We woke up this morning and made our way downstairs to use the wifi to FaceTime our families. The "White" side of my extended family *my dad's side since everyone's last name is White.. no I'm not racist* is all together and enjoying our annual White Family Vacation that we take every summer. I'm so sad that I'm missing it, but I was able to FaceTime them and say hi to everyone. It was glorious and I almost cried. I'm so incredibly blessed to have all 21 *with a baby on the way* of them play active roles in my life. It was such an encouragement to see them all and chat for a minute. My entire family *mom and dad's side* is full of love and laughter and incredible support. I would not be half the person that I am today if it wasn't for there constant encouragement. I am so blessed by my family. And while I'm on this subject, I would like to give a HUGE thank you to all of the encouraging emails and blog comments that I've gotten. I'm so grateful for each and everyone of you and it is so wonderful to have you all in my life. I could not have come to Cambodia without you and your encouragement is helping me live my life to the fullest here.
Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.
So back to the story.
After worship, we hit the streets with the students to hand out clinic visit tickets and evangelize. We set out with Sythourn, Cham Nan, Srun, Synat, Roth, and Kia. Instead of turning left and going to the neighborhood we went to last time, we turned right and entered a new neighborhood. It was still primarily Islamic and bustling with people. We maneuvered in out and in between the shack-houses ducked under clotheslines. We came to our first stopped and met with an elderly woman with a shaved head. The students had explained to us earlier that shaved heads are a sign of mourning and they would be shaved prior to a family members' funeral. We assumed she had just lost her husband and now lives with her son. The students spoke with her and answered questions she had about us. They taught us how to correctly say "my name is" and we introduced ourselves. She told that she was sorry that she didn't have any food to offer us, but we quickly assured we were just fine. We sat on her cot with her for a while longer and then said our goodbyes. We made our way to the next several houses but didn't really sit down and chat at any of them. Then we came across a woman sitting on her front porch with another younger woman. The younger woman was coining the older one.
Side note:
Coining is a medical practice here that consists of someone rubbing a type of medicated balm on your back, arms, neck, and chest. The balm is applied in a stripe-like pattern and then the metal lid of the medicine container is used to scrape over the lines repeatedly. The end results are red, tiger-like stripes all over your torso and healing from your ailment. *It seems to me like a "oh you have pain? Let's cause more pain somewhere else and take your mind of your initial pain" kind of thing...But that's just me* Our students are coined by Om *Khmer word for Aunt that we call Sokhom's sister* often for headaches and fevers and it looks extremely painful.
Anyways, this woman was being coined because she had heart problems. She invited us to sit down and chat with her. The students explained to her that we were their English teachers and Christians. They told her that it didn't matter if she was Buddhist of Muslim, we love her anyways because Jesus loves us. In the middle of our discussion, a monk approached and the woman dug around for some Riel in order to contribute to the collection. She offered it and then bowed as he recited some kind of prayer in Khmer. It was very new to me and very interesting. After we visited for a while longer, we said goodbye and continued down the road.
One of our lasts stop was at this hut where two women were preparing yams. They were very friendly and offered us a place to sit and rest. Roth immediately began evangelizing to them and Sythourn kind of filled me in on what was happening. He was telling them that we have no idea when we will die. Sythourn explained it to me as
"We walk, walk,walk, but then we fall."
We build up these huge lives for ourselves here and walk, walk, walk through life trying so hard to succeed by the world's standards, but then we end up falling. Things fail and crumble and whither away. We lose money and jobs and loved ones. We don't know how long we have here. We will die.
But that's what makes it so wonderful.
We don't have long so we have to make everyday count.
Life is just a vapor.
It's just a breath.
Don't waste it.
As I was watching Roth stand and tell these women how great our God is, I was flooded with emotion. *big surprise, I know* These students love The Lord so much and love sharing the good news. They have such compassion for people and it's an absolutely beautiful thing.
Ahh heart to hearts and yams.
I'm a fan.
We finished up our walk and then headed back to the school. On the way back, Cham Nan began to ask us about peoples' faith back home. He asked if it was easy or hard to tell people about Jesus in America. Sarah and I struggled to find an answer.
Yes?
No?
We told him it wasn't hard because most people knew about him already. He kind of chuckled and agreed that it seemed a lot easier to do in America.
I was immediately hit in the face.
Again.
Why was it so hard to evangelize in the states? Most people know at least a little about Christianity and yet, I find myself considering it to be awkward.
What?
My students are studying Bible in an Islamic neighborhood. Like 99.99% *exaggeration* of Cambodia is Buddhist and yet, my students still walk through neighborhoods. They still knock on doors. They still enter people's homes and sit in their rooms. They live and breath God and cannot wait to share him with people that have never even heard of him.
If I have trouble teaching English to students that don't speak a different language but want to learn English, it's hard for me to imagine the difficulty of explaining an entire belief system to someone who has never even heard of Christianity and doesn't necessarily want to convert.
We have it so easy y'all.
Why don't we take advantage of it more?
Once we got back to the school, Chanty drove us to the Russian Market so that we could meet Mallory and Shanleigh there and then just walk over to Dennis and Sharon's house. We arrived at the market and easily *unlike last time* with Shanleigh and Theary. We grabbed some more apples *Shanleigh was making an apple pie* and made our way back to the Welch's house. Theary let us help set the table and put the finishing touches on the meal she had prepared for us. She made lok lak *questionable spelling on that one* and chicken amok. Lok lak is a favorite of mine and Sarah's so we were pumped. The meal was DELICIOUS and Shanleigh's apple pie sealed the deal. It was a wonderful time of fellowship and discussion.
After lunch we piddled around and then left to head to City Mall. We decided to catch the 4:00 pm showing of Despicable Me 2 at the movie theater.
Now movie theaters are a tad different here.
The tickets are priced between $3 and $5.
A small popcorn is rather big and costs $1.50.
The seats are comfy and the room is HUGE.
You have assigned seats and pick your spot when you buy your ticket.
People wear heels and dresses to see a movie.
People don't whisper during the movie.
And I loved every part of it.
Sure, we arrived to the movie theater 30 minutes early and found out that the 4:00 showing was sold out. And yes, we had to buy tickets for the 6:00 and kill 2 and half hours in a mall in Cambodia.
But you know what?
We had a blast.
We also learned that we are experts when it comes to killing time in a foreign mall. We may or may not have spent the majority of our time browsing the movie selection at the pirated movie store, as well as closely examining and guessing the content/ingredients of foreign snacks at the huge supermarket.
It was great.
The movie was incredible.
And the fellowship was wonderful.
Another beautiful Saturday spent with friends.
I'm sure you're wondering why the title of this post is a score update. Well let me just tell you about it. I am currently suffering from some sort of eye infection. It's extremely painful and swollen and red and oozing yellow stuff... Yeah. Not too great huh? Sarah and I have many theories as to what it could be, but one of the theories is pink eye. There are several different types of pink eye and one type is caused by chemicals, pollution, or like excessive smoke. Well I'm around all of that 24/7 with all the pollution and trash burning and incense. So that may be it. Or maybe it's just an infection.
Either way, Cambodia is still in the lead.
And I'm still trying to stay afloat.
At least you can still stay afloat with one eye.
Love you all,
Cassie
Okay, let me just say out of all the pain treatments I've had, coining does not sound appealing at all! But I really find that kind of thing interesting... It's such a different world over there.
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