All slinged up.

One of the youngsters who frequents our kids club got pushed forward to Sue by her big sister after club on Friday. The poor little chicken had fallen on her arm a couple of weeks ago and heard a crack. It was still sore but her mum had said 'not broken so no problem'.

Doc Ryan was with us again and had a look. Then we had a good pray-up for the little lady. After that the concensus decision was to put her arm in a sling. Susie had a sling ready to go so on it went. Neighbours were having a good gander from the gate, as they do.

Five minutes later big sister was back. Her big brother had burnt himself on his motor bike (exhaust??) Did we have some medicine for that? I'm an aloe vera convert when it comes to burns. I sent her home with a fat juicy leaf off a plant in the garden here.

Chinese city

Phnom Penh has all but shut down. It is Chinese New Year, which is not even a holiday here. That is reserved for mid-April and the all-important Khmer New Year weeks' holiday. But when it comes to business, the ethnic Chinese population obviously run this city. Markets are closed - even the huge Olympic Market near the church we attend. Money changers are hard to find (unbelieveable!) Streets are all but deserted.

Heading to the Healing Home this afternoon. Usually my left turn into a lane 100 metres from here is an art-form against opposing cars, bikes, motos, pedestrians and dogs. Today - behold.

Don't think deserted streets = quiet tho'. Where would the Chinese New Year be without the trusty firecracker?? There must be many fireworks factories in town. This year business has been remarkable good for them. The kids in our lane have certainly bought not less than 150kg of product.

Schools have mostly closed for three days (but this is not a holiday ...) which meant that our Kids Club had an extra 15 or so little ones today. This is about week 5 of running a one-hour program twice a week for the little locals. Today I counted 44 local kids unleashing happy bedlam on our place. I'm not sure if word of our plumbing issue had got out but Susie discovered one kid peeing in the garden ...

Ryan, a trainee doc from Dunedin, setting himself up for a big sweat at kids club today. Ryan is working in a children's hospital In Phnom Penh for three weeks and together with physiotherapist fiance Rebecca connected with us via folk from The Street Church in Wellington.

There was face-painting, skipping, soccer (of sorts), Ryan-climbing and tennis balls everywhere. I spent a bunch of time tossing tennis balls to boys who looked to be eight years old. Most of them had very, very poor ball-catching co-ordination skills. Later Chantol, Bonna and Dtouch taught a Jesus-song and then Chantol told the story of the good Samaritan - complete with lively actors. We have a great team here!

No loo paper please

I believe that our beans are saved but I have grave fears for our lettuce!

When I discovered dubious-smelling water bubbling out of the ground next to our garden this afternoon, I suspected that we could have a problem. Lifting a hunk of concrete revealed a sump with the flow certainly heading the wrong way. The smell and the colour was a bit disconcerting too.

After half an hour or so of bucketing the stuff out and pouring into another drain, the backflow ceased. Our trusty landlord appeared shortly thereafter and appeared to understand the happenings. When the sewage could not flow the right way, it had an escape hatch - our lettuce bed! Oh poo!!

Jason, where are you when you're really, really needed??

Loo paper appears to be the culprit. We're tossing around ideas for the best solution. Only allowing number 1's at the Healing Home is an option maybe ...

A good accident

My attention was arrested by friend Pam when I heard her saying that she had witnessed 'a good road accident' on Sunday. The same day I had witnessed a new height to local driving skills. A flashy black sports car crossed double yellow lines to overtake two lanes of cars that were stopped at red lights - with local cops gazing on (and they never blinked).

So, what constitutes a 'good' accident? The answer was a giggle. King of the roads here is not the biggest vehicle - but the vehicle of choice for the (very many) rich - the Toyota Lexus 4wd. The city is filled with these machines and we who straddle the lowly motos learn not to play chicken with these guys.

So, when Pam witnessed a white Lexus, overtaking and blasting its horn as it approached a t-intersection at the same time as a black Lexus was also on the wrong side of the road with horn blaring coming into said intersection ....

