The glorious food! Part 1

One thing's for sure, if you are on a Cambodia mission trip with DUMC, your stomaches will be satisfied to the full because CMS (Cambodia Methodist Services) has a great cook!!



In fact, haha, you guys are going to say that we get pampered and are super spoilt, because if you go out on village outreaches for the whole day.......

.....guess what, your cook travels with you!!! The cook would bring her pots and pans and ingredients, load it on the van...and stop at a church member's place in the village to cook. Once your outreach is done, you just go to the house to enjoy your hot lunch. Then, everyone will pack up and move on to the next village in the afternoon.....HOW COOL is that???

Another highlight for me on this trip is trying out the different kinds of Cambodian food...
You can be sure the food served is 100% fresh...because outside the city, there's no electricity except generators. This means, there's no fridges so everything cooked is bought fresh from the market everyday!

Fresh water fish soup which has a sourish taste to make you hungry...and ginger chicken plus veggies. The fish is very fresh and has a sliky texture; though the small bones can be a problem.

Cambodians love their port (curuck), their vegetables and their soups! We had soup for almost every meal. Yummy, especially with white rice and....chili! The chili there is very hot, perfect when a slice of chili is dipped in soya sauce and paired with a slice of pork......wahaha!

Cambodian curry: Not too spicy, with a mix of sweet & spicy taste, very fragrant too...it's so good we lapped it up, and ate rounds and rounds of rice. Imagine, curry with white steaming rice!!!!!! One of the best dishes!

Sorry for the pic quality...this is fried chicken with a special fish sauce+pepper+soya sauce dip. Nice nice nice.


This is what our cook cooked during our outreach from her mobile kitchen. The soup is kind of like our salted veg soup with pork and short, juicy taugeh with pork again. The taugeh are like those from Ipoh.

Ok, a pause first: let me teach you a Khmer phrase, hok bai is eat rice in Khmer.

This is one of the best dinners we had. We ate with all our 10 Cambodian pastors and their wives. The top dish is some kind of vege dish with pinapples and tomatoes. The one with the leafy green is pork...the supposedly star dish & highlight for everyone. The soup is good!!! Chicken soup with don't know what vege. Oh and desert was sweet dragon fruit! The food's so good that you'd jsut eat and eat and eat, only to realize you've consumed 2-3 plates of rice.
For the people there, this is considered a feast. In fact the things we eat everyday is a feast to the average Cambodian. Most of the people only eat vegetables and rice, the poorer ones rice and salty fish sauce only.

I don't have a better picture of this but must put it up....cuz the joke among us was that we were drinking detergen. Seriously, look at the colour!!! And oh yea, it was also the one and only time we drank ice in the village, because we were warned not to drink ice anywhere else except in CMS because of hygeine purposes.

Yea looks gross?? But nice! Guess why it's green? It's actually kangkung soup...boiled until it disintergrates into this colour. Another soup that's very deliciousssss there is seaweed soup. It's also a local soup...I didn't know Cambodians used seaweed in their cooking. It's gooood!

I know you'd say we were spoilt AGAIN. We were in a village for outreach when they noticed we were thristy. So on the spot they got down some coconuts from the tree, cut it, for us!!! Truly in Cambodia I felt I was being blessed far far more than blessing the people there.

The glorious food. Part 2

Our youth camp ended on Friday lunch time. Then it was the start of R&R, rest and relax for us. You see, in every DUMC mission trip, there would be 1 day scheduled for the team to rest and relax where we get to SHOP!, sight see, EAT! and do the tourisy stuff! Yey, fun rite?

We get to spend 1 day and 1 night of R&R in Phnom Penh, the capital city.
The adventure starts on the way back from Baray. It takes 2.5 hours from Baray to Phnom Penh, and our missionary travelled with us. Along the way, we get to stop at each village to sample their food. Each village have their own specialty and food! Our missionary told us that she feels God is very fair, because He blesses each village with a special produce.

First stop is the Baray Market where I got to eat my SPIDER and TOAD! :)

Oh wow, a plate full of spiders..yum! hahaha. Each costs around 50 malaysian cents

WELCOME TO THIS EPISODE OF FEAR FACTOR. I'm trying hard not to laugh, cuz only 2 out of 9 of us dared to eat the spider and thus both us were filmed and photographed a lot in our "experiment" I actually have a video recording of the whole process, but I won't embarrass myself and show it.

