The week has gone okay. It is hard for Ashley to still be patient with the pace of things. He is doing a little better every day. We are thankful he had Thursday and Friday off this week. On Thursday Ashley took Maggie on a walk down to the base of the river dam at Tenwek. It was a beautiful, steep walk. That afternoon we took our first trip into the town of Bomet. It was the typical developing country small town. There were dirt roads and lots of small buildings and roadside stands. The grocery store was surprisingly nice. It had only 2 types of cereal, but it carried ice cream and Tabasco sauce. We also saw that there is a bank with ATM and post office in town. It is only about 4 miles from Tenwek. When we returned we were sitting on the front porch a chameleon fell out of the tree, kind of random. Thursday evening we had breakfast for supper. Afterwards Ashley and one of the other doctors went outside for awhile and threw around the Frisbee.
Friday was a big day. Sarah is still very sick, but praise the Lord she felt well enough to go on a hike Friday morning. We all walked down to the “rickety” bridge at little ways down from the dam. It was a beautiful walk, nicer than most parks back home. Maggie made the trip exciting as she was on Ashley’s back in the backpack and would firmly grab hold of a tree without him knowing. When we arrived to the bridge we knew why he had the name it did. The bridge consist of posts and planks crossing a swift river. The gaps between the board were easily enough for a leg to fall through. Needless to say, we did not take Maggie across the bridge and we were pleased to know that a work team would be coming in replace the bridge soon.
For lunch Friday we ate samosa (seasoned meat pockets) from the hospital, mmm… Afterwards Ashley met with the national coordinator for family practice in Kenya. Along with him was his wife and a visitor who is a recent FP grad who actually is friends with some of our good friends from our residency. The session was fairly overwhelming as it was a chance for Ashley to learn the Kenyan medical system, a review of what family practice means in Kenya, and what his responsibilities would be as coordinator at Tenwek.
Family Practice is very different here as it is more inpatient oriented than anywhere else. There is also a large amount of surgery the residents are supposed to be able to do. In Kenya, a medical degree is a bachelors degree earned after 6 years of school after high school. Then a one year internship is completed. Then the young doctor must work for at least 2 years before he can apply for a residency, which is a master’s program. Therefore, it has be connect to a university and requires research and some in class training. The program is fairly new in Kenya with the first national graduates anticipated in December. Tenwek currently has 3 third year residents. They are very smart and hard working. We will be getting a new resident here in January. The position as coordinator is fairly intimidating as Ashley’s counterparts were involved at faculty positions at other programs and universities before coming here. Ashley also learned a lot about people and that the work here is much like living out one’s faith, especially requiring a lot of humility. The Kenyan people are very good at reading people and seeing if they are sincere or arrogant, which is a good thing and something else that will help all of us remember to ben
After this Ashley quickly met with World Gospel Mission regional coordinator who helped Ashley with the Mac. Praise the Lord he was able to get online with it, but we are still having issues with wireless connections at our house. After this the folks that Ashley met with that afternoon all ate at our house for supper, along with another couple.
Next we went to a praise and worship service at the Africa Gospel Church near us. It held about 1000 people and is a beautiful church. The locals sang for awhile, and then the mission team from Pittsburg performed. It was nice be with our friends joining the locals in worship.
Saturday morning Ashley met with FP folks again for just a few minutes to upload some documents onto his computer. We then took Maggie to a birthday party for one of her 3 year old friends. It was fairly similar to a party in the states and Maggie seemed to have a good time. That afternoon we rested. While the girls took a nap Ashley planted and an avacado seed, our first plant in Africa! We have been anticipating this for over a week as it took us this long to get a pot. One of our workers was able to buy the only small one she could find in the town next to us. But we had to borrow the gardening tool from a neighbor to complete the task. That evening we ate pizza and borrowed some movies from our neighbors video library.
Today was church and this afternoon it was rainy. That kept the neighboring kids playing inside and allowed us all to take a nice nap. This evening we had a cookout at a neighbors house. It was a bring your own meat party. We then had a special time of celebration. We read the passage of scripture where the Israelites set a pile of stone after crossing the Jordan in remembrance of what the Lord had done for them. We did the same thing with each family placing a stone in a pile and telling of something that the Lord had done in the past year. It was encouraging to hear everyone’s stories. They all had their struggles, but in the end all saw that God was, and will be, faithful.
Here is a praise report. We left our car behind to be sold by Sarah’s grandfather. The other day we realized it was time to make another payment. Later that day we found out the car had sold, and for more than we had originally asked. We have our struggles, but saw this as another example of God confirming us being here.