Good Ngeit

The girls gather for Ngeit's send-off: Dtouch (our weekday cook) Sopheap (with Alisa in arms) and Bonna (who helps cook, helps care, helps in kids program and is our bargaining food shopper queen at market .)

Ngeit has been with us since September, with just a couple of weeks back at her home village during October when the Healing Home closed for Pchum Ben Festival. That makes her our longest term patient. This afternoon she got to return home.

Ngeit lives just a few doors down the path from Tau, who we took back home last Friday. She heads out with a happy heart, with her arthritic pain almost all gone. Donnie volunteered to make the trip today - and to bring another patient back with him. It is 7.30pm here now and we've just had a text to say that the new patient has arrived. The wheelie beds stay out for a bit longer!

Donnie's offsider Kun (with his face buried in a helmet) about to hop on the motorbike for the 90 minute trip to Ngeit's village. Yep, that's how much seat space he gets ...

Baby baby

Pedros has happily bounced out of here, but we have another wee one. Little Alisa arrived yesterday with her mum Navy (pronounced Na-wee; 'v' becomes 'w' in Khmer).

Alisa and Navy are our first patients referred by an outside agency. Wilma, an Aussie working with Hagar, contacted us about mum and daughter. Navy is blind, very poor and without family. Alisa at eight months old is badly malnourished, largely because she has a sucking reflex problem.

Little Alisa in Sopheap's arms

Susie has been shopping - three sets of baby clothes, toys, nappies and whatever else was thrust into her hands by happy market vendors.

Full house

We've had to roll out the two wheelie beds this week. In the midst of a whole lot of coming and going, the flow has been inward. This is how we want it - there is no point having this great place if it is not touching people.

Phanna leading a Bible study in the main bedroom this morning. Two further patients are out of the picture in beds to the right. Baby Alisa does not attend the studies - she will be found in Sopheap's arms somewhere around the Healing Home. Dtouch is in the white shirt behind Phanna.

One of our seven patients is Dtouch, a 31-year old guy with a lovely shy nature. He had a snake-bite at age 14 which eventually healed, only to be bitten by a dog in the same place some years later. He did not want to bother anyone, so for years he hid his leg under long pants. Finally the smell of a leg turned to ulcerated yuk became too bad to hide.

He's not yet a Christian but he loves to receive prayer. The poor guy has also just had what was meant to be a biospsy removal from his groin but in fact a chunk was cut out. He's not walking well at all.

Cruising with Con

Far from the minus 43 degrees of home - Con's birthday cruise

If you come to Cambodia, a boat trip out on the Mekong is a must. We've done this many times now - and Con's birthday was more than enough reason to cruise gently on the waters of this great river.

Con and his wife Kate come from Winnipeg, Canada. Con is a bee-keeper and Kate is a teacher. They have perfected the Ontario winter escape, coming each year now to Cambodia for over three months to bring their skills to this nation. Kate is teaching Asian Outreach staff on grammar and other English delights and upskilling the admin area. Con brings his bee-keeping skills here and trains in agriculture development.

Cambodia is wide open to folk like this - the baby-boomer generation with so much to offer, so much to give.

Yes - sad but true. Con and I were the only blokes on board - most of this table-load are Kiwis including Helen (left front - Aucklander, teaching English in Hagar) and Kate (front right - Wellingtonian teaching in kids school for two years here).

Home delivery

I had another trip out to the province last Friday to take a patient, Tau, home. Also heading back was Tau's wife, a little daughter and two children who belong to Ngeit (still at the Healing Home) who are near neighbours. So, five was just a bit too many for one motorbike. Sypho took mum and two littlies and I took Tau and 12-year-old Dtouch on the 90-minute trip home.

Family group on the back yard. Sypho (pronounced See-poh) is on the right - a fantastic young lady who volunteers at our home - and has her sights set on becoming a school teacher.

They live in a sweet little village in Takeo Province that follows the now-familiar 3-step of tarseal - gravel - goat track. Tau's home is very simple. A river runs directly behind Tau's home and a couple of little boats are bobbing by the bank. Even tho' he has maybe 600 square metres of land, there is no garden planted - just a few banana palms and papaya trees.

Home sweet home for Tau. That's his little daughter in the white shirt.

