Blogging from Cambodia -- the beginning

I googled "what should I blog about." Here's what I found:
The most obvious answer is to blog about things you are passionate about and interested in.
The holy grail of blogging is a mix of what you love and what you can get paid for – and paid really well.


That all sounds sensible. Well, except for the money part! So what do I love?


I love Apple Inc and most of their products. Come to my house and I'll convince you to buy some of your own.


I love Nikon cameras, but currently have to settle with an Olympus.


I love babies, but currently have none of those, either.


Although I've never worn a cheese head or been inside Lambeau Field, I'm a die hard Packer backer.


I like very black coffee. Some Australian friends just brought us some Rainforest Alliance Certified, organic, medium-dark, arabica whole bean from El Salvador! Come on over; we can share a fresh pot.


I love Cambodia. I think. I must? Although Darlene and I have lived here for 15 years, Cambodia has proven to be a tough place to really love.

We like the beautiful greens and crisp air of the rainy season. But halfway through the rainy season, the rain has become an obnoxious nuisance.


We enjoy the flavors of tropical fruit and Asian spices. But neighbors regularly steal our fruit and those spices can produce debilitating episodes of diarrhea.


We love grabbing babies whenever we feel the urge - that's still "OK" here. But we detest the selling and trafficking and abuses aimed at these precious bundles.


We love the riverside, the festivals, rural villages, Cambodian smiles, improved roads, and Khmer curry. We hate corruption, injustice, AIDS, selfishness, pain, and hopelessness. OK, time for another paragraph.


We came to Cambodia because God gave us a passion and desire to serve and love hopeless people.

Through the years, most of our work has focused on families living with HIV-AIDS and on orphans. More recently, we have made the best of opportunities to serve the needs of poor villagers.


Today, we can drive into the village of Sobhan and discover one small green spot in an otherwise very brown world. We find kids and adults working, producing, studying, playing, worshipping and dreaming.


But helping people hasn't been as easy as we expected it to be. We’ve met tons of obstacles. Every week, we experience disappointment and discouragement. Why doesn’t God honor our commitment, our hard work, our good intentions, we wonder?  Why don’t more people see and take advantage of opportunities that we believe could change their lives?


Reality is usually different from what we "see." Usually.


Dar and I just spent three months with friends and family in America. From there, it was like clicking on Google Earth. As the aerial camera zoomed in, we suddenly saw things we never even noticed while actually on the ground.


People were changing. We noticed a couple men working around their house, helping their wives care for the property. We saw a couple bright green ‘spots,’ evidence that at least some were trying to apply the principles taught in our home gardening seminar. More uniformed children walked the three-kilometer road to school, proving that parents made education a priority. The grassy parking lot at church had expanded to include a few more bikes and motorcycles, evidence that some villagers attended.


Now back in Cambodia, we embark on a "blogging journey." we'll describe our life -- that includes our work, our fun, our weekends, our friends, everything. You'll know our frustrations and our joys, our anger and our contentment. You will meet some amazing people who are on our team. We'll tell stories of people who are on their own journeys -- some for better, some for worse.


Of course, life, as I mentioned earlier, does include Apple, coffee, Nikons and the Packers. They may make cameo appearances in the blog.


We hope you'll come back. And please join the conversation.