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Cambodia Day 13

7/30/2013

 
I leave today! As usual, things are still busy until the last moment, but its all being done! So I can leave happy and at peace that one of my biggest objectives was achieved, the car will be sold! So there was a lot of tension in people's minds after the election. People remembered the past and given the opposition won, it was uncertain what would happen. But apparently all the results have changed and the old PM is still in power. It's unclear if the opposition will do anything about it. 

I'm actually at the airport now. The car sold! So we have a little bit more money in the account there! :)  Things were busy till the end.  Sold the car, then rushed to the bank to deposit it, had to fix a few things and figure out stuff, then more finances to take care of followed by rushing to the airport on michael's moto with my suitcase.  The streets are starting to get crowded again, but still a little less than normal.  

On the plane ride I ended up sitting next to a nice cambodian woman who is going to try to help Save Each One! :) I love how God puts the right people next to you.  On the way over it was the doctor's brother for vietnam and now this lady :) 

Waiting at the airport in Taipei and trying to spend the time.  The ride over was just a little exciting. It's been my long term desire to have a call over the announcer for a doctor and today there actually was one. hehe! It ended up being a healthy gentleman with diarrhea :) but it was still a little cool to be able to help.  One of these days I hope I get to save a life, but in the meantime putting others minds at ease works too :)

Cambodia day 11

7/28/2013

 
So woke up this morning after a peaceful over 9 hour sleep and the streets are quiet.  I tried looking for internet reports about anything back happening in PP and can't find anything except for 2 cars being overturned.  I saw the local Facebook footage for that and they were police cars and people hurling rocks on it and then walking on.  No people getting injured. There is one report of a vietnamese man who got beat up.  Not sure if that was during the election or after.  Apparently they come in disguised as cambodians and try to vote.  There were apparently a few thousand caught trying to do this.  Not sure if all the hype yesterday with the phone calls will pan out today but lets see.  :)  Michael and I searched stuff on Facebook with his network for a bit yesterday and found nothing so hopefully my car can still sell!!! :)

Cambodia Day 10

7/28/2013

 
So I just got 2 calls from friends telling me not to leave the house tomorrow.  Apparently its almost confirmed that the current PM has lost and so last time this happened in 1995 there was fighting on the streets.  Apparently tomorrow will not be safe.  Despite all the bribes  and the media not promoting any other candidate, it still happened.  Last time the fighting lasted until the current PM won.  I'm glad I decided not to stay in a hotel but at a home of my friends closer to the airport.  I still should be able to get out on tuesday.  But do pray for me.  
I guess this is a lesson in not leaving till tomorrow what you can do today.  Now I don't get to eat the fruit I have been wanting to buy but always to busy to stop to get. Oh well! :) 
If something does happen that looks scary on the news I have internet and a number I can be reached at :)

Day 10 Cambodia

7/27/2013

 
I started to write yesterday but was too tired to get past the first line.  Today is the first day I woke up to the alarm in a while.  I had a 7am meeting with a doctor.  He knows the medical students and so I'm seeing if they can work together for camps.  He seems great! Off to church soon. 
It's been great to be back, but I am so busy I am barely remember what I am doing :)  I had dinner with my friends after my time at the cafe.  I am still amazed how I ended up talking to everyone that I needed to meet at the cafe to get put things together for the future.  Dinner with my friend was great. He was one of my best friends here and he met a girl the week after I left. I have been hearing things about her and I was so blessed that she just happened to be in town while I was and got to finally meet her! 
Saturday I woke up early at 6 and got work done and then had my 9am appt with the students.  We are talking about expanding and involving more quality students and possib. At 7:30 someone called and wanted to see the car.  The students came and we talked and then the car guy came and he wanted a camry instead of a corolla :( But then as i was going to meet my missionary friend that I used to mentor while here I got a call from a guy I had been trying to connect with about the car since the day before.  So he saw the car and maybe!!! he'll take it! Let's see! 
Had a great time meeting with my friend.  She has grown so much and is so wise! I loved it. She had been praying for a few things before I left and it was amazing to see the answer to her prayers.  It was above and beyond what we could have hoped for! Got home and it was time for my next meeting with my friend and co-worker for the medical camps.  We had a great time discussing the future of the medical students and where we want things to go and came home exhausted and fell asleep.  This mornings meeting was great and I might have someone interested in the car!! So yay! Let's see. 
Today is election day.  The streets have been full of supporters for the opposition.  It's been amazing to see the students and young people out there so excited about change. The current PM has been in power for 28 years and apparently there is a lot of stuff going on that will make him a shoe in to win but it looks like cambodia is growing up and things will change! So I am excited.

