ice cream in bread - feels sorta awkward

May 23

For the last month, I've lived on the top floor of ADRA, with the associate director, named Ann, a quirky brown-eyed Canadian, who was born and raised and still continues to serve in the mission field. She grew up in Budapest, and all around Africa, and when she worked 6 years in Russia as an auditor, she still said she did most of her shopping in Zimbabwe (she actually hasn’t lived much in Canada at all). She works past midnight most weeknights, so I don’t see her much during the work week, but it has been amazing living with her for the last of my time here. She'll tell me stories about taking the ferry to Norway, weekends in Estonia, and being rioted in Bangladesh, crowds of Muslims throwing rocks at her car windows. She made Russian dumplings the other night, and they were delicious. To say I admire her would be an understatement.

My last day in Cambodia, and I deeply inhaled the Phnom Penh smog in my lungs for the last time as I took a motorbike taxi back home from downtown. Home again soon, at last.

May 22

Eating stolen Weet-Bix straight out of the box, slowly adapting a deep numbness to world chaos. I don't have CNN and have only sketchy resources, but I heard that the death toll in China since the earthquake has reached 30,000, and that because of poor construction, most schools collapsed, causing an unusual high number of deaths in children. Sad. My friends from Myanmar (Burma) wanted to return home to visit in July, but over muffled phone lines, their families told them they better not. They also told them that all of the Adventists were safe, but I met a Burmese ADRA worker last week who had opposite reports.

Had my first real taste of fresh durian today. Had sort of written it off after having bad paste and weird ice cream. Plus the smell and the scary, spiky exterior that literally pops car tires and could do you some serious damage if you fell on one wrong. But my roommate Ann and her friend Mark decided I couldn't go home without having the real stuff. So they bought some for me the other night and we had it with dinner. It was amazing. And when I was eating it I couldn't smell it at all. And it was creamy and smooth like custard and mildly sweet, and I finally understood all the hype.

I talked to a friend the other day, expressing the year's list of beautiful letdowns. And he almost started to laugh, saying he always thought I was a bit idealistic, admirable in a way, a warm and silly foolishness, naivety in the way I always want to assume the best in others. But when the words came out of his mouth, the sense it made only felt relieving. Jesus upset the tables in the temple, Jesus taught us that while we should love the sinner, we should hate the sin. It's okay to feel desperation and rage and disappointment. The world is unjust, messed up, so maddening. But I still have hope. Change is still possible. Maybe that's idealistic of me again, but I still believe I can be a small part of this change.

May 13

Just got back from an hour of traditional Khmer massage. I found there was a place down the street run by acid victims for $4 an hour. They did some pretty hardcore bone-cracking chiropractor moves and positioned you into some crazy yoga stretches; walked out feeling pretty good. I'm going to be really sore tomorrow.

Rode my bike underneath the trees, deliberately under the ones with low branches, pulling down on the leaves. Walked around Toul Kork a bit. Psa’s certainly awaken multiple senses. The smell of garbage and smoked sausages wafts through the air, smoke stings your eyes, exhaust from motorbikes hot on your legs. The ground is wet and muddy from regular rainfall, and emaciated old men stand shirtless smoking cigarettes, inhaling deeply, further exposing their ribs, saggy nipples, concave chests. Walked by baskets of baguettes, raw fish heads, deep-fried bananas, frogs, snakes on a stick, realized it's all grown pretty mundane.

Sreywin got in a moto accident over the Khmer New Year holiday and she was out of school for a week because she'd been in the hospital. I saw her older sister Soriya at Psa Mnong who told me she'd be out soon and back to school, and as I walked out the entrance, she yelled to my back, "Teacher, she misses you!" She arrived back to school the following morning, kids tugged on my arm informing me of her return, and parted out of the way to reveal her standing in the back of the line, arms folded, eyes and face down at the ground. I walked to her and put my hand beneath her chin, and only then did she show me her face. Her left eye had an enormous abscess of blood collected in the corner, bruises underneath both eyes dipping down past her nose. She looked awful, like one of those kids in the horror movies, little girl swinging on the creaky swing in the yard. She's easily the hardest working and most respected girl in the class, and so it was odd to see her looking so pitiful. She later noticed me avoid looking her in the eye, and called me on it, my insides resonating with guilt. "My sister said I look like a goose," she said and laughed. I would have thought to call her many other things before that, but I kissed her on the head, and whispered in her ear "Nee-uh suh-aht" (You are beautiful). She smiled silently and carried on with her work, because she knew I had meant it.

I cried talking to a friend on the phone about one of my students named Naro, living proof really that the world isn't fair. Proof that karma isn't real, filling me with rage, how unjust and violating it all is, that children exist with such heart, humility, and no opportunities, barely necessities. And others not so far away live in material excess, and don't appreciate it or realize it could be different, and history only repeats itself or grows worse until we die. I don’t think my reception was all that great or if she really heard, because she hardly responded. But it awoke something in me, a reaffirmation, realization, that I care deeply about what I do and whom I encounter in life, and find that a gift. I can’t help but feel blessed by it all, when at the same time it pains me, this unveiling of life's most disconcerting truths. I’m leaving in 2 weeks to go home, truth be told, it’ll be a bittersweet day. But with more honesty, I speak, I am more than ready for it.

May 7

numinous, and I will follow...
Today was one in which I had wished for the sun to shine a bit more on me, although it didn’t shine much on anyone here in Cambodia. It’s still pouring rain.

Despite my current bitterness, rain is one of my favorite parts of living in Asia. I love warm rain, flooded streets, thunder, lightning, volatile skies. But after being told the address to the wrong airline office by a careless travel agent, I found myself being driven around town by a duplicitous motodope (moped taxi) who kept reassuring me he knew where we were going, when we both knew he had no idea at all. After I ordered the man to drop me off on the side of the road, throwing him a fistful of wet cash, I wandered the streets, and finally arrived upon the office on foot, to argue with the agent, in broken English. When that ended with no success, I returned back to the street, where the rain was violently coming down in such excess, that when the drops fell, they literally stung my skin. I rubbed my arms, checking for welts. My white blouse within seconds became see-through, my undergarments exposed, and once again I was blatantly ogled by old men, drunks, scrutinized by families passing by, small children, the homeless.

I’ve been trying for months to muster up the courage and articulation to truly speak my mind with deep honesty. Things are not going as well as I would have hoped, although I did have months of experiences in which I will forever hold invaluable in my heart. But for a significant stretch of time, within these past 8 months, I’ve sat with my fingers rested on the keyboard, typing pages of disheveled thoughts, to after hold the delete key for several minutes, watching it all slowly disappear, wishing as if life’s problems could vanish in the same way. But alas, life goes on, and I pray most nights with my eyes shut tight, for the Lord to give me strength to do his will, and for clarity on what his will might entail. And so I ask, you friends, that if you care for me, as I do for you, you would pray for me, encourage me, have faith in me, that I might live a life in which I feel fulfilled and happy, in which I am pleasing my own soul and my maker, following the path He has already lain beneath my feet. Can mercy find a way?