CamboCurtis

This week has been such a blur. It's hard to believe we've been in the country for 10 days already. After being in our mansion for only 4 days, we headed back to Phnom Penh on Sunday evening for a Senior Couple retreat event. Actually, we thought we were leaving Saturday evening, so we ate up our remaining food so it wouldn't sit in the heat for a week. We were rescued by the young missionaries who gave us an onion. We nuked a couple of potatoes, fried the onion and had delicious hash browns with onions. By the way, Phnom means hill. Even though Cambodia is a pretty flat country, there are still plenty of phnoms here and there. Penh is the name of a famous lady in Cambodia. Not sure of the details. We stayed at a hotel near the mission home called, "The White Mansion." It only had 18 rooms, but was luxurious by Cambodian standards: small fridge in the room with cold bottled water, hot water to the sink and a 25 meter lap pool. But the BEST thing about this hotel is the free breakfast at an adjoining French Bakery called Eric Keysers. Ham and cheese croissants, omelettes, fresh fruit platters (mango, papaya, dragon fruit, water melon, pineapple), traditional Khmae breakfast (soup with rice noodles and shrimp, fried rice with chicken and vegetables) and a bottomless cup of fresh passion fruit juice. All you can eat (and drink).

Our conference was good, but I (Jim) haven't been feeling well (My Immodium moment arrived and decided to stay for several days). I am truly amazed at what the other senior couples have been doing. One couple manages wheelchairs, wells, reading glasses and other charitable events for Humanitarian Services. Another works with government officials at both the national and state level and coordinates events for good all over the country. A third couple is helping the locals work toward self reliance, and less reliance on outside agencies and governments. The couple working in the mission office manage all the buildings, rents, expenses and paperwork coordination for over 100 missionaries. They went shopping with us to get us a bed that isn't made of concrete and a couch that can help serve as an oasis at the end of a tiring and sweaty day. The fifth couple does what we will be doing (they are in Battambong) and have inserted themselves into the hearts of the local Khmae people and the missionaries who serve there. We hope that some day we can be half as good as they are. What's fascinating is that these senior couples are just normal people like everyone else - except they responded to a call to serve and have been supported and directed by the Savior. These couples, along with thousands of others across the globe, gave up golf, travel, grandchildren and their personal finances hoping they could do some good in a difficult world. In Cambodia, we are trying to establish a beach head (hope you don't mind a military reference), so that others can come after and really grow the work. We are still naïve greenies at this point, but are following a trail blazed by others.

We wrapped up the conference Wednesday with a dinner cruise along the Tonle Sap and Mekong rivers. Both are BIG rivers. And when they join up in Phnom Penh, the resulting Mekong is easily as wide as the Mississippi. The river starts in the Himalayan mountains, and exits into the South China sea at the bottom of Viet Nam. I'll write more about the Thursday trip to Udoung later (no time tonight).Here's a couple of pics from the boat.