Cambodia Day 8

7/26/2013

 
God is good despite us! Woke up super early today -3 am. Don't know why but couldn't sleep.  My sister and I had gone to sleep saying if we wake up early then we can do something before she leaves. She woke up at 5 so we rushed and got out of the door by 9 and went shopping.  :) I kept telling her given the election there will be parades of supporters and we will get stuck but I think until you have gotten stuck in traffic (when obama came I got stuff in traffic for 2 hours - total standstill).  So she wanted to get to the airport left and kept shopping till as late as she had wanted to hehe and then we got on the tuktuk and we got stuck! but luckily we still got to the airport 1 hour before and were able to get her checked in and onboard.  The great thing about Cambodia is they let you in and so I was able to know she was checked in.  From there to get the car washed and then the first buyer came.  He isn't sure but hopefully!!!! pray about it. I don't want to hold onto this car any longer! My second buyer is mad at me because I won't meet him where he wants, but I just can't drive in so much traffic, i am out of practice :) So lets see.  I hear back soon from the first one.  
I thought I would have time to rest after my sister left and meet people and pursue my ideas but things are piling up so fast, I feel like I am going faster than before, but everything is just falling into place. I stayed at the cafe where the center is thinking the 2nd buyer would come today but because of that Michael and I were able to discuss ideas that have been brewing in my head and his and it's great. We are on the same page and I think even without being here, I can help him with the english classes. I am going to do teaching videos! and there are new posters that I have been thinking of making and he was saying the same thing.  So I have spent the afternoon taking all the pictures I need for the first set of videos for total newbys.  
The center is in a cafe that reaches out to medical students and I had been talking to my students about them learning from this group and so I was able to connect with the right person to hopefully make this happen and maybe even get a doctor to help with the medical camps! So yay again! I love how God connects and just makes everything fall into place. When I first got here I wasn't sure how I could show cambodia to my sister and do all my work, but it's all working out and I am doing in just a few days what I thought would take the whole time and maybe I would still need more time! Amazing how God works! Give and it shall be give, pressed down, shaken together and running over! :) 
I am so happy to be here and reconnecting with everyone from last year whether they are acquaintances or friends and i just love how even short term friendships can be so strong and lasting! I didn't realize how much family I have in cambodia! YAY! I am so blessed! 