The spider is big (half the size of my hand), black, with furry legs, cindy..haha!
It's fried in garlic oil so it's nice! Yumm..haha. The legs are crispy, the body's a little mushy though..now I can say this...I'VE EATEN A SPIDER AND SURVIVED TO TELL THE TALE. :)

They would walk up to the van/car to sell you the food. This is the "beheaded" toad.

Toad taste just like otak-otak..the head is already removed. Kind of delicious cuz it's stuffed with spices.

From top: Palm fruit, lotus plant, lotus seed, Cambodia apple.

Next stop was in another village for Palm fruit or what we call sea cocunut in Malaysia. This tasted okay for me. The pokok pinang is actually the national tree in Cambodia. Another stop in the following village was to buy lotus plant. I'm quite a jakun cuz I've never eaten fresh lotus seeds, I've only eaten the ones you find in mooncakes. It tastes like nuts with a softer texture. Then we continued on our journey and stopped by this village that sold Cambodian apples. Yea seriously, they are called Cambodian apples. It's kind of sweet with a sourish tinge, quite good as well! :)
This is our favourite stop! I love the hammocks!

There's shacks like what you see in the picture, full of hammocks. What you do is buy the corn, then you can sit on the hammock while eating. The corn is very very sweet! Juicy, and you have to bite carefully otherwise the juice would drip down your face. WAH! And, the wind that blows while you sit on the hammock gives a cool and refreshing breeze. If you come later in the afternoon, you'd get to see the sun set over the paddy fields while lying on the hammock, eating the golden corn. This is where the Cambodian people come and pak tou. So romantic..hahahaha.

The next day, we went to the Russian Market in Phnom Penh for breakfast. And that's where I tasted the BEST BEEF NOODLES ever! Seriously! With Great Coffee!

The beef noodles is favourful, the beef balls not too tough, but springy enough..and drinking the soup doesn't leave you with thristy from ajinomoto like in Malaysia. The coffee is grown in the hills of Cambodia. It's thick, very "kau" and strong! Just like Ipoh white coffee, kind of like that. (koa fey ohlay) white coffee in Khmer.

Then for lunch, we went to this famous ice-cream and bread shop. Since Cambodia was a former french colony, they eat french loaves instead of bread. We got to ate the pate, beef stew with toasted french bread and DURIAN ICE-CREAM!

You start of by eating the pate first. It's basically french bread with salad kind of garnish, sour pickels and ham. Kind of like a starter.
Then the beef stew would come. You dip the french loaf in the sauce and eat, or you can put the beef between the bread and eat. Joel loved this so much he ate 2 plates! The beef is cooked so tender that it is soft and easy to chew. The broth is thick with spice.

Heaven in a coconut.
But of course the highlight would be the ice-cream in coconut. They empty the coconut, pour the coconut water into a glass for you to drink and serve you the ice-cream in the coconut shell. I had the combination of durian and cempedak ice-cream! Hahaha, glorious! Cuz normally durian is "heaty" when eaten, but when it's turned into ice-cream, you still get the favour, but now it's cold and refreshing!

Imagine, we are on a mission trip..and feast like Kings and Queens! The food is very good because the missionaries know which shop serves the best dishes...so the experience is even better than that of being a tourist in Cambodia. You eat where the locals eat!

Oh yea, these are the durian biscuits we had when we were in Baray. Very very very nice. Sorry, my vocab is limited, I can only describe everything as, nice, delicious. ;) The cream has a strong durian taste, creamy and sweet. The ones I brought back from Cambodia was from a different company and didn't taste as estatically nice as those we ate there!!!

Okun la...(meaning, very good in Khmer)

Caught in action EATING!

See, next time if there's a mission trip, join it! You people should have come along with me! :)

Oh wait. I must tell you about my bettle eating experience. Just before we were heading to the airport, we dropped by at Central Market. Central Market's a tourist attraction where the dome is supposedly the biggest dome in SEA? or something like that.

