Summertime:)

It has been an exciting summer so far for Imparting Smiles. Teams from Texas, Georgia and Oklahoma have come to teach the kids, paint, lay cement and run mini-Bible camps for the children around the centers. Of course one of the things the kids enjoy most about teams coming are the new friendships that are built during their stay.








Imparting Smiles also had three young men come and serve and teach for extended periods of time at the centers.

Zac Law from The Church of Glad Tidings in Yuba City, CA taught English and some math at the center in Kracheh. He also built a new garden fence and served and spent time with the kids in many other ways. He just returned home after being here for a little over 5 months.
Nick Lowman from Heights Church in Prescott, AZ taught English and served in Kracheh for the month of June.

Zach Reed from Kingsland Baptist Church in Katy, TX is currently teaching guitar and serving the kids in Poipet and Kracheh for the month of July. It has been great to have them and the kids have enjoyed learning from them for extended periods of time.

Our first 12th grader, Mach Sokeing, will be taking her exams this month to graduate high school! Everyone is watching her with great expectation. We are excited for her and we’re praying that she will be able to pass her exams.

THEY CAME BACK FOR MORE :)

The Heights Church from Prescott, AZ came back for more! This time they ran a
three-day Bible camp for the kids from the villages around the Poipet children’ s center.
Around 300 kids came everyday and the team did a great job with them. They learned
memory verses, played games, had a Bible story, a craft and a time of learning new
songs. Everyone seemed to have a great time and all of the children can’t wait for them
to come back again!

Christmas

All the children from the Kracheh center rode a bus for over 10 hours to celebrate
Christmas with the kids in Poipet. There were over 150 people there when all was said
and done. It was a big party and the day included lots of good food, games, songs and
dances, gifts, a visit from the provincial governor and even a display of fireworks! It was
a very merry Christmas.

BUILDING A PLAYGROUND:)

At the end of November a team from Memphis, Tennessee came to build a playground at
the Poipet Imparting Smiles children’ s center. This was all possible because Steve and
Ellie Marcum at Bellevue Baptist Church were inspired to help the kids. They rallied
their church’ s VBS program this summer to help and the kids raised the money to build a
playground.

Building a playground in Cambodia is not like building one in the USA. They had to
bring many of their tools from the States, including chains, and rustproof screws and
bolts. We had to pre-order the timber to build the playground which entailed having a
wood-cutter go into the jungle and find the trees we requested. Then they had to cut the
tree down and cut each individual plank with a chain saw. After that they had to haul it
by ox cart to the center. To finish the wood we had to hire a table plainer to plain it down
so it was not so rough. It took months of preparation just to get the wood ready.

When the team arrived they spent a whole week building the large playground. Thanks
to them the kids at the center and the kids in the community now have an exciting place
to spend after school hours.

Imparting Smiles First Field Trip :)

Imparting Smiles took their first field trip last week. Twelve of the high school and Jr.
High students, who were in the top of their class, took a three-day trip to Angkor Wat.
There are many temples around Angkor Wat that are rich with Cambodian history. The
field trip was meant to encourage the children to continue to apply themselves to their
studies and also to help them understand their nation’ s history and culture better.

Besides visiting the ancient temples, the kids also visited a silk factory to see the
Cambodian way of producing silk. Cambodians have been making silk for hundreds of
years and it is quite a long process. We also took some time to go and see traditional
Cambodian dances.

Christian Life Gospel Center, PJ @ Poipet

The kids at the Poipet children center had so much fun learning the bible last week with a team of people from Christian Life Gospel Center, Petaling Jaya, Malaysia. The week long programme included a 4 Day Kids Camp entitled Treasure Island and workshops on guitar and balloon sculpting. We were also glad to have four youth from the children center at the Kracheh province joined us. It is good to see them learning to minister to the younger ones here.

The camp focused on three aspects of a child – spiritual, social and physical. The spiritual aspect was being addressed through the bible teaching sessions and the one-to-one group time with each child. While the social and physical aspects were addressed through the game sessions. In this camp, children learned discipline and respect for one another. We saw positive changes in some of them as they responded to the word of God and words of encouragement from the team.
The team also shared and taught the Word of God every night to the leaders here to encourage and affirm them of the work that they are doing here. During this time several children also experienced the healing of God as some of them were sick.

We thanked God for His faithfulness and love for the children here and His providence that every need was being met each day. All glory to God!


Balloon sculpting: The team teaching the older ones on sharing the gospel through balloon sculpting.


Teaching session: Kid interact with the team leader during one of the teaching sessions.


Ministering to the leaders.


Icebreaker


Guitar lessons: Simon Kang with the kids.


Guitar lessons: Tammy Leong with the kids.


Group cheer from the parrots!


The monkey group!


The team getting ready for the camp day.


Game: Flip it right.


Game: scissors, papper, stone & WET the game master!!!


Game: Telematch


The game masters.


The game master giving instructions on the game.


Teaching session: Illustrating a point through acting.

Children's Center in Poipet

After nearly 18 months of exhausting work the new children’s center in Poipet,
Cambodia was dedicated. The Deputy Prime Minister, Keo Kim Yan, was the one to
officiate the dedication ceremonies along with Governor Oeung Oen, the Governor of
Banteay Meanchey province.
There were over 2,000 guests including members of the National Assembly, Senate,
Military, Police, all provincial officials, business community, and organizations. Since its
inception our desire was to include all government, local business people, international
community and the community in meeting this need. On this day thousands of people
involved came together to celebrate the dedication.
The Deputy PM made a personal donation of 3 million Riel ($750) along with other
donations of bicycles, beds, dishes, and chairs by other officials. The Deputy PM also
called on other officials to use this center as a “Model Center” for the nation.
At the center, apart from general education, we also teach the children English,
computers, agriculture, and music which is all centered around the Word of God and
character based discipleship. We are also hoping to start a crisis pregnancy center and
kindergarten on the site as well in the near future.
Currently we are housing 34 children but we are prepared to take on more children
immediately. The capacity of the center is 100 children. We will soon be taking in
children (approximately 15-20) who were born to female inmates and have no place to
care for the children. These kids, because they have no home, are being held in prison
in the general population. There are still hundreds, if not thousands, of abandoned and
orphaned children in this area as well.
Please continue to pray for us and the new center in Poipet, Cambodia. We still need
further assistance and are offering sponsorship of the children at $35 per month. At
present, we have more than 70 children in Kracheh Province and 34 here in Poipet and
the number will soon grow.