Anchors of Faith

Today was such an amazing day. I have been trying to get up a few hours earlier than everyone else so that I can have some time to myself, and that has been a really good idea on my part. (Sometimes I can surprise myself with those.) I get to write in my journal and check my email by myself, which is pretty nice. I finished all of that early today, so I thought a second about going running, but then I decided that may not be the best idea to do by myself. It may have also been the continuous sound of my grandmother's voice in my head advising me not to do such things. When everyone else did get up, we met for church. There were some people from another missions organization, WYWAM, that came to have church with us. They have been in Cambodia for almost three months! That seems pretty amazing to me at this point. Sarah, one of the girls with them, was from Boerne, TX and know some people I went to ACU with, which was really kind of comforting in a way. Church actually was really wonderful. The singing sounded so beautiful. John, one of the six month Chiang Mai interns from A&M, gave the lesson. He is one of the people in charge of the whole Cambodia trip, and he has doen a seamless job! He graduated from A&M in December '07 with a computer engineering degree and it is really neat to see how well he has adapted the six months he has been over here. After church, we went to a restaurant called The Red Piano. They advertised it as being Angelina Jolie's favorite in Siem Reap, which I thought was kind of funny. After lunch, we drove back out to Angkor Watt to do our street ministry camp outside the main temple. It was so fun to have our vans pull up and see kids come running out of the woodwork towards us. It amazes me how willing they are to give up a day of selling to tourists to come hang out with us. Some of them even said they would get in trouble for doing so, which just breaks my heart. When I actually sat down and talked to them and heard their stories, they became real people to me instead of just some person I would pass on the street. One little girl in particular, Knter, was so sweet, and she grew kind of attached to me. We played every game and sang every song together. We spent about four hours this afternoon singing songs and playing games, and it was so fun to see how excited all the kids got. It really made me excited to be there! Their kindness and generosity really astounded me. Knter gave me a bracelet she was supposed to be selling. It is crazy to see the kids go from trying to sell you their things to giving it to you. I don't think a single one of us walked away that day without some kind of gift from one of the kids there. When it was time for us to go, it was so hard to say good bye. They kept asking when we were coming back, and I hated having to say probably never. I hate how they can only have these experiences every once in a while. I really wish that if I can't, that someone else could come out there every day and love on them and show them just how valuable they are as human beings. It was horrible to drive away from all of them and see them crying and chasing after our vans. Today really showed me how important it is to really treat and see everyone as one of God's children instead of trying to ignore and avoid them. I so wish I could do more for them, but I hope that the gift of an open heart and open ears will be enough for them for now. They, at least, seemed to be more than satisfied with that. When we got back to the guest house, we all cleaned up and then we had another singing practice. Terri and I opted out to just listen today. They all sounded really great! After practice we all went to eat at Viva, a local Mexican restaurant. I have decided that I am a Mexican food snob because I haven't found any really good Mexican food outside of Texas. I guess it was kind of silly of me to expect anything out of Cambodian Mexican food though. After dinner we had a debriefing session, and it was really great to hear everyone else's experiences of the day. I am so happy that I was able to have this opportunity today, and I really hope I never forget about these wonderful children and everything they taught me!