Let Kristy and I start off by saying we miss you incredibly! Even though our experiences so far has been quite breath taking, all of you still hold a piece of our heart! Kristy and I have already started hanging pictures of all our family and friends and it brings us a warm comfort!
Now for the stuff you probably want to know! We arrived safely in the Kingdom of Camobodia at 10:30 am Thursady morning. (For those of you who like to know the time difference, it would have been 9:30 pm Wednesday night for you!) The travel was definitely long and tiresome, but we made it in one piece. We had a few interesting experiences on our flight, but nothing to cause a worry. Probably the coolest part of flight was seeing Logos International School from the window of our plane as we were landing! Little did we know that we flew right over our new house!
This is Kristy and I as we were flying into Hong Kong, China!
This is Phnom Penh as we are landing!
The first thing to hit us in Cambodia was the heat and humidity! We started sweating as soon as we stepped out of the airport doors! We still have not gotten used to it, but we know it will come in time!
The Ohlin family was at the airport to meet us and they are an incredible family. Dan and Carolyn are the parents and they have four children. However, we have only gotten a chance to meet the two younger ones! They are really fun. The first place they took us was to our new house. We meet our landlords and got a chance to see the house. It is extremely nice. Especially, after seeing the poverty that is all around us. We are extremely thankful that God has provided so much!
This a Sotheare (So-Tear-EE) and Onn (Own) and their two rowdy boys! They are an amazing couple and incredible landlords! We are blessed to have them.
After dropping off all of our stuff, (Praise God that we did not have any trouble with luggage!) the Ohlin family took us out to lunch and showed us several places around town that we can buy stuff at. After the quick, but incredibly information filled tour, the Ohlin's dropped us back at our new house to rest and unpack. Once "home" we talked about and signed the lease with Sotheare and Onn and then began moving in. We were blessed to have dinner with Ohlin family later that night and then Dan introduced us to a "Tuk Tuk" driver that he does a lot of business with name Wibol (Vee-bol).Below is a picture of Wibol and I and his Tuk Tuk. Shortly afterward we crashed in bed for the night. (Unfortunately, the jet lag caused us to be tired at 7:00 pm)
Wibol is kind of like a taxi driver here in Cambodia, but he does not drive a car. Amazingly, he is normally avaliable whenever we need him.
Our second day in Cambodia was just as interesting as our first. Dan Ohlin picked us up again to show us some more important places around town and it was nice to start learning our way around. We got to eat lunch at Logos International School and meet some of the staff we will be working with this year. Luckily, the teaher Kristy will be taking over for was there, and we spent about an hour just talking with her. Another blessing from God came for Kristy, when the teacher told her that everything in the classroom was going to stay and become Kristy's (How awesome is that! Kristy was excited!) Moreover, Kristy even got to meet the Cambodian teaching aide that she will be working with this year! I was having a great time watching the two of them talk like they had been best friends forever.
The rest of the afternoon we did some unpacking and cleaning in our house and waited for the Internet people to come by. They came by, but were not able to set up our Internet, because they did not have all the equipment. (I guess that is just something that happens in Cambodia.) So, we ended up waiting until today (Saturday) for them to come a hook us up! And now that we are all set up, hopefully you can begin reading our blogs!
I promise all of our blogs won't be this long, but we wanted you all to know everything! We will generally update whenever something exciting happens, and I am hoping the Kristy will send out an e-mail when we update!
Praises of Thanksgiving!
- Kristy and I made it safely here with no luggage problems either!
- The Ohlin family for there warm welcome and support.
- Sotheare and Own (our Landlords) for being amazing followers of Christ and incredible helpful.
- Wibol for being willing to drive us and always having a smile on his face.
- Kristy's classroom being fully stocked and meeting her assitant.
- Kristy is already an amazing wife as she works hard to make this home for the two of us.
- God has blessed us with tons of family and friends that are supporting us with prayer and finances so that He can do a ministry through us!
Prayer Requests
- Pray that we can quickly get over this jet lag.
- The poverty we see everyday weighs heavy on us and is a little overwhelming.
- Finding our way around the "city" safely and getting more familiar with the Cambodian way of life.
- Kristy and I continue to look towards the Lord in every struggle, and grow closer to him in every situation!
Thank you again for all your support! We could not be where we are at if it was not for what you are doing! We love and miss you tons!
Gideon and Kristy Walker
