May 22nd – 11th June

Welcome to yet another blog, we’ve had a busy two weeks being back at CHO, hence the slow blogging! Since our return from the village we have been back into a fairly regular schedule, working in the morning and teaching at the Safe Haven School in the afternoons. There have been a few teams come through after a short break and so was nice to see some fresh faces and talk with them. We are delighted to see Rebekah with us again (she came before, in February, for a short time). She has been to CHO numerous times and will be working with the ‘School on a Mat’ project and Safe Haven School implementing a new curriculum over the next six months. Rebekah works for one of the NGOs (Hope for the Nations – works in nearly 30 countries worldwide, founded in Canada) that support and sponsor CHO.

We ended May mostly working at the building site for the new house for trafficked boys at the Safe Haven Centre. That building now is nearing completion and is currently having the roof put on. There is a lack of finance for this building at the moment so your prayers would be so appreciated for money to finance the construction.
Since then we have been building a road through the Safe Haven and will continue to do this for the rest of the month (well, until it’s finished!). There is a mud/dirt road already running through it, but with the rainy season on its way (it is raining more frequently now in the afternoons) we have been putting small stones on top to keep the road in place, making it possible to walk on when the rain comes.


Paul, Calum and Thea working on the road (Alex is working, just taking the picture!)

We joined with several hundred children on the 1st of June to parade around Poipet for ‘International Children’s Day’, to promote children’s rights and stand against trafficking and child labour. Every year, CHO sponsor and organise (together with local schools) a parade around the city like this. Out of the hundreds of children that came, over 200 were kids from ‘School on a Mat’. It was a hot, but joyful and special day.


School children at the start point of the parade



Parade on the main road at the top of the City

With Rebekah now implementing a new curriculum into the Safe Haven and Mat schools, we have started to do more varied lessons in both schools. We have done art, music and puppetry lessons with the children; drawing, weaving, making shakers and puppets, with more diverse lessons to come. A new art exchange program has begun, with the Safe Haven and Mat School children drawing postcards which will be sent to schools in Lancaster (England), Kelowna (Canada) and Hong Kong. The children in those schools will then send their own postcards back to these children, so it is exciting to see the beginning of this process.

Other updated news; in addition to our morning devotional talks, we will now speak at church on Sunday morning’s – Alex started at the end of May with Paul and Calum to follow. We unfortunately said goodbye to Dara, who has been translating for us since arriving in Cambodia. He has been a good friend and fun to be with. We wish him all the best. On Fridays we are now playing basket ball with the Canadians at Victory Church, down the street, and a few Filipino guys who work at the casinos. There has unfortunately been a stop to the STREET outreach event due to some difficulties. Please pray for fresh ideas for an outreach project that we can start before we leave in just over a month.

Our time left in Cambodia suddenly seems somewhat limited (the time is flying past), but please keep us in your prayers.
With our love and prayers,

Blessings from Cambodia ...

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