a night out

I had an experience last night that still has me feeling slightly boggled. Did it really happen? 10 of us, 4 canadians, and 6 youth from Bastion, all caught a bus last evening and went off to a concert, a symphony concert! Turns out that Guayaquil has a symphony orchestra and this is the beginning of their new season, and last night's concert was free, and so we went! And in the space of a few minutes, I was transported from this new world in which I now live, a world of poverty, noise, dirt, and endless blaring salsa music EVERYWHERE, to a slice of my old world. A quite nice concert hall, plush seats, cool, dry, quiet, and Mozart! The transition was too fast, it took me some time to make the adjustment, and it just seemed too incredible to me. Very weird. But very enjoyable. The first half was Mozart, a very familiar piano concerto, followed by Mahler. Then out we went, back into the other world, of pouring rain, flowing mud and smelly buses, all of which we experienced on our way home. And then to climb into bed and wonder if that was just a dream. Wow!

Another week of ups and downs, maybe that's just the way of life here, maybe life anywhere! Better just get used to it.
On the downside (for me) I've had all kinds of internet grief, losing my connection at home for days at a time, finally getting the guy in to fix it, then promptly losing it again. It's working at the moment, but still precarious. Now I know that this is a luxury, and not a necessity, and people have lived for a very long time without it, but here's the problem - I've got used to having it. And for me living here, it has been such a bonus, being able to talk to my family over skype, and having access to help on the internet and from doctors at home for some of the medical issues that I'm encountering here. Not to mention being able to update this blog in the comfort of my own home, on a keyboard that has letters!

My patient load has been on the increase, and I haven't even started work at the school yet. I have accompanied people to doctors' appointments twice, and have another visit coming up tomorrow. We have a lady with a fairly major heart problem, which is going to need open heart surgery to correct, so that is going to be an ongoing issue for her and me. One little guy in the school has been having seizures and had some tests done which confirm epilepsy, so there's some juggling of his meds to get that under control. There's a pregnant teen who has been having almost no regular prenatal care. And my current big challenge is a man with a rather nasty leg ulcer that he's had for 2 months, and now is there for me to try to cure! I'm making daily visits to his home to do dressings, with some input from Jannine, a nurse at my old clinic at home who has more experience in these things, and all the while knowing that it's not me who can heal this ulcer, it's only with God's power that I can help. It's a further challenge because I've been told that the family of this man would really like him to see the local witch doctor - yes they still exist around here, so it's with lots of prayer that I try to deal with this.
As I experience more of the medical system here, I am so thankful for our system in Canada, and don't ever wish to hear any complaints about it!! We are SO fortunate to have such medical care, that we really take for granted, and feel we must complain if we have to wait a bit for attention or appointments. Our healthcare is excellent, available and above all - FREE! We are looking at needing to find probably $5000, maybe more, for this lady's heart surgery, completely unaffordable for someone living in Bastion. So may Canadians be truly grateful for their healthcare system! There, that's my rant done.
The population in my house rises and falls, Julia is here with me until the beginning of June, Bethany and Paul have been here, coming and going between travels. Now Paul has gone back to Canada and Bethany is here for 2 more weeks. The visitors to the house come and go, too. Sometimes there is a steady stream of dropins, and then other days, it's quiet. Flexibility is the key!

And a brief rat update. In short, I haven't got the problem licked yet! There is one small fellow who insists on coming to call, in spite of quantities of rat poison that I've put out and which disappears. Surely there must be a lot of rats somewhere who are not feeling well. Yes this one is only small, but small rats turn into big rats, and that is where I draw the line! Then there's the side effect of the cementing of holes that was done to try to discourage the rodents, which has become apparent since the reappearance of nightly downpours of rain. I can now see that the water used to drain away down these holes, and now the only place for the water to go is under my kitchen door and into my house. So I have to stand by with mop and bucket while it's raining hard. We'll have to find a solution to that one.

So life carries on, seldom without interest, and almost always hot. But when I feel that these little trials are making my life hard, I go over to Bastion to visit there, and that cures me.

camp photos

here is a link to some photos from all 3 weeks of camp
http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/Camp2008

good days, bad days

Another week has gone by, a week with challenges, but with rewards and joys as well.

