July 17

July 17

Today was another wonderful day in Embangweni but we have experienced some of what Lydia calls TIA – this is Africa!  The morning chapel at the hospital was an incredible way to begin our day.  The music, words, and prayers were familiar but new at the same time.  The music was moving and beautiful.   After the service, our group was welcomed by Ishmael and everyone there.   I think most of all the people enjoy seeing our children and really appreciate that we made the effort to come to Embangweni  when there are many other places where we could send a mission team.  We were all quite humbled with the words of thanks.

As Kim and Trey stayed for the morning meeting at the hospital, the children and I headed back to the guest house to prepare for our visit to the School for the Deaf.  While I worked on the preparations the children played in the grounds outside the guest house and met a sweet girl who just stared for a long time and finally our children invited her to play.  They were practicing with flying plastic airplanes sent by Donn James and those drew not just the interest of the children but the adults working at the guest house too.  Everyone enjoyed them a lot and we hope to see our new friend, Tako, at Bible School tomorrow.

Helen Zimba and her three sons came to go to the School for Deaf as well as Helen’s sister Mary and nephew, Martin.  We first met Mr. Macleod Hara, the Headmaster and the 12 of us sat down in his office.   It was great to see the smiling faces of our WPC member, Bill and Lydia Kellett, and Hots and Elliott Easley on the bookshelf in his office.  We presented a donation of behalf of the church to the school and the words of thanks were again very moving and humbling on behalf of Mr. Hara and the entire school.  The government cut the funds for the school this year from 6 million kwatcha to 2 million kwatcha – which meant all the food supplies were completely gone just before the winter break – the donation was very timely to help them prepare for the new school year which will begin in September.  We also brought some chalk as well as chalk board paint.  This is also needed as they cannot find chalk to buy here and boards have not been painted for many years.  We had a tour of the rooms we will help paint.  As the adults talked the children found other children from the community to play with and a game of soccer had started as well as more fun with the flying airplanes from Donn.

Kim had a good day at the hospital and helped deliver a healthy little girl via a C-section.  Trey moved from the hospital to the school with us and back to the hospital helping with morning and afternoon rounds and cases where his expertise as an Internist is needed. 

The power and water went out in the morning.  Then the power came back midafternoon but no water…. We thought this was strange but apparently you can have water and no power or power and no water.  The water came back some tonight but not enough pressure for a shower, so we all had bucket baths.  I must say I was  VERY thankful for a little trickle of water since we had been all day with no water.  Thankfully the guest house has bottled water as well as boiled water for cooking and drinking, so our lunch was cooked again over the fire.

Our afternoon was filled with trying to use the internet which is the hardest thing of all to do here, as well as a visit with the Head of Station’s wife, Grace Mvula and her nephew (a grown young man), “Little Ben.”  We named Ben Dubose (4 years), “Big Ben” to know which one we were referring to while visiting.  They have a stunning two story brick home that was built in 1905. The children enjoyed the visit and liked the back part of the home the best where the chickens, ducks, cat, and dog live and where the cooking and food preparation takes place.  I had a visit with Henry Mvula at his office and met one of the teachers working with him to prepare for bible school.

We are ready for bible school tomorrow and Kim is “on call” tonight for the hospital.  We are thankful for another good day.

Ellis’ friend Holly sent her a note we read tonight and I wanted to share the two quotes she added:

To handle yourself use your head; to handle others, use your heart. Thomas A. Kempis

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it for anyone else. Charles Dickens