prayer request

This is going to be a short blog as I am running out of energy to type, but I wanted to ask you all to pray for a specific situation.  In our ward we currently have a 10 year old boy with a brain tumor rivaling the size of his brain.  He's from the Democratic Republic of Congo and they flew him here hoping that we would be able to help him.  Unfortunately, it is malignant and they are unable to operate.  Even if we did have a neurosurgeon onboard who could operate, he would still need chemotherapy and radiation treatment, which aren't available.  I don't know what the plan is for this boy, if we're going to try and transfer him home or if he'll be here until the end.  Please just pray for this boy, his family, for us as medical staff to show him God's love, and that God would be at work in mighty ways. 

Life here

So I wanted to briefly share about one of the patients that I had on orientation.  My real work starts tomorrow, but for now I can give you a little info on the diseases prevalent here.  On Friday one of my patients was a woman in her 40s who had originally had a partial thyroidectomy.  She wasn’t healing well post-operatively and so they ran some tests and discovered that she had malaria and HIV, with a CD4 count of 140, which I think is technically considered AIDS.   She also started having pretty severe diarrhea so then they did some more tests and found out she had typhoid as well.  A chest x-ray revealed that she had pneumonia as well, which was most likely due to the AIDS.  Despite all this she is getting better…well that’s relative since I don’t even if she does get better and get started on ARVs how much that can help her immune system.  This culture is very different from ours in that they aren’t direct especially when relating bad news.  In light of that, our social worker is working hard to make friends with the family in order to drop hints and tell them after getting to know them better.  It’s quite the task.  Anyways, despite all these things, this woman greeted me with a smile and she seems to keep fighting. 

I’m told malaria is quite common here and supposedly it’s the worst type.  Typhoid has to be common as well since the sanitation here is pretty bad.   There’s trash everywhere and there’s a stench throughout the whole city.  Sometimes my lungs really long for some fresh, cool air ;).  I’ve included a few pictures of the city.

On Saturday I went to one of the orphanages that Mercy Ships is partnering with while we’re in Sierra Leone.  Most of the orphans are war orphans.  There was a civil war here from 1991-2002 (think those are the right dates.  I might be off by a year or 2), which left a lot of orphans and a lot of people without limbs.   There were about 30 orphans ranging from 3 or 4 to late to mid teens.  They were all so kind and the little ones just hung all over us.   They just come up to you and hug you.  Our leader taught on the fruit of the spirit, which was a great lesson for me as well!  We also sang some African worship songs and did a coloring exercise, which they all loved.   There was also this teenage boy there who was in a wooden wheel chair. It’s kind of difficult to describe the wheelchair, but it looked ancient and very difficult to maneuver.  He looked like he had clubbed feet. His calf muscles were completely atrophied.  I just thought how I wouldn’t see this in the U.S. and about all the resources that would be available to him.  Really, he is very fortunate to be at the orphanage even though he is still so limited in his mobility.  (Jen you really could some amazing things here).  It’s tough to deal with stuff like that here because there’s often so much more we know we could do, but we don’t have the resources to do them.  I wish I had some pictures to share, but they discourage us from taking pictures, so I didn’t take any.

I was able to go to a local church today, which was quite the experience :).  The church service was about 2.5 hrs, but I think that’s on the shorter end compared to some of the other churches.  Church was pretty much structured the same way it is here.  We sang some songs, had a message, sang some more songs, had a time of testimony sharing, prayer, had the main message, communion, and then shared a meal together.   Somewhere in there they passed the offering bucket 3 different times.  As it was passed by for the 3^rd time I thought to myself how this would go over in the U.S.  Maybe people would be more likely to actually give 10% or maybe they would still give the average 3%.  Hmmm.  The music was incredibly loud-I don’t think their music is ever loud enough ;).   Everyone was incredibly friendly.  They called us the V.I.P.’s and served us the best of everything.   Lunch was one of their typical dishes here-rice with some green sauce that had to have some peppers, fish, and some other green leafy vegetable.  It was pretty spicy and wasn’t bad except for the fact that my second bite I got a mouthful of fish bones that took me a while to get to a point where I could swallow them. ;).  Oh the experiences in a new culture.  I’ve included a few shots of the church service.

I took a few pictures of the ship so you can all see where I’m living.   We’re docked at the largest port in West Africa.  I found that out today from one of the nurses that went to church with me.  I’ve been able to run along the ship on the port.  It gets boring real quick, but at least I can run!  Life on the ship is real nice.  I have internet, a warm, dry bed, air conditioning, decent food, and people to hang out with that speak English.  There were about 9 of us nurses that all arrived together and so we’ve all been hanging out and are becoming better friends.  God is good.  Thanks for your prayers.

This is me and a friend with one of the facial tumors that was removed! 

where i go running

eating after church

our meal at church

the kids with one female pastors

one of the nicer streets, most don't have two lanes

another street

my dorm

my room.  i'm on top

our transportation

these cargo are supposed to be stacked 4 deep and 2-3 tall for our safety

Arrival

Well after something like 30+ hrs of travel I finally arrived in Freetown, Sierra Leone exhausted and ready to go to bed.  There was a group of about 25 of us that flew from Brussels to Freetown on the same flight, which made the flight in less stressful. Customs at the airport was non-existent and because I was with Mercy Ships they collected all of our passports, stamped them, and let us through.   After pushing my way through the crowd to get my luggage, we left the airport and all walked to the parking lot where they loaded all of our bags about a couple feet above the bed of a truck with a person sitting on top so it didn't fall out!  it was kind of comical.  we then all loaded into multiple vans and cars and headed to the ferry.  Driving in third world countries is always an experience-there were bikers everywhere (it was completely dark) and multiple motocycles that we were weaving in and out of.  Fortunately, we didn't crash nor did we crash into anyone.  I've determined it's almost better just not to watch the road.  We finally made it to the ferry boarding after about 20 minutes, but unfortunately we just missed the ferry and so had to wait another hour for the next one to leave :(.   We were all super hot and sweaty now as the humidity here is about 90% or higher.  After a 30 minute crossing we unloaded all our luggage and got into the Mercy Ship SUVs that were waiting for us.  In a few minutes we were at the ship...finally.  It was now about 10:30 pm.  We did some paperwork, took our pictures for our IDs (awesome since we all looked terrible after traveling for over 24 hrs).  I went to bed at midnight and then got up around 7 am for breakfast and then headed to nursing orientation at 7:30am. I had nursing orientation the next two days and then started on the ward doing clinical work the next two. I'm been assigned to the maxillary-facial team or maxfax team and will also be working int he ICU.  I'm pretty excited about it because our pt's undergo such massive transformations as they have incredibly huge tumors removed and their lives transformed because of it.  Dr. Gary has been here for 20 years and has really lead his field in surgical techniques and removal of these types of tumors as well as other facial deformities.  He did a lecture for the crew the other night and brought in one of the tumors for us to touch, which was really awesome!

As far as living situation is concerned, I live in a room with 5 other roommates and one bathroom.  We have to take 2 minute showers to conserve water (and yes dad, I've been complying with those rules ;). I've been able to run outside in front of the boat, which is better than not being able to run at all.  Anyways, it's getting late and I'm getting tired, so I'll try to blog more after the weekend.

This weekend I'm going to one of the orphanages that Mercy Ships is involved with and then will be going to one of the local churches for Sunday service.  I'm excited to experience more of Sierra Leone as most of my time so far has been spent on the ship.   I hope all is well back home.  Feel free to email me at h.j.yamamoto@gmail.com.