The View from the Mountain...

On Wednesday, we finally had the chance to go out on food distribution with WHIZ! Eight of us loaded up in the land cruiser and went bumping our way out into the bush. It was an awesome day. We delivered mealie meal ( a fine cormeal) and cabbage to seven different villages/trusts and were able to greet those who received the food and play with some of the adorable children. We saw many of the different Community Trust projects such as piggeries, milling systems, and chicken houses.Each bag of mealie meal that we gave represented one vulnerable child,orphan, or AIDS patient in the trust. The people were so thankful and it was so humbling to be respected and thanked for doing nothing but bring the food that they have worked so hard for. I wished I could have done so much more, but I praise God for using something that seems small in my eyes to do much for His kingdom.

The places we went were beautiful. The seven villages we went to were around the Jembo area and many were up in the mountains. One church that we stopped at was situated right on the top of a mountain and had a particularly breathtaking view. It was so green and lush and it is not even the rainy season yet! We met an older women who said that she had been ill and had walked for hours to come to the church and be prayed over for healing. She was excited to tell us that she had been healed. We all sat around her on a plastic tarp and she proudly showed us her tattered Tonga Bible that she was reading. It was so touching to sit there and thumb through the pages. As we found the 23rd Psalm, her daughter came over with an equally worn English Bible. Her faith was touching and inspiring.

I had a little buddy at one of the villages that took my hand and stared at me until I picked him up and carried him into the beautiful, makeshift church that was fashioned with branches, grass, and sticks. The ingenuity of these people amaze me and their contenment humbles me.

On Thursday we drove about 1.5hrs to Siachitema Clinic. I was able to follow Dr. Joan Jones from Zimba Hospital and learned a lot about Tropical Medicine and also picked up a little bit of useful Tonga that deals with assessment. I love learning this language, but I wish I was better at it! I borrowed a book from Beth Waters that should be helpful in this regard. It is when I go to the villages and encounter those that speak very little English that I realize the need to learn more. I first greet my patients with "Muli Buti" if they are my age or older and "Kamwamba" if they are younger than me. It is great to see the smiles that my Tonga receives.

I spent about 2.5hrs taking vitals, doing the pre-physician assessment, on all sorts of patients that came to the clinic to seek care. It was hilarious to be nursing in the tiny labor and delivery room with the chickens and roosters making a racket outside the open window and people squashing in around me on all sides. Each time I looked up and hoped to see the crowd dwindling, they seemed to multiply! After that tiring adventure, I had a little bit of a break and then got to do two full prenatal assessments. :-) That was pretty awesome. I am excited to have more experiences like this in the near future.

Yesterday was a wonderful day to catch up on some work, color with some girls from the village, and visit the market.

Today, the sky is very grey and one of the girls said she felt a few raindrops this morning. There is an abundance of mosquitos around and that makes me think that the rains are coming. The internet has been giving us fit after fit and so, there is no telling when I will post this. :-)

P.S. The rain has begun! It is a beautiful thing after the days and days of sun and heat. Yeah for the first rainy Saturday in Africa, Starbucks coffee from the Helvies, and my instrumental playlist. :-)

P.P.S. My little friends from the village just came back with their coloring books safely secured under their shirts and are sitting with me on the patio coloring and listening to the rain. :-)

Love you all!