Traffic

I am a horrible passenger. I would much rather be in the driver's seat in most circumstances (except on a plane or other commercial transportation system). However, I am realizing that driving here in Cambodia is also my biggest struggle. It isn't because I don't like the challenge of feeling like you are driving in a crazy, obstacle laden video game all of the time. For me it is more a sense of injustice that comes along with people not following the "rules of the road". Let me give you a few examples of how Cambodian traffic rules/laws.. differ from those in America, since those are the only 2 places I have driven.

Green Light:

• America: Go
• Cambodia: Go (so far so good) In fact, why not go early. The light is going to change in 5 seconds anyways, I will just start going now. Also on a green light, don't assume that cross traffic will be stopped or remain stopped. ALWAYS be on the lookout :-).

Yellow Light:

• America: Slow down and use caution. Make sure the light won't be red before you get to the intersection.
• Cambodia: Still green

Red Light:

• America: Stop and wait for the green light.
• Cambodia: When it changes to red, you have at least another few seconds of "go" time. Then stop unless you really want to go or if it seem clear or if you are in a really nice car and you are "more important" than whoever has the green light. Basically it is a subjective decision.

Right Turn Lane at a light:

• America: "Right Lane Must Turn Right"
• Cambodia: Right Lane Must Turn Right unless you want to go left. Go ahead and turn in front of all of the other lanes and make them wait while you inch your way through your left turn...from the right lane.

Left Turn Lane at a light:

• America: "Left Lane Must Turn Left"
• Cambodia: Left or Right or Straight. Doesn't really matter. Other people will gladly wait for you and miss their opportunity to get through the light all to accommodate your last minute decision.

Yield sign:

• America: Yield
• Cambodia: Don't Yield.

Speed Limit Sign:

• America: Travel within a reasonable range of the posted speed.
• Cambodia: A rare sight here. Vehicles in traffic travel any where between 1 m.p.h. (ox cart, elephant or person pulling a cart used to collect recyclables) to 70+ m.p.h. (buses, nice cars/suv's or anything that will go that fast...etc).  Cops are not equipped to pursue so most people don't really think about it.

Diamond Shaped sign with exclamation point on it:

Self Explanatory

• America: Not sure since they don't have them there.
• Cambodia: Not sure because no one I have asked knows.

Big Pig Truck going through an intersection on a red light.

Many families work together during the day. This is just a visual example of what you may see in traffic here.

Mobile beverage vendor.

Small glimpse of motos collecting in the middle of an intersection...they had the red light.

Following the path of least resistance.

Morning Ice Delivery. Most people don't have refrigerators so  daily ice blocks are a must.

Motos deliver sooooo much in the city.

Balloon vendor.

This little girl is riding in a trailer pulled by her dad's moto. Sweet face.

This 3-wheeled bike is pedaled around the area so he can sell the food that is cooking as he rides.

Local market right off the road.

Just a variety of "vehicles" that are seen here on a daily basis.

So those are just a few differences between traffic in Cambodia and traffic in America. Makes driving fun,  challenging here. Maybe at some point I will post a video of it. Although I have made light of it, the blatant disregard for traffic laws by people here is by far my biggest struggle. It strikes a chord of injustice in me. "Why should they be able to break that law just to accommodate themselves and make us all wait?" It is an exercise in love and patience EVERY time I get behind the wheel (or handlebars). If I can eventually learn that lesson, through the patient, loving encouragement of my wife, I will be a better person in the end.

