Gay is back from her house-building trip to Cambodia with Tabitha USA, and I was hoping to be able to quote some memories from her journal. Unfortunately, one of her dogs ate it almost as soon as she got home. Really.

Quick perceptions, however ...

She had a wonderful time, is still digesting the experience (much like the dog), was deeply touched by the people, their resilience and ability to smile given their all-too-recent and terribly tragic history, and is planning to go again next year to build more houses.

Cambodia is such a difficult place to explain, but quick to get under your skin once you're there. Her history, both grand and grim, is palpable, and her people are unlike any I've met anywhere.

One story Gay related was presented as part of her orientation by the Tabitha staff in an effort to introduce new team members to the country and give a taste of what it means to be Khmer. Their person on the ground in Phnom Penh has lived in Cambodia for years, and early in her time had occasion to visit many homes in the course of her work. Without comment, she had noticed in every house a bottle of water sitting up high on a shelf somewhere. At one point, she needed to swallow a pill, and with no running water in the house reached for one of these. The woman whose house she happened to be in at the time swatted it out of her hand.

It was not water in these bottles in all these houses ... it was poison. And it was there in case another day came like the one in April 1975 when the Khmer Rouge marched everyone out of Phnom Penh and started the horror that lasted until 1979.

No one in Cambodia has any doubt that this could happen again and none want to live through it a second time.