December Books
7 years ago
11 June 2009
18 May 2009
16 May 2009
Praise
Last week, we were blessed to see the Lord bring a patient from the brink of death. Last Thursday night, a patient suffering from a severe pneumonia became quite short of breath. I went to her bedside about midnight and told the family that I thought she was worsening, was getting the best care available in Lilongwe, and did not recommend transfer to the Central Hospital. She clearly needed to be intubated and put on the ventilator (breathing machine). We of course don't have one. Central Hospital has a couple, but they are usually in use. Her husband, my nurse, and I prayed for her through the night. I was called again at 2am to return to her bedside, as her condition had worsened. I spent the rest of the night in the ward, resting in an open bed. We administered steroids and prayed. By morning, it was apparent that she was improving. I thought she wouldn't make it through the night, however the Lord sustained her. I'm not sure it was a miracle, but I don't have another explanation.
06 May 2009
Loss
Our little infant boy for whom you've been praying died last evening. Meningitis is the likely cause, but we won't know for sure. I had met with his father, Chimwemwe, earlier in the evening to inform him of the baby's condition. Chimwemwe looked to be holding up well, especially given that he was to bury his wife in the coming hours. Thank you for continuing to pray for this family. Their grief must be unfathomable.
The Lord reigns.
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Psalm 147:3
The Lord reigns.
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Psalm 147:3
05 May 2009
Prayer request
Please pray for a new little baby who was admitted to our ward yesterday. He doesn't have a name yet. He was born yesterday morning at 3 am, and his mother died from postpartum hemorrhage, a fairly common occurrence here. He was her first child. Her husband was quite shell-shocked when I met them yesterday afternoon.
The baby now has a fever and even had some febrile seizures last night. He is on two antibiotics and we are trying to control his fever. I suspect meningitis or sepsis (bloodstream infection). Please pray that the Lord would preserve this little one, as his father is quite desperate having just lost his wife yesterday. Thank you for praying.
The baby now has a fever and even had some febrile seizures last night. He is on two antibiotics and we are trying to control his fever. I suspect meningitis or sepsis (bloodstream infection). Please pray that the Lord would preserve this little one, as his father is quite desperate having just lost his wife yesterday. Thank you for praying.
30 April 2009
20 March 2009
23 February 2009
February 2009
Sorry for the long stretch between blogs this time. I've thought many times of sitting down to write, but I've had a hard time knowing what to write about. When we first got here, each week was full of new things, exciting experiences, strange sights and funny mishaps and they were all so fun and easy to write about. When you move into a culture that is so foreign from the one you have always known, it takes a while to just learn to function, to settle down and live rather than just "experience" what's going on around you. In the past few weeks, I believe that in some ways, the "new adventure" phase has taken a bit of a backseat to things that are much less exciting to write about and are quite difficult for us to sort through in our hearts and minds. It takes a while of living here to even begin to understand the tip of the poverty iceberg. And I mean "understand" in the simplest, most elementary way. We had read the statistics before we came and even shared them with you like we had some idea what we were talking about -- well, we didn't. Poverty is not hard to find, it surrounds us every second of every day. But it takes getting to know someone who is in that largest part of the Malawian population to see what poverty looks like on a day in and day out basis. The best way that I know to help those of you at home to get a glimpse of what I am talking about is to share with you the little that I know about someone who has become very dear to our family and is a sister in Christ.
Martha comes to our house everyday from 8 - 12 to help me clean. I was told before we came that I would need to have someone help me, but I was very uncomfortable with the idea. I had never had anyone helping in my home on a regular basis, and didn't see why I would need it. It seemed like an unnecessary luxury and frankly a little "Gone With the Wind"-ish. We met Martha the second week we were here. Introduced to us by the woman that she had been working for, who was moving to a different country, Martha needed a job and I agreed to give it a try. She was accustomed to working full-time, but I assured her that I didn't have a need for that and she agreed to the part time work. I later realized that she had only agreed to work for us because we were her ONLY option for employment. I soon saw my need to have someone help me clean - with no rain for 8 months and windows opened all the time, the dust was unbelievable. Every surface was covered in black dust. People began plowing their fields, and, again, with no rain, it was just a constant dust supply. We would bathe the children and their feet would be black an hour later just from running around the house. Also, life is inefficient here. On average, they say, that it takes about three times as long to get most things done here than it does in the States. And without the hours in the day multiplying by three, it has been a huge blessing to me to have Martha helping me. So, I've changed my tune as far as realizing that I do actually need her. I have also changed my tune as I have realized how much she desperately needs this job.
Martha is 28 years old. Married seven years ago, had a baby, then was left by her husband because he had an education and didn't want to be married to an uneducated woman. Martha is plenty bright, but her family ran out of money to pay for her schooling. There is no free public education here. Her sister died after giving birth to twins, leaving the newborns and their older sister to Martha's care. So she was 25, single mother of 4, with two of her younger siblings also living with her and dependant on her. We knew from the beginning that she was poor - the majority of Malawians are, but even after learning all this, we had no idea what that meant. Malawians, in general, are very good natured, always say what they think you want to hear, really know how to put on a happy face and are very private. I've heard people jokingly compare Malawians to us Southerners!! It takes time to get to know them. One day she approached me, with her head hanging low, and said, "I am ashamed to come to you for money, but we've had no food in the house for two days. May I borrow 50 kwacha (35 cents) to buy some food?" Our ignorance was exposed. John asked if he could look over her finances with her. She eagerly agreed and came the next day with her budget written out to the kwacha. The only non-essential on the entire list was hand lotion. HAND LOTION!!! That is the ONLY thing that she reportedly spends money on besides what is necessary to keep her family fed, housed and educated. Her income didn't even come close to covering her expenses. Her salary was right in line with the going rate for her line of work - her situation is far from unique. We don't know how they were staying alive. Our ignorance exposed again. Part of her salary was going towards mini-bus fees to get her to and from work everyday. So, we decided to buy her a bike (the most common form of transportation besides walking around here). She was so excited, even rode it around the yard with the children cheering. Then she came only a few days later distressed because her landlord had seen her bike and increased her rent. He said that she must be making lots of money now since she could afford to buy a bike and that she could afford to pay more rent. Well, she couldn't afford to pay more rent, so she had to move to a house with no electricity or running water. We were more upset than she was. We tried to get her to let us talk to her landlord, but she just said, "Oh, no, it's OK, it's OK." So she moved with absolutely no complaining. I asked her one day what different kinds of veggies she used to make the relish (sauce) that they eat with their nsima (staple food - kind of like thick grits). Nsima and relish is what they eat everyday. She said, "tomatoes and onions." So I asked what else she used for the sauce, to which she answered, "tomatoes and onions." Those are the cheapest ingredients, so that is what they had eaten every single day for who knows how long - likely years. I asked her one day if she wanted the rest of the whole chicken that I had baked to use for soup. She said, "Yes. I am so happy. I've not tasted chicken in two years." Our ignorance exposed, yet again. These are just a few examples, there are many more.
So what is our role in all this? Do we pay her much more than the average person in her position for the short time we are here, do we just continue to try to make it up in other ways such as giving her food and other necessities regularly and helping her find piece-work in the afternoons? How do we best help Martha and her children for the long term? We just don't know. In the meantime, her 5 year old niece died by falling into a well and her ex-husband died in a car accident. Her children and younger sister went to live with her mother an hour away, in Salima, to help in the fields in October. Her younger sister, who looked after the children while Martha worked, is now pregnant and isn't returning to Lilongwe, so Martha can't bring the younger three back home without anyone to look after them. We learned many of these things just before Christmas. As we have prayed about what to do for Martha and her family long term, God has provided another job for her that comes as an enormous blessing. A wonderful Christian family moved to Lilongwe and needed full time cleaning and cooking help. Their home has a little house with electricity and water in the back of their compound that they asked Martha to move into. So she is now working about 12-14 hours a day and is so thankful!! Last week, she was so excited, because she was going that weekend to Salima to bring back her mother and children to live with her for a while. When she got to Salima, she found that her mother was in the hospital with severe malaria and needed blood transfusions. Martha gave a unit of blood and so did a sister. She was counting on her mother to take care of the children, so she was unable to bring the children home with her. So she returned alone. A day later,she got a call saying that her mother needed more blood, but there was no one left to give and they didn't have the money to buy it. Martha didn't have the money because she had used it on transport fees to and from Salima. We were able to help and her Mother recovered. Martha's uncle picked the mother up at the hospital (on his bike) to take her home on Saturday and was hit by a car and killed on his way home. This was the only male member of the family in Salima and he looked after her mother who looks after her children. I feel like I've gone on and on about the difficulties in Martha's life, but I've only given you a few examples. There is so much more that we don't even know. In all of this, she is constantly reminding me that God is good and that He provides. Last week as she was telling me about her sick mother and having to leave her children in Salima, I became so overwhelmed by the everyday burdens of her life and came to her distressed, trying to find out what we could do to help her. She just looked at me, very graciously, but almost like I was a child, and said, "I am not worried." Everything in me wanted to scream, "Well you should be. Do you not know how hard your life is? Do you not know how heavy your burdens are?" It is I that have no idea what burdens are and am so ill-equipped to even encourage her. But, she belongs to Christ, and He knows her burdens, and she understands far more than I do what it means in 1 Peter to 'cast all of your anxiety upon Him, for He cares for you.' It may be true, as we have been told, that we are naive. For as many stories as there are like Martha's, there are also stories of missionaries/foreigners who have grown to trust someone who has worked for them for five years, to have that person rob them blind or lie about various things. All we know at this point is that there are many desperate people around us, and we have no idea what that means. I can't bear think what I would do if I sincerely feared not having food to feed my precious little children.
