Today I turn twenty-four. I have never had a birthday before when basically everyone I know was on the other side of the world, but it has been a really good day all the same. Thanks to everyone for the emails, e-cards, text messages, phone calls, MySpace comments, IM greetings, and especially to whoever it was who arranged for them to set off fireworks this evening in Phnom Penh. I watched to my delight as the starburts lit up the sky over the river and the puffs of smoke came rolling past my balcony like those massive but delicate floats in the Rose Parade.

Around noon today the team from Tennessee headed off to the airport for their flight up to Siem Reap to see Angkor Wat. Also, Ming Visal and the family headed off to Sihanoukville for a couple of days, so I am on my own.

Since it’s my birthday and all, I decided to do something special. I thought I’d make history. Never before in my life have I paid money for a haircut. All these years my mom has been gracious enough to take the clippers to my head every few weeks, so I’ve never had need to pay a barber. But having now gone two and a half months without a haircut, I was starting to go crazy because my hair had gotten so long that it touched my ears, so I made a trip to the beauty salon a few blocks from the house. After a brief explanation of what I had in mind, the barber got to work and 15 minutes and three dollars later I felt like a new man. I had him leave the hair on top and taper the back and sides. Part way through the ordeal I feared it would end up looking like a crew cut but fortunately it doesn’t, even if a crew cut might have been fitting for Veteran’s Day.

This afternoon I went with Sina to his football game. Sina is a leader with WR’s Hope program, and I got to know him a little bit at the retreat this past week. He, like me, is twenty-four, but unlike me, he is really good when it comes to Khmer traditional dance and he strikes me as one who is smooth with the ladies. Anyway, he’d invited me along to his game and I figured there was no better way to spend a birthday afternoon in Cambodia than to watch some soccer. He plays in a league comprised of ten teams from churches around Phnom Penh, and tonight’s game was on a field that apparently belongs to a Thai-run university in the outskirts of town. On the moto ride out there, Sina jokingly compared his game to that of David Beckham and Ronaldo. Losing two to one at half time, I tried to give him a pep talk, reminding him of momentum, the sports concept I taught him about earlier in the week when my volleyball team was looking to surge ahead and beat his, though we lost and he won that day. The momentum was not with his team today, however, and they ended up on the short end of the stick, by a score of four to one.

So now the day has just about come to a close, and I’m listening to Paul Simon and typing from Java Café, this cool expat hangout with good coffee brewing and art on the walls. They have wireless Internet access, and I am wishing I’d have discovered this place sooner. I’m wearing this snazzy blue Cambodian football jersey I picked up this morning. Tomorrow my brother Joshua arrives and he’ll be here for the next two weeks, so good times guaranteed.

(Sina is the guy on the right, stretching his leg.)