Cambodia Day 7

7/25/2013

 
Today was the big party with the center.  The regular students were invited and as usual Michael and I had a difference in opinion of what we wanted and since he is here I decided to let him do his thing and I would do mine the last day.  But as it turned out we ended up being able to mesh our ideas into one cohesive party and it was perfect. We spent the morning going to the genocide museum and the killing fields.  They felt thankful for living at this time and not 40 years ago and horrified at what had been done.  After that we had lunch at our center restaurant.  So we talked and then tied in adversity to overcoming and my sister shared how she became the first person in the world in a wheelchair to will a main stream pageant against other able bodied girls.  She shared of life before Christ and after and her she left her lucrative career as  lawyer to become a pastor in india and share the love of God with them after a chance encounter when we prayed for a blind boy in a market place. It was our first beautiful non rainy day and it was hot but a blessing not to be going through the killing fields in the rain in a wheelchair.  When we got to the killing fields they charged us foreigners automatically for the audio tour and so I changed mine to khmer and gave it to michael to then share with the group since I had already done the tour with my parents a few months back.  The guy handing out the audio units felt bad because the khmer one technically is 2 dollars less and so let us have the khmer one for free and told me to keep my english one.  Cambodians are so sweet and accommodating.  We had a flat on the way back to the hotel and tuktuk driver got it changed with my sister still in it.  It was a hard thing for the mechanics but they all worked and worked and tried new things until they were able to do it and not take her out.  Gotto love cambodia and how accommodating they are.  Not to say they are perfect :) but most are quite sweet.
My sister leaves tomorrow and hopefully I sell the car tomorrow! and then I can concentrate everything else and seeing everyone in cambodia! Luckily there are elections on sunday.  The streets have been full of parades of supporters for the candidates.  Apparently it could get dangerous if the current prime minister doesn't win, but hopefully it won't be.  Last election he said if he didn't win he would have a war, so people assume he will win even though no one I talk to likes him. It's sad how dictators get away with things, but God willing the people will vote the way they want and there will be positive change.
I called up two of my friends and it was so good just to hear their voice. Since I travel so much I can usually only concentrate on the place I am at and its when I get there that I realize how much I miss them, how much I love them and how much they love me! I feel sooooo blessed and can't' wait for this weekend when I get to meet them all! And I have so many ideas for the center I want to start this weekend.  My head it full of stuff and with my sister in america I can put it all together. If she had stayed she could have helped me, but now I'll have to learn to do it myself!!  You know what I love about my life, is even the downtime when I am sightseeing is all inspiration for more of what I can do for God, so I never have to feel guilty to enjoy every moment of everyday to the fullest! :) 

Day 6 Cambodia

7/24/2013

 
I love how God works.  So I was sitting at the airport just thrilled we were on the flight for free and then God just topped the whole thing by showing us why.  Overhead just before we started to board I hear an announcement that our old flight had technical difficulties and won't be boarding till after our current flight takes off.  I don't know if and when they did take off but praise God! As it was, we had just enough time to do everything. We got there and poor Michael's friend had been waiting for ages for us. No one got our messages but in usual cambodian style he had a big smile on his face.  We got to michael's house and changed luggage around so we would only have a backpack for the trip to angkor watt and off we went to meet the medical students.  They had been waiting for an hour as well.  So these students work super hard in arranging and doing the medical camps, the trainings at the various NGO's and the schools.  So as a thank you since they are all volunteers I decided to take them to a local cheap 5 star for dinner.  Unfortunately although they loved the ambience, the food was not to their liking.  Despite that we had a good time and they shared what their future plans are.  I love them! They are so easy to communicate with and we share such a good rapport that they can share their true feelings and they are such strong individuals that they fight for what they want, but are open to discussion! They are awesome! 
From there we went to the bus stand.  It was supposed to be a lower bunk sleeper but it ended up being only an upper bunk! So my sister is yelling and screaming as she is carried by 5 different people up 5 different stairs telling me she doesn't want to do this.  But they got her in and the bus company said the return trip they would make sure the bus was a lower bus.  When we got there they drove us into the city special so that we could get off on cement.
Then the adventure began. We saw all the big temples, the landline museum, the night market and pub street.  I went to sleep getting my nails done :) The bus ride back that night was as promised, a lower bunk. Arrived at the hotel and left my sister and saw the mechanic. I am so hoping to sell the car this time! So just needs a battery and someone sees it tomorrow! Slept through all of yesterday and today am having a party for the center. We are going to the genocide museum and killing fields (things they have never seen before) and then lunch together at the cafe that hosts us so that we can talk!  I taught part of the morning class! 3 new students have joined! and the old ones have really grown!  Teaching a few days before that showed me that maybe I should put together a video series for the new students so that they can watch and learn from that while the old ones can continue to move forward.  