We've heard it said that Africa is on the 1000 year plan. It seems as if nothing even makes a dent in all of the problems here. What's maybe most striking is that Martha is actually quite fortunate. There are very likely 300 million stories similar to Martha's across this continent, however they have no voice and no similar network to Martha's. We're not pretending to understand Africa just from our limited exposure to one family's struggles, however we do feel like our relationship with Martha has helped us gain some amount of perspective into the plight of so many.
Various updates since our last blog:
Clever, the preemie that was brought to the peds ward at 10 days and 2 lbs. has gone back to his village to live with his grandmother. If you looked at our pictures from Christmas, you saw little Clever. His mother died from complications from HIV/AIDS right after Clever's birth. His father was not in the picture and his only other relative is his grandmother. She took him home for the first 10 days of his life, and then realized that he wasn't thriving, so brought him to the hospital, who referred him to ABC Clinic. How she kept him alive, we don't know - only by God's grace. He couldn't suck, so had to be fed through an NG tube for several weeks. He learned to eat from a bottle just before Christmas. Little Clever spent several days with us at our house over Christmas. What a blessing it was to us to get that time to love on him and fatten him up a bit. He gained a whole pound in the five days he was with us. The children LOVED him and didn't want him to go back to the ward. One couple tried very hard to adopt him, but in the end, his grandmother wanted him and he went back to the village weighing a whopping 5 lbs. We may never again see that precious little one on this earth, but he will remain on our prayer list for as long as we live. Certainly, our hope is that God would hold him tightly in His hand and that Clever would grow up to serve the Lord.
Speaking of Christmas --- it was good, very, very different and hard to be away from our families, but good. All the students that remained on campus for the Christmas holiday came over to our house on Christmas Eve for food and games. We had a blast and they ate us out of house and home, It was a real highlight for our family and I hope as much of a blessing for the students. A bunch of us went to our neighbors' house for carol singing on Christmas Eve. It was very strange to be hot on Christmas day. While you all were scraping ice off your windshields, we were swimming, John took the children swimming for a little while as I cooked on Christmas Day, just so he could say that we went swimming on Christmas Day, The local nursery imports Christmas trees from somewhere (maybe northern Malawi?) and sells them for a pretty penny. It was definitely a bit "Charlie Brownish", but we loved it. We had fun stringing popcorn and making gingerbread men ornaments. An ABC student made stockings for us, and we bought a beautiful Nativity scene at the wood market. I think that we had anticipated it being so much easier to focus our hearts on Christ without all of the commercialization. However, we learned that, as most things are, it is a matter of our hearts, not our surroundings. It was a humbling lesson to learn, but a very good one.
Baylor Pediatric AIDS program -- I am now spending one Saturday a month at the Baylor Peds, AIDS teen clinic. It is an all day clinic for teenagers with HIV. The purpose is to give them support, teach them how to live with HIV, how to take care of themselves and make wise decisions. There is also some time built in for fun, creative arts and each child meets with a physician for an examination also. It is quite overwhelming to look at a lobby full of about 40 teenagers who all have HIV - about 98% of them contracted it at birth from their mother's, so have been and will live with it their entire lives. Most of them don't look sick, but they are and must deal with that each and every day. We met a family on our flight here who are with Baylor, so the physician's wife and I are helping with just a small aspect of the clinic.
The ABC Clinic has a new administrator -- HUGE blessing. She is doing a great job and we are so very thankful for her. John is working hard with malaria season in full swing. We are enjoying most of what the rainy season brings (green earth and lots of flowers and cool breezes), but we will all be glad for the rains to stop and for the malaria threat to subside. He has had some interesting and difficult cases that I hope he will find time to write about for you. Please continue to pray for our health. We all got a nasty, nasty virus just before Christmas that I don't care to repeat and we still are in the thick of malaria season. Please also pray with us for the High family to be able to sell their house so that they can get here before we leave. We know that God's timing is right, but in our eyes, it would be most helpful for the new pediatrician to arrive in time for there to be some sort of transition time for them with John still here.
The children are all doing well. Sam is still loving swimming and has enjoyed playing in a few soccer games lately. Last month he wanted to be a potter (thanks to Beck Evans, ABC art teacher and fellow Ole Miss grad), but today he announced that he is going to be a geologist with some art on the side. He and a couple of his friends at school are convinced that they have found gold in some rocks outside the school building. He got a real bow and arrow, bought from the guy that sells them on the side of the road. I guess they are made for shooting small game, but Sam has finally settled for inanimate objects and giant snails. Sam dreams of bagging a crow. Ford learned to swim two weeks ago and has turned in to quite the little fish. He is keeping us laughing and asking funny questions. Today's question was, "How do frogs die? If we find a sick one, can we give it a shot and make it better? Who makes frog shots?" He and Sam are having fun playing in the treehouse they built with John over Christmas and constantly catching new and exciting creatures (chameleon, hedgehogs). The boys and I went to the crisis nursery last week and had a sweet time loving on several babies. Alice Ann is taking ballet, which is about the cutest thing I've ever seen. She LOVES it and is quite serious about it. She and Ford have turned into quite the duo when Sam is at school. Today I heard her explaining something to him that she said he "just couldn't understand, because only people born in China know about things like that." What makes that so funny is that she has no idea what China even is. Ruthie is talking up a storm and constantly walking around in high heel shoes (aka pretty shoes). Her first two sentences were, "Jesus is in our hearts." and "Daddy is strong." In her Daddy's opinion, those are the only two facts she needs to know her whole life. She is keeping us on our toes and on our knees -- she'll be two in April - no need to elaborate. She keeps us laughing! She ran out the door and across the yard yelling "tiss, tiss!" after Sam as he rode off on his bike to school last week. She had not climbed down from the breakfast table in time to kiss him goodbye. Thankfully, he heard her and stopped to "tiss" her.
I'll finish by sharing with you a few unusual signs we've seen around town.
"Age Doesn't Matter Welding Center"
"God is Good Plumbing and Electrical"
"Capital City Bakery, Where Quality Is Always One Step Ahead"
"Double Vision Boys Secondary School"
Martha comes to our house everyday from 8 - 12 to help me clean. I was told before we came that I would need to have someone help me, but I was very uncomfortable with the idea. I had never had anyone helping in my home on a regular basis, and didn't see why I would need it. It seemed like an unnecessary luxury and frankly a little "Gone With the Wind"-ish. We met Martha the second week we were here. Introduced to us by the woman that she had been working for, who was moving to a different country, Martha needed a job and I agreed to give it a try. She was accustomed to working full-time, but I assured her that I didn't have a need for that and she agreed to the part time work. I later realized that she had only agreed to work for us because we were her ONLY option for employment. I soon saw my need to have someone help me clean - with no rain for 8 months and windows opened all the time, the dust was unbelievable. Every surface was covered in black dust. People began plowing their fields, and, again, with no rain, it was just a constant dust supply. We would bathe the children and their feet would be black an hour later just from running around the house. Also, life is inefficient here. On average, they say, that it takes about three times as long to get most things done here than it does in the States. And without the hours in the day multiplying by three, it has been a huge blessing to me to have Martha helping me. So, I've changed my tune as far as realizing that I do actually need her. I have also changed my tune as I have realized how much she desperately needs this job.
Martha is 28 years old. Married seven years ago, had a baby, then was left by her husband because he had an education and didn't want to be married to an uneducated woman. Martha is plenty bright, but her family ran out of money to pay for her schooling. There is no free public education here. Her sister died after giving birth to twins, leaving the newborns and their older sister to Martha's care. So she was 25, single mother of 4, with two of her younger siblings also living with her and dependant on her. We knew from the beginning that she was poor - the majority of Malawians are, but even after learning all this, we had no idea what that meant. Malawians, in general, are very good natured, always say what they think you want to hear, really know how to put on a happy face and are very private. I've heard people jokingly compare Malawians to us Southerners!! It takes time to get to know them. One day she approached me, with her head hanging low, and said, "I am ashamed to come to you for money, but we've had no food in the house for two days. May I borrow 50 kwacha (35 cents) to buy some food?" Our ignorance was exposed. John asked if he could look over her finances with her. She eagerly agreed and came the next day with her budget written out to the kwacha. The only non-essential on the entire list was hand lotion. HAND LOTION!!! That is the ONLY thing that she reportedly spends money on besides what is necessary to keep her family fed, housed and educated. Her income didn't even come close to covering her expenses. Her salary was right in line with the going rate for her line of work - her situation is far from unique. We don't know how they were staying alive. Our ignorance exposed again. Part of her salary was going towards mini-bus fees to get her to and from work everyday. So, we decided to buy her a bike (the most common form of transportation besides walking around here). She was so excited, even rode it around the yard with the children cheering. Then she came only a few days later distressed because her landlord had seen her bike and increased her rent. He said that she must be making lots of money now since she could afford to buy a bike and that she could afford to pay more rent. Well, she couldn't afford to pay more rent, so she had to move to a house with no electricity or running water. We were more upset than she was. We tried to get her to let us talk to her landlord, but she just said, "Oh, no, it's OK, it's OK." So she moved with absolutely no complaining. I asked her one day what different kinds of veggies she used to make the relish (sauce) that they eat with their nsima (staple food - kind of like thick grits). Nsima and relish is what they eat everyday. She said, "tomatoes and onions." So I asked what else she used for the sauce, to which she answered, "tomatoes and onions." Those are the cheapest ingredients, so that is what they had eaten every single day for who knows how long - likely years. I asked her one day if she wanted the rest of the whole chicken that I had baked to use for soup. She said, "Yes. I am so happy. I've not tasted chicken in two years." Our ignorance exposed, yet again. These are just a few examples, there are many more.
