Arrivals

I left home on Friday, 15 November, at 16h00, and arrived in Phnom Penh on Saturday, at 23h00 (17h00) in UK time. A long way to travel! I flew with China Southern airlines, and really enjoyed the big beautiful Boeing 787 in which we flew for 11 hours to get to Guangzhou. Apparently this plane is only 6 months old, and it showed.


Chinese food is another matter. My spoiled Western palate had difficulty with the seaweed salad and the strange tasting and unidentifiable contents of my plate. I ended up guiltily pushing the food around for a while and leaving it. Not a very good volunteer behaviour, I know!

Guangzhou proved to be an enormous city, and we arrived there as the sun was setting. It was a beautiful sight as the plane came in to land. In the airport I quickly found the departure gate for the flight to Phnom Penh, and then settled down for a 3 hour wait. The flight to Phnom Penh was almost entirely filled with military personnel in uniform - there were just a few Westerners, and a smattering of Cambodian civilians. It was nice to hear the now familiar sound of Khmer.

Thai is nasal and the vowels are stretched out, making the language sound slightly whiney to the Western ear. Chinese, at least the Chinese I heard in Guangzhou airport, is more guttural, but soft with it. It sounds like the back of the mouth and throat have to work hard to produce these sounds, and I think I would become quickly tongue-tied if I were even to try! Khmer is a bit like both, to my admittedly untrained ear, but there are a lot of stops and shortened sounds, giving the language a particular feel.

Our flight to Phnom Penh was made eventful by a rather dramatic lightening storm as we came towards the city. Looking out of the window, everything was very dark, but periodically the landscape below would be lit up as if with a flash-light. It was an amazing experience. There was one occasion during which the lightening struck sharply and you could see the flash and the line of electricity from just in front of us all the way down to the ground. Amazing! At this point it did occur to me to be scared - what if the lightening struck the plane? But Martin Smith's beautiful song 'Safe in Your Arms' had been playing in my mind almost continuously ever since I left home, and with that truth in my heart there wasn't room for fear.

'The Lord is my shepherd; He leads me on

Beside the still waters, He restores my soul 
Though I walk through the valleys, I will not fear


I know You are with me, I feel You here.
I am safe in Your arms; in Your arms

The Lord is my shepherd through darkest night 
Though evil surrounds me, You defend my life

Goodness and mercy for all my days

In the house of my God my heart will stay

I am safe in Your arms, in Your arms

And my heart overflows - forever I love You


I love You...'

Walking out into Phnom Penh from the airport building, the first thing that arrested my attention was the smell - the smell that seems particular to Cambodia. A combination of bike fumes, ripe fruit, people, fish and other nameless things. Not unpleasant but distinctive, it is a while before the nose adjusts and one is no longer conscious of it.

It was raining softly, but the heat was still enough to make me glad that I had had the foresight to remove some of the many layers of clothing with which I had left England. There were crowds of people everywhere, in spite of the lateness of my arrival. It is the Water Festival, and the city is imbued with an atmosphere of excitement. The annual Water Festival celebrates the change of direction of the flow of the Tonle Sap. Astonishingly, this really does happen! Read more about it here.

Looking around, I wondered where I would possibly find my driver, but he had recognised me straight away. As I seemed to be the only Western woman arriving alone this is less surprising than it might seem. ' He introduced himself as 'Andy' (not his Khmer name) and gave me a running commentary on the sights as he drove me to my hotel. I was quiet, images from 'The Killing Fields' running through my mind. Twenty six years or so after I had seen and been so impacted by the movie, here I was. In Phnom Penh. The city decimated by the Khmer Rouge. So many of this nation's hurts go back to those few short years, 1975-79. Maniacal years...

"From 1975 to 1979-through execution, starvation, disease, and forced labor-the Khmer Rouge systematically killed an estimated two million Cambodians, almost a fourth of the country's population." ~ Loung Ung: First They Killed My Father

Recovery from such a wounding is inevitably slow. Although certainly not the only factor contributing to Cambodia's present problems, the genocide of the Khmer Rouge era has contributed hugely to negative social, emotional and spiritual aspects in the country. In the end, it was this that led to my presence here, my desire to offer something, however small, to help in the process of restoring and healing broken hearts.

Coming around a corner, I asked Andy if he knew of Dr Beat Richner. Ironically, at that very moment, we were passing his famous Kantha Bopha children's hospital, so he pointed it out to me. The timing was a surprise, as there was no way I could have known this. Andy said that everyone loves Dr Richner, because without him, all the children of Cambodia would have died. How is that for a tribute?

Eventually we arrived at the Landscape Hotel, just a short distance from the mighty Mekong river. It was just after midnight. As I was checking in, my lovely friend Sophy Kann came downstairs. How wonderful it was to see her!

My room was another lovely surprise. After Poipet, I was expecting something very basic. Instead, I have a beautiful, comfortable room, with a lovely view of the city. It was a great relief to unpack, have a shower and then hop into bed, where I fell asleep almost immediately.