Last month we were in Kampot for a teambuilding retreat and, afterwards, our family decided to drive up into Preah Monivong Bokor National Park to see how things had changed since I was last there (in 2007, I think?). Bokor is a mountain near the coast and marks the southeastern end of the Cardamom mountain…
Author: Charles
Chan Trea’s Class on Anger Management
I wanted to share a story of change from our Peaceful Education project. This story came specifically out of the Peace Club pilot and was collected by our MER Coordinator, Mr. Mok. A white shirt with a blue skirt or blue trousers is the sight of six grade students who attend Svay Chor Primary school…
New Service Workers
Back in September of last year, I shared that we were recruiting for three new service workers to join the MCC Cambodia team. I’m glad to announce that all three arrived safely and without incident in Cambodia on May 19th. We had a service worker back out after accepting last year so we waited to…
Raise the Anti-Mosquito Fortifications!
Last year we meet with some wonderful Lutheran missionaries who spent many years in Hanoi before moving to Phnom Penh and who had gotten to know the Mennonite Central Committee Vietnam team quite well. When they saw Charlotte wearing a MCC shirt at a churchgoer’s birthday party they immediately connected with us. Later, when we…
5 Year Program Review Team
Ideally, every MCC country program in the world should undergo a Program Review every five years. This doesn’t always happen due to instability, conflict, or other disruptions. Cambodia was scheduled for a Program Review in 2020 but it ended up being delayed for three years due to the pandemic. The Program Review is an opportunity…
Reblog: Finding My Seat at the Table
I wanted to share a blog post by Kiron Mateti that was posted by Mennonite Church USA. Kiron is a member of Plains Mennonite Church and his wife, Rachel, actually went to the same Christian school as my youngest brother Tim for awhile. I love how he writes about going from multicultural to intercultural. It’s…
Monarchs of Asia
In December 2021 I spotted some rather familiar looking caterpillars on a Crown Flower plant that was growing at the corner on the end of our street. Crown Flower, or Calotropis Gigantea, is a regional variant of Milkweed and, like it’s North American cousin, is popular among a certain regal species of butterfly. Crown Flower…
A Cambodian connection at the Mennonite Heritage Center
We have a number of connections with the Mennonite Heritage Center in Harleysville, Pennsylvania. The Heritage Center is a museum and library dedicated to preserving and sharing the stories of Mennonite faith and life in eastern Pennsylvania. The connection continued even after we came to Cambodia in 2019. The fraktur prints that we present to…
Mearda Maternity Clinic and Susu Birthing
In the past, MCC Cambodia parents who were expecting a new child would travel to Thailand and deliver the baby there. I hadn’t thought about it until some MCC alumni asked and we realized that Caleb is likely the first “MCC baby” to be born in Cambodia. I asked Pou Cheang and Ming Ramy, who…
One Week of Caleb Daniel
Even when we lived in Pennsylvania we were far from most of our family. So, for Charlotte and Catherine, I did weekly Google photo albums up to 52 weeks. Then, since we already had the photos all together, I printed a photobook for the girls and the grandparents. I thought about sharing the weekly albums…