I just HAD to try eating grasshopper before I left. But I also bought the black bettle. The grasshopper was okay, crispy just like eating shrimps. Kind of delicious in a morbid way..haha. But believe me, the bettle was horrible! HORRIBLE. You know, the kind of smell that cocroaches emit, bitter...it's that kind of taste, exploading in the mouth. Don't ever eat that!!!! That was the only thing I ate in Cambodia that was not nice. The rest, was..wow! :)

Saying goodbye is the hardest thing to do

Someone took a liking to me in Cambodia
...and I couldn't help but feel the same way too

........saying goodbye was the hardest thing to do, I wish I could pack him and bring him back.

And I miss him now. Sigh.

He's so cute! And the way he holds your hand melts your heart.


Before you start saying that I'm being "scandalous" again, let me clarify okay ppl!
I really didn't do anything and I really don't know why of all the people from my team, he spent time with me.

His name is Daniel.

And he's 4 years old. Haha, yeah, breathe a sigh of relief...

I know I am definately not a mary poppins kind of person; not an entertaining or funny person. I can't tell jokes, make funny faces (yea maybe my face is naturally cacated? haha), or tell amusing stories. Don't really know how to make toys like paper aeroplanes (to my defense I come from a family of girls..). Quite a boring person actually. That's why it's always unexplainable if children like following me around...because I don't know why would they want to stick around a boring person like me...

Daniel is Ps Kenneth and Yin Meng's youngest son. Ps Kenneth's family have been in Cambodia for 3 years.

So cute right? I want a son like that!!! Hahahahaha

Having him holding on to my hand around the streets of Phnom Penh is scary...for me because the traffic in Phnom Penh is really chaotic. Motorcycles zoom from every corner, plus the fact that we are not used to traffic coming from the right side of the road (just like America) which makes looking out for traffic harder.

In fact the trick is to not cross when cars are driving and to cross when motorcycles are coming your way.......because all (by faith) motorcycles give way to pedestrians in Phnom Penh. It's just like walking into oncoming motorcycles..and trusting that they will stop for you. (they do but this "system" takes time to get used to).

And going to the Russian market for breakfast with him can daunting, not because I don't enjoy his company...but the people carrying hot soup there don't bother to watch out for kids. The market is kind of dark too with narrow lanes, sometimes blocked by goods.

Yet it's fun to play with him. To let him win all the "lets see who can push the other person's hand harder" game..(maybe that's why he likes me huh? haha). To answer all his numerous questions. To hear his husky voice (his natural voice is kind of like someone having a sore throat). To talk to him and answer all his questions, and hold his hand everywhere.

And on the way to the airport, you just don't know what to say when he starts asking "Are you coming back?" "When are you coming back?" "Mummy why I cannot go to Malaysia?" "Mummy I want to go back to Malaysia."

The hardest question was..."when are we going back to Malaysia?"
...and Yin Meng had to answer honestly "2009"

At the airport, had to start keeping a distance, so that he won't keep on asking the questions.
It's so sad to leave him behind.

Truly it's not easy for Ps Kenneth and Yin Ming to come to Cambodia with their family. They will be moving from the city to Kampot...2.5 hours away, to a place without electricity or running water. It's a sacrifice because they would have to home-school their children and set up home in a place without any Christians.

Their house in Kampot is still under-construction and delayed because they can't buy timber pillers for the house. It's stressful because they have to move out of their Phnom Penh house by September. Their kids, Rose-Sharon, Jonathan and Daniel also have to sacrifice as they would be living in a wooden house, with no internet or phone line and without friends their age.

It's especially hard for Kenneth and Yin Ming to make the decision to come to Cambodia because Jonathan has a hole in heart problem, and the health care system in Cambodia is not up to par. One morning during devotions, Kenneth was sharing about his worries for Jonathan, almost with tears because he wants the best for his child as well.

Yet they are faithfully serving God. And even though their children may miss out on the latest games and gadgets, they get to experience different cultures and grow in maturity and love of God.

What did we do there? The youths part 1

Just some background info. DUMC actually sends out 4 mission teams a year to Cambodia. Each year out of the 4, 1 would be a youth team that goes to help organize a youth camp for the youths in Baray district. Baray is a district in the province of Kampong Thom where Esther, our veteran missionary from DUMC is based. In the 11 years that she's been there, from stratch, there's now 10 Cambodian pastors under CMS (Cambodia Methodist Services) and 22 churches around Baray.

