The almost son

Yesterday, I almost brought a son home! His name is Hammadou. He was born premature weighing about 2 lbs. Yesterday, Aleta and I met him and his mother. He is now 1 month old and still weighs around 2 lbs.- just skin and bone. The mother has limited milk supply which means she has to supplement with formula. This is an extremely difficult task. First, she has to buy it. A can is about $5. While that seems like nothing to us- that is 2 1/2 days wage (that is if you have a good paying job). The mother will have to find a store that sells it which might be difficult since they are nomadic and away from their village now. When she wants to make it, she has to build a fire and then boil water- yes, even in the middle of the night. Then she has to mix the formula to feed and afterwards wash the only bottle she has. Perhaps it is the difficulty of the process that has led to her only feeding the baby once a day, or maybe it was lack of knowledge since she speaks Fufulde and the nursing staff does not or maybe the lack of feedings is due to the fact that the Fulani are resigned to fate- whatever God wills will be done so there is no point worrying about it, after all she has already lost 2 babies.
Aleta and I went into full nurse educator mode! We stressed how important it was for her to feed him every 2 hours and to try to nurse as well. We got discouraged when we thought she had gone to prepare a bottle only to find her washing clothes instead. I was determined to help this baby- even if that meant taking him home with me, and in fact the baby's great aunt asked us to take him and care for him. At one point I was alone with him, trying to warm him under lamps. I sang "He has the whole world in His hands" to him. And He does- the little bitty babies as well. We prayed over him and his mother and then we gave more education and more support to his mother. Aleta went and checked on them last night and the mom was nursing Hammadou and she had also fed him 3 other times!
This morning we went to see mom and baby and to bring some warm clothes for him. One of my concerns was if he was urinating enough- if he was then he was getting enough food. To my delight, he was soaking wet when we arrived and his mom was making a bottle for him! While he has a lot of weight to put on still, I believe he and his mom are moving in the right direction. Please keep baby Hammadou and his mother in your prayers!

A Charlie update!

Here is a Charlie update!

• Oh she has been soooo much fun lately! She is talking up a storm- both in English and Sango. Her new word yesterday was "funny." Everything was funny! She is making sentences- which are usually commands- "Mommy, come." "Mommy sit." But the phrase she says 500 times a day is, "aye yigh yigh!"  

• She likes to play pretend, especially with her babies. She sings to them and puts them "night night."
•  She is obsessed with coloring and we just painted a dresser for her with chalk board paint and she colors on it all of the time. She "draws," "flowers," "bugs," and "1,2,3."

•  She is really into counting. She always gets 1, 2, and sometimes she gets 3 in the right place. When she wants some more of something, she says, "2, 2!" even after she has already had 2. or she says, "oko" which is one in Sango. She knows her vowels also- we have alphabet stickers on the wall and she says, "a, e, i, o, u"- but she says them the French way.
  
• She does things to make herself and us laugh, like the other night we were looking at a book with animals and I asked her where the elephant was. She totally knows "elephant," but she pointed to every other animal on the page and laughed and laughed when she did. She thought she was so funny. 

•  She is also so sensitive. If she thinks we have a boo-boo, she pats us and says, "k,k,k" as in "are you ok?" Then she kisses our boo boos, and then the best is when she takes both hands, puts them on our cheeks, and strokes them softly while she "shushes us." It is amazing.
  
• She is also really into cars lately. Yesterday, Josh borrowed a jeep and Charlie pretended she was driving it. She was so excited. Then a Fulani group of kids came and she wanted the baby to sit with her- her first date. Not so happy that they went parking though! 

• She loves to play with the local kids. Today, all of the kids her age and younger cried and cried when she came near them. Poor Charlie- hope she doesn't get a complex. But thankfully all of the older kids love to play with her. They pick her up and play with her like she is a doll.
  
• She is doing really well with potty training!
  
• In the last couple of weeks, toddler temper tantrums seem to have been decreasing! Praise the Lord!

• She is becoming less shy again- now she shakes the hands of Africans again. 
• She loves to pray and several times during the day she will say, "pray" and put her hands together. I then ask her what we should pray for and sometimes she will name a person or she will look around a say a thing like flowers, door, cookies, or whatever else is on her mind. 

