Cambodia Day 19

According to the CIA World Fact Book, Cambodia is 95% Buddhist; but they are not. If you ask 95% of the Cambodians what religion they are they would say Buddhist; but they are not.

Even though there are wats (pagodas) everywhere you look throughout the country, and even though these wats are home to Buddhist monks and their female counterparts, and although any Cambodian can be a monk if he chooses, the people at large know almost nothing about Buddhism nor do they care to know.

The religion I hear described by my students, my translator, and my host is a very individualized mixture of Buddhism, Hinduism, Ancestry worship, and uncategorized superstition.

Perhaps this accounts for the almost universal involvement with Spirit House worship. The only constant is that the Spirit House houses spirits. Who or what they are is very much up to each individual. The spirits may be ancestors who have not yet reincarnated or they may be good spirits that protect and bless a house or a business. The Spirit House may be home for a spirit that inhabited a grand tree that needed to be cut down to make room for a rice field. And, of course, there are the evil spirits, but we would rather not talk about them.

The mother of one of my students bought a new Spirit House last week for $50 US. He reasoned with her that she really needed to spend the money for rice but she believes it is money well spent. Some people pay as much as $3,000 for their Spirit Houses.

The landlord of the house I am staying in has a nice Spirit House in our front yard. Unfortunately his spirit has done a sorry job of protecting the house from thieves.

For the devout, the most common worship carried out with the Spirit House is to bring an offering of food every 8 days and to burn an incense stick daily. For the less devout, they make up their own schedule or let the spirit fend for itself.

Cambodia Day 16

Saturday I was a tourist. When you are a tourist there are two places in Phnom Penh that you must see; not because you want to see them but because you must; because that is what tourists do.

The first place is a school turned prison turned torture chamber. It is called S-21. It’s Khmer name is Tuol Sleng Tuol simply means the highest point around. Sleng, when used as an adjective means “supplying guilt”. As a noun it refers to two different Cambodian trees, both of which are poisonous.

In 1975, under the infamous reign of Pol Pot, the school was converted into the prison that now stands as the genocide museum; home to unspeakable torture and death for huge numbers of political enemies, professionals, academicians, and not a few foreigners. Age and gender were no deterrents to the Khmer Rouge as they attempted to force a new society where all men are equal and some are more equal than others.

In a country the size of Oklahoma that has less than 14 million people today, 2 million men, women, and children were killed in a period of 4 years before the blood letting came to an end.

Many of the dead were buried in mass graves on the south edge of Phnom Penh in a place simply called “the killing fields.” Thousands of the skulls from bodies that were buried there are now on display in a solemn memorial structure with the hope that it will serve as a warning against such a thing ever happening again.

My interpreter, Tawn, was born in the middle of that atrocity. He survived because of relatives who were able to keep him in a hospital where there was still food and because he was “a cute baby.” He says that neither in jest nor as a matter of pride, but just as a matter of fact. Many of his relatives did not survive.

There are 13 students in class now. I asked how many had close relatives killed by the Khmer Rouge. All but two raised their hands. Their parents and grandparents have told them stories that are too sad to even think about.

How awesome it is that as Christians our Kingdom is not of this world.

Cambodia Day 13

I suppose it had to happen; I have lost my solo-guest status. Dennis and Sharon Welch arrived from the States and are staying with us at the Dolan’s house while they find a place to rent. Dennis has just graduated from Sunset International and he and his wife have moved to Cambodia to assist Rich and Rhonda with the school.

They are committed to becoming fluent in the Khmer language in the shortest time possible. I admire them, but I don’t envy them. It is a most difficult language for us Westerners to learn. It has way too many consonants and way too many vowel combinations, and way too much variation in syntax, and none of the letters or numbers look anything like I ever saw.

I own a 1989 Toyota Camry that I bought new. Donna and I still use it as a second car. For several years after it came out it remained number one on the “most stolen car” list in the USA. Even today it is in the top ten. I never could understand why it had that distinction until now. Driving around Phnom Penh recently I saw a maroon 1989 Camry just like mine. I started noticing and I counted 8 maroon ones and I don’t know how many of different colors. Even our landlord has a 1989 Camry that has been converted to run on natural gas. Mystery solved.

I have just crossed the half way mark in my teaching here. The students took their final in Sacrificial Systems today. Fifteen hours is about all I can stand of that subject and probably more than the students wanted. But they stayed faithfully engaged and clearly saw the types of Christ that are so abundantly represented there. The morning class in Romans will continue another two weeks and the afternoon class will be devoted to looking at “Seven Habits of Highly Effective Christians” adapted from Dr. Steven Covey’s famous book.

I could easily be a weather forecaster here. The forecast is always the same: “hot with a chance of rain.” How easy is that?

Cambodia Day 9

OK, so you don’t like to pay $3.50 for a gallon of milk. Here in Phnom Penh (pronounced Pnom Pen) that gallon of milk will set you back about $8.50. If it is any consolation, the milk we got today has an expiration date of February 2009.

The official currency here is the Riel. It has an exchange rate of about 4,000 Riel to $1 US dollar. There are no coins, but every place accepts US dollars and change is made with the local Riel. (1,000 Real is equivalent to a quarter.) A haircut is 3,000 Riel or six bits if you are an Okie.