Our team is the youth team, so the main reason we were there was to connect to the youths and help them with their camp. We would do the preaching, the workshops..all translated of course, they will organize games, praise and worship (let me tell you, their praise and worship ROCKS, literally..haha..will blog more about that later).

Basically our schedule was as such:
Friday: Arrival
Saturday: House visitations in villages
Sunday: Preaching & night session with Pastors and wives
Monday: Village outreaches & night session with Pastors and wives
Tuesday to Friday: Camp
Friday and Saturday: Rest and Relax in Phnom Penh

Anyway, let me share some things that are very precious to me, that I MUST write this down so that I'd never forget.


It was the 1st day since our arrival. It was a sunny saturday and everyone was eager to go out for some action. Driving to the village, was the vast scenary of flat paddy fields punctuated with palm tress. Simply picture perfect. Sigh.

Anyway, Joel, Debbie and I were in the 1st group together with Ps Kenneth and our translator Piset. We went to visit the house of a man and his family. The daughter was around 19 years old. She was a Christian, so was her sister. Her parents were not.

And so I asked her if she was going for our youth camp. She said no. But she said her sister will be going.
With a smile and in kind of a joking/persuading way, I said (translated) "Come! It'll be fun. Come! I'm sure u'd enjoy it, your sister is going some more..blah blah blah."

She answered with a sad tone "I can't go because one family can only send 1 person. Because my sister is going, I have to stay back to help up in the fields."
You could tell that she wanted to go too. She was nearly in tears.

My heart dropped. I was humbled and struck speechless.
Because I immediately recalled the times, when we in Malaysia feel reluctant to go for a certain event because we rather watch a movie, watch TV, relax in the mall, sleep.....

and definately not because we have to work in the fields; to enable someone else the chance to go for a camp.

How we take forgranted our camps, our Christian activities. I remember that for the CF camp we had to pratically beg people to come. Do fancy videos, print posters. Employ persuasive techniques. Hold it at some fancy place. And here, people were dying to go and simply couldn't.

The good news is that when Debbie share about creation and Jesus, her father accepted the Lord! And when we were praying the sinners prayer for her father, she cried tears of joy.

I knew I just had to say this to her before I left. "It's okay that you can't come to the camp. That's why we come to you. And I want to share with you this year's camp verse. For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you, plans to give you a good hope and a good future: Jeremiah 29:11."

And I discovered God's word transcends culture, transcends countries, transcends social class.

Despite our different backgrounds, this verse that means so much to me, also meant a lot to her. In just 1 hour visiting her house, the lesson I gleamed was unbelieveable. And it helped me love the people there more.

So beautiful right? The things God allows one to see, to be carved on one's heart...

What did we do there? The youths part 2

Of course, not everything is always cheery and dandy. Real life has its bumps and humps. (okay..i don't know what's with the rhyming craze..)

There was a minor disagreement on the youth camp, 1 night before the camp was about to start. I shall not mention names, but to share what happen...not because it's a nice thing to write about but only to show how different the problems of ministry in Cambodia is compared to home.

The disagreement was about the number of youths that would be allowed to join the camp.
You'd be probably going.."huh?" cuz...
Why would there be a disagreement on the number of youths joining a camp rite?
The more the better? Don't we struggle to even reach our targetted number of participants every camp?
Yea, that was what I thought.

You see, resources are scare in Cambodia, so much so that each pastor can only invite a fixed number of participants for the camp. There is a lack of housing for the camp to accomodate 180 youths. Some of the youths slept in the church, in the mission house, in the missionary's house AND....in church members' houses.
I am just so amazed that the people there would open their houses for 10 (yea, 10 teenage strangers for each house!!!) to let the youths stay and sleep! Even more amazing when you take into consideration that Cambodian houses HAVE NO ROOMS! Cambodian houses ain't very big either!
Sleeping in your own home with 10 youths whom you never met before? Sleeping in 1 room with 10 youths you don't know? I would hesitate to even have 3 friends over in my room... what more 3 strangers to share a house with me? Or 10 strangers to share a room?....