Sitting on a death- Ash Wednesday

Today, Ash Wednesday, I "sat on a death." I went to the home of a Fulani woman whose husband had died. He was in his 30's and unexpectedly left behind 3 small children.

There is much to learn from a culture by the way they live but also by how they respond to death. While the other tribes around us wail loudly, flailing their arms about in dramatic theatrics when someone they know dies, the Fulani are reserved. They strive to be dignified. They are also hopeless and fatalistic: "What can we do? It is Allah's will."

As we sat with the women on the dirt floor of the house, my mind and heart lingered on the phrase "ash to ash and dust to dust" for today is Ash Wednesday. For my non-liturgical friends, this means it is the first day of Lent- the season of preparation before Easter.

Many of us are uncomfortable with Lent. For a long time, I looked down on it as the kind of works based practice from which Jesus has freed me. But the true emphasis of Lent is not what I can do (give up bathing, chocolate, Youtube, etc). Instead, it is preparing for the celebration of what He did. Before I celebrated Lent, Easter would often sneak up on me. I spent more time thinking of marshmallow birdies and a new dress than the awe of Easter. But before we can celebrate the resurrection, we need to remember the cross and the reason Jesus was crucified. Lent is a chance to remember the dark before the dawn. To sit with our sins. To appreciate the need for a Savior. To remember that there are still people in need of the Savior.

Really until this year, until I "sat on a death," Lent has always been about me, me, me. But as I sat with the family of a man that returned to the dust, my heart was heavy for them and our other Fulani friends that only know darkness. Oh how I pray they will come to know the joy of the Easter resurrection.

This Lent, as you reflect on Easter, please join me in praying for our Fulani friends.

A very merry Christmas

A lot of people have asked how we spent Christmas here in the Central African Republic, well I will tell you....

Yes, we had a Christmas tree! It was left over from the days when the Swedes were here. It had ornaments made from Fulani ladies/



The Sunday before Christmas, all of the missionaries sang in church. We sang in English and Sango and even had two recorders and a guitar to accompany us. Josh played drums. It was very tame compared to the normal African singing in church! In the afternoon, we went and caroled at the hospital. We also gave out soap and sardines to the patients- probably not your typical Christmas gifts, but those are things they really appreciate.

On Christmas eve, 42 missionaries gathered for a smorgasbord dinner! There was a table in every room!





On Christmas morning, I made homemade doughnuts!




Then we opened presents- mainly Charlie opened presents. We were able to get a few things here for her- mostly cheap junk,but she loved it!



When Charlie saw this bag, she pointed to Belle and said, "Mommy!'




Here she is in all of her dress up glory!



On Christmas night, all the missionaries gathered again for desserts and a white elephant exchange. I got cheese from France! SO excited about that because cheese is precious around here!
 There was a lot less hustle and bustle than usual and we missed our friends and families, but  all in all, we had a great Christmas full of fellowship, fun, and time to remember the "reason for the season."







 

Thanksgiving

I know this is late, but just wanted to share how we celebrated Thanksgiving here in Africa!

There were almost 30 of us- including 7 kids under age 5! We had tons and tons of food!




 Here is Timote about to dive into his plateful of food



Charlie had her fill too!




We had 11 pies for dessert!



Everyone played with the newest pet on the compound- Elijah!



We has a wonderful, thankful, tasty Thanksgiving!




And here is another Charlie picture for the grandparents!

confessions part 2

Here is another missionary confession....

We have someone that cooks and cleans for us 6 days a week and another person that watches Charlie 6 days a week.

Missionaries are supposed to be rugged, hard working, and most importantly poor, right?! In the States, pretty much the only people I know that have a maid live in pristine gated communities and have a lot of excess cash. And the only person I know that has a personal chef is Oprah.

House-workers, or as I like to call them- coworkers, are a very complex issue. One that I still struggle with. Some days I feel like I am living the movie "The Help" and other days I feel like we have a beautiful relationship.

Again the book I am reading, "What You Can't Leave Behind:A Rookie Missionary’s Life in Africa" has been very helpful with this issue. Ryan J. Murphy, the author, rightly points out that there is an expectation by the community for us to share our wealth with them and one way is by employing local workers. Hiring workers helps to make inroads in the community. Not employing workers would come across as selfish and insensitive.

