Poor Phiong's choice

Sandwiched between the new Savannah Shopping Centre and the nicest church facility in Phnom Penh is a wretched slum. Here, somewhere between 200 and 300 people subsist. This slum has a reputation for alcohol abuse and gambling. We hear stories of parents sending their children out to collect recyclable garbage while they play cards and drink - and then beating their kids when they return for not working hard enough.

Phiong comes from this slum. She is a building labourer, earning between 6,000 and 7,000 riels a day (NZ$2) for long hours and hot work. For 15,000 riels a month she rents a shanty room. Vimean, the children's church pastor at our church, runs an outreach into this slum. That's when he discovered Phiong, over eight months pregnant, really sick and totally destitute. Her husband has just done a runner, taking their two children and his new lady off to his provincial home.

Phiong at lunch today. This afternoon she reported that baby has dropped!

It is remarkable how much her countenance has changed in these last two weeks. Love, prayer and care has relaxed her so that her high blood pressure has come right down. She came to us having signs of toxemia but that has all gone. An Australian team has left her with enough money to have a hospital birth. The big issue is what happens after she gives birth.

I sat at Phiong's bedside yesterday and talked with her. She feels that she has no options. This is how life is for the poor - their options become so very few. Without a husband and with only one place to earn daily bread money, she says that she must give her child up for adoption. She sees no alternative.

Kov, our resident gate opener and active English learner. He has such a hard-case grin!

We are alongside her in this process, asking the Lord for His way. At the same time, we still have little Kov with us. He is 11 years old but looks eight; the loveliest, brightest little guy who is often thoroughly naughty too. We just can't let him go home to his family. Dad is an abusive alcoholic and his parents indicate that they can't afford him and don't really care less. His older brother died recently from worm infestation - hardly a difficult thing to diagnose and treat. Donnie is to explore foster family options for him.