Hunger

Hunger:
a. A strong desire or need for food.
b. The discomfort, weakness, or pain caused by a prolonged lack of food.
2. A strong desire or craving: a hunger for affection.
v. hun·gered, hun·ger·ing, hun·gers

She is malnourished. Because her body lacks so many nutrients, her feet are swollen with oedema, she has a pot belly, her limbs are skin and bones, and her skin has started to slough off. When we first saw her in the village on Sunday, we thought she had fallen into the fire. Her mother loves and cares for her, and so she sought help to make her baby well. Like many people here, she went to the traditional healer (witchdoctor) for guidance, who advised her to withhold food and drink until her child got better. After a few days of her daughter getting sicker and sicker, this mother and another relative walked 5 hours to our clinic to seek help – a journey that took both courage and endurance. Now, 5 days later, the child has begun to heal. The child’s unsatiated hunger nearly cost her her life.

The dogs here are desperate. One has continued to break into our kitchen, wreaking havoc, breaking into metal trunks and causing destruction. They break holes in through the sticks on the side of the tukl, and when those have been repaired they jump through the window or squeeze and scrape their bodies through the chicken wire and back in through the hole. This week one was caught inside and a man here beat it severely. Several of us woke at 1:30 in the morning to the desperate yelps and growls of an animal defending its life. Though it was not beaten to death, it is impossible that it survived unscathed. But the next night, the dog squeezed itself back into that kitchen to scavenge for more food. Its hunger compells it to return.

Her uterus contracts again, just as it has been since her water broke 3 days ago. Though she has laboured at home stoically since, her first child has yet to be born. When the fever came, her relatives brought her to the clinic. She is exhausted, but still trying to push out this child that will make her a woman in the eyes of her culture. Never has anything had the potential to bring meaning to her life like the delivery of the baby that is inside her. But though her uterus contracts, her cervix does not open; she remains only partially dilated hour after hour, and the situation becomes severe. She will certainly need a caesarean section for the child to survive, and maybe for herself as well. Though the doctor at our clinic has performed over 500 of these operations, the risk for infection is too great with the facilities that are here. Her relatives find a vehicle to take her 6 hours to the closest hospital. Against odds, her child’s heart continues to beat strong. The baby hungers for life.

Hunger. Every day each of us has on earth, hunger will be with us in some form or another whether it is hunger of the body or hunger of the soul. It can seduce us to pain; it can inspire us to fulfillment. Left unsatiated, we will die. Satisfying it in dangerous ways also provoke morbidity and mortality. The good news is that we are created to have the deepest hunger of our beings filled by the Bread of Life who came down from heaven. He is the One whose eye is on even the desperate dogs, and so much more those denied food, those led astray, and those battling for life. Taste and see :)

The Routine

It's 5:50 am when the alarm rings. I press snooze at least once before putting on my headlamp and untucking the mosquito net. I will need to see the floor very clearly before putting my feet down, and natural light won't light up my tent enough for almost another hour. I put on a skirt and t-shirt, and shake out my socks and shoes before heading outside to the airstrip for a half hour run. Though the air is thick with heat and humidity (it is already about 30C), the 3 runners at this base keep going. But no one is charting any personal bests.

At 6:45 I arrive back at base and have a quick shower. 7am are group devotions, where we each take a turn sharing something from the Bible and praying for one another and the other bases in Sudan. Then it's breakfast - almost always oatmeal with powdered milk, peanut butter, cinnamon, and dried cranberries. I leave for school, a 5 minute walk from here, at about 7:40.

The school day lasts from 8:30 until 3pm officially. Then most days I just hang out at the school and answer questions from the students, and invest time. This is often my favourite part of the day.

Now it's time to think about supper. I'm part of "K-3", which is kitchen 3, where 5 of us cook on a rotating schedule. Making a meal here takes about 3 hours, as we light a charcoal fire and make everything from scratch. This week we've been going crazy here making chinese food, sweet and sour meatballs, stuffed peppers, banana bread, and roasted goat. A plane and a truck arrived this week that have brought the first fresh produce we've seen in a long time.

The evening is filled with clean up, quiet time, another shower, sometimes internet, the occasional games and movie nights. Every evening I sit on the "veranda" of my tent, flossing my teeth, and looking at the sky. I can see both the Big Dipper and the Southern Cross from my vantage point, though the North Star is just out of view. The haze from the humidity makes the stars on the horizon unclear, and I think it's pretty close to the edge. (Davey, let me know - 10 degrees North:))

Then I go into my tent for the night, and close the door with clothespins. The zippers are broken and unfixable here, and securing the flaps closed seems to keep the dogs out. I take one final look around the interior of the tent with my headlamp, looking for critters. Most spiders I let stay - there haven't been any yet that have been too creepy. The couple of lizards that are there are also allowed to stay. Centipedes and scorpions are not. Whack. Then I check my sheets carfully to make sure that I am sleeping alone and crawl into bed, leaving my chacos behind, and tuck my mosquito net in securely. It's somewhere between 10 and 11 and I am so ready for sleep.

That's a typical day for me... Even having a typical day is quite something :) Wherever you are in the world, I hope yours was wonderful, that you saw the simple beautiful things in it, and wondered about the One who made them all...

Reasons to be Thankful

It's been a wonderful week, full of new experiences & opportunities. This list of things that I'm thankful for will give you a few snippets of what this week has looked like.

1 - A chance to spend the weekend out in the village of Gasmala, a 7km walk from here. It was just so nice to be out in the village with the people - hearing a lot of Mabaan, speaking a little Twam'pa with the only Mabaan family that used to live in Bonga, and sharing friendship and time with the Sudanese. We also got to walk out to Thomaji where a new borehole (water source) was officially opened. It was the kind of weekend that gives you a glimpse of how amazing heaven will be, when people from every tongue, tribe, and nation will gather together eternally celebrating what God has done for us. The unity of Christ across cultures that have little surface commonalities is an incredible thing to experience.

2 - Teaching has been really great - the 13 men that I spend my days with, assisting a veteran teacher, are so wanting to learn. Most of them spent 2 hours after class today just hanging out, digging deeper. Learning in another language, about a topic that is beyond any science most have even heard of, and is sometimes in contradiction to their own health practices, is a very difficult thing. All of them have wives and children, yet they live here in communal living with the other students. They push forward and I hope so much that each of them will succeed and become pivots of change in their communities.

3 - This morning I was walking to class, in the middle of a dirt path, my mind going over the day that was about to unfold. Then I heard it - a hiss... Then I saw it - a green snake with black & white markings rear up about 1 foot from my left foot. Instinctively I zagged away from it, and thankfully, so did it. I called for someone to come and kill it and 2 men with sticks came and beat it to death. My students tell me that it was a cobra, and though that is not the official verdict, they are not as rare here as one would think. I am very thankful today for a God who didn't make me have to be the one to try out the snake anti-venom!

There is always more to be thankful for... the day to day of life here; the woman I am learning from as I teach under her; the others who love Sudan on this base and we spend time together processing culture and remembering our own; the simple beauty of this dry land turning neon green... But I will leave the stories here for now. May your days be wonderful today, all over the world! I hope that you are knowing how God is taking care of you just as He is me, and able to delight along the way :)

More Eyes

If you're interested in life in Doro from other perspectives, click on the links to the right. "Amelia Jane", "Kata", and "The Agnes'" are all here and writing about it. And they even have pictures :) Enjoy!

PS - and now you can link to "Kev" too!:)
PPS - and now "Julie"!
PPPS - and now "The Bracht's" too:) We keep growing here in Doro.
PPPPS - and Sheila