Cambodia Mission trip: squid on a stick.... is that a tentacle stuck in your teeth?

Today has been another great day. I have to admit I am getting homesick. After decades of traveling the world I guess I am finally settling down. I do wistfully think about sitting on the back desk with Wendy and having a glass of wine as the sunsets in Virginia. Making it worse is Rachael is home for a month and I really miss her. Matthew comes each Sunday for dinner normally and I saw him right before I left, but still... I miss him a ton too! I leave in four days and I have a feeling in two it will be worse and in 4 I will be sooooooo ready.

We started off very early and I will say that for the first time I got about 6 hours of sleep. Oh man what a difference. Its strange that 6 hours which is a couple shy of normal can feel so great!

Its official, got my creds today :)

Got up this am and luckily the hotel I am at had a great breakfast. BACON! oh I am so tired of rice and fish. I tanked up. I think I ate 2 eggs, BACON, a little rice, pancakes a two egg omelet, did I say BACON, some ham and a couple rice porridge balls which I admit... not a wise choice. Think baby puke cooked up in a ball and raw in the middle.

The age 14 and up group.

The group split the children into 4 groups according to age group in order to present material to them at the appropriate age. Many of the volunteers here are from Singapore, but there are many from 8 other countries too. The folks from Singapore seem to be the majority of the organizing force for the events. They have it pretty well nailed down.

Here the about 10-14 age group works on name tags that they make saying they are Princes and Princesses in God's kingdom. It was pretty neat.

These guys are watching a show where the man from Singapore is telling Christian themed stories and doing small magic tricks to drive home the salient points of the story and teach the Children about Christ.

Princess Makara

Princess Thida

DJ and I were able to meet the two children that we sponsor through Digital Consultants. We gave each of them a bible and told them that we were so proud of them. They just took their exams to see if they can go University and are eagerly awaiting the result. Their names are Thira and Thiren. Great kids.

How about fresh grilled squid stuck on a stick?

We took all the kids to the beach this afternoon and yes... there were old women there selling odds and ends. Most of which I wont eat like fresh fruit, peanuts, Cambodian Tacos (like a crepe kinda with.... yep rice and fish, and Durian. So there is this old woman cooking these squid on a stick over some open charcoal and one of the guys from Singapore buys em. Here ya go have one, they are delicious! GULP. umm ok

Rachel George and I give it a go. Actually it was delicious! And I did indeed get a tentacle stuck in my teeth in the spot I always get stuff stuck.

If you have never heard of a Durian, it is most definitely the grossest fruit out there.

Durian

Ok think about something dead.. and then its kinda been in the sun for a while. Then make it a fruit and cover it with spikes. YUCK! and so one of the kids came up with some Durian, I passed and DJ tried it. Oh not good, I thought he was going to throw up. But I have to admit the faces were classic!

Kids are having a great time.

Man Him was waiting for me at the beach and as soon as he saw me we had to go swim. I think it was something he had been waiting to do for a long time. So we jumped in the water and had fun surfing the waves. They were pretty good size so we had a good time. Poor guy swallowed some seawater so I had to go find him a bottle of water. Hope his tummy is ok.

They set up a quick game of beach volleyball. Guess who got drafted as the tall guy..... me! I wish Andy had been here, he is very tall and it would have been so funny. It was fun, I have no idea how they scored but all of a sudden we lost. The funny part was once I rotated to the net, all rotation stopped. LOL

I skipped dinner tonight due to lack of interest in the fish but it gave me a chance to work on this. :) Tonight we had each home do a dance show. It was really something. Unfortunately the videos take forever to upload due to the poor internet here.

putting on a show!

Then once that was done, the group split into two with the elder children having an evening sermon and the younger children having a great Christian message with lots of singing and dancing.

I think someone may have caught me on video dancing gangnam style with some wee ones. :D ah well had a blast.

After the kids went to bed we checked out the local food on the streets at night. Found some interesting things to eat. I tried a few fruits which were great and you can see below some other delicious choices.