Really generous of the people there...my heart just melted when I heard about this...

Anyway, the disagreement came about because a youth leader told the pastors that it's okay to fit in a few more participants for the camp. But because there was just no place to house the participants, our missionary had to say no. It was hard to say no, but the missionary had no choice. The youth leader was disappointed because he wanted to give more people a chance to join the camp.

Can you imagine if there same thing was to happen in Malaysia? Turning people away because we have no room? Going overquota?

Youths who desperately want to come so much but just can't?

In the end, there was no choice but to stick to the quota.
But thankfully the disagreement was settled.

You know, in some sense I wish that such "disagreements" would happen in Malaysia; CF or church...of course not because I love to argue...but rather, it would mean there's too little room for too many people. Where we won't even need to ask people to come, but people would be so eager, lining up, anxiously waiting to come to church, cf, conferences, camps etc.

What did we do there? The youths part 3

The main reason we were there was to help up in the youth camp. The worship and games were done by the locals while we organized workshops and the talks. Kau Sern and Uncle Aaron were the main speakers and they spoke passionately about topics like "You are special!" "God has a plan for your life" "You can change your world"

It's really amazing to see the youths sit through the sessions and take notes (haha, I myself seldom take sermon notes..) It's really not easy to stay awake after lunch, added with the heat as the sun penetrates the trampoline tent.

But the youths were really supportive towards us! For one of the workshops we actually asked them to draw their own tombstone and write how would they like to be remembered. At first, most were hesistant because in the Buddhist culture it's bad luck to do so. Yet after explaining a bit more to them, they were willing to draw their own tombstone and even come up stage to show their work.

Each of us from the team paired up with another member to handle a workshop. My partner was Debbie Debbie and our workshop was on letter writing. At first, we called up some people on stage and asked them to hear their own heartbeat (that's where my stestescope came in handy).

Then we asked them to write a letter of appreciation to their parents, or people who looked after them (because in Cambodia some are orphans). We told them the significance of writing a letter to thank their parents, gave them some time and then ask for volunteers who wanted to read their letter in front of the crowd (oh yea, another wow thing about Cambodian youths is that, you normally get lots of volunteers! so unlike m'sian..me included..haha).

Debbie Debbie in action......

At first it was 4 youths writing to their parents in which they thanked them for their hard work. Then it was the turn of a boy..maybe around 17 years old.

He was reading the letter he wrote to his sister. He was writing on how his sister loved him and cared for him especially when he was involved in an accident. As he read out the letter, he started sobbing. He was trying hard to control his sobbing because I guess, it was not cool for a 17 year old boy to cry on stage in front of 180+ people. As he read his letter, he started crying even more. He read about how his sister sold of her land just to pay for his hospital bills. He sobbed as he said he was so grateful she cared for him, especially when he felt his parents didn't love him. He continued sobbing as he thanked her in his letter.

By the time he finished his letter, Debbie Debbie was crying too. So were some of the youths. Some of the pastors as well.

His tears changed the atmosphere of the whole workshop. From an activity, it became a testimony. From a simple letter, it became an expression of gratitude.

We ended by challenging the youths to give the letters they wrote to their parents especially those who came from non-Christian families. We wanted the youths to show their parents that being a Christian is a good thing, as some youths get persecuted by their families for being a Christian.

Fun-ny moments

1) From a restaurant at Phnom Penh International Airport.


2) Our "adventure" on the pony ride.
I was on the 1st cart, some other friends on the 2nd. Debbie was sitting nearest to the pony on the 2nd cart, and she suddenly bent her head down. We in the 1st cart was curious and later asked her why did she do that?

Apparently, the horse defecated while running....and she had to put down her face to prevent splatters of it from landing on her face! And how did she know that the horse was going to defecate??? The pony actually whipped it's tail twice as a warning sign before defecating.

3) Guess what is manure called in Khmer???


Aik! Yepp, it's called aik (meaning shit) in Khmer. It's one word all of us had no problem remembering; as the rest of the Khmer language can be hard to remember.
"Aik! Don't step on the aik!"

In fact on some village paths there was so much aik, that you just stepped on the dried aik to avoid the fresh, wet aik.