2 examples of everyday life here that you may find interesting. The first is keys. Every door here has a key. And there are plenty of keys to go around. The problem lies in the keys are not marked well and it is hard to know what goes where. For example, we have 3 different locked doors to our home. We were given keys to 2 doors, but nobody knew where the other key was. One day Ashley went through a pile of extra keys in the house and found 2 keys to the door. Then at the hospital the other week Ashley needed a piece of equipment in the hospital. He had to go to the nursing office and find the nurse in charge that weekend who found the nurse in charge of the keys. She then had a pile of what appeared to be over 100 keys. Fortunately, we were able to find the right one.
The second example is about water. Tenwek is blessed with having filtered, running water. However, most still do not find the water suitable for drinking. It also has chemical in it used for filtering. Some gets left behind and it is not harmful, but “gunks” up your hair. For drinking water we use rain water. It is collected in big containers from off the roofs. Almost every day we gather a container of water which we boil for about 20 minutes. We then cool it and place it in a filter tank. We then place our filtered water in a big cooler that we keep, ready for drinking.
Thank you for your prayer and continue to pray for us. Sarah in 9 weeks today. Praise the Lord!
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Monday, August 20, 2007
A Bit of Frustration
Hello all,
This is Ashley writing. Praise God that today Sarah has a good day sickness wise. Pray for her that she will feel well enough to help with a local VBS coming up this Thursday. She would really like to go if she feels up to it. We had lunch at another young family’s house. He is in the middle of surgery residency and she is a mom of a 2 year old who is to deliver again in November. We had an excellent supper tonight. Sarah found some big potatoes a man was selling so we had baked potatoes with seasoned pork loin.
I had a long day at work. After helping round on some of the inpatient service, I went to help over in casualty, which is what the ER is called here. It has 7 beds and 2 nurses. At first I helped the CO (PA equivalent) with a few difficult patients. I am still getting used to the pace of receiving back labs and orders slower than I am used to. The sick children bothered me the most. I saw a 4 year old boy with a large neck mass. He will probably be okay. Then I a saw an 18 month old, which is Maggie's age. This baby was going to have a cleft palate repair at a local hospital and on the table seized and has not been responsive for 3 days. It was hard to hold back tears as I gave some orders and asked for the chaplain to come in. Another things is that there is no such thing as a consult, but people can just show up with papers from another hospital. Lots of folks come here in bad shape expecting to be healed. Fortunately here these patients will hear the Gospel message. There were a few other frustrations, but I am sure they are things that I will get used to in the future.
This is Ashley writing. Praise God that today Sarah has a good day sickness wise. Pray for her that she will feel well enough to help with a local VBS coming up this Thursday. She would really like to go if she feels up to it. We had lunch at another young family’s house. He is in the middle of surgery residency and she is a mom of a 2 year old who is to deliver again in November. We had an excellent supper tonight. Sarah found some big potatoes a man was selling so we had baked potatoes with seasoned pork loin.
I had a long day at work. After helping round on some of the inpatient service, I went to help over in casualty, which is what the ER is called here. It has 7 beds and 2 nurses. At first I helped the CO (PA equivalent) with a few difficult patients. I am still getting used to the pace of receiving back labs and orders slower than I am used to. The sick children bothered me the most. I saw a 4 year old boy with a large neck mass. He will probably be okay. Then I a saw an 18 month old, which is Maggie's age. This baby was going to have a cleft palate repair at a local hospital and on the table seized and has not been responsive for 3 days. It was hard to hold back tears as I gave some orders and asked for the chaplain to come in. Another things is that there is no such thing as a consult, but people can just show up with papers from another hospital. Lots of folks come here in bad shape expecting to be healed. Fortunately here these patients will hear the Gospel message. There were a few other frustrations, but I am sure they are things that I will get used to in the future.
A Little Encouragement
Wednesday night we had our first Kipangi. This is basically a big covered-dish meal. Traditionally one is held monthly. All of the missionaries and visiting work teams were there. Sarah fixed pies and had our helpers make cookies. BBQ beef was the main ingredient. It was hard to meet everybody. We are quickly learning that there are constantly people in and out of this place.
Work has been okay for Ashley. He is battling the slow pace of things in the wards, such a the time it takes to receive lab results, but he is starting to learn his way around. He is also beginning to build relationships with other staff members. It occasionally gets discouraging for him thinking “what am I doing just seeing all of these patients”. However he began reading the chaplains notes in the charts which made him smile. They says things such as “ I prayed and provided encouragement from the Bible” or “I shared the gospel of Jesus Christ with this patient”. The other day Ashley had a patient who he and the surgeons decided should go to hospice care. He asked the patient is she knew if she would go to heaven if she died. She did not know for sure. The chaplain shared the gospel with her earlier, but she was not ready to surrender her life with Christ. The next day Ashley asked her if she was ready then. The nurse then led her in a prayer to receive the hope of Jesus Christ. What a blessing! He also had patients smile and thanks him the other day as they left the hospital, which made his day.
