I’m in the middle of my fourth week of teaching now… The time really does go by a lot faster now that I’m busy and have things to do… and feel needed. Classes are going pretty well. I think I enjoy teaching math the most, much to my surprise. English is alright, though I’m realizing all the more how confusing our language with its endless rules. It’s good to review on all these things that I’ve forgotten about, especially in math. Right now I doing quadratic equations with 8th grade. It’s pretty hard sometimes to teach from these books they use. There really isn’t such thing as a teachers book, and the student books don’t explain the concepts and rules very well. I’m sure without the amazing teaching of Mr. Carle and Mr. Chinnock in math class I would be totally lost. And, of course, without Mrs. Lewis, these students would be even more confused then they are already.
Anyway, it seems as though I’ve been going into town quite a bit these past two weeks. It’s always just for miscellaneous stuff like getting papers copied or buying fruit at the market. Last week I had to go in to drop off my passport at a travel agency. With the visa situation here in Cambodia, I have to just go one month at a time; they won’t let me get a 3-month visa–you have to have a business visa for that, which I don’t have, and which they also won’t give me. So, just buying one month’s worth of visa is going to be a pain and quite expensive. I was a little wary about leaving my passport with them for this week; they have to send it to Phnom Penh (the capital) to get the visa. I’m just praying I get it back safely.
These past couple nights, some of the students have been coming over to our house to sing some song with us. Me, Maria, and about 5 students are trying to prepare a couple songs to sing at campmeeting. It’s a stuggle for me to just overlook their out-of-tuneness… They sing their own Cambodian songs great, but when it comes to English songs… I don’t know why it makes such a difference, but hopefully these “special songs,” as they call them, will turn out okay for campmeeting.
For a couple days, there was another volunteer here, Freddy, who is also from California. I don’t know how he heard about this place ’cause he’s not a Christian, but he had planned on staying 3 weeks. Unfortunately, his family was having financial trouble because of the economy or something, so he had to leave after just 2 days. It was kind of sand talking to him. When I asked if he was a Christian, he said he has come to a point in his life where he doesn’t need a God. He feels that a person can possess all the qualities of a Christian without actually being one. It was almost depressing to talk to him… I just pray that God will continue to work on his heart and show him that he really can’t do it all on his own.
Well, not too much exciting things have happened around here. I’m just pluggin’ along… I guess my dad is leaving for Micronesia in a couple days, and so for two weeks, our whole family will be in different parts of the world. Pretty amazing. Again, thank you all for your prayers–they are appreciated and needed. GB!
