On the way Home from the Wedding

We stopped to take a picture of this beautiful orange flowered tree and soon drove into the Wat behind the tree. There were children playing in the wat and when they saw us they ran and hid. When we left they came out. They probably thought we were bad people looking to take children or something, when really all we wanted to see was the inside of the yard of the Wat.


The children were hiding in this Wat. Perhaps it is a home of a Buddhist Monk. Sometimes, they take in children and raise them if the parents bring them there for help.

There were many cattle all along the road and. . .


also many water buffalo. These had been in the water because they were all muddy.

If you make this picture bigger, off to the back right there is a baby cow nursing.

We were almost back in Phnom Penh when we saw this beautiful Cambodian sunset. I love it when I see them because in the city there are too many buildings around the mission home that block the view of a sunset.

Wedding in Romlong

Buntea (I think that's the right name) is from the Phnom Penh 12th Branch. He has been on a mission, but wasn't as active in the Church. Now he is going well and to all the activities. Whenever we see him, he comes and sits by us and he really likes Scott. He wanted us to come in the worst way to his wedding, but Scott told him he didn't think we could come and gave him a wedding gift of cash. That's what you give here. Anyway, it is 2 1/2 hours from Phnom Penh. When we arrived he about hugged Scott and just kept saying, I didn't think you were coming. Thanks so much for coming. He kept coming up to all of us (Fairchilds, Nelsons, and Housers) and thanking all of us for coming. As you can see, he loves the Nelsons and was greeting them as they got out of the van.


The young man married the daughter of the Kampong Thom Branch President. She isn't a member, but has promised him that she will come to church in Phnom Penh with him. They have rented a one room apartment. Her parents are on either side of them and the sisters of the Mom are there also. Everyone greets you as you go in to the festivities.


The Bride and Groom.


These little children were standing around waiting for us to finish drinks so they could collect the cans. One of them was so thirsty that he grabbed a glass of water when the person stood up. As soon as we all stood up to go, they grabbed all the left over food and put it in bags to take home and eat. In all our time here, I have never seen such hungry children. We were happy that they could eat what we didn't want.

Farewell to Elder Miles

Monday morning Elder Miles flew out for SLC, Utah. One of the first things he is going to do after greeting family is go to Cafe Rio and get a pulled pork burrito or something with pulled pork in it. He used to work there. Great missionary and he will do well in school and work, whatever he does!

New Missionaries

On Thursday, April 22, 2010, we received 8 new missionaries from the MTC Provo. We also had 2 new missionaries from here in Cambodia. They will start their missions now and then go to the MTC Manila Phillipines with 3-4 other Cambodians in June. They have had their calls for 3 months and were ready to come. The above group from L-R. Elder Son (came in on a Transfer from Vietnam at the same time this group arrived), Sister Nouer (the Cambodian), Sister Hildenbrand, Sister and President Smedley, Elders Seang, Cope, and Cox (Assistant). Back Row L-R Elder Thinh (here in transfer from Vietnam), Elders Conway, Baird, Christian, Ballard, Elder (yes, Elder Elder), and Elder Sweeten (new Assistant replacing Elder Miles). This is a great group of missionaires. Happy and positive.

This is the new Cambodian Elder. Elder Mai. He is 24 and has already baptized his Mother, has been a branch missionary and his current branch president is someone he baptized. So he will just carry on even more from his pre-missionary work!

Elder Hurwitz took this picture for me. This is on Friday after Training the new companions came in to pick up the new missionaries which also meant a BIG transfer. Elder Hurwitz was not standing on a chair. He is 6' 10", and so all I did was hand him the camera and now you have his viewpoint on things, plus you can see many of the missionaries.

This always requires LOTS of luggage.

The sisters before they took off to their new areas. Me, Sisters Sok, Pin, Askerlund, Hildenbrand, Essma, Wu, and Noeur. One of these days, I"ll get rid of the roll I have!

Finishing Missionaries

We have two missionaries finishing. They came in on Friday and had their Final interviews. Elders Ormsby and Miles. Both are excellent missionaries and have contributed much to the work here and the building of the Church in Cambodia. Elder Ormsby at one time was one of our Office Elders and Elder Miles is finishing as one of Scott's assistants. Elder Ormsby's parents came to the mission home to meet him and also have dinner and a final devotional with us. This is the sweet Reunion between Elder Ormsby and his Mother and also both parents



They are so thrilled to see him and so proud.