Sarah has been building relationships with her workers. They talk a lot and when they go to have their “chai” (tea) time, she invites them to sit at the table with her. The other day the girls were discussing a wedding they were going to and Sarah shared about ours and showed them the wedding album. They are all very thankful for the growing friendship.
Maggie is becoming more well known around the facility. She is playing more now with the other kids, but native and Mks and seems to enjoy it. She also is sleeping better now through the night.
This weekend Ashley has been on call. It has not been that busy, but he has had to stay around the house to answer the phone. Some of the patients have been intimidating, but he is learning to do the best he can with the resources he has available.
Saturday night we had our first guests over- 2 couples. One is a couple from near home, Anderson, SC. They are a pair of FP’s, one of which Ashley went to college with (small world). The other is a couple from Massachusetts. They are 1 year into a 2 year commitment. He recently finished surgery residency and she is a nurse. We all pitched in on food and had a good time of just sitting around and talking with one another. We love our colleagues here, but these folks are the closest to our age.
Work has been okay for Ashley. He is battling the slow pace of things in the wards, such a the time it takes to receive lab results, but he is starting to learn his way around. He is also beginning to build relationships with other staff members. It occasionally gets discouraging for him thinking “what am I doing just seeing all of these patients”. However he began reading the chaplains notes in the charts which made him smile. They says things such as “ I prayed and provided encouragement from the Bible” or “I shared the gospel of Jesus Christ with this patient”. The other day Ashley had a patient who he and the surgeons decided should go to hospice care. He asked the patient is she knew if she would go to heaven if she died. She did not know for sure. The chaplain shared the gospel with her earlier, but she was not ready to surrender her life with Christ. The next day Ashley asked her if she was ready then. The nurse then led her in a prayer to receive the hope of Jesus Christ. What a blessing! He also had patients smile and thanks him the other day as they left the hospital, which made his day.
Sarah has been building relationships with her workers. They talk a lot and when they go to have their “chai” (tea) time, she invites them to sit at the table with her. The other day the girls were discussing a wedding they were going to and Sarah shared about ours and showed them the wedding album. They are all very thankful for the growing friendship.
Maggie is becoming more well known around the facility. She is playing more now with the other kids, but native and Mks and seems to enjoy it. She also is sleeping better now through the night.
This weekend Ashley has been on call. It has not been that busy, but he has had to stay around the house to answer the phone. Some of the patients have been intimidating, but he is learning to do the best he can with the resources he has available.
Saturday night we had our first guests over- 2 couples. One is a couple from near home, Anderson, SC. They are a pair of FP’s, one of which Ashley went to college with (small world). The other is a couple from Massachusetts. They are 1 year into a 2 year commitment. He recently finished surgery residency and she is a nurse. We all pitched in on food and had a good time of just sitting around and talking with one another. We love our colleagues here, but these folks are the closest to our age.
Getting Started
Well, here we are with another story. The week has been kind of slow thus far. Ashley oriented some more Monday and began work on Tuesday morning. It was very chaotic at first with so many people seeing folks on the wards. There are about 20 people in the men’s ward and women’s ward each. There are clinical officers (like a PA), medical officers (MD’s), interns, residents, and attending. Here Ashley is an attending physican. There are 4 medical attending and 4 surgical attending on staff.
Sarah is continuing to battle morning sickness, but appears to be doing better each day. Sarah is having the workers help her relearn her crocheting. Things get quiet at times here at night. After Maggie goes to bed we will watch an episode of Little House or the Cosby Show on our TV that is connected to our computer. It almost makes us forget where we are at times. We are quickly getting used to sleeping under the mosquito net.
There are volunteer teams in and out of here all the time. The Maryland prayer team left earlier this week. 2 more teams are coming later this week. Currently there is a team here working with the surgeons on esophageal cancer. It is very prevalent in Kenya, Iran, and China. Tenwek is one of the main centers working on this with research going on as well. The team here developed a machine that will freeze cancer in the esophagus (cryOtherapy). It is experimental, but appears to be working well.
The patients on the wards are very sick. About one adult dies daily. Several sick children died yesterday. Almost half of the adults Ashley sees on the floor have HIV and everyone gets tested (don’t worry, we are very careful with everyone).
It has been raining a lot in the afternoons and some at night. The temp stays about the same year round. We do not have heating or air and are very comfortable. A couple next door says that in one year there indoor thermometer’s highest reading was 72 and lowest was 67.
Every morning the medical staff has an educational session at 8AM. On Wednesday there are devotionals. Today Ashley was able to participate in his first long-term doctors meeting, which really helped to catch him up on the inner workings on the hospital.
Sarah is making our shopping list for Nairobi. Several folks are going in and out of there this weekend everyone offers to get things for people. We are beginning to learn what we need more and less of. It is difficult trying to plan so far ahead. For example, we doubled our egg order this week. (We order our eggs from one of the orphanages around and they deliver them on Tuesdays). In addition to the folks that come by and sell their fruits and veggies at the door, people are now beginning to bring us their crafts as well (baskets, ornamental gourds, etc.) We have bought a few.
