week fourteen

well i have begun to find my bearings a little more in this place... some things take longer to get used to than others such as the constant feeling of being sweaty and dirty and that every where i walk, people are constantly yelling out ‘wazungu’ or ‘habari’ (the first meaning ‘white people’ second meaning ‘hi how are you’) at first it was very overwhelming but its now becoming more normal. plus i think the people around us are getting used to us more because its not as constant, which is nice... can you imagine every time you leave your house people are yelling out at you ‘white person, hey white person’...... its a different feeling than when i was in indonesia. there they thought it was so neat that you were there and thought you to be something of famous wanting to take your picture or if you say hi they just giggle. here is a mixed response, often people will just stare at you if you say hi, or they laugh at you. not in the giggly way of ‘oh they talked to me’ but in the ‘funny white person trying to speak swahili’ way..... its not always like that though, we have met some lovely people who are extremely helpful when trying to catch a dala dala, they escort you through the busy crowds to the correct bus and make sure you get on. others will smile at you and say hi back and many do say ‘karibu’ which means ‘welcome, you are welcome here’.

this past week has begun to get busier, we still have no working visa’s, (which we know could take months) but the clinic attached to the base has offered us a place to learn and work alongside them in. but because it is a small clinic only four of us can go in a day. wednesday was my turn! it was immunization and baby weigh day. we were told to prepare a teaching and that we could watch and learn from the staff there. so me and my partner did a teaching on ‘weaning foods’ (getting a baby on its way to eating solid food) and spent the rest of the day watching and learning. at one point the staff was very overwhelmed with women coming in continually and so me and my partner took over the baby weighing... a difficult task at first because some of the babies were just brand new and did not have there growth charts yet, so we had to fill in one for them and you can imagine with the language barrier it was a bit challenging! but we learnt what each slot meant on the card and how to ask the correct mother the questions... spelling, well that was a completely different matter that apparently doesn’t matter too much because no one seemed to correct us and later our staff said that many times people charts in the hospital will have several different spellings but its all for the same person, and its not an issue! it was pretty neat to weigh the babies and chart there weight, some who were a little older you could see if they were growing the way they should and if they were healthy. the smallest baby i weighed was only four days old and weighed 2kg (4.4lbs) so tiny. we basically did weighings for majority of the morning and watched a few immunizations, apparently next time we’ll be allowed to administer them.... not so sure how i feel about sticking needles into unexpecting young ones but we’ll see!

this week has also been filled with working around the base as they are short staffed, so cleaning and sweeping the outside... basically raking but they call it sweeping.... doing village walks and meeting some of the locals to build a relationship with the community we live in and i even spent a morning teaching at the elementary school. the teacher is a staff here on the YWAM base and has been sick all week, so to help out we offered. so two of us went over there on tuesday and it was quite hilarious! we were told to tell a story.... caught a little off guard we did as any ywamer does and told the story of ‘David and Goliath’ i told it and my partner acted it out! the kids loved it and i think somewhat understood it (they had english lessons). then were told to ask them questions and get them to draw a picture and then we were given a red pen to mark them! pretty neat hearing there accents saying to me ‘teacher, i am finished’

we had a free day as well where me and some other girls caught the dala dala to downtown where there is a hotel with free internet on the ninth floor! as well as a restaurant that had cheeseburgers! haha! it was a nice afternoon sitting in an air conditioned room and then made our way home on the dala dala, which isn’t as scary as the first time!

today was church, and although we left the base at 8.45 and arrived home at 5.00 it was an enjoyable day. the service was a mixture of our team doing drama’s, sharing testimonies and preaching, mixed in with their church sharing testimonies, singing songs and even having the children come and sing and then one of the girls, probably around ten years old preached! it was amazing! i think even the congregation was surprised and they brought up her parents after to the front to say a few words. and because this is Africa, they also brought up group by group the members of the church to introduce us and welcome us to the service! it was a long service around three and half hours but yet it was really nice, they had someone always translating for us so we could follow and understand what was being said which was a huge blessing. and then we discovered that they had prepared lunch for us and we were expected to go. so that is how the day became so long, a lunch turns into sitting in a living room for four hours! but the food was good, and they had real sofa’s to sit on and even a fan blowing cool air around! luxury!

so that was my week.... roughly! and i’m ready for another. this week we are having evangelism down town all day tomorrow, so another long day. and then on thursday i am going to the clinic again but this time its antenatal care! so hopefully i’ll be able to do some palpation's and things! who knows!

till next time....