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[hyovans]

I know I've been missing a few days, but I fell terribly sick so I was unable to post anything new. I woke up on Monday (first day of school) and I was utterly powerless; I could hardly feel my body other than the fact that it was intensely sore. I couldn't move my body and I just lay there groaning and willing myself to move but being unable to do

Comments

[tripletxtreme]

Sounds like Cambodia really did have an impact on you. And now I understand what you mean by wanting to help rather than being influenced/identifying with it.

Did your parents ever talk to you/ did you ever talk to your parents about the poverty that you saw around you?

How old roughly were you when you started realizing that you had things the other kids didn't, and that it made you in a way more fortunate than them?

I'm sorry this is starting to look like one of those annoying RE surveys that the whole world was doing. I'm just kinda extremely curious.

[hyovans]

haha no it's fine, your questions give me a chance to think about things from another perspective.

hmm come to think of it we never directly talked about poverty around us, although I remember one time my mom was really angry and she threatened to send us out to be like one of the street bread sellers for us to truly realize how good our lives were.

I think it was really obvious from the moment we landed, when we saw all these beggars without limbs and the dilapidated houses they lived in, that we were more fortunate than them.

[anonymous]

if u dont mind, since ur parents are missionaries (i dont suppose they earn a lot, unlike back before the 1993 korean crisis), how does your parents support u and ur brothers' overseas education and expenditures?

[hyovans]

Well, i don't know really. God's grace. I don't know if a lot of people would buy that but when I look back I really believe it wasn't just some natural chance happening that we managed to get funding for school.

Secondary School -> Vice principal turned out to be a Christian who understood our situation and gave us a half scholarship.

JC -> Was supposed to pay $1200 a month as a foreign student but within a space of 2 weeks, I managed to get PR and then the Humanities Scholarship so I paid virtually nothing for the entire JC period.

University - I'd rather not disclose what happened, but basically I got a scholarships and grants worth half my tuition and the rest just came through.

My parents, on their own strength might not be able to support my education but it seems like somehow at all the critical moments, something/someone (GOD) intervened and that's what I really believe.