Walking the Red Carpet. Elder Ormsby

Elder Miles

The final dinner. All the missionaries love Sarat's Lasagne. Sarat is the part time housekeeper/cook here in the mission home. So she fixed this great meal and stayed to help me with the clean up.

After the devotional we met for one last picture with us.
We certainly will miss them, but wish them the best in the future.

Happy 60th Birthday to President Smedley/ A Baptism

We invited the office staff and some new Cambodian missionaries to join us along with 2 Senior Couple for cake and ice-cream. So it was a nice crowd of 14 people. The frosting turned out okay even though I forgot and put 1/2 the brown sugar it should have had. I should have licked the side of the cake pan and then you wouldn't see the extra frosting!

Sister Nouer (say New-a with a smile and your teeth together.) is a new Cambodian missionary. She and another Elder are starting out their missions without going to the MTC. They go in June with 2-3 other missionaries who just received their calls. These two had their calls for 3 months already and so Scott had them start now. I am Sister Nouer's companion until the new missionaries from the MTC come in tomorrow. We have 8 new missionaries coming in. Sister Nouer came into my office to tell me Good Night. There is one American sister coming in and they will be companions for a day. Sister Nouer is so willing to do what she needs to do. I went through her clothes and she had some short skirts and denim pants about 3 pair and 2 pair of high heels to do missionary work in. She was still left with 4 useable skirts. Tomorrow morning we will go next door to a store and see if they have any long enough skirts. I think she will have to wait until she goes up to her area. But she had a good attitude about getting rid of unuseable items. High heels are not good biking shoes or walking shoes. I mean, these were 4 inch heels! Her family will bring her in 2 pair of other serviceable shoes tomorrow morning.

We visited a branch that had a baptism after. Janet, on the left is an investigator from China. She speaks no Cambodian. She just dropped in after work because she couldn't go to Sacrament meeting in the International Branch. She works 7 days a week and 12 hour days with 2 days off a month! She is looking for different work. She had never seen a baptism, so we invited her to come. She loved it, but was surprised that women couldn't baptize or hold any priesthood. The other sister is a returned missionary, Sister Mouk, who did some translating for the talks for Janet and me.

These are two of the young men baptized that I talked about in one of my weekly letters. The Elders felt impressed to stop and talk to two young men, and ended up giving 13 other people pamphlets and got many return appointments. The young man in the white shirt and tie on the right is one of those young men. The other with the white shirt also got baptized, but I don't know if he was one of that other crowd. The missionaries from L-R: Elders: Leng, Hermann, and Stevens.

Office Elders Missing Part of Sports Day

Our very fine office Elders had to make a rush trip in to help President Smedley get some reporting into Hong Kong that had to be in that day. It was Sport Day here because of the Cambodian New Year. 2/3 of the people in Phnom Penh are out of town, so on the worst of those days the Missionaries take a day for Volleyball, basketball, badminton, Ping pong, etc. Elders Murdock and Klinefelter were on their way to participate when they got the emergency call from President Smedley. They were about finished when I discovered them. It was about 12:30 p.m. and they had already missed a couple of hours. What good missionaries they are. They never complained once and cheerfully got the report done. Now Scott doesn't look stressed!


Another creative arrangement. The elephant? Yes, sideways ...again!

Three Departing Cambodian Elders

Last Friday Elders Chheoum, Horl, and Duong came into the mission office for their Final interview and their temple recommend interview. We then had them come up into the mission home where they stayed all night and also had dinner with us and the Assistants and Office Elders. These three were very fine missionaries. All had been District Leaders and Elder Horl was a Zone Leader on his release.


Walking the Red Carpet. Elder Chheoum. His family has been on the blog a couple of times. First when we took President Perkins there to visit and last month when his sister got married.

Elder Horl

Elder Duong. Elder Duong came in for his final night with too long of hair. He told us he would get it cut, but then said he had no more money, so Scott gave him a Dollar and the Assistants ran him over to the barber to get his hair cut. Afterwards he said, "Now Sister Smedley isn't sad any more!" And that was true, I was happy he got it cut.

Scott and I take the Cambodian Elders home if they live within an hour or 1 1/2 hours of the Mission Home. The above Elders and the Assistants went with us to take Elder Chheoum home. His Mom and Dad and brother were waiting so they could take him to conference at their new chapel, the Takhamao Chapel. His Father is the branch president there. He is the only one of this group to have a family that were all members.

Our next stop was to take Elder Duong home. This is his Mom and Sister with us. Both look like Mormons. I hope they will listen and he can get them to come to Church with him. All of these Elders go home to more humble home conditions than how they lived during their mission. Elder Duong's Mom's home is on stilts, but is large inside and seems to have plenty of room.