On Monday I went to the school in Bastion to talk to the director (or principal) about what my role will be there. As a result I will be starting there on the 28th of April, and will start by seeing each child in the school individually to do a kind of once over, a "well child check". Just to see if we can catch any health issues that need to be dealt with. I'll be doing that 2 days a week.

In the meantime, there are a few medical issues that are needing my input. There is a lady, mother of one of the kids in the school, who has a fairly serious heart problem. She has been to see a cardiologist at the hospital in the city, not one of the better hospitals, and he is recommending surgery, but before she agrees to that, we want to make sure it really is necessary. It will be very expensive, and this is a family without much, so we are looking for a diagnosis and recommendations we can trust before we go ahead. So we'll try to find another cardiologist this week and I'll go along with her and see what we can find out.

Then there is a young girl from a family I know well, who suddenly had 2 seizures in one day a few weeks ago. Never had a seizure before. So she is needing an EEG and CT scan to see what's going on. I'll go along for those.

And there are other issues out there, probably an endless list.

I went to visit a lady from the church one day this week, she had had a C section 9 days previous, and still had her sutures! She asked if I could take them out - great - that's one of my favourite jobs! So I hurried off home and got my supplies and took them out. She hadn't had a very good suturing job done, one end of the wound has needed care, so I've been going in each day to look after that, and give advice on breastfeeding and baby care. Felt good to be doing some real nurse stuff. I stayed on one day to have a visit with her and get to know her a little better. It was great, she understands the need for some of us Canadians to have people speak to us a little more slowly than the folks in Guayaquil usually do! So we were able to have a good chat, because I wasn't constantly having to have her repeat things.

The big news of the week was that I finally was able to locate some tetanus vaccine for Daniel. And I still can't believe where I found it. After a week and a half of scouring this city: pharmacies, clinics, hospitals, my taxi driver who took me on one of my fruitless seaches told me about a little hole in the wall pharmacy right here in my own community of Caracol. It's run by a nurse who works at a hospital. It took 4 trips to find her there, but indeed - she had it!! So Daniel at long last got his shot. He didn't seem all that pleased when I showed up with it, but I was kind enough to not give it where the nurse had told me I should, and I used a much smaller needle than what she sold me! He lived though it and I'm happy he's had it.

But... the bad days. There were a couple of days this week when life got on top of me a bit. It started with the rat. Yes, RAT. A big one. In my house! I looked up in time to see it leaving last Sunday, so went out and bought rat poison on Monday, put it out, and on Tuesday morning it had all gone. Great, I thought, that will be the end of that. But when we got home on Tuesday evening, it was clear he had been (or maybe still was?) in the house. Julia (my current young roommate) squealed and got up onto a chair so it was left to me to take a flashlight in one hand and a broom in the other, and press my face to the floor to peer under the fridge and into other corners where he might be lurking. I decided it wasn't in the house, but it had chewed away half of the rubber strip along the bottom of the kitchen door, leaving a huge gap. I put out more poison and jammed a piece of cardboard into the gap, and went to bed, hoping for the best.

Then the next morning, with visions of rats still troubling me, I had computer problems, and there's nothing like computer grief to put me over the edge! So it was in a rather poor frame of mind that I headed off to Bastion. All the way there I had complaining little thoughts grumbling though my head - I'm sick of being hot, I'm sick of being all sweaty all the time, I'm sick of the noise, and dirt and of having to always look out for drivers who seem happy to run me down given half a chance (pedestrians have NO rights here). And now I have a rat problem AND computer problems too. I know I had no right to complain, after all I was on my way to see people with much bigger problems than my miserable little grievances, but I'm trying to adjust to a very different way of life and this wasn't helping!!

Then I went to church in Block 10 that night, and it was a very happy time, and afterwards those who are leaders in that little church had a meeting, and while I waited for Janna, I sat with my eyes closed and absorbed the atmosphere. I could feel a blessed cool evening breeze - such a relief. I could hear the sounds of evening life in block 10, I could hear discussion in Spanish in one corner, I could hear William playing the guitar very quietly and singing softly nearby. And I came away with such a feeling of gratitude and joy. In spite of the challenges, and the minor hardships and trials, and missing my family, I am happy here, and I have the deep contentment that comes with knowing that I am in exactly the right place, the place God has for me right now.

