My connection in Hong Kong was so tight that I would not have made it, so I was rebooked and flew from Hong Kong to Bangkok and then from Bangkok to Phnom Penh. I arrived at about 7:40pm local time. There is a 15 hour time difference here and I am already living in your tomorrow. It is 7:25am on Wednesday and today is my first day at my project. Raksmey is the young man who is the country coordinator for volunteers will show me how to get there today and introduce me around. We drove there yesterday, just so I could see the way but there was a lot of turns and I can't quite remember all of them. It will be interesting trying to get home tonight in a tuk tuk. Tomorrow I will borrow a bicycle from the family and ride there and back. Raksmey said it should only take about 20 minutes or so on bicycle.

Yesterday, was day two of the orientation, but day one for me. We talked a bit in the morning about the roles of volunteers, why a project would want a volunteer and some of the cultural differences that could be expected. We were then shown around the city, to some of the places of interest, stopped for lunch and then looked around a bit more. I was given the Powerpoint presentation about Cambodia in the afternoon and a sheet of common words and phrases in Cambodian and how they should sound when you say them. This morning I said "Sua s'dei" which means "hello" to my host family. "Thank you" sounds like "aw kuhn".

It was smokin' hot here yesterday afternoon. I don't know how hot but it sure felt hot. My skin seems to have a permanent dampness to it and by the middle of the day I can smell myself and it is not a very pleasant smell. I can tell that I will be washing my clothes very frequently here.

The people that I have met here in Cambodia have been all very nice and very friendly. There are scooters and motorbikes by the tonne here. Sometimes there is only one person on a motorbike and sometimes there are more, up to four. I rode on the back of Raksmey's yesterday and that is how I am getting to my project today. The drivers seem quite aware of everyone around them and a quite accepting of being cut off, etc. Interesting. It would be nice to see such tolerance and acceptance on the roads back home.

I have to go now as it is almost time to go to work. Please pray that God helps me in my day today and that I am open and willing to be used in whatever way He wants to use me.

Take care and God bless you and all those that you love.