And the Beat Goes On

Yes, we are still here.  It’s been a crazy, crazy month.  Right after Vandenn got home from Thailand, we had a colleague from the States come to visit us and then shortly after another good friend and colleague.  The dust hadn’t even settled and I was off to Bangkok for my own retreat with two exceptional ladies from Vietnam and Laos–both leader’s wives and such an encouragement!

I can’t say enough about the weekend.  It was just what I needed–as much A/C as I wanted, a lot of sleep, great Mexican food, and even better fellowship.  These ladies are both amazing, and I’m blessed to call them friends.  It was the first time we’ve had our own retreat, and we all agree that it is something we NEED to do again.  Thanks to our husbands for making it happen!

I got back on a plane for Phnom Penh and headed straight to Mindy’s baby shower, which I helped plan with Mandy.  Mindy gave birth to a beautiful baby girl named Ada Beth in April.  Ada has a full head of dark hair and is so cute (sorry that I don’t have any pictures)!  We had the shower at a place called Cafe Living Room.  We didn’t do much for decorations, but I did come across this really great idea for a diaper motorcycle.

It turned out just like I was hoping!  I’m not a very crafty person, but with the help of my friend Sarah, it actually came together quite quickly.

I was an hour late to the shower due to a delayed flight out of Bangkok, but I’m glad that I was able to be there.  What an honor to have been a part of Mindy’s journey these last few years–single to married to new mom!

Don’t let the ominous feeling of this picture fool you–we are LOVING rainy season!  It has come a bit early this year and I am so, so happy.  It brings such a relief from the heat–I can’t tell you how nice it is to sit in our house and not be sweating constantly.  I love to feel the breeze that comes right before the rain.  It has started to rain almost every day, usually in the afternoon.  I love it!

The kids continue to keep us on our toes, and I feel like I’m constantly have to break up little arguments.  They still have their cute moments, though.  I cannot believe how much Kalli has changed in the last few months.  She’s becoming a little person and thinks she needs to keep up with her big brother.

We had our team retreat this past weekend, and they loved spending it in the pool (in between the rain showers).  Carson still doesn’t want much to do with the slides in the water, but Kalli can’t get enough.  She also enjoyed jumping from the side of the pool into daddy’s arms.  She would say, “Go!” and then jump–cutest thing ever!  There’s a little boy that lives at the resort with his family, and Carson really liked playing with him. It’s fun to see him getting to an age where he loves to interact with other kids.

One funny moment of the weekend was Carson off in the distance saying, “Vandenn!  Vandenn.”  Then walking towards his daddy and saying, “Vandenn, help me.”  It was the first time we’ve heard Carson say Vandenn’s name and it came as a shock to everyone!  It was hilarious.  Since then it’s been “daddy,” so I don’t know what got into his little head. He probably heard our team saying Vandenn a lot and thought he’d join in.

It’s so hard to summarize such a busy month, but I hope that this gave you a glimpse into it!

Tags: baby shower, Bangkok, diaper motorcycle, leader's wives retreat, rainy season, team retreat

Khmer New Year

The past couple of weeks we’ve been celebrating Khmer New Year.  The actual New Year was April 13-15, but celebrations are spread out as many people go to their hometowns to be with family.  That leaves us with a nice quiet city for about a week.  We didn’t do any traveling this year, as Vandenn had to go to Thailand for meetings on the 18th.  Besides for enjoying some quiet time at home, we went swimming with our good friends, the Wells, at Kingdom Resort (of course!).  We also visited our family and Leakhena’s family.

Among momentous news–we shaved Kalli’s hair off!  My mother-in-law has been wanting us to do it for quite some time. The belief is that if you shave it, it will grow back thicker.  I always said I would NEVER do that to my daughter…but in the end, I really didn’t want to hear about it the rest of her life if she had thin hair and I never shaved it!  So now, at least if it does end up thin, I cannot be blamed for it (except for my genes, of course).  The actual event of shaving her hair wasn’t nearly as traumatic for me as I thought it would be. Maybe I’m just used to one child being nearly bald most of his life that it wasn’t shocking anymore.  And she’s beautiful with her hair shaved! What a great way to spend hot season!  Almost makes me want to shave mine off as well.

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It’s always nice to get outside of the city and spend time in the countryside.

A great way to usher in the New Year!

Tags: family, Khmer New Year, shaved hair

Caps for Sale!

“Caps for sale! Fifty cents a cap!”  I’ve been reading Caps for Sale: A Tale of a Peddler, Some Monkeys, and Their Monkey Business by Esphyr Slobodkina to Carson the last month or so. He loves the antics of the monkeys and how the situation escalates and ends with a great surprise.

