'Tis the season ...

This shy girl had a cart outside the Healing Home this morning. Hundreds of vendors cover every nook of the city at this time, selling these little nasties.

Adding to the happy chaos of the roads here are the sellers of a local delicacy that look like cockles as in shellfish. My friend Sue Hanna calls them 'diarrhea pills'. They are cooked in the morning and pushed around the city all day in the ever-hot sun.

The locals have a love affair with these wee delicacies. They are not immune to the repercussions tho'. Malis, a delightful girl who works for Hagar, phoned in badly sick a while ago, laid up n hospital. 'What happened, poor lady??' Sympathy went to zero very quickly. Sue H reckons it needs to be written into every job contract - eat these and no sick pay for you!

The diarrhea pills come in two flavours - 'all day gut cleanser' and 'chillied 3-day bowel remover'. The choice is all yours ...

Aussie Aussie Aussie

Puss the stumpy-whiskered one with Julia, Rachel and Ali today

Julia Hamilton-Smith is back for time number 3 with us. This time she has towed two Brsibane friends here - Rachel and Alison. Rachel is an English teacher and Ali is an accountant. Over here, they are teachers, gardeners, orphanage inspirers and a bunch of other things too.

They are slotting in really well with a pretty full schedule that includes daily teaching and input at Centre of Peace orphanage, a bunch of English classes at New Life Church and a garden resurrection at the Healing Home. Julia came well prepared for that last item - in her luggage was a kilo of composting worms!!

The Cat's Whiskers

Remember Chumron, the young guy who took a whack from a cow in a bad mood?

We reckon he is feeling much better now. On Saturday he asked one of our girl's for a pair of scissors.

What a moto moves

It is still on my list of things to get to - to simply take a few morning hours and snap photos of what gets moved around here by motor-scooter. Everything from pigs to the market to lumber; seriously large pieces of glass to more people than you can fit in a toyota hiace - the lowly moto does incredible stuff out here. Watch this space ...

Aluminium screen deliveries coming someone's way - two delivery boys and the moto driver on the road

Ouch!

Chomron, a super-shy nine-year-old guy, and his mum arrived last Friday. He was just in the wrong spot at the wrong time when a cow got cranky and whipped its horns around, collecting his chest. They had been to a provincial clinic where the messy wound got stitched, but the family are very poor and had no financial means to receive further care.

Sue got another six stitches out of Chomron's wound today - just two more to go, buried in the messy wound. That is Sreymom behind him - a lovely lady with a quick mind and a hungry heart.

Chomron is doing well - not nearly so shy now and really brave as Susie goes digging for stitches. His mum has had to head back home to work so he's been flying solo for a few days. He loves the Bible dvds we have in the home, as well as a giggle over Mr Bean (Cambodians just love Mr Bean skits and movies!!)

Tiny Naan

Tiny Naan is Sopheap's arms

We are praying and fighting to keep this wee lady alive at this time. Donnie was very worried that Naan would die on her way in from the province. After three months of miserable life, Naan weighed just 1.2kg.

She did get into a hospital for about four days before returning to us. There is no suck in her little mouth but slowly she is getting bottled formula into her wee tummy. It has been a frustration trying to get mum to understand that we must measure her intake through the bottle - that hanging her on the breast all the time is achieving absolutely nothing. It's at the stage where to be firm is more important than nice - Sue and our girls are taking charge more, lest Naan fade out before our eyes.

The last weigh-in had her at 1.6kg - still well under a keepable snapper in the fishing boat, let alone a living child. Please pray with us.

Southern men

Today the team from North City, Christchurch, have set their sights on home. They fly via Singapore, whereas Marty and Robyn found good tickets via Hong Kong. It is good to know that these lesser cities offer transit facilities to the hub of our world ...

Ninian giving the kitchen roof at the Healing Home a little healing. Leaks and Kim have a way of finding one another ...

Emma, who leaves behind the playground legacy. She's a librarian, but should change her day-job as she is born to promote the Kathmandu label!

Well done, team. Two houses, many meetings and connections and just a great serving, caring attitude. You have done us all proud!

Little transformations

Meet little Kov, one of the sweetest little kids in this nation. He is 12 years old, but looks to be just 7. He was such a sick little guy when he first came to us, en route to hospital. In hospital he unloaded 30 worms. This worm plague has affected his heart, but at least he lives. His older brother has died from worm infestation and TB.

Kov giggling and playing with a little girl whose name I never caught. Her mum came to us with a three month old 1.2kg baby on the point of death. Donnie's wife Sophea prevailed with the hospital authorities to get her admitted - but they would admit mum and baby only, not her daughter. Today's update is that baby is 1.6kg and progressing wonderfully well.

The change in little Kou is just amazing. From a lethargic, pathetic-looking little guy, he has become full of life and fun. On Wednesday evening while I was at the Healing Home he was running around and squealing with laughter, just like any other happy kid.

Kov and his sister as they were leaving on Thursday.

Also homeward bound this week was Chantol's auntie, Mok. Life will be very different for Mok now. She and her husband were delivering fish at 4am in the province when a truck struck their moto. Her husband was killed instantly. No-one had the heart to tell her for 10 days after the accident, in which Mok received a broken collar bone and a broken ankle.

After five weeks, Mok is heading home. She swung by the hospital, where the doc said that the x-ray showed the bone was looking good, but he wanted her to keep the cast on for another week.

We will miss Mok. She has the sweetest gentle nature and really soaked up everything she heard about the goodness of God. But this lady is so keen to go home where six sons await her..

Home again

Marty and Robyn waved goodbye with big sad eyes yesterday. After 3+ months of solid input here they took the big bird back to NZ via Hong Kong.

It was most excellent having them alongside us for so long. They happily dived into teaching English classes in addition to many other areas: Robyn setting up an admin manual for New Life Church; Marty doing some stuff on vehicle maintainance plus helping out a variety of people here. The maintainance area was 'interesting' - he was working against the flow a bit ('so, why do you want to fix it if it has not broken??')!

Here are the young couple - when they were with us last year! While Christian and Becs were with us Marty and Robyn stayed upstairs at the Healing Home; the rest of the time they had level 2 at our place.

They leave with a very good reputation, many friends and a commitment to return in the will of God sometime in the future.

Takeo project

The North City team all headed out to Takeo today - the girls to run meetings for children and a ladies group and the guys to hit into day 2 of building house 2.

Fortunately for the guys, the girls had a bit of time up their sleeves ...

Janice Scott laying a few bricks ...

... while Brian, Russmay and Paul share a few tips ...

... carefully watched by the meat side of somebody's future bacon and eggs

David has found his true calling in life - no need for a concrete mixer with this man on the job ...

... tho' he found the going a little warm