Elder Horl hadn't seen this completed Takhamao Chapel yet, so we swung by so he could see it. I had the pictures on the blog of the openhouse, but not the chapel itself. Elder Chheoum was just getting out of conference, so hopped in the mission van and rode with us to take Elder Horl home. Elder Horl lived the furthest away. He lives in a very remote village about 60 kilometers from the Vietnam border.

His whole family and extended family were waiting for him. They also have Mormon faces and hopefully the church will one day be in their little village so they can attend Church. Elder Horl joined here in Phnom Penh when he was going to school. He will be back here soon to go to school. But we haven't seen him yet, so we hope all is well at home. His family are so nice as were all the families.

We were going to leave and Elder Horl put his arm around Scott and said, "President, my Mom has prepared a special meal just for you. Can you stay to eat it?" Of course we could. This is the kitchen and his uncle is the chef preparing the veggies to decorate the chicken with. We always say a very fervent prayer of the heart before we eat food prepared in some of these kitchens because we do not know how hygenic it was prepared and if it was prepared with pure water or not. But, they gave us their best and we needed to eat. It was delicious. This family is so poor, yet they gave us the very best that they had including their best dishes, silverware and water or homemade punch. Then everyone stood around and watched us eat. I tried to get them to join us, but they tell us they already ate. I hope they finished up what we didn't eat because they gave us so much.


Ex Elder Chhoeum eating the feast with Elder Miles and Cox our Assistants, and Elder Horl. His Mom made some delicious vegetables, broiled chicken which was really good and some sweet and sour soup that was good if you like that. I just had a little of the soup because it's not my favorite Cambodian dish. The Missionaries are sitting on the table/bed/ cooking area.

We were sitting under their home on stilts. They gave Scott and I the chairs and his mom and relatives are clear in the background. His father is sitting by me for the picture.

Our farewell picture with these two Elders. Elder Horl's Mom also gave us the papaya from her tree. Just so kind and nice all of them. And again it was so humbling to have them give you their best and then they don't eat. I hope we left plenty for them.

On our way home we saw this truckload of chickens. I took it because usually they turn the chickens live upside down by their legs and then connect them on to a car, truck, moto. This one, they were all standing up all in a row nice and cozy like. We love it because you never know what you will see on the roads when you travel. It made a fun end to a very special day delivering missionaries back to their homes and parents who were so proud of them even though Elder Duong's and Elder Horl's families are not members.

A Few Things of Interest

I have now replaced the Turquois ring that got ruined in my fall in Hong Kong last August. This is a Cambodian CTR ring. I tried to take a picture without it on my finger but it didn't show good, so when I took this one, you could see it good, plus you could see all of my old veins and arthritic hands. Well, some of my fingers have arthritic bumps. So sad to get older! Well, in some ways it's good, I think I am a little wiser too. We''ll just let this go at that!


My Easter decoration on the top landing near the dining room, kitchen and living room. I come up the stairs and see that, and it just makes me feel good.

This little flower arrangement was made by some handicapped students in Vietnam. I felt like I was helping a little by buying it. So, everytime I see this, I also get warm feelings.

Odds and Ends

Yesterday Sisters Fairchild, Curtis, Liggett and me went to the Olympic Market to buy material. We were on our way to the Russian Market to get an Elder who went home sick, some souvenirs that we could send home with his suitcases and the Tuk tuk driver took us on such a bumpy road, Sister Curtis thought she would fall out, so they were laughing because of our wild ride.

When we got back from Zone Conference, two Young Adult Women from the 12th branch came and brought us an Anniversary gift. We do not know how they found out it was our anniversary. They brought us this beautiful Table Runner or scarf and this cake topper of a bride and groom. They gave us a beautiful card saying that they hope we have good luck, good health, safety and peace and a great victory over Satan, our trials and suffering. They want us to have the Holy spirit come and dwell and help us to have success in our lives. They ended it by saying, "We always love you all the time" Ahhh, we thought it very sweet. They had it wrapped up all pretty in a beautiful box. So thoughtful and giving.

Today's pillow arangement. Notice the elephant. Scott still hasn't noticed he is sideways again. Hmm, I wonder how long it will take?

In the back of the Kampong Thom branch president's house in Rhom Long, he has a little pond. The neighbor across the pond has some water buffalo and they love to get in the pond and eat teh greenry that grows there. This one was close enought to jump on. However, I refrained myself. To be truthful, I would be terrified to get on one although they are supposed to be quite docile.