The story is of a peddler who stacks his caps on his head and walks around town selling them. One day no one wanted to buy any hats and he had no money for lunch, so he went to rest by a tree, making sure that all of his hats were securely in place.

When he wakes up, he puts his hands up to check his caps and to his surprise, they’re all gone, besides for his own checked cap.  He looks around him for the caps and when he happens to look up, he discovers that a bunch of monkeys have stolen his caps!

This is when the peddler gets angry.  He shakes one finger at them and tells them to return his caps, but they just shake one finger back at him and say, “Tsk, tsk, tsk!”  He shakes both fists at them, even angrier, and they just shake both their fists back at him.  The situation escalates until he stomps both his feet on the ground–they only do the same.  Finally, in disgust, he throws his own checked cap on the ground and starts to walk away.  When…

The monkeys throw THEIR caps on the ground!  The peddler is surprised, gathers his caps, and places them back in order on his head.

Carson laughs at this story every time, and loves to say “Tsk, tsk, tsk!” with the monkeys.  After I read this a couple of times, I started to see parallels to living cross-culturally.  How many times have we had a break down in communication, thinking, “Why can’t they just do what I want??” The thing about the monkeys in this story, is that they were just copying the peddler; they thought they were having fun!  When the peddler finally threw his hat down, they surrendered their hats as well.

Oh, how I try to keep all my hats in order!  Anything that disturbs them, can put me on edge.  As I thought about this story, I noticed that the peddler loses all of his hats except one.  I consider this to be our essentials, our nonnegotiables.  All the other hats?  Well, I can say that God is working on me and showing me that I don’t need every single hat.  When things disturb me like loud, banging music by our neighbors, dogs barking, bad traffic, etc., I have to consider my reaction.  Why do I hold so tightly to my hats and why do I get so angry?  Do I feel like my way is justified and better than theirs?  Do I feel like they’re taking away something from me?  Does my reaction actually make it any better?

Because when it comes down to it, I have my own cap.  And it cannot be taken away.

I would love it if my reaction next time there was a loud wedding next door was “Cap!  Cap for sale!  This cap is about ideas comfort and quiet that bring on anger when not fulfilled!  I don’t need it anymore!”

Or when our neighbor’s dogs bark: “Cap! Cap for sale!  This cap is about revenge and angry words!  I don’t want it anymore!”

Or when I compare myself to someone else: “Cap! Cap for sale! This cap is about self-pity and doubt!  Please help me get rid of it!

The longer I’m here, the more I realize that I have a lot of caps for sale.  Thankfully we serve the One who wants to see us more like Him.

Tags: Caps for Sale, cross-cultural living, reactions, transformation

Easter 2012

He is risen! He is risen indeed!

We have so much to be thankful for as we celebrate Resurrection Sunday and remember that our debt has been paid.  Vandenn had a busy week hanging out with students, and he had opportunities to have significant conversations with many of them.  The weekend started out with an Easter party where several teammates and Khmer friends organized some fun Easter games and also shared the Easter story.  The students had a blast dying eggs for the first time.

And then on Sunday we had our Easter service and potluck (which is always interesting in an Asian context).  Carson refused to go up and sing songs with his Sunday School class, which wasn’t a surprise at all. I tried to prep him for it during the week, but when it came time, he would have nothing to do with it.  This is coming from the same kid who sings ALL THE TIME at home!  Oh well.

Sunday afternoon, Vandenn hit the soccer field with the dorm students who live at GCF.  The group has grown from a handful of guys a few weeks ago, to over 20 guys now living there. It’s an amazing opportunity for these guys at such a pivotal time in their lives.

Vandenn has really enjoyed investing in these guys and there is a lot of potential for great fruit.

Kalli enjoyed wearing her new dress from Grandma Bonnie, continuing the tradition I had of growing up with dresses my mom made for me.

Happy Easter from the Krouches in Cambodia!

Tags: dying eggs, Easter, party, Resurrection Sunday, student dorm

When You’ve “Married Into” a Calling

We all knew what we were getting into right?  We fell in love with a wonderful man who was passionate about the Word and about glorifying God with his whole being.  We knew that marrying this man would lead us away from home, from family, from friends, from other places that we loved.  And we married that man with joy, looking forward to sharing our life with him, wherever it would lead.

Wherever it would lead.

I knew that marrying Vandenn would bring me to Cambodia.  There was no doubt about that!  He was already the country director and had spent 5 years here, digging into culture and life.  And I joined him, having the same burden on my heart for the people of Asia, having worked in Mongolia for three years.  And yet, it wasn’t “my” calling.  I was here because I married Vandenn.  If I hadn’t gotten married, I would probably still be in Mongolia.