So what is our role in all this? Do we pay her much more than the average person in her position for the short time we are here, do we just continue to try to make it up in other ways such as giving her food and other necessities regularly and helping her find piece-work in the afternoons? How do we best help Martha and her children for the long term? We just don't know. In the meantime, her 5 year old niece died by falling into a well and her ex-husband died in a car accident. Her children and younger sister went to live with her mother an hour away, in Salima, to help in the fields in October. Her younger sister, who looked after the children while Martha worked, is now pregnant and isn't returning to Lilongwe, so Martha can't bring the younger three back home without anyone to look after them. We learned many of these things just before Christmas. As we have prayed about what to do for Martha and her family long term, God has provided another job for her that comes as an enormous blessing. A wonderful Christian family moved to Lilongwe and needed full time cleaning and cooking help. Their home has a little house with electricity and water in the back of their compound that they asked Martha to move into. So she is now working about 12-14 hours a day and is so thankful!! Last week, she was so excited, because she was going that weekend to Salima to bring back her mother and children to live with her for a while. When she got to Salima, she found that her mother was in the hospital with severe malaria and needed blood transfusions. Martha gave a unit of blood and so did a sister. She was counting on her mother to take care of the children, so she was unable to bring the children home with her. So she returned alone. A day later,she got a call saying that her mother needed more blood, but there was no one left to give and they didn't have the money to buy it. Martha didn't have the money because she had used it on transport fees to and from Salima. We were able to help and her Mother recovered. Martha's uncle picked the mother up at the hospital (on his bike) to take her home on Saturday and was hit by a car and killed on his way home. This was the only male member of the family in Salima and he looked after her mother who looks after her children. I feel like I've gone on and on about the difficulties in Martha's life, but I've only given you a few examples. There is so much more that we don't even know. In all of this, she is constantly reminding me that God is good and that He provides. Last week as she was telling me about her sick mother and having to leave her children in Salima, I became so overwhelmed by the everyday burdens of her life and came to her distressed, trying to find out what we could do to help her. She just looked at me, very graciously, but almost like I was a child, and said, "I am not worried." Everything in me wanted to scream, "Well you should be. Do you not know how hard your life is? Do you not know how heavy your burdens are?" It is I that have no idea what burdens are and am so ill-equipped to even encourage her. But, she belongs to Christ, and He knows her burdens, and she understands far more than I do what it means in 1 Peter to 'cast all of your anxiety upon Him, for He cares for you.' It may be true, as we have been told, that we are naive. For as many stories as there are like Martha's, there are also stories of missionaries/foreigners who have grown to trust someone who has worked for them for five years, to have that person rob them blind or lie about various things. All we know at this point is that there are many desperate people around us, and we have no idea what that means. I can't bear think what I would do if I sincerely feared not having food to feed my precious little children.
We've heard it said that Africa is on the 1000 year plan. It seems as if nothing even makes a dent in all of the problems here. What's maybe most striking is that Martha is actually quite fortunate. There are very likely 300 million stories similar to Martha's across this continent, however they have no voice and no similar network to Martha's. We're not pretending to understand Africa just from our limited exposure to one family's struggles, however we do feel like our relationship with Martha has helped us gain some amount of perspective into the plight of so many.
Various updates since our last blog:
Clever, the preemie that was brought to the peds ward at 10 days and 2 lbs. has gone back to his village to live with his grandmother. If you looked at our pictures from Christmas, you saw little Clever. His mother died from complications from HIV/AIDS right after Clever's birth. His father was not in the picture and his only other relative is his grandmother. She took him home for the first 10 days of his life, and then realized that he wasn't thriving, so brought him to the hospital, who referred him to ABC Clinic. How she kept him alive, we don't know - only by God's grace. He couldn't suck, so had to be fed through an NG tube for several weeks. He learned to eat from a bottle just before Christmas. Little Clever spent several days with us at our house over Christmas. What a blessing it was to us to get that time to love on him and fatten him up a bit. He gained a whole pound in the five days he was with us. The children LOVED him and didn't want him to go back to the ward. One couple tried very hard to adopt him, but in the end, his grandmother wanted him and he went back to the village weighing a whopping 5 lbs. We may never again see that precious little one on this earth, but he will remain on our prayer list for as long as we live. Certainly, our hope is that God would hold him tightly in His hand and that Clever would grow up to serve the Lord.
Speaking of Christmas --- it was good, very, very different and hard to be away from our families, but good. All the students that remained on campus for the Christmas holiday came over to our house on Christmas Eve for food and games. We had a blast and they ate us out of house and home, It was a real highlight for our family and I hope as much of a blessing for the students. A bunch of us went to our neighbors' house for carol singing on Christmas Eve. It was very strange to be hot on Christmas day. While you all were scraping ice off your windshields, we were swimming, John took the children swimming for a little while as I cooked on Christmas Day, just so he could say that we went swimming on Christmas Day, The local nursery imports Christmas trees from somewhere (maybe northern Malawi?) and sells them for a pretty penny. It was definitely a bit "Charlie Brownish", but we loved it. We had fun stringing popcorn and making gingerbread men ornaments. An ABC student made stockings for us, and we bought a beautiful Nativity scene at the wood market. I think that we had anticipated it being so much easier to focus our hearts on Christ without all of the commercialization. However, we learned that, as most things are, it is a matter of our hearts, not our surroundings. It was a humbling lesson to learn, but a very good one.
Baylor Pediatric AIDS program -- I am now spending one Saturday a month at the Baylor Peds, AIDS teen clinic. It is an all day clinic for teenagers with HIV. The purpose is to give them support, teach them how to live with HIV, how to take care of themselves and make wise decisions. There is also some time built in for fun, creative arts and each child meets with a physician for an examination also. It is quite overwhelming to look at a lobby full of about 40 teenagers who all have HIV - about 98% of them contracted it at birth from their mother's, so have been and will live with it their entire lives. Most of them don't look sick, but they are and must deal with that each and every day. We met a family on our flight here who are with Baylor, so the physician's wife and I are helping with just a small aspect of the clinic.
The ABC Clinic has a new administrator -- HUGE blessing. She is doing a great job and we are so very thankful for her. John is working hard with malaria season in full swing. We are enjoying most of what the rainy season brings (green earth and lots of flowers and cool breezes), but we will all be glad for the rains to stop and for the malaria threat to subside. He has had some interesting and difficult cases that I hope he will find time to write about for you. Please continue to pray for our health. We all got a nasty, nasty virus just before Christmas that I don't care to repeat and we still are in the thick of malaria season. Please also pray with us for the High family to be able to sell their house so that they can get here before we leave. We know that God's timing is right, but in our eyes, it would be most helpful for the new pediatrician to arrive in time for there to be some sort of transition time for them with John still here.
The children are all doing well. Sam is still loving swimming and has enjoyed playing in a few soccer games lately. Last month he wanted to be a potter (thanks to Beck Evans, ABC art teacher and fellow Ole Miss grad), but today he announced that he is going to be a geologist with some art on the side. He and a couple of his friends at school are convinced that they have found gold in some rocks outside the school building. He got a real bow and arrow, bought from the guy that sells them on the side of the road. I guess they are made for shooting small game, but Sam has finally settled for inanimate objects and giant snails. Sam dreams of bagging a crow. Ford learned to swim two weeks ago and has turned in to quite the little fish. He is keeping us laughing and asking funny questions. Today's question was, "How do frogs die? If we find a sick one, can we give it a shot and make it better? Who makes frog shots?" He and Sam are having fun playing in the treehouse they built with John over Christmas and constantly catching new and exciting creatures (chameleon, hedgehogs). The boys and I went to the crisis nursery last week and had a sweet time loving on several babies. Alice Ann is taking ballet, which is about the cutest thing I've ever seen. She LOVES it and is quite serious about it. She and Ford have turned into quite the duo when Sam is at school. Today I heard her explaining something to him that she said he "just couldn't understand, because only people born in China know about things like that." What makes that so funny is that she has no idea what China even is. Ruthie is talking up a storm and constantly walking around in high heel shoes (aka pretty shoes). Her first two sentences were, "Jesus is in our hearts." and "Daddy is strong." In her Daddy's opinion, those are the only two facts she needs to know her whole life. She is keeping us on our toes and on our knees -- she'll be two in April - no need to elaborate. She keeps us laughing! She ran out the door and across the yard yelling "tiss, tiss!" after Sam as he rode off on his bike to school last week. She had not climbed down from the breakfast table in time to kiss him goodbye. Thankfully, he heard her and stopped to "tiss" her.
I'll finish by sharing with you a few unusual signs we've seen around town.