Tau has a 16-year old daughter (standing next to Sypho in the top picture) who has been working in a garment factory. Garment sweat-shops earn something like 80% of Cambodia's export income. As a sign of the economic times that are hitting Cambodia, her factory has closed and she is out of work. Export orders are drying up and already many thousands of workers have been laid off.

From what we are able to ascertain, her $50 a month sounds to be the family income. With this scenario being repeated again and again in the nation, very many Cambodians are facing difficult days.

Baby

We've now had two 83-year olds at the Healing Home. Now we have a record at the other end of the age-scale - wee Pedros. He's just six months old and a real heart-winner with his smiles and chuckles.

Here is the little guy, all wrapped up in Nicole's arms

Pedros and his mum came to us last week looking healthy as, but with a malaria-positive diagnosis. We're not sure whether the diagnosis was dodgy or whether Jesus has done His stuff - but three days later another test gave them the all clear. Mum was thrilled to bits and disappeared on a motodop praising the Lord!

Giving beans

Jason and Julia thought that they were coming to Cambodia to quietly work away, putting a garden into the Healing Home. We first linked up with these friends in Toowoomba four years ago when Julia and I were coming on board as school chaplains - same time; different schools. Julia was with us here last year and this year Jason, her most excellent man, was also able to come out.

We just had time to orientate Jason to motorbike survival essentials and the local coffee shops before we had to head home for Sue's mum's funeral. So, we smiled and said 'welcome to off the deep end - you are here to run the Healing Home too'.

It has been fun to return and admire all that Jason and Julia have achieved in their 3+ weeks here. Our staff love them to bits and hugged them good-bye with great love and tears this afternoon. 26 kids rocketed through our yard today in the twice-weekly kids club that they have been running. And, we have beans.

Remember the wasteland where the missing rat trap was found? Now behold! That's Julia and Jason in front of the bean frame - and the emerging beans in the foreground.

We also have lettuce, chilli, tomato, bok choi, passion fruit, chick pea, ginger, garlic, chives, cabbage and more veges than I can remember, in various tiny form emerging from our soil. Loads of rubbish fill has been removed and an amazing labour of love and planning is beginning to grow. Oh, and we now have a compost too.

Julia is a garden enthusiast extraordinaire and a perma-culturalist by training, and she really did her homework in tropical gardens before she arrived! She came with a folder filled with research and seeds ready to go.

Jason sorting the wire netting frame for my third love - passionfruit! Nicole gives helpful advice as puss Feisty offers moral support.

Kids club this afternoon. Many of these little ones come from very poor homes. We are looking to getting a big pile of kids clothing in the near future to bless their sweet little hearts.

Cardigans in Cambodia

We are in the grip of a Cambodian winter. Rather than sleeping on top of the sheets, we have a sheet and a bedspread over us - and no fan at night. This is so novel that it is fully worthy of a blog entry.

Susie, Julia and Nicole this morning, just handling the shock of winter

Further, the girls have broken out the cardigans. I haven't checked the temperatures since we've been back but it would have to be a stunning 17 degrees at 4am (that is when we get up and hiff water balloons at the wretched yowling neighbour's dog) and under 25 degrees by day. Currently it is 9.30pm; maybe 20 degrees and we have three dogs in full chorus and Susie moving outside towards the water balloon stash ...

It's the law

Sue and I arrived back in Cambodia last Friday. The first thing that struck us was ... helmets!


In Cambodia, the masses move by motorbike. We were aware that a law change was coming into effect on January 1 - that helmets were to become compulsory. But, this is Cambodia and laws are often as optional as stopping at a red traffic light ...

But lo - helmets are now everywhere. On main drags, compliance would have to be in the 70% realm. On back streets we are still tracking at over 50% - a phenomenal change from the perhaps 5% of helmeted motorcyclists of just two weeks ago.

I know that this shop was not here last time I passed by a couple of weeks ago

Another spin-off is the blossoming of motorcycle helmet shops. They have sprouted up all over the city. It would be good news indeed if this law takes root and the horrendous motorcycle injury rate here starts to move downwards..