When we moved here together, it was a huge adjustment.  Vandenn slipped back into life in Phnom Penh so easily, although it obviously was different from his single days. He knew the language, he had friends and connections, he understood the culture in deeper ways, and most importantly, he felt like he was fulfilling the work set out for him here.  Where did I fit into that?

I struggled with depression and feelings of inadequacy.  I compared and over-sentimentalized my time in Mongolia.  I despaired that I could ever find Phnom Penh to be my home and “my” calling as well.

After one year in Cambodia, we headed to Northeast China, feeling our hearts tugged to a very broken country.  I sighed a big breath of relief–thankful that I didn’t have to continue to face my issues here.  It felt good to run away.  But…we were led back to Cambodia after another year, and I realized that my issues couldn’t be avoided.

It has been three years since we’ve come back.  I have continued to cry out to God, pleading with Him to bring me joy and love for this country.  Many times it seemed hopeless.  Many times I wanted to run away again.  Why did it seem so easy for others? I was so jealous of friends who fit in quickly here, who loved Cambodia so passionately.  I even asked a wise friend, “How long does it take before you just give up and move on to somewhere else? What if the love never comes?”

I write this to say, my friends, that there IS HOPE!  And now there is love!  I grasp on to the things that God has given me, thanking Him daily for this new outlook.  I can’t say that I’m completely out of the woods yet, because I know how our enemy loves to attack us at our weakest points.  But, our God is greater and our God is stronger than any other. He is bigger than even my deepest depths of despair.  This is my home.  This is where God wants to use me and to teach me so many things.

So what do you do if you’ve married into a calling?  Cling to Him.  Abide in Him.  And all these things will be added unto you.

Tags: calling, Cambodia, struggles, surrender

Hot Season

There is absolutely nothing that makes me less motivated than hot season…except maybe being pregnant, but since the latter is currently not true, hot season wins.  As sweat drips down my face and back, even the most simple tasks can have me waving a white flag of surrender–air conditioning anyone?  Because Cambodia still does not make its own electric power (which is soon changing, by the way), electricity is a major dent in our monthly income.  We do run the AC at night and during the kids’ afternoon naps, which I’m so thankful for.  The rest of the time, though, you’ll find me planted in front of a fan.  My only goal during this time of year is just to make it through.  Really.  Make it through the power outages (because the city can’t keep up with the demand).  Make it through all the laundry, due to sweating through all of our clothes more quickly.  Make it through hanging up that laundry without passing out.  Make it through my kids’ play time outside, while sweat trickles down our bodies… yes, when it comes to heat, I’m the first in line to say that I’m a complete wimp!

Now, I don’t want to complain this whole time, because I do know that we are pretty fortunate. Our power doesn’t cut out half as much as some places in the city and our house stays relatively “cool.”  Our previous house was a sauna, and we were forced to flee during hot season two years ago because we couldn’t bear it anymore!  We’ve also had some cloudy afternoons and a couple quick rain showers in the evening, which helps keep the heat down.  And who am I to complain that hot season ushers in mango season?

So, I think that I’ll go stand in front of our fridge for a little bit and eat some mangoes.

[Note: the picture above doesn't really have anything to do with hot season...just a cute picture of Kalli who swiped some Lawry Salt out of our fridge the other day and walked around like she had won a gold medal or something.]

Tags: AC, hot season, mango season, power outages

Wedding–Naga World Style!

This past Saturday we were privileged to attend the wedding of one of Vandenn’s former students from 8-10 years ago.  She and her husband have been studying their PhD’s in Japan and came to Cambodia to get married.  And let me tell you–this wedding was FANCY!  It was held at Naga World, which is our city’s casino…but the wedding was held in the grand ballroom.  We walked on a red carpet through the casino and up two flights of escalators, and I got a glimpse of what being a VIP feels like!

The ballroom had red chandeliers which I just loved, but then Vandenn had to comment that they looked like blood dripping down from the ceiling. I couldn’t quite look at them the same again.  At the wedding, Vandenn was able to see many old students, which is always a lot of fun.  We brought Carson along, and he kept himself entertained with his IPod Touch the whole time; the waiters kept commenting on how smart our son was for playing on the IPod (and here I thought I was being a lazy, selfish parent who just wanted to keep her very active three-year-old quiet!).

The food was great and the wait staff was excellent.  Usually at receptions you have cans of soda sitting on the table but this place already had it poured into glasses, so no cans in sight!  It’s the little things that really matter. They even placed the napkin on your lap!  We enjoyed our 7-course meal of appetizers, Peking duck, delicious fish, soups, mango prawns and Khmer dessert.  A lovely evening indeed.

Tags: Khmer wedding, Naga World, old students