GRIFFITH GLEANINGS APRIL 2017
This month the Khmer new year coincides with Easter. The streets of Siem Reap are festooned for this most important date in the Khmer calendar. Families will gather together in their province of birth to celebrate with food and traditional games. Many shops are selling “super-soaker” style water pistols for the occasion as well. This past month we have been touched by the joy of new life, as well as grief in the death of some loved friends. Grief has different dimensions when it involves a geographical distance. Life and death is celebrated in different ways in Khmer culture that we are beginning to discover.
The family of the coffee cart in our street have welcomed into the world their baby girl. The day of the week that a child is born can impact the choice of the name, as can various family members. A “baby shower” type of celebration is planned for 1 month after birth. The fragility of life of a young child in Cambodia we expect has influenced this custom (Children in Cambodia are greater than 10 times the likelihood of death in infancy than a country like Australia). We have had the privilege to visit the family, mother and baby a couple of times now to build on these relationships and we see healthy signs of growth.
Many Khmer people in the past week have observed a festival with Chinese influences. Jom Reah Pnoo a “tomb-sweeping” holiday involves families gathering to clean and adorn their ancestors’ graves during the festival. We observed tomb stones being repainted, soil being mounded up higher on top of graves. Watching family members from different generations altogether, taking turns kneeling and offering prayers, after which they begin burning paper offerings. Our language nurturer informs us that each has a symbolic meaning – paper clothes for cover, a house for shelter, passports and visas for travel, and a whole range of fake money notes – in different currencies to save the ancestors the hassle of exchanging money. These material comforts are offered to their ancestors as a way of honouring their ancestors and in the hope that they will be blessed in return. After the ceremony, the family divvies up the food they brought for worship as a sign of good luck and to signify family reunion with their ancestors.
In our language learning we have moved to a new phase where we tell stories from wordless books. After our nurturer helps us with our attempts, we listen as our nurturer tell us how a Khmer person would relay the same story. We are also being acquainted with the Khmer alphabet leading to learning simple words to read. Who said, learning to read is child’s play?
In our almost 4 months of being here in Cambodia. Whilst living cross culturally we have grieved some significant deaths of Australian loved ones and friends from a distance. Including Deb’s birth mother (as Deb was a foster child from 6 months of age), Deb’s spiritual mentor from our home church, our Pastors wifes’ mother, and this last week one of Deb’s best friends suddenly died. We are grateful for God’s presence, your prayers, love, and supports during this time of grief.
This news of death and new beginnings for us frames what we share together in the knowledge of God’s gift to us at Easter. May you this Easter reflect on what that gift of forgiveness and new life means for you and your family. He has risen. |
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