Some of the carpenters on campus have build us some much needed shelves in our home. Labors in Kenya work for 8 hours a day for 6 and ½ days (or just 5 days and work more on those days).
We are working on getting pictures posted. The other computer has them for now and we are having trouble getting it on the internet. But don’t worry, we are taking pictures. The internet is such a blessing as although it is slow, it does allow us to connect with our family, friends, and the outside world. Keep writing because we do read things even if we don’t reply right away.
Sarah is continuing to battle morning sickness, but appears to be doing better each day. Sarah is having the workers help her relearn her crocheting. Things get quiet at times here at night. After Maggie goes to bed we will watch an episode of Little House or the Cosby Show on our TV that is connected to our computer. It almost makes us forget where we are at times. We are quickly getting used to sleeping under the mosquito net.
There are volunteer teams in and out of here all the time. The Maryland prayer team left earlier this week. 2 more teams are coming later this week. Currently there is a team here working with the surgeons on esophageal cancer. It is very prevalent in Kenya, Iran, and China. Tenwek is one of the main centers working on this with research going on as well. The team here developed a machine that will freeze cancer in the esophagus (cryOtherapy). It is experimental, but appears to be working well.
The patients on the wards are very sick. About one adult dies daily. Several sick children died yesterday. Almost half of the adults Ashley sees on the floor have HIV and everyone gets tested (don’t worry, we are very careful with everyone).
It has been raining a lot in the afternoons and some at night. The temp stays about the same year round. We do not have heating or air and are very comfortable. A couple next door says that in one year there indoor thermometer’s highest reading was 72 and lowest was 67.
Every morning the medical staff has an educational session at 8AM. On Wednesday there are devotionals. Today Ashley was able to participate in his first long-term doctors meeting, which really helped to catch him up on the inner workings on the hospital.
Sarah is making our shopping list for Nairobi. Several folks are going in and out of there this weekend everyone offers to get things for people. We are beginning to learn what we need more and less of. It is difficult trying to plan so far ahead. For example, we doubled our egg order this week. (We order our eggs from one of the orphanages around and they deliver them on Tuesdays). In addition to the folks that come by and sell their fruits and veggies at the door, people are now beginning to bring us their crafts as well (baskets, ornamental gourds, etc.) We have bought a few.
Some of the carpenters on campus have build us some much needed shelves in our home. Labors in Kenya work for 8 hours a day for 6 and ½ days (or just 5 days and work more on those days).
We are working on getting pictures posted. The other computer has them for now and we are having trouble getting it on the internet. But don’t worry, we are taking pictures. The internet is such a blessing as although it is slow, it does allow us to connect with our family, friends, and the outside world. Keep writing because we do read things even if we don’t reply right away.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Hellos and Good-byes
Well, we are here in Kenya. As you have probably noticed, it has taken us awhile to post our first blog. Let us recount our first days here and we'll tell you why.
Leaving home was bitter sweet. We were so glad to have our family to see us off, but it was hard to tell them good-bye. It is great, though, to have all of their prayers and support. It was especially good to have them help us with all of our baggage at the airport. We had 20 bags to check. I will not say how much it cost to send them, but thankfully the cost was about 25% less than we expected. We also arrived with only about one other person in line, which was a blessing. The ride to the airport was more stressful with a caravan of 6 cars traveling together through heavy Atlanta traffic!
Once we said our good-byes, we traveled through security without a hitch (which is rare as we normally get stopped). We credit part of this to the fact that one of the workers there was not feeling well and Ashley made small talk with him making sure he was okay as we nonchalantly grabbed our bags and headed on through.
The first flight was a full 8 hour trip to Amsterdam, which went okay. Maggie did well, just wanting to get out and explore. We carried Maggie's babyjogger on the plane, so we were the last to get off as we had to let everyone clear out to get it (but we were some of the first on!) It was the middle of the night US time when we arrived, so we walked around in a daze for about one our. Security in Amsterdam went smooth and we boarded our next 8 hour flight to Nairobi. This flight harder as we all wanted to sleep and it was hard forlittle Maggie to get comfortable. We also got to meet a few other missionaries on the flight.
We were happy when we finally deplaned in Nairobi. We found our way to immigration and when through getting our visas and stamps. When we told the agent what we were doing, she said "Thank you for coming to help us". We have never had that experience and it made us smile.
