October 18th Update

After Canadian Thanksgiving,

Did I tell you about the guy with the nail in his eye? Well it actually just hit his eye and bounced out but  it was a little scary.  Haven't seen him since but one of the workmen said that he is starting to get some sight back in that eye.  And then the guy that came at 10pm last Friday night with a fish bone stuck in his tongue? I sent him to kalene the next morning and they operated under a local for an hour to get it out.   This week has been ears, throats and a baby that I am concerned that I missed treating him . I have done lots of malaria tests but they all have been negative.  3 sprained ankles.   And Tim killed a snake – python the kids found  coming up from the river on wed.  there are definitely more snakes around and I guess it gets worse the more it rains. I am getting pretty good at killing scorpions  but hope that I don't have to kill a snake.    Thanks giving  weekend was  our weekend on so we had a lot of jobs, being that half the staff are off.  One of the staff members had to go to Kalene to have her nose fixed.  Two others went away for the weekend.

On the Saturday  we took the students to the pool swimming then came back up hoping to get a bit of a rest, when a loud knock came to the door.  It was a man  who had brought his wife in on a motorbike.  She had been bit three times by a snake.  He was not sure what kind of snake but thought it was a Shield-Nose.  It is a poisonous snake. Mary did an amazing job treating her.  Mary  called Mel from the farm to come over.  She was able to talk to the lady in Lunda.  We found out she was breast-feeding , so gave her ors for the baby while the mother is on medication.  We are praying that she will be okay.(and mary as well)!

We got some talk time and were able to call home for Thanksgiving.  We had a two minute call to Aly in Ottawa, before we got cut off. It was nice to wish her happy Thanksgiving.  We had a better connection when we called Katie in Philadelphia.  We were able to talk for about 8minutes.  Then we called Grama in Thessalon and it was great to hear her voice even if there was a 2 second delay.  It is such a problem when people talk on top of one another.  Anyway we got it figured out and had a nice talk for about 10minutes.  In all we talked for about 20minutes and it cost 150 000K.  I guess it was worth it.

This is pretty stressful here and I (Mary) am glad that our time is officially  half over!  God has been really faithful. I have claimed the verses  "as I was with Moses, so I will be with you… only be strong and courageous."  And " if any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all men liberally..' and believe me I ask many times each day.  I have a hard time- second guessing myself  all the time- should I have used this medicine or that one. When do you use certain antibiotics etc. am I missing something- should have I done this or that?  But God has been faithful.  I have 3 different books- "where there is no doctor" " Diagnosis and treatment" and " a guide to tropical medicine" the problem is that often they all say something different and I can't decide which one to follow!    But God provides- yesterday, a  doctor (actually a plastic surgeon from new Zealand) who we met in the spring at Chit came and brought his family.  He is working at Kalene- (the next mission station that has the hospital)- they are there for about a month – So yesterday he brought the family over here for swimming with our students and so I had him see some people and asked him lots of questions. He gave me some good advice – like use septrin more and save amoxicillin for pneumonia and serious things.  I am having a bit of a hard time with the malaria testing- they are all negative and people are sure that they have malaria. So then I struggle with whether to treat them anyway or to rely on the test.   So I probably will start treating more people for malaria even if the test is neg, if they want the medication- still not sure but I have had some children in several times with fevers and headaches or stomach aches.

Yesterday we took a student from here to Kalene as she was spiking a high fever and we could not seem to find the cause.  The road is quite bad.  It just about 25km or so but takes almost an hour to get there.  It is quite interesting driving thru the many villages. Most buildings  are small, (8ftX10ft) made of mud brick with grass roofs.  Cooking is done outside  on a fire.  There are lots of kids and you have to be careful driving as they will run out in front of you.  It is a good thing you cannot go much faster than about 50km/hr.  I was just saying to Mary that travelling the main road here is like OFF-Roading at home.  At Kalene we had a nice visit with the Reeds ( a couple from Australia) and met a visiting doctor  (Gary & Sarah) and his family from Ontario.  It turns out they have spent time in Sudbury and know many of the folks at Lansing Baptist.  We decided to leave the student at Kalene and come back to Sakeji.  Hopefully they will be able to find out what is wrong.  They started her on a broad spectrum anti-biotic and wanted to watch her.  We took a different road on the way back but was more of the same.  Small village after small village.  Some have a community well but most have to walk to the river to get water.  It looks like a place for the well drilling machine.  Maybe we will have to make a trip up this way.

Take care. That is all for this update.