God is Always in the Details
On May 23, 2013 we traveled to Kampot Province to visit the community of Pastor Sopheap. Sothea Then was with us at that point and we were visiting various church communities to discuss the upcoming Angel Dormitory, which was in the final stages of preparation.
It comes to mind for me without even looking at the old contact report some very specifics that happened that day while we were there, looking back to the photo attached from then.
First off, it was during that initial visit that I noticed a large number of children in presence. They appeared to be engaged in any outside activity that could occupy their daytime hours. Mingling around were many senior community members which we gathered were probably their caregivers and family. Not apparent during this day were younger adults whom we may have surmised were their parents and extended family. Sothea investigated for me and was told that most of the young adults from this village will go to Thailand or a larger area to work because there is very little source of income for them in the village. They do not take their children but leave them in the care of the group of people we saw mingling about today. It takes a village here to raise a child.
Since George was off with Pastor Sopheap at the time of this discussion, I asked some further questions thru Sothea (with his cultural permission). You see, there were a fair few babies in the mix and probably these children were not from the older adults present either. Apparently the parents go together to work and from that more babies arrive on the doorstep to be raised.
Note in the background of the photo below. There is a small building that Pastor Sopheap had financial assistance given to build so that these children would have a place to go to school. There was no school in this village at that time. Pastor Sopheap’s wife is the lovely lady next to the lady in the purple top. She had taken on the leadership to teach these children in this little building with the help of some older assistants who are also there.
Fast forward to November 10, 2015 and we again visited this community again, this time with a group of American Christians who have come alongside the ELCC in partnership to provide a Garuna school to these children.
Pastor Sopheap’s wife recognizes me and comes running to greet me. After the Khmer bow she embraces me with her arms and gently takes me to the front of her home and asks me to sit down on a bench under the tree. We cannot verbally communicate but her expression and gratitude are very apparent. She knows why we had come. Honestly, until just before driving up in the van, I didn’t know this is where we were going. But it didn’t take us long to recall our previous visit either.
This community now has a school and teachers. It is a Garuna school financed by a group of generous people who are passionate about improving the village communities, and this is one of them. Thus far through scholarship commitments, there are 35 students in the morning and 10 in the afternoon. These students are being nurtured in the word of God along with their basic subjects to carry them out into the world. (We missed the students since they were home for lunch and it was locked up.)
Also noted here is that there are some beginning steps to provide agricultural initiatives to the folks in the village. This same group of people have brought forth some of those ideas as well and we were there to see those results first hand. Time will show if these efforts will pay off, but at this time it was only a first pilot project for them to increase the yield on their rice crop. I’m leaving that information to the experts at this point.
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