"Age Doesn't Matter Welding Center"
"God is Good Plumbing and Electrical"
"Capital City Bakery, Where Quality Is Always One Step Ahead"
"Double Vision Boys Secondary School"
05 January 2009
28 November 2008
Lilongwe Half-Marathon
John and I ran in the Lilongwe half-marathon (21 KM) last Sunday. Wow... what a run. It really was great to do something that was so "normal" to us, but in such an incredibly different setting. It started at 6:00 am, but should have started at 5 -- man, it was hot! We showed up at 5:45 and pinned on our numbers (mine was a piece of cloth with the number written with marker).There was a hand drawn map posted at the starting line that everyone was studying -- leading me to believe that there were probably going to be no course markers. I was determined to run at any pace necessary in order to not run by myself (for fear of getting lost). I was pleasantly surprised when I saw someone standing at the first turn pointing to the left. I finally decided that as long as I didn't see anyone indicating otherwise, I was to just keep straight. There was definitely no sort of traffic control. Thankfully, I couldn't get my i-pod to work (except for a story about holocaust survivors on the radio - really helps you get a good pace going) - I needed both ears to listen for cars coming up behind me. Remember that drivers here are used to dodging people walking/biking down the side of the road, so they feel perfectly comfortable driving within centimeters of a pedestrian. Part of the course took us down a dirt road surrounded by fields of soon-to-be-planted maize as far as the eye could see. I did, actually, end up running by myself during this portion of the race (I could see one guy running far up ahead) and it was amazing. Never have I met (and ran right in between) three women carrying "ginormous" (as Ford says) bundles of firewood on their heads and watched people hoeing their fields. We passed little kids that got a big kick out of us, ran past the gates to the president's house, up more stinking hills than I care to count, and alongside some crazy guy yelling "I'm strong, I'm a soldier." The guy that I ran the last few miles with gave me great incentive not to let him get in front of me - he was a Malawian fella in every "scents" of the word - no Sure or Degree for this guy, no way. He was such a sweet guy and knew where we were (I hadn't a clue) and told me when we only had a few kilometers to go (music to my ears). They did have several water stations and a friend met us in a couple of places with bottles of Energade (Gatorade). I past one water table and someone said, "Well done, you are only the second azungu (foreign) woman to pass by so far. One woman was standing outside her house with a water hose and a tambourine. I don't know what the winning time was - it had to have been fast. The lead runners were in our sight for all of about 15 seconds - they were amazing. There are usually African runners in big races in the States. It was fun to run in a race where almost all the runners were African. Quite an experience.
A few randoms bits of info:
The rains have officially started and have given great relief to the heat. It basically rains once a day really hard and sounds incredible on our metal roof. Makes me wish I could take a nap every time. When the rain stops, the sky is full of giant flying termites, called 'ngombe' (pronounced 'en-GOOM-bee'). Malawians eat them - either right out of the sky or fried with a little salt. This morning there was a constant stream of people walking back behind our house with bowls to collect them from the ground under a fluorescent light near our yard - there were thousands. We've learned the hard way not to leave any outside lights on or they will all fly into your house if you dare to open the door. Martha cooked some today and all the children tried them. Sam and Ruthie promptly spit them out, while Ford and Alice Ann thought they were great. Ford claims that they taste like pretzels. I'll take his word for it.
Our guard brought the children a hedgehog the other night. He had seen us one night on a frog hunt, so remembered how much our children love creatures of all kinds. It was like a tiny porcupine - really kind of cute. It escaped from it's box during the night--so sorry, we have no pictures.
"International Day" at school last Friday. All the children dressed in costumes from their home countries and brought food from their country. The parents' went to school and had a big feast. The food was great - incredible to see food from so many different countries. And the children were precious - the Indian little girls were my favorite in their brightly colored dresses/wraps and hair up in a bun - so beautiful. Sam and Ford were Ole Miss and Auburn football players respectively. They loved distinguishing between American football and "soccer/football" here. Sam did have some sort of allergic reaction this afternoon (just rash/itching) - who knows what caused it - we have no idea what some of the things were that we ate. Ignorance is bliss, huh? It was all delicious, actually, with Ethiopian being at the top of our list.
Several points for prayer:
-- Praise God that Sam's malaria test last week came back negative.
-- Sam's teacher's husband had a brain aneurysm a few weeks ago and had to be flown to South Africa for treatment. He has made almost a full recovery and is doing great at home now. Mrs. Tricks returned to the classroom this week to a very excited class. Sam asked if he could go to school at 6 am (school starts at 7:15) to make sure that he was there when she got there to give her her 'welcome back' picture that he had drawn. The Lord truly spared him.
-- Martha's aunt died two weeks ago while walking home from her field and then her 5 year old niece died last week from falling into a well. Please pray for God's comfort for their family. Martha is a Christian, but I am not sure about other members of her family.
-- Continued prayer for another doctor to come. Friday was Dr. Mark Boersma's last day. Also, pray for their family as they head back to Louisiana in a couple of weeks.
-- For our family to look for ways to be a blessing to the students here and others that we have regular contact with.
25 November 2008
Pediatric Ward, visits from family!!!
It has been a busy few weeks. Forgive me for taking so long between entries this time -- I've gotten several "gentle reminders" from our families that they would like to know what in the world is going on over here. Well, a lot!!! I'll try hit the highlights...........
John spent most of October preparing for the Grand Opening of the new Pediatric Ward. Whittier Area Church out of California raised the money to build, furnish, and supply this new ward in a one-time special offering. Not only did they raise the money, but they came twice to Malawi to work tirelessly on the finishing touches. To God be the glory great things He has done. It is a beautiful building and beautifully equipped. We are now praying for the staff to run it and ask for you to pray the same. There is a Pediatrician and his family looking to come in January - please pray that they are able to sell their house in the US so that they can come. We do not have the staff needed to run it at present, so it will be quite a task for John until they come. They actually are taking care of their first patient right now - a 3wk old, 2.5 lb. baby. His mother had HIV and died a couple of days after birth. He is doing pretty well - they are working to get him feeding by mouth rather than requiring NG Tube. Running a NICU right from the start!
The highlight of the past few weeks was our precious visitors!!!!!!!!!! Mom and Dad arrived on Oct. 30. -- what a sweet reunion we had!!! As you can see in the pictures, the children worked very hard making "Grandmom" and "Granddad" signs to hold up at the airport and a banner for the front of our house. We were able to watch their plane land from an observation deck. Since it was one of only three planes landing that day, it was easy to spot which one was theirs'. I got in trouble for taking a picture of the children waiting for the plane. Apparently "Security" doesn't allow picture taking on the observation deck. Each and everyday they were here was filled with just the right amount of playing and sightseeing. They got here in time to attend the grand opening of the Pediatric Ward, which was great. We visited the crisis nursery and held the babies. I don't think I've written about the crisis nursery in past blogs -- It is a little house just a few minutes from the ABC campus. It takes care of babies whose families are unable to care for them, usually because the mother has died. Last time we were there, I was told that all of the babies' mothers were dead except for one, and hers was in a mental ward. Most of them will be returned to their families at some point, but need care while the families are deciding who will take the baby. Some are adopted, but the Malawian govt really pushes for the babies to be with some family member. Many arrive malnourished and/or sick. Sam loves to go with me and loves playing with the little ones that can sit up. He even chooses to skip soccer practice to go sometimes. Ford went for the first time while Mom and Dad were here and got a big kick out of Delori, a 1 year old that walks around like she owns the place. He tried to keep her from wandering outside and she hit him and yelled "no!!" at Sam. She's a mess! One of our friends here adopted her daughter from that nursery and takes her back often to play with the babies. Amazing to see God work in little lives. We've not been able to go to the nursery as much as we would like. With four small kiddos, and a whole new set of African viruses, it seems that we can't stay well enough to go regularly. We don't dare risk passing anything on to these babies, so we have to be careful. We will just grab the opportunities to go when the Lord gives them.
Other things that were particularly fun because Mom and Dad were here.....
-- Watching and playing in what we thought was our first rain of the rainy season. We found out this week that it was only a light shower, but it surely was exciting and refreshing.
-- Taking them on the grocery store rounds, trying to find all the ingredients for a given recipe. Dad thought we practically lived at grocery stores.
-- Going to the different outdoor markets - only the guys made the trip to the meat market and paid a toll to cross a footbridge.
--Attempting to go to Cafe Delight (kids' favorite) to get soft serve ice cream, but the power was out.
-- catching geckos and frogs
-- having an audience at swimming lessons and soccer practice
-- ummm... basically everything was particularly fun with them here.
The highlight of their visit was definitely going to Lujeri Tea Estate at Mulanje. It was about a 5-6 hour drive from Lilongwe - beautiful drive, giving them a good picture of life outside the city. We passed many many villages with markets and surrounding fields being prepared for planting. Thankfully, the drive was uneventful, just the normal obstacles of travelling here. There are police roadblocks every so often that serve little purpose that we can see. Normally, you just stop, wave at the police, they wave you through and you keep going. One barricade just happened to have a great little market along side the road that Dad and I took a couple of pictures of. A policeman saw us taking pictures and seized the opportunity to exercise his authority. He made us stop and kept asking us why we were taking pictures and telling us that it is "not allowed to take pictures of police stop". He made us scroll through our pictures and erase the ones of the market. Anyway, after a stop at Dedza Pottery, we arrived at Lujeri just in time for supper. The pictures just don't even come close to doing justice to the beauty of the tea estate. Rolling hills of tea plants surrounded by magnificent mountains - it was breathtaking. We tried to go on a hike the next day but after two hours of driving around lost ON the tea estate we gave up on finding the trail head. So we pulled over under a big tree in a spot that looked as private as we could find. In about 2 minutes we had a audience of about 10 women who stood about 3 feet from us and watched us eat our picnic - talking and laughing the whole time. It was a bit unnerving. We forget that what we do/eat/wear is as fascinating to them as they are to us - especially to people that live in small villages hours from any city. It was not a leisurely picnic - but a learning experience. We did, however, get better directions and make a great hike the next day. It took us through tea fields and a small village, to a beautiful swimming hole. We had questioned every one's suggestion that we needed a guide, but, man, did we ever need Freddy. He was awesome. We loved walking through the village - the people were so gracious and the children precious. We drew quite a crowd of little ones - all hoping we would leave them with some sort of souvenir. We saw several children walking around carrying huge knives - such a strange sight to our safety conscious American eyes. After three fun and rest filled days in the mountains, we headed back to Lilongwe and, sadly, to send Mom and Dad off after a very short 10 days.