Day 3 Vietnam

7/22/2013

 
We are at the airport in Vietnam.  This morning we got up at 5/6 and got ready to got the hospital.  It was an interesting experience.  A nice doctor after an hour of waiting came to show me some of the reports for the daughter of the family of three with a schwannoma.  They have a heriditary disease called neurofibromatosis.  It's sad, but the mother isn't even getting seen because there is no money, but she also needs an operation as her tumor has returned.  She has lost her hearing already.  The daughter had one tumor removed and the other they will radiated and probably 10 years later the doctor feels she'll have a  recurrence.  Half her face is paralyzed.  The good news is someone came by the day before to find out details and so hopefully her operation will be funded.  The other lady who wanted help for her son's nurse wouldn't disclose any information.  So it's hard to know how to even help. :(
We got back just in time (a little late) to get the airport and when we got here they gave us our ticket and then while we were waiting for the wheelchair pusher they came and told us she could not go on the flight and that we needed to buy two more tickets! Of course I was upset and said this is not fair. If you let us come on this same flight on this same seating why can't we go back or why can't you just give us the other flight since it's on your partner airlines.  But they said no, until I said i could go on this flight and my sister would come on the other one.  Then they said to wait and after 15-20 minutes they said that if there were wheelchair accommodations on the next flight they would do it for free! Yet they just 30 minutes earlier had been telling us to buy the ticket on that flight! But they couldn't now guarantee anything.  But praise God someone came by then and said it was a wheelchair accommodating flight.  At the same time a poor foreigner from australia came and was arguing with them because he had called and they said the flight would accommodate his bike for no extra cost. He flew from melbourne to vietnam to paris back to vietnam and now they were charging him for the first time and not honoring what he had been told. He was frustrated and angry and then called them thieves and left.  Poor guy, my sister and I felt for him.
Well off to catch the flight!!

Vietnam, day 2

7/21/2013

 
Day 2 in Vietnam was our day off! We got to get up later and relax more.  The day started with breakfast on the rooftop.  We are becoming quite the connoisseurs of cheap hotels.  I think I have found my favorite :) 
We left the hotel around 10.  We were immediately met by cyclo drivers. The day before I had been saying we could go on a ride, but Mr. Loc said they are notorious for getting customers on and then in the middle of the city refusing to go back without getting more money and calling a crowd of cyclo driver to scare the person.  So we said no to the smiling nice seeming people.
Kept walking and I took a wrong turn and ended up at a different site! But since everything is close it didn't matter.  We saw the Notre Dam cathedral and the post office before encountering heavy rain.  So we ducked into the high end mall and went around window shopping.  From there we went to the opera house, Ho chi mihn park and then city hall.  We followed that with the reunification palace flyby (not worth going inside is my opinion) and then made it to the war museum.  The was museum is my favorite thing.  I hate it because it makes me cry, but I love at how it touches my heart.  It was my third time there and just like me my sister needed nearly 2 hours to see it all.  The sickening feeling of seeing what your people have done to others is what overwhelms you at first.  It's so true that absolute power corrupts absolutely.  We as a nation have certainly shown that over and over again and yet, I am so proud to an american because of all the good we have done and I think even our atrocities make it so that others in the future won't do the same thing (at least that is my hope).  But we went to war for greed and we supported an evil man in power and that is disheartening. Using fear of communism we did what we shouldn't have done.  I remember as a child I always wondered why some mean americans protested the war.  I thought it was unkind of them not to welcome home the troops with cheering for going to fight for us.  But I see that the war was so wrong.  That said, I don't blame the troops.  18 year olds who are fearing for their lives under the guidance of their superiors may not use the best judgement and may out of fear act cruelly, but the commanding officers were older and new better and I find it sad that many of them never had to answer for the crimes they committed - agains the vietnamese and the soldiers under them.  It's so surprise so many came back with PTSD, because the things they saw and did would scar anyone and on top of that, those exposed to agent orange had to see the effects of it everyday in their kids.  And of course my sadness as I walked around didn't just stop there. We went into a prison cell and seeing how the prisoners were treated reminded me of the genocide museum in cambodia - same torture and worse treatment at some points.  How cruel we can be.  But I am so glad that God redeems.  He's sending an american to help the people.  And I feel so blessed to be part of God's plan to help the vietnamese people.  I'm excited to meet up with Mr. Quan tomorrow.  

