Love is a luxury when survival is the necessity.

(Yesterday I went with Jenny, Chhorn and Adam to help film some of the family's we support at CFI. We went to the most impoverished homes in rural cambodia. One of the most amazing experiences in my life. Hard to explain but this is my attempt.)

My reality was crushed today.
Twisted into their simple truth only for a moment, I was thoughtless with pain.
All forms of emotion came over me in such few hours of the day.
Hope. I saw hope in the kind eyes of the family with the small metal hut suspended over the water at the edge of the rice fields.
Flowers leaning on the small gate outside.
This is their home, but this is not their land.
I saw hope, in the boys eyes who had a chance for a job, teaching soccer.
I saw hope in the smile of the mother and how she held her baby so tenderly.
I saw hope in that the father was there.
To abandon them is so easy and so frequently it is done. But he smiles at his wife and plays with his small child, holding his tiny hand in his as they look at one another… smiling, barefoot, dirty and as precious as life.
I felt ashamed as we bumped along the dirt road past the rice fields on the motobikes.
Ashamed that I bother with the things that truly does not matter.
Confused why we strive to be anything but ourselves and crave much more then what is needed. That delusion that is toxic to love, truth and goodness.
I felt thankful. So thankful that I closed my eyes, that there are happy endings, along with the all the sad. Thankful that people do care sometimes.
Thankful that my friends spend endless days and nights finding a way to make it somehow easier for them.
A bit more rice in their bowls.
A way to send the children to school, building their confidence, strengthening their ability to survive and smile.
Finding a way to bring down a fever, heal a broken home, and take care of someone left behind.
He was left behind and his eyes are always so far away.
The circumstances of poverty are heartless.
Love is a luxury when survival is the necessity.
Did they ever say goodbye? Did they feel guilt or question leaving?
As a boy looks at his feet in the middle of a dirt road lined with trash, Alone.
Did they hug him before they left him in the dust?
I felt the sadness of a child left, in his eyes. At the will of those around him.
He is quiet and keeps his head down. He must only take what he can.
His aunt is bitter and his rations are small.
I felt lost in those eyes and in these emotions as I felt her anger, his silence and the other children’s neglect.
Chickens, dogs and roosters were noticed as much as the children, playing naked and wild with sweet smiles of rotting teeth.
When will they stop smiling I think to myself.
I am scared for these small souls born into situations that will break them.
I want to take them in my arms and hold them away from reality.
Safe in my helpless arms.
They should not be here, I hope they leave one day, smiling.
I can only hope.

-Maya Tucker (CFI volunteer)

Back in Battambang

I remember it all now…
The uncertainty of crossing the road, the smell of sweet roasted duck mixing with the sewage running down the sidewalk drain.
The beautiful pagodas with architecture like a twisted kings crown.
Monks talking on cell phones and smoking cigarettes, still make me smile.
Sunsets over rice fields as I ride on the back of a motto on my way home from the center. The wooden houses perched on stilts, crooked, looking as if they will soon fall into the muddy yet beautiful river.
The river lined with the greenest vegetation you have ever seen.
Banana, jackfruit, pineapple.
Oh the pineapple! Like you have never before tasted pineapple =)
Tuk-tuk! Tuk-tuk lady! Hey Lady!! Ladyyyyyyy!!
Everyone on the bus is throwing up in bags and it stinks and this nice lady next to me is making me eat something stringy, wet and black and I don’t want it,
I don’t want it.
but I just smile as she forcefully slops it in my hand and I say mmmmmm… ah koon =)
The potholes you hit with that crazy guy driving you.
He doesn’t care! HE has a helmet!
Wedding season outside your window, everynight, everyday.
The lady who rips you off at the market for a massive grapefruit.
Her toothless smile, you cant help but love her a lil, you smile as she waves and thinks “stupid tourist, HA!”
When I run outside of the town, people clap.
I liked it at first =) made me run faster.
Now I run in the park, people stop clapping after the second round.
The outlet is smoking….
The outlet is smoking a lot…
The shower is cold and refreshing.
How many 18 year old boys work here?!
Do you work here…? My outlet is smoking.
Karaoke bars are bad places
=( unfortunately.
Money spent on gambling and beer when there is no rice at home.
Abandoned, raped, sold, broken.
Our boys and girls and their survival…its barely.
Their strength and ability to persevere… they are the worlds tiniest heroes.
The stories are beyond and above what we don’t want to know,
Yet they smile, and they are only 7, 9 or 14.
They all have a story.
Now they all have some hope, and a pen.
And a teddy bear to hold at night, to replace a mother.
Laughter in the garden.
Games, games and more games.
They try to teach me but my shoes get caught in the tree.
We just laugh.
I’m digging in the garden and they think I’m crazy,
And I am. =)


-Maya Tucker (CFI volunteer)