The luggage carousel was a madhouse, but Ashley squeezed in and would gather a bag or two at a time. Sarah stood by and guarded the 10 trolleys we had gathered to place our belongs on. Whenever she turned her head, someone would walk off with an empty one, which made us laugh. Some folks in line recognized our bags and would help set them off for us as well. Miraculously, all 20 bags arrived safely and without a scratch. Some of the airport works helped gather all our bags (stacked on 5 carts instead of 10). When we told the customs agent what we were doing, he said okay and let us walk through without checking a bag. The luggage caravan then proceeded outside. This was an answered prayer as we had no idea how we would get all these bags moved on our own.
We then met the lady who came to pick us up. She had the driver pull around right to where we were standing and load our bags. One van was for us and our overnight belongings. The next van held all our other items. Everything fit! We quickly became friends with the folks who came to get us (We'll omit names for now until we clear it with them that it is okay to use them.
We quickly became introduced to a little culture as a security officer came up to our driver and said we could not park where we were. He informed him that there was no other place to park and no signs saying we could not park there. It was obvious that the officer wanted a bribe to brush this off. Fortunately, the folks we work with do not believe in giving bribes. The driver politely stated his case and said he would even stay in jail overnight if he needed to. The officer finally let us go. A battle won!
Sleepy and hungry, we meander through the dark streets around Nairobi looking for a place to eat. We ended up at the Nairobi Java House, which is owned by Americans. The food was great, like most American menus! We took our food and went up to the Samaritan's Purse guest house. It was relatively new, but had no telephone access yet. We met two young guys from the states who were working in Sudan rebuilding churches. They were nice and quickly took up to Maggie. We ate our meal and a euphoric daze went to bed.
The next AM we grabbed some toast in the kitchen and shortly headed out to the NakuMatt to do our shopping. Our friend who met us had already done some shopping the day before, but needed us to help to the rest. First, she and Ashley grabbed some excellent coffee and we set out. This store was very nice and like a Walmart Super Center on steroids, it had everything! We shopped for about 3 hours. Ashley's job was to entertain Maggie. We then went to another JavaHouse for lunch and picked up our meat at the butcher (they know folks from the hospital and were very nice and helpful). While Ashley got the meat loaded in coolers, Sarah purchased fresh produce at another store. We bought ALOT- mainly to get started up, plus because most folks buy things for 6 weeks at a time, which is a little hard to do the first time.
Exhausted, we finally loaded up in the van to go to Tenwek. What a beautiful drive! It was about 4 hours over rough roads that passed through a few small towns (literally). We were disappointed that we did not get to go to an amusement park before we came, but most of the roads made up for it! Maggie laughed and thought it was great. We passed by the Rift Valley. It had several lookouts that reminded me of the Blue Ridge parkway, except there were also tourist traps along the way (which we did not stop at as we were in a hurry to get to Tenwek. Along the way we say baboons. They were trying to take corn away from vendors who were selling it on a stick. We were told they are very aggressive. We did not get our cameras out in time to get a picture of this. We did slow down when we saw giraffes. They were incredible! The folks who have lived here for years tell us that seeing them never gets old. We also saw gazelles and zebras in the distance as well. We got out at a gas station and stretched our legs 3 hours into the trip. We we got back on the
road, the sun began to set. It was gorgeous, so much so that the driver even wanted us to get out and take pictures!
Driving in the night is dangerous, as there are very few lights and people and animals in the road. Praise God we arrive just as it turned dark. As we pulled into the property and headed to our home, it was too dark to tell much, except we knew we weren't in Kansas anymore. There was a sign from our neighbor welcoming us to our new apartment. We were also greeted by our bags stacked inside (they had arrived earlier). Thankful one of the workers had already put Maggie's crib together for us. We were told to eat and go to sleep and do nothing else. A few folks came a greeted us. It was about 7:30 PM local time when we arrived (we are 7 hrs ahead of EST). Needless to say we were a bit overwhelmed. Maggie thought it was great sleeping under a mosquito net, though.
The next day (Tuesday) was our first full day at Tenwek. We slept in a litte and when we got going a first task was to tell some of the local house helpers what they could do for us. House help is very common here. Everyone has at least one, if not two full time workers. They are very knowledgeable and make day to day living here more bearable. Our workers quickly came in and started helping to set up the kitchen for us as we began to unpack bags. Some of the missionaries came by and helped as well. The worker typically help M-F from about 9 to 4 or 5. As we said we currently have two (Janet and Regina) and are trying to decided if we need to keep two workers in the future.
Breakfast is held, but so far does not seem to be that important. Neither is dinner. Lunch is the big meal of the day. For our first few days we were scheduled to eat lunch in different homes. Our first day we ate a home of a surgeon and his family who have been here for about 10 years. The next day we at the hospital resturant. We met with other short term volunteers and ate some local food, which was very good. Lunch is from 1 to 2. Chai (tea with milk) time in an import daily event. Here most things stop around 10AM for this.
