Day 6

Day 6 was a great day but the most emotional day for me. We had two business visits that day in Phnom Penh. The first was to a manufacturing facility that made prosethics because there are so many active landmines in Cambodia there is a major need for prosthetics. We toured the facility and saw them making the legs and arms and also making wheelchairs.

The thing that I most admired about this facility was the fact that they employed so many people who were disabled. There was even a man who was blind who was drilling holes in the wheelchair wheels. It may seem comical but it was really sad to see. But you have to admire the fact that he was there working hard and doing his job.

Here is our whole group with the director of the facility. (I look like a geek!) I got to present to him a donation that our group put together for the facility. I was in charge of all humanitarian activities for the trip, I will tell more about this shortly.

Then there was a children's surgical center next door to this prosthetics lab. We all wanted to go visit it so our professor walked over and asked if there was someone who could come talk to us. So one of the coordinators came out to talk to us. Since we were a large group in a small area I could not hear her so I just hung back and were playing with the kids and laughing with the mom's. This surgical center mostly focuses on cleft paletes and other cosmetic things. They said if they were to open the center up for trauma then that's all that they would do and no one would focus on these other kinds of things. This center is actually run by a Western Doctor who has dedicated his life to running this facility. The coordinator told us that a common surgery they perform now is skin grafts from acid burns. The people in Cambodia are so poor that they cannot afford bullets or guns so they have resorted to throwing acid on each other. Doesn't that just make you sick!

Here is a picture of a cute little guy who was waiting for his surgery. This is a dark pic, but he was soo cute. And they don't have diapers in Cambodia..

Here are more kids that thought we were so awesome, they were all hanging out at the surgical center.... we don't know why. This is my friend Ericka whose husband is in the program with me and the two girls standing in the back were our "helpers". They are members of the church and were so awesome to show us around and to translate for us. I will also tell more about them later.

At the surgical center they let you walk up to this window and just watch what they are doing. Really cool but really gross....They also let us walk right into the recovery room. I could not believe some of the things that we saw there. I just stood there with tears in my eyes and watched these poor kids. I still can't even tell people what I saw there.

After these business visits we decided to do our humanitarian project that we wanted to do. Like I said I was in charge of it. So I just gathered money from everyone who was there. If you can believe it I got over $400.00 from the 34 people who were there. I was shocked to get that much. I think everyone really wanted to help the people we saw there and were really getting to like!

We decided to go to the maternity hospital that was just around the corner from our hotel. We thought we could get them sarongs (skirts) that the women wear. We also got shampoo/combs/toothpaste and then we brought over 500 toothbrushes with us, thanks to a wife of a student who is a dental hygenist.

So the two "helpers" took a couple of us to their local market to go shopping because we could get a better deal. We had so much fun getting all this stuff. And because we were at the local market I thought I would take advantage of the good deals and I got John a Rolex watch. One of the girls helped me get an awesome deal.

So we went back to our hotel and assembled the packages. We just took over the lobby, I am sure the Cambodians were wondering what these darn white people were doing.

After we had them all assembled we took off to the hospital. Now we don't have a single contact there, we just decided to show up so we were not sure what kind of procedure they had. So here we are in the lobby while our professor went with one of the "helpers" to see if we could leave these packages. Of course Jamon was tying balloons for the kids...

We were shocked when our professor came down and told us that they would let us go into the rooms and pass these packages out to the people, as long as we were not a political group. So we got to walk from room to room and personally hand out these packages we had put together. These people were so grateful to us for these small packages. There were about 12 beds to a room and each family got one bed, so it was very crowded and very hot, the only rooms that are air conditioned are the rooms you get when you are having your baby, but as soon as you have it you go to these other rooms.

Look at these cute babies.

Then look at these moms who are sitting up and taking care of their babies.

I just walked from room to room and cried at the thankfulness of these people. And I felt so blessed to have the hospitals that we do, and I also just missed my little baby.... Morgan, who is not so little anymore.

Day 4 and 5

Day 4 found us up at 6:00am which may sound early but most of us were up by at least 4:00am every morning anyway... the joys of jetlag.

We caught a plane to fly up to a northern city in Cambodia called Siem Reap where they have these old rock temples called Angkor Wat. It was soo cool to walk through these ruins that were hundreds of years old and be able to touch everything. We decided that in the next couple of years they probably won't let people climb all over these things.

There was evidence of the Khmer Rouge war all over the temples. This picture you can see that most of these statues have new heads put on them. The Khmer Rouge came through and destroyed these statues, they knocked the heads off and there are gun shot holes all throughtout the temples.

