Hello friends and family, as with the other emails these messages are from a student missionary currently in Koza, Camerooon
Friday, October 22, 2010
It Intimidates Me
It intimidates me… It’s the hardest thing I have to face every morning. When I think of dealing with it, I literally become paralyzed. I tell myself I can’t face it, not today… and sometimes I don’t. As I stand there watching it, I finally muster up the courage, and I do it. I jump in. The moment I reach the bone shattering water, I scream a little inside. You’d think that I would get use to the shower after being in Africa for a month, but I haven’t. This experience happens to me everyday, unless I truly can’t handle it, and I just wash my hair in the sink. It is actually quite humorous how much fear I have of taking a shower? I hate cold water…
Well, where did I leave off last. I know some of you have been wondering where my blog went. I am still not sure because as I’m writing this post, I haven’t even gotten on the Internet. I write all my emails offline because I don’t have Internet in my home. I have to drive an hour on a little moto taxi that, after taking the trip, I have to rest my but because the roads are so bad. There are rocks the size of half dome in the middle of the road (little exaggeration?). Now that my blog is online again, I have figured it out!
Funny/Sad experience happened since the last time I wrote. You know how I got goats? Well, when I was at work one day, the gate must have been opened by someone, and my goats were gone. For two days I was looking all over for them, and actually praying that they would come back. I left it up to God to bring them back home… a ridiculous thing to ask. Well, they showed up yesterday! They were just chilling in a field right outside my house. I don’t know what it is; I have so much love for these goats. They are my one and only pets here, and I can’t loose them again. Interestingly enough, I actually though about it the other day, how much God loves us, and we continually run away from Him, but He patiently waits, or goes out searching for us until one day we show up. I love these goats so much. How much more does the Heavenly Father love His children! WOW.
I have now delivered 4 babies, 3 beautiful girls and 1 handsome boy! I will probably never see deliveries this intense in America. As I’m trying to get the baby’s head out of the cervix, the other nurse is pushing on the woman’s stomach trying to help the baby come out. Others are holding her legs apart, and I’m trying to reach around the baby’s head to conclude a fast delivery. Relieved, I haven’t delivered any underdeveloped baby, but I have heard more than occasionally of a woman who has a miscarriage, abortion, or has an underdeveloped baby because of the sickness and disease here. Malaria destroys a lot of people’s lives here. After being here for only two weeks, my housemate, Catilin Cuenca, has malaria. She has taken the week off to rest, and she is starting to feel better. I feel like her mother because she isn’t taking the Advil for her headache unless I’m forcing her to. One day, I was telling her about the consequences of not taking Advil and that I would really like her to take it she said… “Thanks Mom”. Well, what can I say, I don’t want her to get sick enough to have an IV.
I have been doing random odd things everyday. I pretty much go from one section of the hospital to another every hour or so. The other day I helped measure pregnant women’s stomachs. I’ve also still been helping give IV’s as well as taking blood tests. It’s the same thing mostly every day. This week especially has been rough though because 4 kids have died in the Emergancy room… its only Wednesday.
I had the amazing opportunity to say 7 verses from Psalms 122:1-7 at church… In French! I practiced and practiced, but the morning of Sabbath I was still confused with some words. I didn’t know what to do because no one in my house could help me and I didn’t want to make fool of myself. I just did my worship normally, and when I was about to open the French Bible to practice, a boy randomly came to my gate. I invited him in, and he helped me with all of the words I was confused about. He was an angel in my book. I read the verses, wondering if anyone even understood me, and surprisingly enough after church, people were impressed with what I accomplished. Praise God. Its kind of funny… whenever I go to church, since I don’t understand the songs the pastor or anyone else is singing for that matter, I try to secretly look at one person’s mouth, and try to pronounce the words… the problem is, they end up looking at me, so I have to change people every few seconds. Its difficult to sing the songs, but the melody is familiar a lot of times. They sing many hymns.
When I thought of coming here, and after hearing that there was no doctor, the only thing that was on my mind is the fact that I might have to be the doctor. I didn’t realize that if I got sick, there isn’t a doctor to take care of me! Right when I was close to freaking out, Katie told me that there are American doctors about 3 hours away if I was desperate for help… that calmed me down a bit.
The electricity goes out once in awhile (I walk around with a candle like it’s the 1800’s), and sometimes we have to cook outside on the fire. Other days, I do my laundry (so much easier in America with washing machines… it takes me hours to do one load), but its an adventure that I won’t be able to have back in America. Everyday brings new insights for me, and a chance to learn more! I have started to have a system every day of praying for 10 minutes, asking God to reveal His Will to me this year. Recently I went to my mamma’s house (Zara), and she told me of a project that she has been praying about for quite sometime. She wants to build a shelter for woman and children who do not have a man to take care of them, or a home to live in. We have been praying sincerely, weeping sometimes because of the suffering that people have to go through. This project is going to be what I focus on this year, and maybe even when I go home. I need help in raising money for a shelter, and getting people together to build it. Right now, it is not going fast, but we are continually on our knees to see what God has to offer us. I prayed one day and God opened my eyes to this verse: “For our momentary, light suffering is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison because we are not looking at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen. For what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal.” 2 COR 4:17,18. We will stay faithful to this verse, and trust that God has a plan.
So this has been my experience so far, with so much more in-between that I can’t write or this post will be WAY too long. I’m praying each day that God will bring a doctor here… the other day a woman was in labor, and we had to send her away because the baby’s hands were coming out first, and we are not allowed to do C-sections. CRAZY! If I were at the hospital I would have said, “screw it… take that baby out, whatever you have to do!” But… who knows where the mom had the baby, maybe on the side of the road. Please keep praying that a Doctor would be willing to give a little bit of his service to the people here in Africa. Thank you for listening to my stories… A Bientot! (I’ll se you next time)
Posted by Elissa
From http://cameroonmissionary.blogspot.com
www.missiondocs.org