And the end (?) of the rat story is that it probably did me a favour by showing its face when it did, because when I got Jose over to try and sort me out, we found that it had been living in and making free with the space where the water drains out of my house from sinks and showers, and it had been doing a lot of earth moving so that the outgoing drain was almost blocked. Could have been nasty! So that all got fixed up, cement applied, more poison put out, and the happy news of today is that a large dead rat was found in my backyard. I had the privilege of getting it into a bag and into the garbage and my, but it was ugly close up! But that's one down. Are there more? We'll see. I am in the market for a cat - a biggish one would be good!

a day trip to Playas

Yesterday I went to Playas for the day. We (all the Canadians who are living and are involved in the ministry here) are trying to meet regularly to talk about things, pray with and for each other, and have a devotional time. Because some of us are now living out at the beach, we are taking turns at where we have the meeting. Yesterday it was our turn to go to there.
So we left at 8 in the morning to catch the bus, walked to where we could get the right bus to stop for us. And I am discovering that travel by bus here is almost always an adventure. Just part of daily life for those that are used to it, but a definite adventure for me!
When we got on that bus, it was full, well, the seats were all occupied, but in Ecuador, that's not full, far from it. So we resigned ourselves to standing all the way there (about 1 1/2 hours), but another discovery that I've made is that there are advantages to having gray hair, and being slightly on the mature side, shall we say. I was offered a place to sit, a little metal folding stool that the fare collector got down and set up for me. Right at the front of the bus, on a little raised area, facing backwards towards everybody. Kind of felt as though I was on a stage and should make a speech or do something interesting. (Of course, as a "gringa" here, everything I do is interesting!) But I was grateful for a place to sit, and settled down for the trip. But the peace didn't last. The bus kept stopping and more and more people got on, and you start to think that there really isn't room for anybody else, but there always is. At one point there were a family of 6 or 7 all standing in my tiny space, one leaning on me from the side, and one cute little child leaning on my knees for support. Then when the bus really is completely packed full, on get the vendors of food items, who think they are going to work their way through the bus to make some sales. And, unbelievably, do so! All very well and entertaining, but I was having quite a time trying to keep myself on the stool, because the driver's goal (besides trying to squeeze as many onto that bus as he possibly could) seemed also to be to try to throw me off my stool. He drove like a maniac, at top speed, then slamming the brakes on to go over a speed bump or pick up more passengers, swerving around potholes and hurtling around bends. And I was on a very small, unanchored folding stool, remember. I was scrabbling around trying to find something to hold onto to keep myself from tipping over. I didn't want to be that interesting! And my other problem was that right behind my head was the television set that they have on buses for your viewing pleasure, and every time the driver stopped or started my head banged into the bottom part that stuck out right at head level. Oh yes, it was quite a trip, the last half hour into Playas became an endurance test. But we made it, and it was wonderful to finally stagger off that bus onto terra firma!

We had a good day all together, the Marshalls, the Horsts, and us 3 from Caracol plus our visitors. We had a wonderful lunch together (pulled beef sandwiches, salads and 2 kinds of pie, yes pie!). Afterwards we had a great time of prayer together, giving thanks for so many things and praying for the work here, and for each other. Then Nikki led a time of discussion on prayer and we had some good discussion and sharing of thoughts. Finally we talked "business" matters, it's good to bounce things off each other and get input on issues that we are dealing with.
And at long last I was free to head for the beach, which may be my favourite place in the world! I just had to check to make sure it was still there, that nobody had rolled it up and taken it away since I was last there. Nobody had and I put my feet in the Pacific and had a lovely walk, and time to sit and let the peace and beauty wash over me and blow away the dirt and noise of Guayaquil. Late afternoon is such a beautiful time on that beach.
Then it was time to head for home, us 5 who are living in Caracol at the moment caught the bus back. That trip was not without interest, too. First the army got on and told all the men to get off while they checked both the men and their bags (I was told it was because 2 weeks before some guys had held up 2 buses between Playas and Guayaquil, waved guns about and robbed everybody). Then a guy who had lived many years in the US sat himself beside me and talked endlessly - told me more about his life than I think I needed to know, breathing beer and garlic into my face, and then wanting me to prove my faith to him ( he was Jewish). I finally plugged my ipod into my ears and tuned both him and the blaring salsa music out and slept.