Alien

I'm not a huge fan of "fitting in". I don't mind being different and doing things a bit out of the box. I am certain that God did that intentionally since it certainly played into my desire to move to a developing southeast Asian country. One way that that trait made itself evident here was shortly after we moved here.
Everyone here (not literally everyone; I always tell my kids to never use absolutes but you know what I mean) told us that everyone (see above parenthetical statement) who moves here goes to Sihanoukville for their first excursion out of the Phnom Penh. Sihanoukville is the most popular beach town in Cambodia. 90% of tourists who say they went to the beach in Cambodia mean they went to Sihanoukville. Although I didn't articulate it right then and there, when I heard that, something inside of me cringed. "I don't want to do what everyone does". So Carolyn and I decided to appease my petty desire to not want to fit in and we went to Thailand instead. A bit further of a drive but well worth it for many reasons.
This desire of mine has also helped out a lot since, as you can imagine,  I don't really fit in with the locals here. I am not sure if it is my height or my accent when I speak. It could also be the clothes I wear or the fact that I ride a loud dirt bike. Or...maybe its because I'm white. Haven't quite figured it out yet. Anyways, I can never blend in. Ever. Even if I wanted to. This point is made more evident since Cambodians enjoy staring at foreigners. I have learned that they aren't being rude. It is just culturally acceptable here. This is how it played out for me one day: I took my dirt bike to a local "car wash" to have it washed. Since the workers there are thorough but not fast, I brought a book to read while waiting. I sat at small table (maybe 3' by 4') and drank some water while I read. Not long after, a Khmer man came and sat across from me. Although I did not look up, I could tell that he was staring at me. I could have reached out and touched him he was so close. To try and discourage this behavior, I thought I would look up at him and make eye contact. Certainly that would make him look away. Well, he just smiled, undeterred, as our gazes locked for 6-8 seconds. Then I smiled back and continued reading. Fun times.

Me driving kids to school on "crazy hair day".

All of us in the fam get stared at because we stick out. I have had several conversations with my kids about this. They will say something like "I don't want to do that. People will stare at me". I always (again, see parenthetical statement above) reply with "They will stare at you anyways. Why not give them a reason?" That is met with the typical teenage rolling of the eyes, even from the ones that aren't teenagers yet. Regardless, it is something we are all getting used to, whether we want to or not.
As we anticipate our time in America this summer, I think I will subconsciously breathe a sigh of relief. For the first time in 2 1/2 years I can walk around and feel like I fit in, even if I don't.  Then, like God usually does, he caused me to think deeper. As a Christian, should I ever fit in down here? I was not made for this world. I am just passing through. This isn't my homeland...just like Cambodia isn't my homeland. And just like it is glaringly obvious that I don't naturally belong in Cambodia, maybe it should be just as obvious that I don't fit here on Earth. 1 Peter 2:11 speaks directly to this: "Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires which war against your soul."  Maybe not fitting in was what we were all meant to do.

Breached

One thing that we have gotten used to over here (some of us more than others) are insects. In fact, most of us have actually eaten a variety of the little guys. Just the other day I was grabbing a quick plate of noodles on the street. When I was halfway through my meal I noticed a small cockroach peaking out from between the toothpick dispenser and the roll of toilet paper (used in place of napkins in many locations). Without skipping a beat, I used my left hand to flick him off the table and continued eating. One of the most common creatures with which we have learned to co-habitate is the ant. During many meals we are brushing them off of our table while we eat. Ants don't even register a blip on our radar anymore....for the most part.
They do raise a bit of concern, though, when I notice a 4 lane interstate highway of them all leading to a particular location. This means that one has found a stash of candy, a dead bug or a crumb that was missed. He then radios in to headquarters and gives all of his friends the coordinates. Many times the situation culminates in a conversation such as:
Me: "Are you sure you don't have any old candy in there (pointing toward a stack of books, clothes...etc)?"
Child X: "Yep".
Me: "Really? They aren't usually attracted to the pages of a book or a pencil case."
Child X: "I'm sure."
Me: "Well I'll take a look just to make sure."
32 seconds later
Child X: "Oh yeah, I was wondering where that open bag of Skittles went".
Me: "Gosh, I am so shocked to find that (Dripping with sarcasm).

After the amazing discovery, the ant party is disrupted by a few shots of Raid and a broom.

