Little Elephant

“Thank God He Ain't What He Was!” I do know this is the way I feel regarding most of the lives FCOP has impacted in Cambodia. We have two orphan kids with the nickname "Elephant", and the name came with a condition they were born with called 'meningoencephalocele' which is a hemorrhage of brain tissue through a hole in their cranium near their eye, and it forms a trunk looking appendage, thus the name, "Elephant". Both of our boys received very delicate operations. The first was the most serious and the procedure was performed in Cambodia which saved his life but caused blindness in his right eye. He has turned out to be a remarkable young man.The picture on the left shows him shortly after his operation 17 years ago.

He was the smaller of the two so, for the past 15 years, he has been "Small Elephant". The condition affects their physical growth, but after age 20 they begin to develop, but will never reach normal full stature. Talk about a, "We ain't what we wanna be!"? These kids are orphaned, dwarfed, teased, and in his case, blind in one eye. But the good news is they are becoming, "What they gonna be!". Small Elephant is a natural leader, small, but strong, he is willing to take on people twice his size when he feels they are not doing as they should. Two years ago he went to the rice farm and he works as hard as any of the men there. He's learned to operate the heaviest equipment and takes a real responsibility for feeding his 2500 brothers and sisters. One thing is for certain, as a future leader, "He ain't what he was!".

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