Cambodian countryside

Today I got to visit with my Krusa-FM colleagues in Cambodian countryside, in a province called Kampong Cham. First we crossed the Mekong river by ferry, and after that we drove sometimes red clay covered roads, sometimes straight paved roads. I need to say paved road are really good here.

We visited one listeners, a pastors who guides a congregation of ten families. He has been taking care of this flock for three years now. Most of the 100 village households are Buddhists, but these ten households have takes a baptismal in a local small river and are committed to follow Christ. Most of the congregation are farmers and fishermen.

Pastor himself has two cows, several pigs and several ducks and chicken.

You would think this brings additional income. Sometimes, yes selling a pig does. But the pastor explained that when there is a lot of pigs for sale, then the price goes down This a problem that the villagers face.

Other problems? His church is half built. This is the second church I meet today. The pastor has started to build it, but does not have funds to finish. He will finish it when the funds permit. I encouraged him to think of the building his people, concentrate on that. Human capital is more important than church buildings per se. I wish I would transport all the empty church buildings from Finland to Cambodia!

We also visited a listener group. Lovely Chann, the Krusa-FM broadcaster who takes care of the women’s program on Friday evenings, has connections to many listeners. Most of these listeners we met today, are wives of the fisherman or farmers, who are currently working. Lovely Chann did kind of informal focus groups – had the audience listen to a ten-minute program that is normally aired on Krusa-FM. After listening, the audience talked about the program, and what they learnt from it.

One funny ice breaker they did – carrying a pen from arm to arm – a competition by two groups.