This is a picture of the actual Angor Wat temple. It was so amazing to see. There were monks inside praying. It reminded me of a movie set for an old Roman movie. Well, minus the monks. Oh yeah, it was pouring rain on us here... so enjoyable to be wet from the rain and still sweating from the humidity and heat.

Here is a picture of a couple of faces that they made out of the rocks.

This is something we saw a lot of at Angkor Wat. These trees that are hundreds of years old had roots that had grown over the rock ruins. It was so amazing to see, but as I look back at the pictures now, I am so creeped out... I don't know!

This is our prop plane that we took to fly from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. I am such a dork to pose out in the front of it like that. I think the guy in the tie was telling me to get away from the luggage...

Here is our hotel in Siem Reap. So when I told you I had been in Cambodia, did anyone ever think I would be staying in something like this... me either. I thought we would be in cots with mosquito nets around us. This was the nicest hotel we stayed in on our entire trip. Every room had these dark wood floors. It was beautiful.


Day 4 was also known as the down fall... this was the night I got sick. During the day at Angkor Wat we stopped at this tent and ate lunch in the middle of nowhere... should that not have been my first clue. So by about 1:00 in the morning I was not well and it lasted all the next day... But I hung tough. Really you have no choice.

Day 5 started with us touring around Siem Reap waiting for our plane to leave to take us back to Phnom Penh. We went to a place called Angkor Artisans where you can watch people make these handmade crafts that are for sale. I got the coolest painting of an elephant. There were these 16 women who were handpainting these pictures and they were all deaf.

Well one of the guys in my class whose wife knows sign language started to talk to them and they were so happy to have someone to talk to. They just kept laughing and telling her how embarressed they were to talk in front of all of us. I guess to have 34 people staring at you can be a little intimidating.

A couple of us found a pizza place and it tasted so good.... I thought I might live after eating normal food. Then we found the convenience store. Notice the name... I thought it was funny.

I also managed to slice my finger open on Day 5 (day 4 and 5 were not good to me). I was in the bathroom at Angkor Artisans and the latch got stuck and I had that panickly feeling that I was going to be left to die in a bathroom in Siem Reap Cambodia, never to be heard from again... Anyway I ripped open the latch and my finger was sliced open. I seriously thought I was going to have to get stitches in Cambodia. Not a fun thought. Luckily one of the guys from school was an EMT up at Alta Ski Resort and he had his first aid kit and he cleaned it up and bandaged it. It was touch and go, but I made it.

Actually I will be honest with you, I missed John and Morgan so much and I was sick and I cut my finger.... I wanted to go home!!!!

Day 3

Back to the trip journal...

Day 3 was our first Sunday in Cambodia. We tracked down an LDS branch very near our hotel and the "LDS kids" went to church. I already told the story about the Vietnamese branch and how I bore my testimony while a missionary from Layton translated for me. What a cool experience.

After church we had to rush back to our hotel because we had our first business visit. We were going to the rice fields to eat lunch with the farmers and see how they are learning this new way of farming rice. The LDS church is partnered with an NGO in Cambodia called CEDAC and they are there teaching these rice farmers how to double their rice production.

On the way out to the fields we stopped at these road side markets and bought bread and fruit for the farmers and us to all eat together. We saw some pretty interesting food dishes, it started out with the usual dead fish hung from hooks and in bowls of water, then went to the dog head, etc. I have pictures but I decided not to share...

After that we got to the fields and the farmers had this big hut that was on stilts that they laid out these mats in and we all sat in there and ate. Then we got to ask them questions about farming and then someone asked them if they had any questions for us. The only thing they asked us about was farming in America, which most of us (myself included) had no idea about. But we had some laughs about the fact that they only could think to ask us questions about farming...

Most of the farmers that were at our lunch were women and when we asked where the men were, the women said they were in the fields because the women wanted to see the people from America... they were so funny. When we would take a picture of them and then show them it on the digital camera they thought it was the funniest thing they had ever seen.

Here is our lunch spread. We had to eat sitting on our legs tucked under us because our guide told us to show them the bottom of our feet was disrespectful. This picture does not do this justice but it is about 125 degrees in this hut.

This was a little boy at the lunch who was sooo cute. He kept playing games with the guys and we all wanted to just scoop him up and take him home.

Here is a group picture we took with the rice farmers. Is it that obvious who the Americans are??

Here are some of the people there who were waving goodbye to us. Did I mention that everywhere we went we took candy and little toys for the kids. We were like the President of the US over there, we had such a big following every where we went. Can you see how happy these people are? It always amazed me to see the smiles on their faces.

