Sunday, May 27, 2007

A fistful of hours

Riding through the rain and the flooded streets of an Asian city on the back of a moto. Eating grilled steak with weird sauces and vegetables while listening to traditional Christian hymns.
Watching cookie-cutter Cambodian girls sing cookie-cutter songs with a back-up band and then proceeding to dance to some weird kind of techno with my friend Samnang in a huge Western-style club. Driving back and falling asleep to the crowing of a rooster next door.

A few snapshots of last night.

Morning was glorious at 6:30. I can't believe I woke up feeling rested. I had nothing to do. No commitments, in fact, no real possibilities for entertaining myself. So I hung out with God. It was a bit uncomfortable having that much time.

Samnang wanted to go get breakfast, but I was reading, so he left. And stayed gone, so I got his brother to take me on a tour of the city in search of a church. Yeah, it was the SunWAY Hotel they meet at, not the SUN Hotel. So I walked into church 40 minutes late, just in time to catch some awesome Word about seeing and praying. So I decided I needed to spend some serious free time praying so that I could see from God's perspective. I can't wait. It was a pretty traditional service otherwise. If Eric reads this, he should know that the preacher mentioned the sons of Isachaar and said that now is the time for us to be like them. Cool confirmation from God that I was in the right place.

After church, a sweet couple that is on the board of directors for a huge healthcare organization dropped me off at Friends Cafe (shout-out Anna) where I met some Norweigens that I hung out with for the afternoon. Great curry too!

We hit up the touristy places and it was pretty crazy. S-21 was the premier Khmer Rouge prison and we went on a tour of that. We also took a tuk-tuk (moto with a cart) out to the Killing Fields to see the mass graves and the skull monument. 20,000 people were killed from S-21 at the Killing Fields. 7 escaped. It was pretty staggering.

I'm not sure what the rest of the evening will hold, but the options are endless. Tomorrow will be my first day actually working and I'm pretty excited.

My trip so far: Check out my pictures!

1 comment:

Abraham said...

Ross! It's awesome to see what God is doing on your trip already. I just read your blog for the first time, and I am excited to be in Cambodia already. You'll have to let me know how living with Samnang goes through this month. Yes...I am planning on stealing all of your good ideas. You know what Isaac Newton said...he was only able to accomplish what he did because of "standing on the shoulders of giants". So anyway, I am working on getting ready for my RUOP. I leave in 6 days. God bless. I'll be in touch, Abe