Life in Battambang

So I have noticed that in Battambang, along with everywhere else I've been in Asia, the traffic laws are very much like suggestions which everyone goes out of their way to break.

You will find people riding for extended periods of time on the wrong side of the road. You will not see any speed limit signs. You will see small pickup trucks with, on average, about 15 people just in the bed of the truck. They, of course, are sitting on top of the roof and on top of the stuff that is already filling the truck bed. You'll also see people riding on mopeds with the strangest things.

For example, I've seen a couple of times a guy/girl driving on his/her moped with one hand holding up the IV that is in his/her arm while driving with the other hand. I've seen a family of 6 on a 2-person moped. I could list a bunch of other crazy things, but I'm sure you get the point. You don't even have to have a vehicle to experience the traffic firsthand.

Even crossing the street you take your own life in your hands. Street crossing in Battambang reminds me very much of the video game Frogger. However, I don't remember frogger having to deal with traffic going both ways in each lane. That said, I could certainly destroy Frogger, himself, in a game of Frogger.

And with that we'll move on to where I am staying. Our whole team is staying with an American missionary named Barbara. She rents a really nice house that's in a slum area of Battambang. We have really been blessed to live in such a nice house. In our neighborhood there are probably 15-20 kids that are always out playing around on our street when they aren't in school. So part of our team has started having a sunday school type program for the kids twice a week. Whenever we can(which is usually everyday) we go out and play with the kids. We give them piggyback rides, hug them, speak english with the older ones who know english, and listen to the younger ones speak Khmer to you even though you've told them you can't speak Khmer.

These kids don't recieve that much attention at home from the fact that the Asian culture doesn't really show physical affection. Even between husbands and wives it's rare that they would even kiss privately, never in public. So as you can probably imagine these kids will just run at you with a huge smile and their arms open as soon as they see someone who will show them affection. So we try to go out and love these kids as often as we can.

Along with the kids on our street, there are a couple of other ministry things we are a part of. We also will be working with a Khmer guy named Dara, who does agricultural work in the outer areas of Battambang. We will be using some of the water sanitation skills, that we learned in Bali, to improve the quality of life around Battambang. We are also helping out at the 4 square orphanage. We will be putting on a church service and hanging out with them every Sunday. I, along with some other team members, will be teaching various classes at the YWAM Youth Center. The Youth Center offers free classes in Bible, English, Guitar, Keyboard, and a number of other subjects in an effort to build relationships with the young people of the community. They have several hundred students who come to the center everyday. There are a bunch of other random things we are doing that would take a long time for me to write out, but these are the big consistent things we are a part of.

I know this was a long blog post, but I can only blog on Saturdays because we can only go to the internet place on our day off. Which is totally cool because it really encourages us to realize that we are here to serve people and not ourselves. I hope all of you are doing well.


God is good. All the time.
Dan