As I walked along the street towards home, it felt as though I had been gone much longer than a day!

last week of camp

So, the final week of camp has come and gone. It was different this year having the 3 weeks spread out over such a long time. We've always in the past had all 3 weeks one right after another. It was tiring, but you just kept going until it was over. This year was easier in some ways, but I found it hard to gear up each week and get into camp mode again. But it worked for various reasons.

The past week was a good one over all, I think. There were around 150 older youth there, and they were great. It was a mixture of kids from 2 other churches besides the 2 in Bastion, as well as a group of 11 from Onzole, where I had my jungle adventure (Nixon was there, the boy with the hand that needed my attention when I was there - it looked great, all healed up). It was the first time at that camp for those kids, and they had a wonderful time.
The music for the worship times was really good, Dale headed up a team of music people from Bastion and Alborada and they were excellent - I loved the singing time, and so did everybody else, those kids got right into it, clapping and singing their hearts out and it all sounded great.

The week went smoothly in the water and power departments, no problems there at all. And no major health issues all week, just one or 2 shortlived fevers and some headaches, and the usual sore throats. Nothing big at all, smooth sailing. All is well............... until Thursday afternoon. We were on the beach, having a lovely time, the kids were playing games, running back and forth. Suddenly a gathering by the water - "Heather, come quick". Uh oh, what is it, I have about 1 minute while I'm getting there to wonder if this is a big problem or a small one that everybody is overreacting to. But when I arrived and saw, my heart sank to my boots. Daniel (yes the same Daniel who got hit by the stingray 2 weeks ago) had been running and ran right onto a dead fish, which had big long spines along its back, one of which went straight into the bottom of his foot. He was in agony, rolling around with this very dead, rotting, reeking fish attached to his foot. I looked, got some water to wash away the sand, then tried to pull it out. I pulled, then pulled harder, and even harder, but could not budge it. So I took a minute to try to think it through, and pray, and wish I was somewhere else, and while I was doing that, Daniel got scared. He decided that thing was coming out and gave a mighty yank and out it came. All 3 inches of it, and when I looked at it closely to see if it had come out intact, it became clear as to why it was so hard to get out - it had barbs all along both edges of it. Oh so horrible! After I saw that bleeding wasn't going to be a problem, and he could move his toes, and didn't seem to have done any major damage, I knew that infection was the next issue. That fish had been dead a long time, so he would certainly need antibiotics. What to give him? Only one thing to be done - place another call to my longsuffering boss in Burlington and get advice. And thanks to a doctor who had visited 2 years ago, and left an assortment of antibiotics behind, I had the right one for the job with me. I had found the bottles of meds right before I went to camp, and almost left them here, but something made me bring them along. I guess God knew I would need them.

So poor old Daniel, he was very good about the whole thing, kept his sense of humour and took it all so well. He said "First the sting ray, now this. What's next - a shark??!! He's doing fine, it seems to be healing, no signs of infection, I am just having a hard time finding him a tetanus shot, which he surely needs.

There was another stingray sting the next day, to another kid, but I'm becoming almost blase about those now, especially after the other incident. And it seemed to be a relatively mild sting, he was better after only 1/2 hour in the hot water.

And so camp season wrapped up for this year, 3 good weeks, each different in their own ways, all successful. A great deal of very hard work went into those weeks by many people, lots of planning and organizing ahead of time. And much hard work during the time, by those directing each week, by the counsellors, by the wonderful cooks who produce such huge quantities of good Ecuadorian cooking, and by all the behind the scenes people. Ray and Kelly did a great job of managing the place, sorting out water and power problems, looking after the money side of it, doing shopping runs for the kitchen and manning the little tuck shop (which was a huge hit).

And now it's all over, and for me now, this first day of April means that I am about to begin the next new part of my life. School is starting and I 'll be working there for part of my time, and what will it all hold for me? Lots of unknowns ahead, but I do know that I am not heading out into this on my own, I am looking to God for direction and guidance.