We drove around Phnom Penh Saturday and visited the Wat Phnom. A wat is a place for the monks to live and for the people to bring their food offerings. They burn a candle while they offer the food and when the candle goes out that means the gods/spirits/whatever are finished eating so they then take the food back and eat it themselves.

Legend has it that in 1372 Lady Penh fished a floating Koki tree out of the river and found four Buddha statues in the log. She built a hill (Phnom means hill) and a small temple (wat) on the sight; thus the name of the city, Phnom Penh.

We crossed back and forth over the Mekong River a couple of times. I’ll have some interesting pictures to post when I get back home. We also visited the Central Market which is not to be confused with the Central Market operated by HEB in Houston.

This morning in church we had a visitor from Bangladesh. We sang “The Old Rugged Cross.” The Khmer sang in Khmer; the Americans sang in English; Jonathan sang in Bengali; and our awesome God understood them all. Jonathan is in Cambodia for a regional meeting of World Vision.

Cambodia Day 7

One week of school is now finished; there are three weeks to go. I am well pleased with the participation and enthusiasm of the students. Some have had an amazing amount of training in the short time they have been Christians and a few of them are just starting out in their Bible study. It is nice to see the students who have been in the school a year or so go out of their way to help the new students get started.

Those of you who are Church of Christers will be thrilled to know that the church in Phnom Penh is now officially a sanctioned Church of Christ and on a straight path to heaven by virtue of the fact that I have taught them to sing 728b. True, it has been translated into Khmer (pronounced Ku ‘my) and it is not in any bound book, but it is 728b non-the-less. For those of you who don’t know what 728b is, just ignore this paragraph.

Since Cambodia is 95% Buddhist, I spent quite a bit of time studying Buddha and Buddhism before coming over here. Today I opened some dialog with the students to see how much they know about the national religion so we can do some comparisons between it and Christianity. What I am seeing is that they and the vast majority of the country know very little about the religion. They are born Buddhist but they receive little or no training in it. It is quite different from what I have experienced with the Hindu and Muslims.

The students seemed quite surprised to learn that Buddha himself taught that there is no god and that included him.

All of our students were Buddhists just a few years ago and most of them are the only Christian in their family. Their families don’t seem to mind them converting to Christianity but they are not anxious to follow suit. But our students are getting a good foundation in Christianity; they are putting down deep roots, and it will bear fruit.

Cambodia Day 4

The Cambodian churches use a song book that has Western hymns that have been translated into Khmer in the first half and native Cambodian songs in the back half. The Cambodian songs are often native folk melodies that have Christian verses attached. They are quite lovely to hear. I can’t vouch for their messages.

They generally sing one of each to begin their service. (All services and Bible classes begin with two – and only two – songs and a prayer.)

Since they don’t read music and since they have only had an opportunity to learn a few of the Western hymns, they end up singing the same ones over and over.

I was asked if I would teach them the melody to some more of our songs and of course I am happy to do so. So I have them listen to me as I sing the song first in English; then they begin joining in, singing Khmer along with my English. I don’t know if the results can be called a joyful noise or not, but it is what it is and they are happy to be learning what to them are new songs.

We are beginning to fall into a routine. I have the same Tuk-Tuk driver every day but I still don’t know his name. I couldn’t pronounce it any way so we just bow and smile. The ebb and flow of traffic here is not describable, it has to be experienced to be believed.

I am actually getting the names of the students down much faster than I had hoped. Of course what I call them doesn’t sound like what they call each other but they don’t seem to mind. Several of them are able to communicate with me in English but they would miss a great deal of the material if it were not translated.

Today we had two girls and two more boys enroll in the school. All four of them are very shy but I expect that will change as they get assimilated into the program. There is still a Pakistani man we are expecting to return to the school if he can make his way back into the country.

I continue to enjoy good health, appetite, and sleep. God is good.

Cambodia Day three

The first day of classes is now over. The attendance is still in flux as some students are not yet back from break and some new students are being considered. It is looking like we will have about 12 students. That seems like an appropriate Biblical number.

The students are very impressive. I am looking forward to getting to know them better. A fine Christian named Tawn is my interpreter and he is very good. He has great Bible knowledge and excellent English.

Let me introduce you to Cheav (pronounced Chew). He is about 22 years old, the second of five children. His father died when he was about 8. Ages and birthdates are kind of iffy here. They use two different calendars and don’t keep very good records.

Cheav is the only one in his family who is Christian. The rest are Buddhist, as indeed he was up until a year and a half ago. He was converted by Tawn, my translator. It is remarkable how quickly he has grown in his Christian walk and knowledge of the Bible. He gave the sermon during chapel this morning and he sounded very impressive. Of course I couldn’t understand a word but I could follow his thoughts through the passages of scripture he posted on the white board in English.

I had my first trips in a Tuk-Tuk today. Rich and Rhonda are in Cambodian language classes every afternoon so Rich was not available to shuttle me back and forth to school; thus the Tuk-Tuk. A Tuk-Tuk is a small carriage pulled by a smaller motorcycle.

Traffic in Phnom Penh is much like you would expect. The white strip down a few of the roads and the rare traffic light are merely suggestions. There is no such thing as a stop sign which would probably be a waste of material anyway.

Small motorcycles (motos) are the primary vehicles but the wealthy love the large expensive SUVs from the States and Europe. Everyone just assumes that anyone paying that much for a car automatically has the right-of-way; otherwise it is everyone for himself.

None of that is a problem for me. I’m just along for the ride.