John spent most of October preparing for the Grand Opening of the new Pediatric Ward. Whittier Area Church out of California raised the money to build, furnish, and supply this new ward in a one-time special offering. Not only did they raise the money, but they came twice to Malawi to work tirelessly on the finishing touches. To God be the glory great things He has done. It is a beautiful building and beautifully equipped. We are now praying for the staff to run it and ask for you to pray the same. There is a Pediatrician and his family looking to come in January - please pray that they are able to sell their house in the US so that they can come. We do not have the staff needed to run it at present, so it will be quite a task for John until they come. They actually are taking care of their first patient right now - a 3wk old, 2.5 lb. baby. His mother had HIV and died a couple of days after birth. He is doing pretty well - they are working to get him feeding by mouth rather than requiring NG Tube. Running a NICU right from the start!
The highlight of the past few weeks was our precious visitors!!!!!!!!!! Mom and Dad arrived on Oct. 30. -- what a sweet reunion we had!!! As you can see in the pictures, the children worked very hard making "Grandmom" and "Granddad" signs to hold up at the airport and a banner for the front of our house. We were able to watch their plane land from an observation deck. Since it was one of only three planes landing that day, it was easy to spot which one was theirs'. I got in trouble for taking a picture of the children waiting for the plane. Apparently "Security" doesn't allow picture taking on the observation deck. Each and everyday they were here was filled with just the right amount of playing and sightseeing. They got here in time to attend the grand opening of the Pediatric Ward, which was great. We visited the crisis nursery and held the babies. I don't think I've written about the crisis nursery in past blogs -- It is a little house just a few minutes from the ABC campus. It takes care of babies whose families are unable to care for them, usually because the mother has died. Last time we were there, I was told that all of the babies' mothers were dead except for one, and hers was in a mental ward. Most of them will be returned to their families at some point, but need care while the families are deciding who will take the baby. Some are adopted, but the Malawian govt really pushes for the babies to be with some family member. Many arrive malnourished and/or sick. Sam loves to go with me and loves playing with the little ones that can sit up. He even chooses to skip soccer practice to go sometimes. Ford went for the first time while Mom and Dad were here and got a big kick out of Delori, a 1 year old that walks around like she owns the place. He tried to keep her from wandering outside and she hit him and yelled "no!!" at Sam. She's a mess! One of our friends here adopted her daughter from that nursery and takes her back often to play with the babies. Amazing to see God work in little lives. We've not been able to go to the nursery as much as we would like. With four small kiddos, and a whole new set of African viruses, it seems that we can't stay well enough to go regularly. We don't dare risk passing anything on to these babies, so we have to be careful. We will just grab the opportunities to go when the Lord gives them.
Other things that were particularly fun because Mom and Dad were here.....
-- Watching and playing in what we thought was our first rain of the rainy season. We found out this week that it was only a light shower, but it surely was exciting and refreshing.
-- Taking them on the grocery store rounds, trying to find all the ingredients for a given recipe. Dad thought we practically lived at grocery stores.
-- Going to the different outdoor markets - only the guys made the trip to the meat market and paid a toll to cross a footbridge.
--Attempting to go to Cafe Delight (kids' favorite) to get soft serve ice cream, but the power was out.
-- catching geckos and frogs
-- having an audience at swimming lessons and soccer practice
-- ummm... basically everything was particularly fun with them here.
The highlight of their visit was definitely going to Lujeri Tea Estate at Mulanje. It was about a 5-6 hour drive from Lilongwe - beautiful drive, giving them a good picture of life outside the city. We passed many many villages with markets and surrounding fields being prepared for planting. Thankfully, the drive was uneventful, just the normal obstacles of travelling here. There are police roadblocks every so often that serve little purpose that we can see. Normally, you just stop, wave at the police, they wave you through and you keep going. One barricade just happened to have a great little market along side the road that Dad and I took a couple of pictures of. A policeman saw us taking pictures and seized the opportunity to exercise his authority. He made us stop and kept asking us why we were taking pictures and telling us that it is "not allowed to take pictures of police stop". He made us scroll through our pictures and erase the ones of the market. Anyway, after a stop at Dedza Pottery, we arrived at Lujeri just in time for supper. The pictures just don't even come close to doing justice to the beauty of the tea estate. Rolling hills of tea plants surrounded by magnificent mountains - it was breathtaking. We tried to go on a hike the next day but after two hours of driving around lost ON the tea estate we gave up on finding the trail head. So we pulled over under a big tree in a spot that looked as private as we could find. In about 2 minutes we had a audience of about 10 women who stood about 3 feet from us and watched us eat our picnic - talking and laughing the whole time. It was a bit unnerving. We forget that what we do/eat/wear is as fascinating to them as they are to us - especially to people that live in small villages hours from any city. It was not a leisurely picnic - but a learning experience. We did, however, get better directions and make a great hike the next day. It took us through tea fields and a small village, to a beautiful swimming hole. We had questioned every one's suggestion that we needed a guide, but, man, did we ever need Freddy. He was awesome. We loved walking through the village - the people were so gracious and the children precious. We drew quite a crowd of little ones - all hoping we would leave them with some sort of souvenir. We saw several children walking around carrying huge knives - such a strange sight to our safety conscious American eyes. After three fun and rest filled days in the mountains, we headed back to Lilongwe and, sadly, to send Mom and Dad off after a very short 10 days.
We were doubly blessed......... the day Mom and Dad left, John's brother, Hank arrived -- a bit unconventionally I might add. He had been in Kenya with his church working on a well project. Then spent a few days in Zambia/Victoria Falls white water rafting on the Zambeze River (went down a class 5 rapid on a boogie board - NUTS!!) and then made his way by taxi and large bus to the border of Malawi, then by mini-bus across Malawi to the 7-11 station in Lilongwe, where he called John to come pick him up. He basically (figuratively and literally) followed his nose across two African countries to get here. It was a great sight to see him walk through our front door - quite honestly, we had been a bit on the nervous side. We had a great time giving him the whirlwind tour of life in Lilongwe and then headed to Lake Malawi for a night. The children wanted to take him to Safari Beach Lodge (you may remember from a past blog entry) so that he could see the baboons. So we gave it one more try (our last), finally saw 3 baboons as we were loading up the car to leave after having spent the hottest night in the history of mankind. We made our way over to the beach and spent a great day playing in the lake. One of the highlights of his visit was when he and John went to a local market that we'd not been to yet. Honestly, everything was available there. Local fish next to automotive parts next to stationary supplies/printer toner next to mangos next to suits/sports coats next to mops next to live chickens. The guys had such a great time, and really wished their dad was with them...he would have loved the selection. Hank also got to try the Malawian staple: nsima. Sort of like thick grits. He at least said that he liked it! It was such a blessing to have him here. We had a more than wonderful time with all our company - it just made us miss them all the more when they were gone.
14 November 2008
Mulanje and such
Mulanje pictures and others... Hope to write more soon. Everyone is doing well. Thank you for your prayers.