However, this was not the case a couple days ago. It started out similarly. I noticed a trail of ants entering our kitchen from the outside door. Actually 2 trails. One led to the trash and I quickly took care of that problem. The other went the other direction. I followed the 4 lane highway as it curved under our ant cabinet (an ant cabinet is a glass and aluminum pantry that sits on 4 legs - see picture. Each leg usually sits in a small dish of water or some sort of detergent. This usually keeps the ants away. We basically keep all food that is not refrigerated inside the ant cabinet. This ensures that we aren't sharing our food with a million little friends). I fully expected to see the trail exit from the other side of the cabinet and head toward our dog's food bowl. When I realized that the trail terminated under our cabinet, my first thought was: we've been breached!

I know that may sound a bit dramatic but the ants had gained access to where we keep much of our food. Flour, sugar, cereal, chips, crackers, any of Carolyn's amazing baked goods, candy...etc. They were all now at risk. Immediately I began to assess the situation. How far did they get? What had been overtaken and ruined? I systematically pulled everything off the shelves starting at the bottom and moving up. On the bottom shelf and the 3rd shelf up there were large collections of ants but mostly isolated to a bag of sugar and a bag Blow Pops (brought to us from the US...bummer). I cleaned out all of the ants and put the food back but the most important step would be to figure out what caused the breach. This needed to be done otherwise they would be back again. After careful observation, I noticed that the cabinet had been pushed back less than an inch but that had allowed the leg of the cabinet to just barely touch the edge of the small dish. This provided an access point for the vermin to get in. I repositioned the cabinet and made sure that there was still enough detergent to discourage the little guys from hosting another free party hosted by us.

Not to overspiritualize this event but it did cause me to think of our lives as Christians. We can so easily move ever so slightly off of the path we are on but that movement allows Satan to breach our defenses. I have found that when I am not spending consistent time in the Word and analyzing the state of my defenses, I am more vulnerable to being "breached". To me, this story illustrated, in a sort of funny way, my need to be more diligent in protecting myself from the attacks of the Enemy.

"But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do." 1 Peter 1:15

Religion

In a country that is 95% + Buddhist, religion is constantly in front of us. And with the type of Buddhism that is practiced here, we also experience religion in our noses, ears...etc. In Cambodia, the majority of those who are Buddhist practice extensive ancestor spirit worship and Animism more than traditional Buddhism. To appease the spirits of their deceased ancestors, most every morning our neighbors will place a variety of food and drinks inside the spirit house which sits right outside of their front door. Along with these offerings, they light an incense stick (or several). Many times this aroma makes its way through our windows and into our noses. The actual aroma isn't so objectionable as much as it is what it represents. We know that they are engaging in spirit worship. Religion also fills our ears when the monks at the large pagoda near our house begin loud chanting before 5am, or the eerie sounds of indigenous instruments being played from early until late at a funeral to give the spirit an adequate final departure. We experience many, if not all of these things, on a weekly basis.

A large Spirit House just outside of a Wat (Buddhist Temple)

A nicer Spirit House outside of a store near our house

All walks of life have Spirit Houses, even if they have to make their own out of playing cards. This one hangs on a tree just outside of a shop where we get our moto repaired.

Not only because of what we experience here, but in general I am not a huge fan of religion. While I am follower of Christ and we moved to Southeast Asia to in response to the Great Commission, I don't love all of the "requirements" of religion. As Christians, we inject a lot of our own ideas into what religion should look like. Many of them are ideas that are not found anywhere in the Bible (i.e. Dress up nice for church, do the right thing, say the right thing, say "I'm fine. How about you?" When someone asks how you are doing at church...etc). Those might be oversimplifications but I am sure you understand the generalizations. I love Christ and His people that make up His church but its the religious static that I can do without.

So when I read James 1:27, it made me stop and think. "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." Finally a simple explanation of religion. I like simple. Are you making religion too complicated?