games, glasses, and more goodbyes

Let me start with announcing that The Howdy Ramblin' Big Sky Williams won the on-ship trivia night last Tuesday.  The team consists of me, John (eye team), Aaron (accountant), and Ezra (hospital supply).  Since costumes were encouraged and we are all Americans, we went with a lumberjack/cowboy theme and it worked because we beat out about 15 other teams.  It was definitely a close call: we only won by 2 points and the final two questions were calculus, so it was a true nail-biter.  Other notable teams included Gang-Green (four nurses dressed in all green, hair and all), Team Rehab (four folks from the Physiotherapy department, dressed in scrubs, casts, arms slings, and plaster), and Canadian Tuxedo (dressed in all denim).  It was easily the most fun Tuesday on board and I'm looking forward to the next two Tuesdays--hopefully we can win the overall grand prize.  I almost forgot to mention our prize for last week: a box of random things from hospital supply: an 18-pack of toilet paper, some soap, tongue depressors, a towel, expired sterile gloves, and alcohol hand gel.  Woohoo!

I think I mentioned previously that one of the ship's photographers came with us on an eye screening a few weeks ago.  Well, I finally have the photos!

 Okay, so this one isn't at screening, it's at the ship, in our Peri-Op room.  This is where the patients come before and after surgery.  I'm talking with Lorraine, our peri-op nurse from a few weeks ago, about the day's schedule.  You can see the patients get a piece of white tape over their surgical eye so there is no confusion!

Now we are at screening, in Hastings, outside of Freetown.  Unloading the Land Rovers can get tedious after a while, so I tried my hand (or should I say head) at carrying things the African way.

During set-up, Debra, the photographer, caught me with my camera.  Next to me is Glory, one of our day volunteers and perhaps the most calm and relaxed person on the face of the earth.

Our team leader, Woody, examining a patient.  I will be surprised if this photo doesn't end up on some Mercy Ships promotional literature somewhere in the near future.

Me and Isaac, another day volunteer, helping a woman find a pair of reading glasses.

Mother and child, sporting a new pair of sunglasses.  The kids almost always pick out glasses that match their outfits.

Handing out sunglasses to the children.

Patient holding a secondary screening card.  The pink card allows the bearer to come to the ship for a more thorough exam.  From there, she can get scheduled for surgery or refracted for prescription glasses.

This week, we are again without a surgeon.  Even though we can't do surgeries during this time, it is actually a blessing because we will be screening on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.  It will definitely be a lot of hard work, but we really need to find more cataract patients in order to fill up the weeks when we do have a surgeon.  We are certainly seeing a lot of people at screening, just not good surgical candidates.  We see a lot of people with corneal scarring, which can be caused by disease, malnutrition, or trauma.  It is often blinding, but completely non-surgical.  Much of the corneal scarring we see is due to not get enough Vitamin A as a child.  Subsequently, we give out Vitamin A tabs to everyone under age 8.  We also see a lot of eye issues relating to trauma, glaucoma, and cataracts that are not fully advanced to the criteria for our surgeries.  Unfortunately, we aren't able to help everyone, but such is the nature of the game.  

On Friday, I hosted the "Not-So-Newlywed Game."  In a word, it was a success!  I had 6 contestant couples and around 100 people in the audience!  I will blog more about this later in the week once I get some photos.

And finally, this week is bringing more goodbyes.  My good friend Claire, one of our receptionists, is leaving tomorrow.  She was supposed to leave in another week, but found out yesterday that her grandfather passed away.  She is a fellow YoungLifer and I always enjoyed stopping and talking with her at the front desk, at whatever time of day. Claire, we will miss you!  Also, a few more families are leaving this week--some families that I quickly realized were glue in the Africa Mercy community.  The Rollands, the Peets, the Tvedts, the Sanders, and so many more.  Even though I know that these people will be missed so much by their friends on the ship, it is fun to think about the new lives they will start when they return home.  Some have been here for several years.  The Peets, in particular, will be heading back to the U.K. to start the adoption process with their daughter Libby.  Libby was adopted from Liberia a few years ago and just recently was granted her British visa, meaning they could finally return home.  What an exciting time for them!  Check out their blog at www.peetblog.net.  Olly is the Transportation Manager and Sally is a Speech Therapist on board and they are perhaps one of the funniest couples ever.

Please pray for the continued well being of the patients and crew.  And please pray that the Lord showers us with good surgical candidates this week--seriously, we need it!!

Kari Ann, keep on keeping on in this season of your life!  Let the Lord carry you: Exodus 14:14.

Again, thanks for reading.  And as a reminder, it's not too late to enter the Mix CD contest!

farewells

The past two weeks have been really busy. 

For one, our volume of eye patients has multiplied.  We have been working with Dr. Glenn Strauss and Dr. Joseph Park, so instead of having one surgeon doing 8-10 patients a day, we have two surgeons doing about 30 patients a day (and finishing earlier than usual).  Dr. Glenn can remove a cataract in under 10 minutes, so needless to say, he is pretty speedy.  I went into the OR to observe him and the surgery was over before I knew it.  