Okay, one last picture. This is a van passing our very large tour bus on the way to the rice fields. This is such a common thing to see in Cambodia, a van full of adults and about 10 kids sitting on top. Now this is a very bumpy dirt road that we are driving on. Anyone want to throw their kids up on their car sometime??

And now one last story. After we got back from the rice fields we were exhausted and really hot so a couple of us decided to go get a massage. You can get a one-hour massage on every street corner in Phnom Pen for about $12. So Blake (my trip buddy) and I went to a place and got our massages. Well when I got out from the room he was sitting in the waiting room looking like he was going to cry. He jumped up and ran out and I followed and asked him what was wrong. He said that he was "violated" during the massage and got so freaked out that he jumped up and told the lady he had to go... mind you I am in the other room and he has to wait for me... guess he didn't really think that all the way through. Now he wouldn't tell me details but I could imagine what kind of massage a guy gets on a street corner in Cambodia...

Word about his incident spread quickly and soon we were all laughing because it is always the guy who is the most tramatized about this stuff that these things happen to, isn't it? Poor Blakey Poo (that is his real nickname).

Ok, one more story.. So after the massage "incident" Blake and I decide to just head out of the hotel and find something cool to eat for dinner. We find this Thai restaurant that is outside and you eat under all these cool plants. Am I getting the point across, it was cool. So we go in and order and get our food and just as we start eating the sister missionaries that we met that morning walk by. Blake (who is a return missionary himself) runs out and is like ,"hey sister missionaries, how are you, do you want to come in, we will buy you dinner."

They are very nice and say hi to us but say they have to get home. Now it is like 6:00 in the evening and Blake is saying to me, gee that is weird why do you think the missionaries have to be home by 6:00pm. And I am looking at him like, uh. really? And I say "Blake you just invited the sister missionaries to come eat at this restaurant with us on Sunday night..."

He was mortified. He wanted to scour the city looking for them to apologize then explain why we had to eat out on Sunday, as if they were thinking "Why didn't they plan ahead and buy some extra food on Saturday to eat on Sunday?" No one in Cambodia has a fridge...

Anyway I had another pretty good laugh, at some else's expense (the best kind of laugh).

I have taken a break in my trip posting this week. My grandpa Fyans passed away on Sunday and I just wanted to do a little tribute to him on my blog. He was 90 years and one day old. He was such a loving grandpa and the thing I will always remember about him was that he would always ask us if we knew how much he loved us. Then he would ask us if we knew how much he loved our parents. He was very good at expressing his love and appreciation for his family. I stole this pic from my little sisters blog (thanks for tracking this down Julie).

Last night was grandpa's viewing. We were told that it started at 6:00pm but that the general authorities wanted to meet with the children and grandchildren at 5:30pm for their own special viewing. (My grandpa was an emeritus General Authority). So we got there at 5:30pm and saw Elder Hales leaving just as we walked in. Then we saw Elder Perry and Elder Gonzalez spoke with them for a minute. Others saw and talked to Elder Cook and Elder Ballard. Then a security guard came in and told us President Monson was coming in. We were all shocked I think. He came in and the security people blocked the doors so it was just my family and the prophet. He talked to my grandma for a minute and expresses his condolences. Then he said, "well I am not shy," and then started telling us stories about my grandpa when they were in Australia. Then President Monson told us more stories about him and how he watched wrestling years ago. He had us all laughing and crying at the same time. He said his wife was not as well as he was and gets tired very easily.

He was there talking with us for probably 20 minutes. What a great exprience. I cannot put into the words the spirit that was there. He was such a nice and engaging man. I will always remember his face as he said, "goodbye Tom." to my grandpa as he left.

Here are some pictures that my brother in law took with his phone as the prophet was talking to my grandma.

Day 2 continued

Ok I am ready to continue with Day 2. After the Killing Fields we went to a place called Tuol Sleng prison. It was originally a high school that the Khmer Rouge took over and used it for a prison/torture chamber. This place was also very somber. There were a total of four buildings that we toured, but I could only handle the first two. The first one we went in was Building A where there were all these rooms that were full of beds frames with hand cuffs on them and pictures of dead people in these beds. Very gross.

Then building B was full and I mean full of pictures of all the people that had been killed in Tuol Sleng prison, men, women and children. Then the pictures of the dead men who had been electrocuted and were naked. That is when I said "I'm done."

It was all very depressing but I feel like people need to know about these things, so we can prevent them from happening to these poor people again.

Ok I am done with all the gross depressing stuff. After Tuol Sleng prison we went to a local market called the Russian market and shopped for cool stuff. But let me tell you it was a giant tent that you walk into and it goes on forever and it is all twisty and they have smelly food all over and it is, of course, about 120 degrees, so I didn't want to hang out too long...