29 October 2008
08 October 2008
06 October 2008
Baboons at Breakfast
We returned last night from a weekend at the beautiful Lake Malawi. What a time we had!! We pulled out of the ABC campus exactly one hour later than we should have, or ever will in the future, with our bags strapped to the top of the car, three children squeezing into two seat belts in the "way back", and Ruthie and our good friends Rachel and Caroline Harper (from Jackson, MS) snugly sitting in the middle. The first hour of the trip went as expected - fun conversation, fulfilling snack requests from the monkeys in the "way back", dodging the ever present bikers and pedestrians, cows and goats and the occasional truck barrelling down the wrong side of the road. The second hour of the trip was basically the same as the first with the absence of daylight a.k.a pitch black darkness. Let me clarify a couple of things - there are no bike lanes or sidewalks, so most of the pedestrians and bikers are walking down the road ON THE ROAD - not beside it. Many of them are carrying various loads on their heads (bundles of firewood, barrels of I don't know what, crates of eggs, large baskets of veges) that protrude into the road. Needless to say, the atmosphere in the car changed drastically. Conversation turned into a constant stream of exclamations ........ Emily: "Slow down! Watch the biker, oh oh there's another one! People, people in the road! A cow, a cow! You're going to hit him! Whew, how did you not hit that guy?! Goats! Car in our lane, John, car, car!!!!!" John: "Dude! Crud! What the?!? I am slowing down! I see it, I see it! Whoa!!! People, do you not see a car coming straight toward you?" Rachel: "Did you not get the memo that said 'hit the dirt'!!!!!" It was like being inside a video game only not because IT WAS REAL! And, oh yeah, Ruthie decided to throw-up in the midst of the action. So we follow the signs, turn down an incredibly bumpy dirt road, and arrive at Safari Beach Lodge - only I am convinced that it is a family residence because it looked to me like a small house with a candlelit dinner in progress inside. It was, however, Safari B. L. experiencing a blackout. So we were guided by lantern up what seemed like 300 rock steps, carrying children (one sick), luggage, pack-n-play, etc. to our thatched roof cottage. I write all of this with a smile on my face, because, I can honestly say that we completely enjoyed every single moment (well, aside from a few moments of panic while dodging human beings with our car). We put down our things, the children called dibs on beds and we headed back down the 300 steps to eat supper outside on the lawn of the little restaurant. John had read on the website that we would see baboons, so the children were convinced that every sound they heard was a baboon, and every light in the distance (yes, the electricity came back on after about 45 minutes) was a pair of baboon eyes. So we slept to the sounds of Lake Malawi (still unseen to us) and to the tickling of 'lake flies' (like gnats - small enough to get through our mosquito nets) all over our faces, ever so graciously blanketing our sheets and pillows. Then we awoke to one of the most beautiful sights right out our window. Our cottages were sitting on a cliff overlooking the lake - dugout canoes floating by and monkeys playing in the trees. We eventually made it down to breakfast, all the while looking for baboons, wondering if the little monkeys we were seeing were the 'baboons'. So we sat down outside to eat again on the lawn, then spotted a more picturesque table on the edge of the cliff and decided to move. As we were getting situated at our new table, we looked back to see a huge baboon sitting at our old table finishing off a few food items that we had left behind!! All of a sudden baboons started appearing out of nowhere - literally sitting 20 feet from us watching us eat. They would look at us as if they were thinking, "Are they ever going to finish?" It was amazing. Safety Sam, of course, keeping his distance and taking pictures; Ford, walking right up under a tree where one was sitting and trying to talk to him. Alice Ann was on constant "baboon alert", reporting each time a new one appeared. There is just no way to do the experience justice in a blog--we wish you could have been there with us. To get Caroline and Rachel's perspective (which will be hilarious, I'm sure) click on the link to Caroline's blog . John, the children, and I spent the whole day Saturday at a birthday party for one of Sam's classmates, at his grandparent's house on the lake. You can see from the pictures how beautiful it is. The party was lots of fun and gave us an opportunity to get to know some families outside of ABC. Most of them are South African and Zimbabwian expatriates, living in Malawi for various reasons - mostly business. Most interesting group of people - so many different backgrounds. We had a great time, tons of children - swimming, fishing, playing on the beach, treasure hunt and lots of good food. We spent the rest of the weekend at Livingstonia Hotel (named after the pioneer missionary David Livingstone). It was beautiful and relaxing and tons of fun - very refreshing. It was really nice to get out of the city and see another part of Malawi. We will definitely make a return trip or two - in the daytime!
A friend of ours here that is a professor at the Bible college spent Sunday in a little village near the border of Mozambique. He was told that he was the first white person to have ever visited that village. The people there are deeply rooted in the traditional religions, including the following of evil spirits. A student here at ABC is from this village and had asked our friend several times to go with him and 'preach the gospel'. He took several Malawian guys with him and spent the day there. Our friend ended up preaching twice, baptizing 13 people and serving communion. It amazes us to hear of these things - to see the Gospel at work, piercing the soul.
On the medical front: Mark Boersma and his family (Mark is the medical director here at ABC) are headed to the States in December for furlough. When they leave, John will step into that role. Personally, we are sad to see them leave--we have grown to love their family in this short time and will miss them. Medically, it is pretty overwhelming to John to have so much responsibility after being here for such a short time. He has much to learn between now and then. The new pediatric ward is to open at the end of this month and staff is needed to run it. There are a couple of positions that also need to be filled at the clinic: administrator and bookkeeper. Please pray for qualified staff, the possibility of another physician coming in January and for the Boersma family during this time of transition. Please pray for another physician to come, as well, as John's other part-time colleague, Diane Young, will be leaving for furlough in December 2009.
One strange thing about writing a blog is that you feel like you are writing to the air. Thanks to those who have emailed us - we love hearing from you! Thank you, too, for praying for us. God has been more than gracious to us. Please pray for African Bible College, it's leadership and students. It is exciting to see how the Lord is at work here.
A friend of ours here that is a professor at the Bible college spent Sunday in a little village near the border of Mozambique. He was told that he was the first white person to have ever visited that village. The people there are deeply rooted in the traditional religions, including the following of evil spirits. A student here at ABC is from this village and had asked our friend several times to go with him and 'preach the gospel'. He took several Malawian guys with him and spent the day there. Our friend ended up preaching twice, baptizing 13 people and serving communion. It amazes us to hear of these things - to see the Gospel at work, piercing the soul.
On the medical front: Mark Boersma and his family (Mark is the medical director here at ABC) are headed to the States in December for furlough. When they leave, John will step into that role. Personally, we are sad to see them leave--we have grown to love their family in this short time and will miss them. Medically, it is pretty overwhelming to John to have so much responsibility after being here for such a short time. He has much to learn between now and then. The new pediatric ward is to open at the end of this month and staff is needed to run it. There are a couple of positions that also need to be filled at the clinic: administrator and bookkeeper. Please pray for qualified staff, the possibility of another physician coming in January and for the Boersma family during this time of transition. Please pray for another physician to come, as well, as John's other part-time colleague, Diane Young, will be leaving for furlough in December 2009.
One strange thing about writing a blog is that you feel like you are writing to the air. Thanks to those who have emailed us - we love hearing from you! Thank you, too, for praying for us. God has been more than gracious to us. Please pray for African Bible College, it's leadership and students. It is exciting to see how the Lord is at work here.
01 October 2008
28 September 2008
Muli Bwanji
It is amazing how one's (our) sense of normal changes as your surroundings change. John and I have been laughing lately at the things that have become strangely normal. For example: "Mommy, I'm going out to look for eggs." We hear this most mornings, as our children love to see what Fancy (chicken #2) has produced during the night. It more resembles an Easter egg hunt than life on a farm because poor Fancy doesn't have a proper place to lay her eggs and tends to choose a different spot each time. Last week she chose a window sill and we found it shortly after it happened. Twice she has chosen a windowsill that's not so level and it rolled right off -- mess on the patio.
More new normals:
- "There go the Muslims." --Ford, on hearing the chants/prayers from the mosque several times a day.
- Visiting with the guard that stays on our patio all night every night
- getting a call any time someone spots precious food items in stock at the grocery store such as sour cream, cream cheese or cottage cheese (only once)
- listening to BBC instead of NPR
- bartering for bananas and strawberries with the guys in the parking lot
- being chased down the street by a fella trying to get you to buy his mop for a "great price" (twice in one week)
- calling the patio a "condi", the water hose a "hose pipe" and soccer "football"
- lizards in our house at all times
We have been amazed at God's grace as He has enabled us to adjust to life here fairly well and quickly. There have been many, many people, especially the Boersmas (the other Dr. and family) that have answered our billions of questions and have loved us well since we landed in Lilongwe. We do feel like we are settling in to life here and we are not walking around quite as wide eyed as we were at first. In fact, as I write I am struck by my lack of exciting stories (I'm sure there will be more in the future) and wild facts. The past week has been very much school, grocery shopping, work, soccer practice, swimming lessons -- sounds familiar, huh? We do many of the same things we do in the States, with a twist.
Settling on a church is proving difficult. Worshipping in a culture so different from your own is hard. Many churches have English services in addition to the Chichewe service. I still find it difficult to understand sermons because of the accents. The music is beautiful and sometimes familiar, but very different. In many churches, the men sit on one side of the church and the women and children sit on the other - we lump our boys in the "men" category so that I don't have all the children by myself. Ruthie is plenty to deal with during a 2 hour service - another reason I can't always tell you what the sermon was about. Worshipping here is also a blessing for many reasons. It is a privilege to be able to know and worship with brothers and sisters in Christ here and to look around the room at a beautiful picture of the Kingdom. We have been humbled as we hear all night prayer services announced as an obviously normal part of church life. In the States, the only way you could get us to commit to an all night anything would be only with the promise of some GREAT entertainment! We struggle with sitting still for one hour, while here they may start their service at 7a.m. and finish at 10:00 - and that doesn't include coffee/fellowship time or Sunday school. One church that we've been to several times has designated times of prayer with the pastor from 4 - 5:30 a.m. five days a week. Congregational singing is mostly a capella, which is beautiful, but tricky when you don't know the tune. Hymnals are BYOH - can sometimes be bought outside after church. We are realizing that our ability to worship has relied so on our familiarity with the structure and content of the service. The many differences are distracting at present, but, in time, we trust that God will use them to refine our understanding and ability to worship in spirit and truth.
Sam attended a birthday party last week of a little boy in the first grade at ABC Academy. It was a bit (more than a bit) of a stretch for Sam and me to leave him in a most unfamiliar setting with extremely nice but, again, most unfamiliar people for his first solo event in Africa. We had been there for about 3 minutes and he squeezed my hand with a grip of steel and looked up at me with tears in his eyes and said, "I want to go home with you, I don't want to stay, I don't know what's going on." Everything in me wanted to say, "Me neither Sam, let's go!" I knew he would be fine, he did know a few of the boys from school, but I could very easily put myself in his shoes and understand what he was feeling. The family was more than gracious and welcoming to us. They are Egyptian, and have lived in Lilongwe for 10 years. The dad is a surgeon at the hospital in town. Anyway ........ he stayed, I left, came back to pick him up (a little early) and he ran up to me and said, "I've had so much fun!" It was one of those stretching times that God used for our good. It gave us a great time to talk about how God holds us in His hands and never leaves us. Ford was able to tell Sam how he had prayed for him and Sam was able to tell Ford how God had answered his prayers. Who would have thought -- all from a Scooby Doo birthday party.