People here also get going early (awake around 5-6AM and go to bed around 9). With jet lag, this is taking some getting used to. We have not had a full tour of the compound yet, but everyone here is very friendly. Locals come to the door daily offering produce for sell, which our workers determine if we need to purchase or not. The local missionaries usually congregate outside and visit one anothers house, which is nice. Everyone here is helpful and friendly. We were also provided with a host family, who take care of us and are making sure we are getting oriented to things daily. The other volunteers and missionaries say it takes about 1 month to get adjusted, but in the meantime to take one day at a time, which is what we are doing.
There are also lot of young kids here at Tenwek. Most are home schooled and they try to follow the Kenyan system. We cannot remember all the months, but we know that they are off for April and August. They play together all the time and make is most inquisative.
Life here does have its hassles we have learned. For example, we have a washer, but it has a mind of its own when it wants to work. You also have to be cautious of using the correct outlet because the 110 and 220 volt sockets are side by side.
Ashley begins work next week. He doesn't know much of what he will be doing specificially yet. However we do know that he is going to be in charge of the family medicine residency program be coordinating the outpatient continuity clinic, and coordinating care in the
emergency room.
We also have another big change here. We learned right before we left that we are going to have another baby. Sarah has been pushing through this great and continuing to adapt to life here in Africa.
We will load some pictures soon, so stay posted!
August 10th-12th
On Friday we took our official tour of the Tenwek compound. It is fairly large, but we should learn our way around quickly. We still have not ventured out to the dukas (little shops) or buildings surrounding us, but that will come with time. Ashley then met with one of the intenal medicine doctors who offered to tour him around the hospital. It was an impressive, extensive tour that also provided opportunities to meet several people and learn the little nuances of how to get things done around here. It was good for Ashley and has him feeling more at ease about starting work.
Friday night we had dinner with a couple from Alabama, so it was good to meet up with some Southerners. The reason we say that is most of the missionaries we have met here thus far are from up north or the Midwest, which is okay. For dinner we had pizza, which was good but still tasted different from that back home.
Saturdays appear to be quiet days around here. Morning sickness got the best of Sarah, so she rested, as did Maggie as Ashley relaxed around the house. Everyone does meals on their own on the weekend with no househelp, unless you need them for a special reason. After lunch we went for a walk. We were going to get on line with the hospital but learned that our frustrations with the internet were due to problems with the main server in Nairobi, not with us. Ashley toured us through the main education building at the hospital. It is new and very nice. He claimed his new cubby/office space. We then walked Maggie down to the covered area that has a basketball goal and played “ball”. She enjoyed this, as well as bouncing on the trampoline. Tenwek was given a gift that had to be used for a racquetball court, so we got to see it, which was nice. The MK’s use it for PE when it is rainy.
After this we came home and Sarah was craving fried rice, so she fixed her first real meal in Africa, which was very good (even though we did not have paprika for the white sauce). After this we met with some friends near by who invited us over to meet the prayer team. This team is from Maryland, actually right near where Sarah used to live (small world). They were composed of different people from a church there. One of the ladies used to a nurse years ago here and shared some great stories. We then shared our hearts with one another had a great time of prayer. We all felt very encouraged after this. We prayed specifically for Sarah and her morning sickness. She left rejuvenated, as we all did. We then hung out with the young couple who had us over. They have been here for a year, but had many of the same questions and struggles here early on that we do now.
Sunday morning came and prayer was answered. Sarah felt well enough to make it to and through the entire service. (We made a special point of thanking the prayer team after service!) The service was good. It was held in a building here at the hospital and is very nice. It was half missionary/ half local and conducted in English. It was from 9 to 11. It was so good to be able to rest and worship and reflect on the goodness of the Lord. A local pastor spoke about standing in the gap and the importance of prayer. Most of the music was done by one of the main surgeons here.
We are looking forward to starting our second week here. We are wanting to start working with an orphanage as several are around and many do this on weekends. We will pray about this and try to get involved once we get a little more settled in. Ashley starts work with call and we began having our own meals, so the next week should be more indicative of what everyday life will be like around here.
Leaving home was bitter sweet. We were so glad to have our family to see us off, but it was hard to tell them good-bye. It is great, though, to have all of their prayers and support. It was especially good to have them help us with all of our baggage at the airport. We had 20 bags to check. I will not say how much it cost to send them, but thankfully the cost was about 25% less than we expected. We also arrived with only about one other person in line, which was a blessing. The ride to the airport was more stressful with a caravan of 6 cars traveling together through heavy Atlanta traffic!
Once we said our good-byes, we traveled through security without a hitch (which is rare as we normally get stopped). We credit part of this to the fact that one of the workers there was not feeling well and Ashley made small talk with him making sure he was okay as we nonchalantly grabbed our bags and headed on through.