Vietnam

7/20/2013

 
Arrived in Vietnam yesterday.  The first time I came for vacation, I had a tour guide and we started talking about what I was doing in cambodia and he said Vietnam needed help too.  After attending the war museum I saw the need. Ho Chi Minh city is beautiful and it didn't look like it had a need, but seeing the effects of Agent Orange changed that for me.  Last year I was focussing on vietnam but put that in the back of my mind.  
But this year now that the work in Cambodia is continuing without me and doesn't need me physically there, I decided to start pursuing what other things God has in store. There is something really cool about how God sends you the people he wants to play an important part in your life.  In Cambodia it was Michael and here I believe it will be our tour guide Mr Loc.  He's a man with a passion and heart to help people and in many ways he reminds me of me when I was younger. He is so innocent and just has a heart to help.  YEsterday when he came to meet my sister and me and to talk about future medical camps he brought along the newspaper with two articles.  One of a family with brain tumors who has no money and needs an operation and another of a lady with a huge tumor on her face who has been told it is inoperable and she will die.
So we talked about the medical camps and those of you interested we will be doing them either oct or november. if you are interested, let me know which month is better for you and lets do it! I will need passport numbers as you will have to be registered with the government.  There will be 2-3 volunteer vietnamese doctors and anyone, even those without medical experience are welcome!  I haven't seen the sights but I know Mr. Loc and Mr. Quan are trustworthy and it should be great! Just be willing to go with the flow a kinks will need to get worked out as it will be the first trip there and growing pains will have to be tolerated! We'll have some time for sightseeing so it should be enjoyable and a very rewarding experience!
So we went to the hospital. Just walked in and went all over the place looking for the family with the schwannomas.  At one point some staff started looking like they were telling us we couldn't go this way, but they were telling us to go to the girl ward to find the mother and daughter! It's great how innocence and a great heart just opens doors.  We found out the mother and girl had actually been discharged because all the funds they had had been put into operating on the boy.  He looks about 15, 1/2 his face is paralyzed and he is out of it.  As we went towards his room we passed patients on both sides lying on gurnees because there is no place for them in the overcrowded rooms. There heads are bandaged.  The whole scene made me want to cry.  Loc wants us to help pay the 1000 dollar bill for all three to get operated on.  No doctor would talk to us so we are going back on monday to see if this is possible and what it would entail and to get a real history.  The sad thing is as we were asking the uncle questions other patient's family members started gathering around asking us for help.  There is such a need in Vietnam.  Let's see what happens on Monday.  If nothing else, it's helping me get a real heart for vietnam and when you have a heart, then you move and can be God's hands and feet to make  difference and be used the way God intended you to be.
After that we drove to see a lady with a tumor.  She has been a dishwasher.  Seven years ago she noticed a bump on her face and didn't have money to have it removed.  The tumor continued to grow and by the time she went back the doctors said there was nothing they can do for her.  I have honestly never seen anything this horrible in terms of a tumor.  Her right eye can't even be seen because the tumor from her cheek covers it.  You can see the tumor pouching out of her right nostril and her whole face is shifted.  Her upper jaw/teeth stick out because of the tumor and her teeth have fallen out because of it. It's horrible, yet she is in good spirits. If anyone knows an ENT who would be willing to look at the pictures and path and mri reports once Mr. Loc gets the for me, I will forward them the info.  We would love to see if there is anyone who can help save this lady's life.
We got home after 7 and had been out since 10 :) but the day wasn't over. We went to dominos for pizza.  Dominos in Japan is better than dominos in seattle, but dominos here is probably not worth eating :) We headed back and got horribly lost but God sent an angel in the form of a Filipino businessman/engineer who has been here for 2 years and has a month left before he returns.  He went out of his way and walked us to our hotel! We were late for the next patient encounter but then I spent 1 1/2 hours seeing and explaining things to our taxi driver's aunt who had just come from the provence (countryside) to be seen.  At 10:30 I made it to the room :)

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