Wages here are appalling compared to U.S. standards. The government actually has categories for workers with not only minimum, but salary maximums! (Although we can add a "tip" on, which we do.) In America, you would probably pay around $10 an hour or more for a babysitter (and I have no idea what a personal chef would cost!!) Here, workers make about $0.50 an hour. Disgusting, I know. But before you accuse of running a sweat shop Kathy Lee style, we cannot pay more for the good or our co-workers and the community. If we payed $15 an hour, their lives would change dramatically for the worse. Their relatives might quite working and try to mooch off them. In the African culture, you have access to your relatives' money. Our workers would have to share, they would have no choice. They would also stick out like a sore thumb with the changes in wardrobe and lifestyle that would result from more money. They would be a target for theft, vandalism, and possibly violence. In Africa, the nail that sticks out gets hammered down. In addition, other workers would be outraged that they were not making as much as our workers. They would be angry with our workers, with their employers, and with us. Lastly, it would damage the balance of the economy. Even if we could afford to pay $15 an hour (which we can't), African employers can't pay that much either.

This is definitely a complex issue and an awkward one at times, but I am thankful God brought Bonard and Freidaline into our lives.

Bonard and Freidaline are a wonderfully sweet married couple. Bonard does the cooking and Friedaline does the Charlie wrangling.

Everything in Africa takes forever and rarely does it go smoothly. All food is made from scratch- you even have to grind your own meat. There are no dishwashers or dryers. Dishes are hand washed and clothes need to be put out on the line- including the cloth diapers. This is a time consuming lifestyle that could take away hours everyday from our focus if not for Bonard and Freidaline. We would not be able to study our languages or pray with sick patients or fix computers, we would barely have enough time to survive. Bonard and Friedaline are essential support for us. They are more than just employees, they are our co-workers. Because they do what they do, we can do what we do!

We try to make sure they know that too. We make an effort to treat them as equals- as coworkers. They lunch at the table with us everyday. They help us with Sango and we teach them a little English. Yesterday, they learned "Today, I ate sloppy Joes." And man can Bonard make some awesome sloppy joes. They bring us gifts and we give them gifts. When they or someone in their family is sick, we go to visit. We laugh together a lot. And I try really hard not to be like Tilly!

But the best part about having Bonard and Friedaline in our lives is that Charlie LOVES them. I mean LOVES them. They have become her second parents and they spoil her like grandparents. When they arrive in the morning she yells "Bobo" and runs full force into their legs to give them a hug. Friedaline is so good about teaching Charlie Sango. She will count windows or toys in Sango and repeat words over and over for Charlie. She is like a personal preschool teacher!

 

       
     

I feel blessed to have them in our lives and I hope they feel the same!  

Confession part 1

Time for a missionary confession... I like stuff.

In the last week, I have had two dreams about shopping. In one, I walked through Target. I strolled through each and every department. Oh how I longed for the clearance section, the cute home decor items, and the candy isle. I woke up grumpy with an unquenched shopping craving. Then a few days later I had another dream that my sister and I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving. Again, I woke up wanting stuff, cheap stuff, and the thrill of the hunt.

But alas, this Thanksgiving there will be no searching the ads, waiting in line at midnight, or hunting for door-busters for me. I am trying to be alright with that. You see I like stuff and I like shopping. I know missionaries are supposed to be holy people that live in mud huts and never complain that they have an ugly yellow and brown curtain in their bathroom, well I hate to burst your bubble but I am still the same me that loves to shop and color coordinate.

Missionaries are often unfairly put on a pedestal. I am reading this book called, "What You Can't Leave Behind:A Rookie Missionary’s Life in Africa." It has been so helpful. In it, the author talks about when he first became a Christian and what he thought missionaries were like. Here is his impression:



"They were the monks of the Protestant world, in my mind. I pictured them with noses in Bibles and leading their children around like docile lambs and speaking in hushed whispers about the hundreds of conversions that they saw each week. If there wasn't a halo or aura hovering overhead, then it was only because I was too sinful to see it."

Ha! I have dreams about Target and every time I walk into our bathroom I think, "Hello, 1970's called and it wants its curtain back." Here is the truth- missionaries are just normal people. God just happened to call us somewhere and we went- and we arrived with all of our idiosyncrasies and issues. Now you know. So if God calls you too, don't worry about all of your junk because God can still use you!