Ford is pumped because he learned to ride his bike without his training wheels - if he could only learn to steer and brake. He is LOVING school and his new friends Thumbiko, Ike and Jock. Quote from tonight when the evening chants from the mosque started, "Let's go throw something at that guy."
Alice Ann has never been prouder of something that belonged to her than she is of Fancy her chicken. She always thinks she needs to go check on "my chicken" - every time it squawks, she thinks a dog is chasing it. She takes her responsibility of shooing her off the condi very seriously - AA isn't known for being the eager beaver, but give that girl a chicken ..... On a more serious note - her speech is getting better all the time and it is fun for her to be saying funny things now too.
Ruthie is doing great! We took her off Larium(malaria meds) for three weeks to see if it could possibly be what had been making her so difficult. After three weeks off, if was very clear that the Larium had absolutely nothing to do with it. Thankfully, good old fashion consistency has pulled through again and she seems to be over the "adjusting to Africa" hump. She is starting to talk and has been hilariously funny and happy for the last week or two. Praise the Lord! Her favorite past time is escaping from the house every time somebody forgets to close the door all the way (which is quite often). Tonight I found her running around the front yard naked calling "da da" while I was getting the bath ready.
We are learning a lot, thinking about things we've not considered before, loving the slower pace of life here, adjusting to the ever encroaching heat and overall very thankful that the Lord has us right here right now.
More new normals:
- "There go the Muslims." --Ford, on hearing the chants/prayers from the mosque several times a day.
- Visiting with the guard that stays on our patio all night every night
- getting a call any time someone spots precious food items in stock at the grocery store such as sour cream, cream cheese or cottage cheese (only once)
- listening to BBC instead of NPR
- bartering for bananas and strawberries with the guys in the parking lot
- being chased down the street by a fella trying to get you to buy his mop for a "great price" (twice in one week)
- calling the patio a "condi", the water hose a "hose pipe" and soccer "football"
- lizards in our house at all times
We have been amazed at God's grace as He has enabled us to adjust to life here fairly well and quickly. There have been many, many people, especially the Boersmas (the other Dr. and family) that have answered our billions of questions and have loved us well since we landed in Lilongwe. We do feel like we are settling in to life here and we are not walking around quite as wide eyed as we were at first. In fact, as I write I am struck by my lack of exciting stories (I'm sure there will be more in the future) and wild facts. The past week has been very much school, grocery shopping, work, soccer practice, swimming lessons -- sounds familiar, huh? We do many of the same things we do in the States, with a twist.
Settling on a church is proving difficult. Worshipping in a culture so different from your own is hard. Many churches have English services in addition to the Chichewe service. I still find it difficult to understand sermons because of the accents. The music is beautiful and sometimes familiar, but very different. In many churches, the men sit on one side of the church and the women and children sit on the other - we lump our boys in the "men" category so that I don't have all the children by myself. Ruthie is plenty to deal with during a 2 hour service - another reason I can't always tell you what the sermon was about. Worshipping here is also a blessing for many reasons. It is a privilege to be able to know and worship with brothers and sisters in Christ here and to look around the room at a beautiful picture of the Kingdom. We have been humbled as we hear all night prayer services announced as an obviously normal part of church life. In the States, the only way you could get us to commit to an all night anything would be only with the promise of some GREAT entertainment! We struggle with sitting still for one hour, while here they may start their service at 7a.m. and finish at 10:00 - and that doesn't include coffee/fellowship time or Sunday school. One church that we've been to several times has designated times of prayer with the pastor from 4 - 5:30 a.m. five days a week. Congregational singing is mostly a capella, which is beautiful, but tricky when you don't know the tune. Hymnals are BYOH - can sometimes be bought outside after church. We are realizing that our ability to worship has relied so on our familiarity with the structure and content of the service. The many differences are distracting at present, but, in time, we trust that God will use them to refine our understanding and ability to worship in spirit and truth.
Sam attended a birthday party last week of a little boy in the first grade at ABC Academy. It was a bit (more than a bit) of a stretch for Sam and me to leave him in a most unfamiliar setting with extremely nice but, again, most unfamiliar people for his first solo event in Africa. We had been there for about 3 minutes and he squeezed my hand with a grip of steel and looked up at me with tears in his eyes and said, "I want to go home with you, I don't want to stay, I don't know what's going on." Everything in me wanted to say, "Me neither Sam, let's go!" I knew he would be fine, he did know a few of the boys from school, but I could very easily put myself in his shoes and understand what he was feeling. The family was more than gracious and welcoming to us. They are Egyptian, and have lived in Lilongwe for 10 years. The dad is a surgeon at the hospital in town. Anyway ........ he stayed, I left, came back to pick him up (a little early) and he ran up to me and said, "I've had so much fun!" It was one of those stretching times that God used for our good. It gave us a great time to talk about how God holds us in His hands and never leaves us. Ford was able to tell Sam how he had prayed for him and Sam was able to tell Ford how God had answered his prayers. Who would have thought -- all from a Scooby Doo birthday party.
Ford is pumped because he learned to ride his bike without his training wheels - if he could only learn to steer and brake. He is LOVING school and his new friends Thumbiko, Ike and Jock. Quote from tonight when the evening chants from the mosque started, "Let's go throw something at that guy."
Alice Ann has never been prouder of something that belonged to her than she is of Fancy her chicken. She always thinks she needs to go check on "my chicken" - every time it squawks, she thinks a dog is chasing it. She takes her responsibility of shooing her off the condi very seriously - AA isn't known for being the eager beaver, but give that girl a chicken ..... On a more serious note - her speech is getting better all the time and it is fun for her to be saying funny things now too.
Ruthie is doing great! We took her off Larium(malaria meds) for three weeks to see if it could possibly be what had been making her so difficult. After three weeks off, if was very clear that the Larium had absolutely nothing to do with it. Thankfully, good old fashion consistency has pulled through again and she seems to be over the "adjusting to Africa" hump. She is starting to talk and has been hilariously funny and happy for the last week or two. Praise the Lord! Her favorite past time is escaping from the house every time somebody forgets to close the door all the way (which is quite often). Tonight I found her running around the front yard naked calling "da da" while I was getting the bath ready.
We are learning a lot, thinking about things we've not considered before, loving the slower pace of life here, adjusting to the ever encroaching heat and overall very thankful that the Lord has us right here right now.
23 September 2008
21 September 2008
Medicine in Lilongwe
In case you don't have time to read this whole posting, I'll try to give you a "high-yield" summary: The major differences are patients are sicker when they seek care, CT/MRI/echo/nuclear medicine is not an option, specialist consultation is either unavailable/weeks away/in South Africa, pain medicine is either ibuprofen or Panadol (cousin of Tylenol) and people are typically very thankful for your care. Our clinic is equipped with x-ray, ultrasound, laboratory (basic chemistries, CBC, microbiology, with access to advanced labs), an OR suite (currently not used), pharmacy, and HIV counseling/testing. Our hospital is capable of inpatient care, and our new pediatric ward will be able to care for up to ~24 children at one time. I'm honored to have two colleagues who are wonderful to work with: Mark Boersma and Diane Young. Mark is an internist/ER doc from Ruston, LA; Diane is a generalist from New Zealand. The practice is varied in scope: rule-out malaria (lots), cough, HIV (lots), broken bones (both new and follow-up old), prenatal care, tuberculosis, gastroenteritis, rashes, low back pain, diabetes, and hypertension among others. I'm settling in daily. Soon I should feel somewhat capable, I pray.
Now for the unabridged...
We live about 150 meters from the clinic and hospital. We see patients from 08:30 to 16:30 weekdays, and we have a clinical officer who sees patients on Saturday mornings. Mark and I share call. That usually doesn't mean much, but occasionally we go down to the clinic at night to run a malaria test on college staff person (malaria seems to affect Westerners faster and more severely than Malawians). We have two Clinical Officers (Danford and Rashid) who practice as physician-extenders (like Nurse Practitioners in the States). We see about 14,000 patients a year (not sure of more accurate number). Most patients speak English, and I have good translation through my nurses when a patient only speaks Chichewa.
I have been constantly challenged. Of course I took care of a few HIV patients in Alabama, but never without Infectious Disease specialists on the case. Orthopeadics referrals were a given for fractures. Radiologists read all of the films in the US, but I'm not sure there is one in Malawi. Sometimes patients would really benefit from an CT or MRI, however they'd have to travel to South Africa to obtain one (~2 hour flight). Mammography is available in Balantyre (a 4 hour drive). It is challenging. However, things have been more difficult in recent history, so I have much to be thankful for. Until about 2003, treatment for HIV cost about 3000 kwacha per month, which was about $40. To give a reference point: a bunch of bananas costs 150 kwacha and a standard monthly wage is about 8000 kwacha. The government now subsidizes (through grants) much of the HIV care. Good HIV care, on this scale, is expensive, both in medicines and laboratory, putting an enormous burden on a country like Malawi, where somewhere between 15 and 30% of the population have the disease. I diagnose a new case about 2 or 3 times a week. Just convincing patients to get tested sometimes is quite challenging. Just today, I was trained on using antiretrovirals (ARVs) by Perry Jansen, MD, at Partners in Hope (PIH). PIH is going to start offering HIV testing for follow-up: CD4 counts (for 500 kwacha [$3.50]) and viral loads (for 2500 kwacha [$17.50]). In the US, those tests would likely be several hundred dollars each. This will allow us to better treat our patients and help us detect drug resistance sooner.
