As he approached the floating school, Dareth noticed the children getting into boats to go home. One small boy in particular caught his attention. While the other children paddled away, the boy found a place in the shadows, reached into his shirt, and pulled out a small baggie of rice and a dried minnow. Relieved that he was now alone, the child quickly began to eat.

It was unclear what startled Dareth more – the boy’s hunger or his furtive glances to be sure no one saw him eat. Dareth knew that feeling, the weakness hunger brings and the fear that the food you so carefully squirreled away would be taken from you. A small bag of rice, a dried fish – that would have been a feast compared with the grasses and snails and roots Dareth once ate to survive.

Dareth knew that terrible hunger because when he was that young boy’s age, he was fighting for his life in the killing fields of Cambodia. Now he was back and still fighting for life – for the lives of children and the people of Cambodia. For Dareth, the killing fields were now harvest fields.

Dareth oversees several of Mission of Mercy's projects in Cambodia. Come back tomorrow for more of Dareth's incredible story and how he is uniquely equipped to speak truth and hope to a people who have suffered so much.