During our time here in Cambodia, we slept on the top of a radio station. It is all on the same campus as the church we attend, and the school we teach in so it makes going to ministry very convenient, but also showcases how our hosts never stop working. They have the most dedicated work ethic in all they do and it is so admirable. The Pastor will often be up until 1am-2am at night, and then wakes up at 5am to pray in the church every morning. Lecru (“Pastor” in Khmer) had prayed for a way to share the gospel over a larger area, more than his word of mouth could travel for years. This prayer was answered by founding the JOY4U radio station. This Thursday, November 2nd 2023, marks the fifth Anniversary of the radio station. Which of course is a cause for a great celebration amongst the community, and we were so lucky that we got invited to attend as well.
The morning of the fifth anniversary celebration, we were given time off, as the family was busy preparing and didn’t have a way to take us to house visits. We have a woman who we can pay to wash our clothes right down the street so a part of my team decided to use this time to drop off a load. When one of my team members, Raya, was walking back she saw the cutest little puppy at a house on the corner near the church. There was also a man standing around the porch, who we assumed was the owner of the house. Raya gestured to ask if it would be alright for her to hold the puppy, and the man picked up the puppy and placed it in her arms. He then immediately started shooing her away and refusing when she tried to put the puppy back down. This led to her bringing the puppy home with the intention of bathing and de-fleaing it before bringing it back. We guessed it was only around 10 days old and had barely just opened her eyes. But as you may have guessed, once the puppy came home, everyone immediately fell in love. Jonathan, one of Lecru’s sons, hopped on the back of a moto to go buy goats milk formula for her and Faith got her favorite pink blanket to wrap her in. We all took turns getting to hold, feed and love on her. We named her Ali B, after our team name, Alabaster.
However today was still the fifth anniversary of the radio station, so in the midst of adjusting to a new puppy, we all had to take turns going up stairs and getting ourselves ready for the evening. The stage was being built and it was the biggest one yet. It sat about 5 feet off the ground, came with multiple levels, and had all of the band's instruments such as drums, guitars, pianos, microphones and other essentials. The Governor had been given a warm welcome, along with the Vice Prime Minister of Religion, who both had a seat at the head of the largest table. Our team sat just next to the officials table, so we got a front row seat on their introductions!! When dinner was just about to commence, there was a Korean choir, who originally had given a lot of money for the creation of the radio station, who came up for a performance. They were all very lively and excited to meet our team of missionaries and asked lots of questions about our travels so far. After their performance, a dance team from the church came up to perform a beautiful traditional Khmer dance. A few of the girls on the dance team were actually my students in the evening English's class I teach which was super fun to see them outside of the class structure. Following the Khmer dance was then a sermon from a Korean Pastor, that was then translated into Khmer. This was about a 3 hour sermon in two languages, both of which I unfortunately did not understand. Finally it was time to eat another delicious, hibachi style meal that we were able to cook over our own little stove top. Such a fun night!
The next day we got ourselves all packed up and ready to go because it was Angkor Wat weekend! We were meeting up with some of the other teams on our squad so that we could all tour the temples and get to see a little more of Siem Reap. We arrived at our hostel in time for dinner where our team went out to a local thai restaurant which was so good! Saturday morning we got up bright and early to all meet at the AIM base, and then took tuk tuks out for the rest of the day. We had four people in each tuk tuk and you just had to stay with the same four the whole day. In my tuk tuk was me, Sophie, Megan W., and Emily! We started out touring some of the smaller temples and getting to walk around a lot of the monuments there. One of these temples had stairs that you could climb to the top which was super cool to then look out at the area. However, when you were climbing back down to look at the rest of the connected temple there were monkeys all roaming around. Our host warned us to steer clear of the monkeys in the mornings when they were hungry because they'll attack, but by afternoon they should be fine because they've eaten enough of the tourist snacks. So when we saw one of the monkeys starting to crawl right towards our group, I was the first to start heading in the other direction. The monkey jumped on a lady standing near us and proceeded to try and grab her scarf, then her glasses, and then her bag. Then back to the scarf which the monkey ended up successfully stealing. My group then decided to make our way out of the temple when another one of my teammates, Faith, was then attacked by the same monkey, and a local had to come rescue her. Luckily the monkey didn’t steal anything from her!
When it came closer to lunch time we decided to go visit pub street. Pub street is basically the major downtown of Siem Reap. We got to go shopping in some of the markets and some of my squad friends even helped me barter to get a new bag. I’m so bad at bartering. I will just give them the first price they ask me for. After the market lots of my teammates all wanted to get their nose pierced so we made a stop at the piercing shop that had been recommended to us by previous racers. Here were a whole bunch of other squad friends also getting tattoos and piercings which was so fun to watch! I got to hold everyone's hand as they went but I did not get any piercings or tattoos.
Finally, it was getting later in the day, so for sunset we went out to the largest Angkor Wat temple. We got to take so many fun pictures together and had such a great day exploring together. The whole squad stayed at this last temple until it closed and we all had to make our way back home. It was Sophie's birthday, so even though a lot of the team was feeling tired I took her out to dinner to celebrate! When we got back to the hotel the rest of the team had time to get her a birthday cake and candles all put together to celebrate! Overall it was such a fun day between seeing Angkor Wat, getting to see our squad friend, and hang out with Sophie on her birthday!
October 30- November 5 2023