Our Cambodia office reports on a woman who volunteers with the school feeding project.

Thery lives in Andong Tmar, a small and very poor village near the Thai border in northwestern Cambodia. Although she is a widow she does not live alone. Several of her daughters are still at home with her and she is surrounded by many of her grandchildren.

As we sit in the shade of her home under a thatched roof, Thery tells us she did not come from a poor family. Her father was a doctor. But when she was a young girl the Khmer Rouge took over Cambodia and she did not have the opportunity to continue going to school. Her father tried to teach her at home, but it wasn’t long before he too died after being sent the “Killing Fields.”

Thery continued to try to learn by studying pieces of paper she would find here and there, but it was not long before the young people in her village were forced to become soldiers. “They gave us uniforms and guns and told us to fight,” she said.

Toward the end of the civil war that ensued after the defeat of Pol Pot, Thery and her husband heard the new government was giving away land in Banteay Meanchey, the province along the Thai border, and they decided to move. They received a large piece of land and hoped to start a new and better life. That was in 1997, almost 15 years ago.

Her dreams were dashed when Thery’s husband began drinking. To support his habit, he slowly sold off small sections of their once large piece of land until they had nothing left. He died three years ago, and the village leader had compassion on Thery and gave her a small plot of land to live on.

She had little to look forward to until Samaritan’s Purse came to the village to start a project to feed school children. The program gives them the nutrition they need to focus on their studies, and takes a burden from their parents.

Thery very much wanted to be involved in helping. “I was very willing in my heart to help because the children are so poor,” she said.

She began working with our staff to learn basic bookkeeping. Over the past year and a half she has learned how to understand and work with numbers and now keeps good records of the food that is stored for the project. She said she loves working on the project.

We thank the Lord for this project that supplies breakfast for over 3,000 children each morning and also provides the opportunity for a woman like Thery to have a small job she is proud of and enables her to give back to her community.

Samaritan's Purse , Cambodia , Learning to Work with Numbers

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