4) Another jem: Our group did a skit on the prodigal son in Cambodia. Our leader, KS was acting as the pig that the prodigal son had to clean. KS is of large size...and when he acted, our missionary heard the old Cambodian ladies commenting..."wah, such a big pig! Can sell for very high price!"
(just for info, pig is called curuk in Khmer. And the Cambodians love their pigs. We had pork, pork, pork everyday. The pork there is very nice too...juicy... ;) )

5) Oh this one is a classic!!!
It was the 2nd day after arrival in Cambodia and we all went out for house visitation. It was 3 people to a group plus a translator. You know, the scenary, heat and vegetation of Cambodia is quite similar to Malaysia. And cuz I just got back from Temenggor, the people looked the same to me as the orang asli. I was at the house of one girl who was going to sit for her exams. She could speak simple English.

So we talked, and then we prayed for her, and everything was going fine until suddenly I heard "Kamu punya ujian tiga hari kah?" COMING OUT FROM MY MOUTH.

The best thing is that, I didn't even realize that I was talking Malay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ARGH....hahaha...the girl looked at me puzzled, the interpretator gave a blur look...and Joel and Debbie was laughing and laughing.......and then only I realized my mistake!
HAHAHAHA.
See what I mean???? 2 pics are from cambodia, 2 others from Jehai...can you tell the difference?

Yea yea, I have bad eyesight...must have been the juices from the Spider legs huh? haha ;)

The journey

Excerpt from Philip Yancey's The Bible Jesus Read. (really good..if you can plow through the quotes...I love quotes!)

"God reserves the flow of all religion, which, until then, had pictured the gods as supernatural beings whose actions filter down to affect life on earth. A god cries and it rains on earth, a good gets mad and lightning strikes. The Old Testament shows-and nowhere more clearly than in Job-just the reverse.

A desperate woman prays, and God sends a prophet; a dishearten old man refuses to curse God, and the impact reverberated throughout the cosmos.

For this reason, it can truly be said that the Jews invented history. For them, history did not simply replay cycles of eternity; human actions on earth mattered, and those very responses created history. The Sovereign Lord of history allows people to exert an influence on him, just as he exerts influence on them.

Philosopher Glenn Tinder makes the distinction between Destiny and Fate. The Jews gave us all a sense of destiny, that we exist not in a meaningless world, nor to act out some god's whim, but we exist to fulfill a meaningful Destiny ordained for us by a personal God.

Visit a museum that contains artifacts from Israel's neighbors, and you see the shift. In Egypt of Syria you can view the gods Osiris or Lil or Astarte. A Jew can point to no such image, for graven images of God have always been forbidden. All he can do is repeat Jewish history, the story of a relationship: "our God spoke to Abraham, called Moses, summoned us out of Egypt.

"God," says Jack Miles, "is like a novelist who...can only tell his story through his characters."

Faith is not the clinging to a shrine but an endless pilgrimage of the heart. Audacious longing, burning songs, daring thoughts, an impulse overwhelming the heart, usurping the mind-these are all a drive (loving the One) who rings our heart like a bell---Abraham Heschel.




I find this particular chapter insightful (wah I get to use a big word..) because...
it's almost as if God is taking a risk to stake His fame on us...not on big pyramids can proclaim His power, nor on beautiful cravings that portray His craftmanship...or lofty towers that shout His fame...not even golden images of statues that show His splendor.

Yet God chose to stake His story, His faithfulness, His reputation..on a shepherd boy called David, a cheat called Jacob, a brat called Joseph, a complainer called Job, murderer of Christians called Paul, the liar Peter...

sinful people (just like me..)

The limitations He willingly placed on Himself in choosing mere men to reflect His glory..

That the Jews in the bible..and us as Christians today..may not have large landmarks to point to our great God, but each a personal journey with God. How much He trusts us to show His greatness through our lives. How much grace He extends for us, knowing fully our inability to be perfect enough to shine for Him, already knowing how we will tarnish His image...and yet still willing to take that risk, that sacrifice...just to be intimate with us.

Given a choice I myself would choose maybe a huge large gigantic glittery building that can be seen from every corner of the earth to proclaim my greatness...won't that convience people that I am God??? The owner of such big and great things?

And yet...He chooses our relationships with Him above all these...

Interesting huh? ;)