A Community of Friendship by Mária Dominika Vanková

“Why don’t we create a pen-pal project between our Lutheran Bilingual Grammar School (EVG) in Slovakia and your Don Bosco Kep Missions (DBK) in Cambodia?” asked my friend and former English and arts-and-culture teacher from EVG, Frances Bathgate. As the brilliant educator and thinker that she is, Frances could immediately see so much more in my master’s degree research project than I’d ever intended.

It was the summer of 2022, but the moment she suggested it, I felt like the background commotion stopped and I could travel in time 10 years back to my membership in an EVG pen-pal exchange project with a school in Turkey. It was a truly life-changing experience that helped open our minds to so much new religious, cultural, and linguistic knowledge, and made us grow into more responsible and understanding adults. I knew I would have time limitations because of my university responsibilities, but the inner desire to give back the same opportunity that I had profited from was stronger. The project idea seemed particularly promising because we could connect students from very different worlds: Slovakia and Cambodia, private schools and missions for children from extreme poverty, and even interfaith aspirations as the participants would be Lutherans, Catholics, Buddhists, and possibly some Muslims and nonreligious (including atheists and agnostics). It sounded like an actual, engaged peace-scholarship project.

Five months afterward, in Cambodia, I learned that DBK was very happy and excited to facilitate our project, especially with the extraordinary support of our third cofounder, director Fr. Albeiro Rodas, SDB. One of the most rewarding aspects of the pen-pal initiative was to see how the students became more confident in their English-language and communication abilities. Moreover, the Cambodian DBK students were inspired to see firsthand how education and hard work could open so many doors for them. Many of the students didn’t even have the opportunity to travel to Phnom Penh, and suddenly they were able to talk to somebody from across the globe and see photos of Slovak food, architecture, and landscapes.

The Slovak EVG students, on the other hand, stepped out of their comfort zone and realized that what they have is not the norm for everybody. This was heartening to see, because we all tend to forget that education should be first and foremost about the transformation of ourselves and the world. However, even after the project’s early success, I was still surprised when the Slovak students didn’t take it as only a “compulsory school responsibility” to reply to their Cambodian pen pals, but instead tapped into their own resourcefulness and organized a “Sweet Break” to sell cakes they had baked to raise money for their new friends at DBK. It reminded me of one of my favorite Fr. Anton Srholec quotes: “The greatest, humanly speaking ‘successes,’ only begin beyond the lines of what is our responsibility.”

After the event, the EVG students bought books about Slovakia in English, sweets, and Slovak handcrafts and created handmade postcards and letters. I wanted to further amplify this heartwarming initiative, so I gathered other sponsors for educational supplies and games. Thanks to Don Bosco Kep’s friends at Sawasdee Foundation Netherlands, our shipping container safely arrived at DBK Missions. The expression of friendship and gifts brought much joy, and I believe also had a lasting impact.

The “Sweet Break” organized by the EVG students at the “Indigenous Peoples Days” conference on October 9.

Despite various challenges we had to overcome, our pen-pal project grew and was remodeled into the Club of Friendship Slovakia-Cambodia, where we began discussing different themes every two weeks. Our joint efforts were demonstrated when we organized our first conference, “Indigenous Peoples Days,” on October 9 of this year. The conference was inspired by the DBK’s mission of aiding endangered indigenous communities and environmental protection, and was focused on the theme “We Are All Interconnected.” The event featured talks, videos, discussions, and prayers on how we are all connected through life on the same Earth despite our diverse religious, cultural, and social backgrounds. A highlight of the conference was an online greeting from DBK’s Indigenous Peoples Conference in Cambodia. We also tried indigenous creative practices such as body painting, and students wrote pledges for indigenous peoples and nature on leaves that were later put on a “Tree of Life” painted at the school. A sampling of the students’ pledges is instructive for all of us:

We must live with nature. We don’t know how blessed we are.

Be informed about indigenous people and pray for them.

Every culture is different but beautiful in its own way.

Inspire people around us.

When you change yourself, you change everything. Be an example for others.

We need to have good relationships with each other.

Go outside more.

I will not waste food.

We are nature.

The DBK students worked on painting their own friendship tree that mirrored ours. We also organized a “Sweet Break” to ease the educational expenses of our friends in Cambodia and handed out participation certificates. I was happy to award the Angkor Wat Award to the most dedicated students from the Club of Friendship. Naturally, without great educators and visionaries like Frances and Fr. Albeiro, and without the open-minded and diligent students, teachers, and leadership departments of both schools, none of this would have been possible. I have to express my deepest thanks and respect to them: they prove that a lasting community of friendship is possible, even in our torn and wounded world.

Sometimes, people ask me how long my passion for creating friendships and building bridges will last before I get utterly discouraged by humanity. Thinking about it, I have to say that creating friendships and building bridges goes beyond passion. It is a choice, a decision of the will.What helps me and others to sustain our hope in this choice is what Fr. Richard P. McBrien wrote in one of his columns: “A community of friendship is possible because God is present to human life as one who unites and reconciles, as one who breaks down barriers and builds bridges.” ♦

Mária Dominika Vanková is a writer from Slovakia. She has worked with peace-building and poverty alleviation initiatives in Southeast Asia, and is currently compiling archives of Fr. Richard McBrien’s syndicated columns on theology. She is the founder of the Club of Friendship Slovakia–Cambodia and a coordinator of humanitarian aid to Cambodia.

Banner image: The pen pals and DBK students receive the gifts and sponsorships from their Slovak friends, February 2024. Photo by Fr. Albeiro Rodas, SDB