The first flight was a full 8 hour trip to Amsterdam, which went okay. Maggie did well, just wanting to get out and explore. We carried Maggie's babyjogger on the plane, so we were the last to get off as we had to let everyone clear out to get it (but we were some of the first on!) It was the middle of the night US time when we arrived, so we walked around in a daze for about one our. Security in Amsterdam went smooth and we boarded our next 8 hour flight to Nairobi. This flight harder as we all wanted to sleep and it was hard forlittle Maggie to get comfortable. We also got to meet a few other missionaries on the flight.
We were happy when we finally deplaned in Nairobi. We found our way to immigration and when through getting our visas and stamps. When we told the agent what we were doing, she said "Thank you for coming to help us". We have never had that experience and it made us smile.
The luggage carousel was a madhouse, but Ashley squeezed in and would gather a bag or two at a time. Sarah stood by and guarded the 10 trolleys we had gathered to place our belongs on. Whenever she turned her head, someone would walk off with an empty one, which made us laugh. Some folks in line recognized our bags and would help set them off for us as well. Miraculously, all 20 bags arrived safely and without a scratch. Some of the airport works helped gather all our bags (stacked on 5 carts instead of 10). When we told the customs agent what we were doing, he said okay and let us walk through without checking a bag. The luggage caravan then proceeded outside. This was an answered prayer as we had no idea how we would get all these bags moved on our own.
We then met the lady who came to pick us up. She had the driver pull around right to where we were standing and load our bags. One van was for us and our overnight belongings. The next van held all our other items. Everything fit! We quickly became friends with the folks who came to get us (We'll omit names for now until we clear it with them that it is okay to use them.
We quickly became introduced to a little culture as a security officer came up to our driver and said we could not park where we were. He informed him that there was no other place to park and no signs saying we could not park there. It was obvious that the officer wanted a bribe to brush this off. Fortunately, the folks we work with do not believe in giving bribes. The driver politely stated his case and said he would even stay in jail overnight if he needed to. The officer finally let us go. A battle won!
Sleepy and hungry, we meander through the dark streets around Nairobi looking for a place to eat. We ended up at the Nairobi Java House, which is owned by Americans. The food was great, like most American menus! We took our food and went up to the Samaritan's Purse guest house. It was relatively new, but had no telephone access yet. We met two young guys from the states who were working in Sudan rebuilding churches. They were nice and quickly took up to Maggie. We ate our meal and a euphoric daze went to bed.
The next AM we grabbed some toast in the kitchen and shortly headed out to the NakuMatt to do our shopping. Our friend who met us had already done some shopping the day before, but needed us to help to the rest. First, she and Ashley grabbed some excellent coffee and we set out. This store was very nice and like a Walmart Super Center on steroids, it had everything! We shopped for about 3 hours. Ashley's job was to entertain Maggie. We then went to another JavaHouse for lunch and picked up our meat at the butcher (they know folks from the hospital and were very nice and helpful). While Ashley got the meat loaded in coolers, Sarah purchased fresh produce at another store. We bought ALOT- mainly to get started up, plus because most folks buy things for 6 weeks at a time, which is a little hard to do the first time.
Exhausted, we finally loaded up in the van to go to Tenwek. What a beautiful drive! It was about 4 hours over rough roads that passed through a few small towns (literally). We were disappointed that we did not get to go to an amusement park before we came, but most of the roads made up for it! Maggie laughed and thought it was great. We passed by the Rift Valley. It had several lookouts that reminded me of the Blue Ridge parkway, except there were also tourist traps along the way (which we did not stop at as we were in a hurry to get to Tenwek. Along the way we say baboons. They were trying to take corn away from vendors who were selling it on a stick. We were told they are very aggressive. We did not get our cameras out in time to get a picture of this. We did slow down when we saw giraffes. They were incredible! The folks who have lived here for years tell us that seeing them never gets old. We also saw gazelles and zebras in the distance as well. We got out at a gas station and stretched our legs 3 hours into the trip. We we got back on the
road, the sun began to set. It was gorgeous, so much so that the driver even wanted us to get out and take pictures!
Driving in the night is dangerous, as there are very few lights and people and animals in the road. Praise God we arrive just as it turned dark. As we pulled into the property and headed to our home, it was too dark to tell much, except we knew we weren't in Kansas anymore. There was a sign from our neighbor welcoming us to our new apartment. We were also greeted by our bags stacked inside (they had arrived earlier). Thankful one of the workers had already put Maggie's crib together for us. We were told to eat and go to sleep and do nothing else. A few folks came a greeted us. It was about 7:30 PM local time when we arrived (we are 7 hrs ahead of EST). Needless to say we were a bit overwhelmed. Maggie thought it was great sleeping under a mosquito net, though.