I've now administered my first round of chemotherapy. For privacy reasons I won't go into details, but I would like to give a snapshot. This patient was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma around September 10. How providential it was to have Dr. Ted Moore, a pediatric oncologist from UCLA, visiting with his church's medical team over the last two weeks. Ted has been able to direct the chemotherapy, while we administer it and follow the patient. The therapy will continue every 3-4 weeks for 6 treatments. Without his expertise, this patient would have a very poor prognosis, but now we are very hopeful for a cure. She will not receive radiation therapy, but, Lord willing, she has a very good outlook for recovery. During her night in our hospital, I even checked her potassium and creatinine in the lab myself. . .I'm learning a lot to say the least.
While Dr. Moore's medical group was here, I got the opportunity to go a local village with them to help take care of general medical problems. It was quite an experience. My camera battery was dead when I arrived there, but I will try to link to some of the group's pictures when they get them on their website. When seeing patients in the village (about 40 minutes from ABC), I was struck by how much I have come to rely on the facilities at ABC Clinic, such as lab and x-ray. In the village, you basically only have the history and physical exam to guide your diagnosis and treatment. In Malawi, you call it "syndromic care." That means you treat what it seems like and move on. Prayer takes a much more (appropriately) central role. Even as I write this, I'm struck by how often I rely on myself for answers. I easily forget to remain in the shadow of the cross and rely on His power.
God has been gracious to show us more specifically why He has brought us here at this time: to give Mark some refreshment and relief, and to open the new pediatric ward, which the Whittier Area Community Church from Whittier, CA, has dontated to ABC. This is a busy time for ABC Community Clinic, and it is clear now why the Lord brought us here. While knowing details is not a requirement for our service to the King, it is such a blessing to be able to have such clarity.
Thank you for praying for us.
Now for the unabridged...
We live about 150 meters from the clinic and hospital. We see patients from 08:30 to 16:30 weekdays, and we have a clinical officer who sees patients on Saturday mornings. Mark and I share call. That usually doesn't mean much, but occasionally we go down to the clinic at night to run a malaria test on college staff person (malaria seems to affect Westerners faster and more severely than Malawians). We have two Clinical Officers (Danford and Rashid) who practice as physician-extenders (like Nurse Practitioners in the States). We see about 14,000 patients a year (not sure of more accurate number). Most patients speak English, and I have good translation through my nurses when a patient only speaks Chichewa.
I have been constantly challenged. Of course I took care of a few HIV patients in Alabama, but never without Infectious Disease specialists on the case. Orthopeadics referrals were a given for fractures. Radiologists read all of the films in the US, but I'm not sure there is one in Malawi. Sometimes patients would really benefit from an CT or MRI, however they'd have to travel to South Africa to obtain one (~2 hour flight). Mammography is available in Balantyre (a 4 hour drive). It is challenging. However, things have been more difficult in recent history, so I have much to be thankful for. Until about 2003, treatment for HIV cost about 3000 kwacha per month, which was about $40. To give a reference point: a bunch of bananas costs 150 kwacha and a standard monthly wage is about 8000 kwacha. The government now subsidizes (through grants) much of the HIV care. Good HIV care, on this scale, is expensive, both in medicines and laboratory, putting an enormous burden on a country like Malawi, where somewhere between 15 and 30% of the population have the disease. I diagnose a new case about 2 or 3 times a week. Just convincing patients to get tested sometimes is quite challenging. Just today, I was trained on using antiretrovirals (ARVs) by Perry Jansen, MD, at Partners in Hope (PIH). PIH is going to start offering HIV testing for follow-up: CD4 counts (for 500 kwacha [$3.50]) and viral loads (for 2500 kwacha [$17.50]). In the US, those tests would likely be several hundred dollars each. This will allow us to better treat our patients and help us detect drug resistance sooner.
I've now administered my first round of chemotherapy. For privacy reasons I won't go into details, but I would like to give a snapshot. This patient was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma around September 10. How providential it was to have Dr. Ted Moore, a pediatric oncologist from UCLA, visiting with his church's medical team over the last two weeks. Ted has been able to direct the chemotherapy, while we administer it and follow the patient. The therapy will continue every 3-4 weeks for 6 treatments. Without his expertise, this patient would have a very poor prognosis, but now we are very hopeful for a cure. She will not receive radiation therapy, but, Lord willing, she has a very good outlook for recovery. During her night in our hospital, I even checked her potassium and creatinine in the lab myself. . .I'm learning a lot to say the least.
While Dr. Moore's medical group was here, I got the opportunity to go a local village with them to help take care of general medical problems. It was quite an experience. My camera battery was dead when I arrived there, but I will try to link to some of the group's pictures when they get them on their website. When seeing patients in the village (about 40 minutes from ABC), I was struck by how much I have come to rely on the facilities at ABC Clinic, such as lab and x-ray. In the village, you basically only have the history and physical exam to guide your diagnosis and treatment. In Malawi, you call it "syndromic care." That means you treat what it seems like and move on. Prayer takes a much more (appropriately) central role. Even as I write this, I'm struck by how often I rely on myself for answers. I easily forget to remain in the shadow of the cross and rely on His power.
God has been gracious to show us more specifically why He has brought us here at this time: to give Mark some refreshment and relief, and to open the new pediatric ward, which the Whittier Area Community Church from Whittier, CA, has dontated to ABC. This is a busy time for ABC Community Clinic, and it is clear now why the Lord brought us here. While knowing details is not a requirement for our service to the King, it is such a blessing to be able to have such clarity.
Thank you for praying for us.
08 September 2008
Today's fun fact
[click on the photo above to go to the entire album, turn on captions by clicking on the small bubble]
We learn amazing facts almost daily. Today we had a lesson on why not to dry our clothes outside. Putzi flies (or tumbo fly) lay eggs in clothes as they dry outside, then bore into your skin, hatch, create a huge boil as they grow, then "pop" out and fly away. Lovely thought, huh!! I promptly scratched "outside clothes drying rack" off my list of things to buy.
Last Wednesday, we made a day trip to Dedza, a town approx. 100 kilometers from Lilongwe to see a pottery shop and eat lunch at the lovely cafe. As you can see in the pictures, the drive was beautiful - mountains popping up out of nowhere and as Sam says, "dead grassy plains" and small villages along the road. There were still bikers to dodge and the occasional herd of goats to slow down for, but the children were continually disappointed that we weren't having to keep watch for lions and elephants. We are planning a trip to Zambia sometime soon -- that's where all the cool animals are. For now we will have to settle for Leia, our chicken, and an abundance of lizards. Anyway, the pottery was great, lunch was apple pie because the power was out and that's the only thing they had that didn't have to be cooked, but the highlight was getting a glimpse of life outside of the city. It was almost incomprehensible to us to be driving past, waving at children, being feet away from people that exist in a world that is so so far from ours. Each of our worlds is so completely foreign to the other and yet we are looking right at each other, smiling at one another. It is overwhelming at times. The picture of the giant centipede-looking-thing is also from last Wednesday. I discovered him in our kitchen when I got up to turn on the coffee. It was ,about 8 inches long 1.5 inches wide, 1/2 inch long legs all the way down its body and huge pinchers. Sam had mentioned a couple of other creatures that children had brought to school, so I thought it would be fine for him to take this. The boys and John caught it and put it in the bug cage and Sam went off to school. About 8:30 the phone rang - it was the office asking me to please come get this "scary creature" that Sam had brought to school. They said that it was scaring some kids and some parents saw it and said it was poisonous. I asked Sam about it that afternoon. He said, "Nobody was scared, Mommy, they were just interested. Everybody was crowding around me to see it - it was kind of like I was famous." Emmanuel, our friends that helps us in the garden said, "We fear it like a snake." From what we can tell, many things are thought to be poisonous - the consensus was that it probably was not dangerous, but no sense in finding out.
Ford's first day of preschool was today and he loved it. The girls and I walked across the street to take him and stayed for a few minutes watching, as did most of the other moms. After about 10 minutes, he very sweetly said, "Mommy, I'm ready for you to go now." I took my cue and headed home for some girl time. He had a great time and can't wait to go back Wed. He's feeling very big to have just had a birthday and gone to school. When we went to get him today, he didn't want to walk across the street right next to me because he's "really big now and can walk home all by himself."
quick notes:
-- ate great Indian food on Saturday - Halls Mentholatums for after dinner mints!
-- thought I was buying tomato sauce, but opened the can and it was fish in tomato sauce
-- one of the only things we've found to be cheaper here - Em's haircuts - Cliff from Zimbabwe is awesome
-- mechanics shops can be as simple as a tree with a sign on it.
-- putting your blinker on doesn't necessarily mean that you are turning, one might assume that you are mearly slowing down for no reason at all and will feel free to pass you on either side.
-- pedestrians ALWAYS have the right-of-way, even if they run out in front of your car -- defensive driving has taken on a whole new meaning!
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