Dear Friends and Family,

Greetings from the Land of the Khmers. I should also include the Chams as we are planting a church in Kampong Cham. We hope you had a nice month. I guess things are warming up now. We just had our warmest month. The rains have begun. So far the streets are usable and the puddles last only a day. Gradually we will become "mud stew" again. Let me share some of what happened this past month.

Kaoh Ksachtunlea East

We had a three day youth camp on an island in a tributary of the Mekong River . It is the site of one of our churches and also the House of Joy, childcare facility. One- hundred and thirty young people, plus missionaries and a visiting medical team of Filipinos, attended. It was fun! At times I was so hot I felt sick. I jumped in the river once and hit the shower stall(river water) often. Seven people from Kampong Cham attended. Suremon, whose house we have our meetings at, was voted the best female camper. She sang a hymn, a solo, one evening. I also had a chance to sing, a Japanese song, when the band had to go pull one of our trucks out of the river. Camp was a great time. We had a campfire and did traditional dance the last night. As if it wasn't hot enough.

Filipino Medical Team

We had ten folks from the Philippines for two weeks. Yuko and I went to Treuslaa to be with them one day. We arrived late because one of the Chinese owned garment factories had a protest going on and traffic was stopped. Fifteen police sat around watching. When we arrived on the island, the team had done some medical service but mostly was praying with everyone. It was also hot inside on this day and I hit the river. I even bought some sugar cane juice in ice. The ice isn't always safe, but I prayed and then enjoyed it. Five minutes later I was melting again but I had that fond memory of a moment's refreshment.

Takhmou

I have about 25 people in my class every Monday. We spend half an hour with an English text and then switch to a Christian comic in the Cambodian language. The students read this and then we do some English exercises from the book. They are expensive, $.55 each, so I can't give them away. The students are disappointed, but we share the literature at all the outreaches. The class is really interested in what we are doing. I'm also building on the relationship I have with Bunleu, the owner's son. Vibol, one of the young men from the House of Love Childcare Facility, works with me. He is my translator. Recently he has had some issues in his life and is being disciplined. I had a chance to share with him some of my insane escapades, and encourage him not to do as I have done.

Kampong Cham

We are going to Kampong Cham regularly(every two weeks). We ad our first children's class, and English class, last week. We had fifteen in the children's class, and twenty in the Bible/English class. The children, especially, had a good time. I brought my suit but didn't have time for the river--oh well. Suremon had half a dozen of her friends there. The family is very hospitable. We had some honey from a hive (on a stick) that Sarah's father found. Sarah works in our Phnom Penh office and is our contact for Kampong Cham. Suremon is her younger sister. The honey was great, the larvae were...well...

Kompot

This is our furthest outreach, a five and a half hour round trip. Kampong Cham is about a four and a half hour round trip. Last month at Kampot we had a hundred children both times we went. Forty adults attended the first week and thirty the second. We're going to get some one dollar a piece plastic stools so folks will have a place to sit. The rainy season is coming. At our last meeting the rain held off until we were finished with the lesson in Matthew. Besides the blessing of sharing the Word with so many people, was the fun of seeing the pig that lives here enjoying the rain. He was absolutely giddy! He was snorting and jumping around and running up and down under the house and in the field knocking over dogs and ducks with abandon. It was delightful.

We had planned to have a joint baptism at Easter, but as it was just after camp, we thought we'd wait. Well it was planned for this last weekend, but I received a phone call Saturday night telling me it would have to be moved again. The reason--Gra peu--crocodiles! Sometimes it's stranger than fiction here. You have to love it.

Thanks for your prayers and gifts. Pray we step on the right rocks.

Love, Chris and Yuko

Chris & Yuko Wilkins
C/O P.O. Box 602
PNOMH PENH. 
CAMBODIA

Please send gifts to: Free Methodist World Headquarters, Box 535002
Indianapolis , Indiana . Please mention it is for "The Wilkins Family." Thanks again.