The next day (Tuesday) was our first full day at Tenwek. We slept in a litte and when we got going a first task was to tell some of the local house helpers what they could do for us. House help is very common here. Everyone has at least one, if not two full time workers. They are very knowledgeable and make day to day living here more bearable. Our workers quickly came in and started helping to set up the kitchen for us as we began to unpack bags. Some of the missionaries came by and helped as well. The worker typically help M-F from about 9 to 4 or 5. As we said we currently have two (Janet and Regina) and are trying to decided if we need to keep two workers in the future.
Breakfast is held, but so far does not seem to be that important. Neither is dinner. Lunch is the big meal of the day. For our first few days we were scheduled to eat lunch in different homes. Our first day we ate a home of a surgeon and his family who have been here for about 10 years. The next day we at the hospital resturant. We met with other short term volunteers and ate some local food, which was very good. Lunch is from 1 to 2. Chai (tea with milk) time in an import daily event. Here most things stop around 10AM for this.
People here also get going early (awake around 5-6AM and go to bed around 9). With jet lag, this is taking some getting used to. We have not had a full tour of the compound yet, but everyone here is very friendly. Locals come to the door daily offering produce for sell, which our workers determine if we need to purchase or not. The local missionaries usually congregate outside and visit one anothers house, which is nice. Everyone here is helpful and friendly. We were also provided with a host family, who take care of us and are making sure we are getting oriented to things daily. The other volunteers and missionaries say it takes about 1 month to get adjusted, but in the meantime to take one day at a time, which is what we are doing.
There are also lot of young kids here at Tenwek. Most are home schooled and they try to follow the Kenyan system. We cannot remember all the months, but we know that they are off for April and August. They play together all the time and make is most inquisative.
Life here does have its hassles we have learned. For example, we have a washer, but it has a mind of its own when it wants to work. You also have to be cautious of using the correct outlet because the 110 and 220 volt sockets are side by side.
Ashley begins work next week. He doesn't know much of what he will be doing specificially yet. However we do know that he is going to be in charge of the family medicine residency program be coordinating the outpatient continuity clinic, and coordinating care in the
emergency room.
We also have another big change here. We learned right before we left that we are going to have another baby. Sarah has been pushing through this great and continuing to adapt to life here in Africa.
We will load some pictures soon, so stay posted!
August 10th-12th
On Friday we took our official tour of the Tenwek compound. It is fairly large, but we should learn our way around quickly. We still have not ventured out to the dukas (little shops) or buildings surrounding us, but that will come with time. Ashley then met with one of the intenal medicine doctors who offered to tour him around the hospital. It was an impressive, extensive tour that also provided opportunities to meet several people and learn the little nuances of how to get things done around here. It was good for Ashley and has him feeling more at ease about starting work.
Friday night we had dinner with a couple from Alabama, so it was good to meet up with some Southerners. The reason we say that is most of the missionaries we have met here thus far are from up north or the Midwest, which is okay. For dinner we had pizza, which was good but still tasted different from that back home.
Saturdays appear to be quiet days around here. Morning sickness got the best of Sarah, so she rested, as did Maggie as Ashley relaxed around the house. Everyone does meals on their own on the weekend with no househelp, unless you need them for a special reason. After lunch we went for a walk. We were going to get on line with the hospital but learned that our frustrations with the internet were due to problems with the main server in Nairobi, not with us. Ashley toured us through the main education building at the hospital. It is new and very nice. He claimed his new cubby/office space. We then walked Maggie down to the covered area that has a basketball goal and played “ball”. She enjoyed this, as well as bouncing on the trampoline. Tenwek was given a gift that had to be used for a racquetball court, so we got to see it, which was nice. The MK’s use it for PE when it is rainy.
After this we came home and Sarah was craving fried rice, so she fixed her first real meal in Africa, which was very good (even though we did not have paprika for the white sauce). After this we met with some friends near by who invited us over to meet the prayer team. This team is from Maryland, actually right near where Sarah used to live (small world). They were composed of different people from a church there. One of the ladies used to a nurse years ago here and shared some great stories. We then shared our hearts with one another had a great time of prayer. We all felt very encouraged after this. We prayed specifically for Sarah and her morning sickness. She left rejuvenated, as we all did. We then hung out with the young couple who had us over. They have been here for a year, but had many of the same questions and struggles here early on that we do now.
Sunday morning came and prayer was answered. Sarah felt well enough to make it to and through the entire service. (We made a special point of thanking the prayer team after service!) The service was good. It was held in a building here at the hospital and is very nice. It was half missionary/ half local and conducted in English. It was from 9 to 11. It was so good to be able to rest and worship and reflect on the goodness of the Lord. A local pastor spoke about standing in the gap and the importance of prayer. Most of the music was done by one of the main surgeons here.
We are looking forward to starting our second week here. We are wanting to start working with an orphanage as several are around and many do this on weekends. We will pray about this and try to get involved once we get a little more settled in. Ashley starts work with call and we began having our own meals, so the next week should be more indicative of what everyday life will be like around here.
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