A party of Five

 In this blog I have mentioned several times that there were four of us orphans on this trip.  The fact is there were five of us...sort of.  I would say in the ways that matter there were definitely five of us. 


Suzy, the wife of Cale (one of the orphans) can along with her two kids, Max and Olivia.  The three of them arrived a couple days after the start of the tour, the day before we left Phnom Penh. Just in time to miss our first bike ride. 


From the start of planning this trip, Suzy showed a great deal of interest, and feeling that this was a great opportunity for her children to introduced to the country their father came from. I was very happy to know that she was going to make it once everything was finalized...
I greatly admired her for making this trip...traveling to a drastically different country, to meet and be with a group of people she has never met, and to experience things that she might have never expected.  

I'm not that brave.

I had spoken to her on the phone once, I think and had communicated with her over text message, but our first actually meeting happened at the Okay Boutique Hotel when I was waiting for an up elevator.  The doors opened but was going down. As the door closed, Suzy popped her head around the corner and said, "Hi Tony."  and then was gone.  I didn't actually realize it was her until about ten minutes later, when I saw them in the van and she said, "I didn't mean to startle you in the elevator." 

It was really nice having them with us, and Cale by proxy.  Max and Olivia got on well with my kids and I am hoping we get to visit them soon...Of all the orphans, they live closes to me.  




One of my favorite memories was when Max and Liam tried those feet eating fish.


Max was able to relax into it. 

John Christal and I were not, notice none of our feet are in the water.


My favorite Olivia memory was when a monkey came toward her, and she threw her flowers at it and ran. 


Note the flowers on the ground...The same monkey attached Christal for her flowers...Christal stood her ground and threw the monkey off. 


And my favorite memories with all of them was the Khmer New Year Water Fights.



Notice Madeleine is in this picture on my phone.

Thank you Suzy, Max and Olivia for helping to make this trip so great...and welcome to the family




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