Mike (who was our guide for Phnom Penh) introduced a couple of us to a friend that he had in the Russian market. She was a Cambodian who had burns all over her hands and face and was selling these pencil drawings for $2.50. But she said that if we were friends with Mike that she would sell it to us for $1.50. She was soo nice. So I bought one from her and gave her $2.00 and she was so grateful to get it. The guy I was with, (Blake, who you will hear many stories about) gave her $3.00 for one of them. It is amazing how grateful she was for so little.

Then we took a TukTuk back to the hotel. This is a cart on the back of a little moped and they are everywhere. Now you remember how I said the driving is crazy, well try to experience this on the back of a moped with cars zooming about 2 inches from you, what an adventure! Our goal was to take the best picture of crazy moto drivers. Here is a dad with two kids, the little kid is on top of two boxes on the back and they are not tied down... This is totally normal for Cambodia

We had heard about a restaurant where the proceeds went to the children's street fund in Cambodia so a group of us headed out that night to find it. It ended up pouring rain on us as we wondered all over the city trying to find it. We never did find it, but we sure had a good laugh at ourselves.

Day 2

Day 2 was much better than day 1. Day 1 I was seriously ready to jump on an airplane and fly home. I was so homesick. But Day 2 I made some new friends and I realized that just about everyone was ready to jump on airplane and fly home, so I felt better.

So we were in Phnom Penh (pronounced Nom Pen) Cambodia and it was our day to do tours and see the city. We started off at this city park where there were all kinds of people walking around selling stuff. This is a pic of Jamon from our group who knew how to tie balloon animals and tied them for the kids everywhere we went. He was a huge hit.

Here is a picture of a couple people in our group that rode an elephant that was giving rides in the park. I told them that in Cambodia when you ride an elephant with someone of the opposite gender then you are now married, they didn't think that was funny.

Next is a picture of my cute roommate Angie and I at the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh.

Next we went and saw the Killing Fields. Now I had no idea about any of this stuff until we had to do research on Cambodia before we left. Look up the Khmer Rouge and the Killing Fields to learn more about this, it is very tragic.

Here is a memorial that was built for all the skulls that the people found after Pol Pot (who was basically like Hitler) and the Khmer Rouge came through and killed everyone who was educated in anyway. Inside the memorial are hundreds if not thousands of skulls of men, women and children who were killed and buried in mass graves. After you walk through the memorial you walk around the back and there are holes all over where people had dug up these mass graves and left the holes, so you could see just how many of them there are. There are also clothes all over that had grown into the roots of the trees and into the dirt. It is a very sad feeling walking through this field. Looking at the clothes that were still in the ground really made it hit home for me that thousands of people were beaten, killed and just thrown into the ground. You can't even imagine the creepy and sad feeling there is at this place.

Day 2 will have to continue tomorrow. I am soo tired. I am STILL jet lagged, I cannot seem to get my days and nights back to normal!

Day 1

Since I was really terrible about keeping my blog updated while I was on my trip I thought I would just post an entry for every day we were gone and share a couple of pics.

Day 1:

We flew from L.A. to Hong Kong and got there at 5:00am Hong Kong time. We had an 8 hour layover until we flew to Cambodia so we went on a city tour. I was so tired that I think I slept walked the entire day. Despite what you think, it is not that easy to get a good night sleep while sitting straight up, with your knees touching the seat in front of you for 14 hours....

Here is a picture of the city scape of Hong Kong from the highest point, called Victoria's Peak. It is very foggy because it was so early in the day. I was surprised at how tropical it was there. I felt like we were in Hawaii, it was early in the day so it wasn't so blasted hot yet, but it was humid and green.

And this is what I look like when I have not slept, showered or changed my clothes for two days...

Then we got to see some shrines (which I think we only set up for the tourists, which really takes the "specialness" away from them). But here I am posing anyway...

We then caught another plane at 3:00pm and flew two hours to Phnom Penh Cambodia. I was so exhausted by the time we got there that I think I fell into bed, which was like sleeping on a piece of plywood. The beds were so hard there, I thought it was a cruel joke at first, turns out it wasn't. Those were the beds we were going to be sleeping in for the next 4 nights....

Still alive

Just thought I would do a quick update. We are in Shenzhen China now and have seen so much and done so much I don't even know where to begin. I will have to share many pics and stories on here after I get home and get organized. I have been writing everything down in a notebook so I won't forget anything.

I have had a couple life changing experiences here, I have seen things you would not believe. Will share much more later.

We fly home tomorrow and I am sooo ready at this point that I am ready to start walking to the airport, just to feel closer to home.

So for now, wish me luck on another 14 hour flight!