Since my teammate Shannon is gone on vacation, I have been taking over for her duties.  Even though her title is "Scheduling Coordinator" it should just be "Eye Team Troubleshooter," because all day you just take care of all the little issues that arise.  I actually enjoy doing it--constantly running between the ship and the Eye Team's dockside unit, dubbed "The White House" (it's a big white aluminum modular structure), finding missing charts, scheduling and rescheduling patients, doing data entry on the hospital databases, playing with charts again, and generally making sure that everything is running smoothly for the team.  In addition to all of this, we had a little excitement in the White House this past Tuesday.  I was in one room talking to a day volunteer, when I heard a thud in the next room over.  I glanced through the doorway and saw a patient lying on the ground.  My first reaction was "Do we need to call the EMT??"  On the ship, the EMT is the Emergency Medical Team.  It consists of on-call doctors, nurses, stretcher-bearers, and other personnel that will respond to any emergency at the ship.  Anyway, I ran to the counter only to find that our cordless phone was not on it's base.  I instinctively bolted out the door to the Admissions tent next door, grabbed their phone and dialed 1000 for reception.  "This is Seth, we need the EMT to the Eye Building NOW!"  I run back to the White House only to find that the patient is now awake and drinking some water.  Another eye team member says "Oh, I don't think we need extra help."  Catching my breath and somewhat exasperated, I run back to the Admissions Tent to cancel my EMT call, knowing what would soon happen.  But before I could get back in touch with reception, I hear the overhead page: "Emergency Medical Team, please report to the dockside eye building immediately.  Again, Emergency Medical Team, please report to the dockside eye building immediately.  Thank you."  Knowing that an EMT page is broadcast to the whole ship, even inside the cabins, probably waking up all the night-shift workers, I let out an "oh well" sigh.  I walked back to the White House and watched as our team leader, Woody, is the first to race down the gangway.  Much to my chagrin, I tell him it is a false alarm, and then I see a whole cascade of crew running down the gangway.  The crew physician, the hospital physician, about three nurses, the ship's captain (!), a few stretcher-bearers, the programs administrator, the programs assistant (Woody's wife, Robin), the patient services coordinator, an anesthesiologist, an anesthetic assistant, and some other people presumably from the OR, because they were wearing booties and caps.  As some of these people go in to check the patient, I embarrassingly explain the situation to everyone else.  Everyone was very understanding and reassured me that it is always better to call the EMT and then not need them than to not call and have an actual emergency.  The captain even commented "Oh, well this was definitely a good drill!"  Never a dull moment on the Africa Mercy!  

In other news, we are still having some issues with finding enough cataract patients.  In years passed, we would have been a few months ahead in scheduling cataract surgeries, but right now, we are only 2-3 weeks ahead.  At our Monday screenings at Kissy, we only get about 30ish potential surgical candidates and similar numbers at our Friday screenings.  But the Lord has recently blessed us with two specific things.  This past Monday we pulled a double and went to a church to screen after finishing at Kissy in the morning.  Our hard work paid off, as we identified 63 potential cataract patients that day!  More than double our usual numbers!  Also, next week, we do not have surgeon, which will allow us to do screenings on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, so hopefully we will find a lot of patients to fill our appointment book.  

You might be wondering why I titled this post "farewells," and it is simply because now that the summer is starting, people are leaving in mass numbers.  There are several families and individuals that are leaving for 1-2 month vacations, but more importantly there have been several long term crew members completing their service with Mercy Ships.  Even though I haven't know a lot of these people for a very long time, it is still tough to say goodbye to people that you like.  It will definitely be weird to have fewer children running around the ship, and it will take time to adjust when new crew members fill the empty spots.  On the bright side, when crew leave the ship, it means there will be ice cream (see previous post) and someplace new to visit once I complete my service.  In all seriousness though, the crew turnover is one of the hardest parts of serving with Mercy Ships.  People come and go every day, and even though there are about 400 crew at any one time, the ship may see closer to 1,000 different crew during one field service.  I am definitely thankful that I am able to serve for the time that I am--I couldn't imagine just serving for two months or even two weeks.  

I'm not sure where I got the idea to do this, maybe because some really great couples/families will be leaving soon, but next Friday, I will be hosting a "Not-So-Newlyweds Game" in our International Lounge.  I've been recruiting couples to be contestants and I'm expecting a nice turn-out for the audience.  Things are still in the planning stage, but be assured that I will fill you in next weekend.  

I'm overdue for a few shout-outs: THANK YOU to Hypes, MK, Carolyn and Jamie, and Ashley for your wonderful entries to the Mix CD contest.  I'm not the only one who is enjoy your music, as I have a few friends who are always inquiring, "Did you get a new CD yet this week??"  CONGRATULATIONS to Ben and Joanna Sutton, who were happily married two weekends ago in Florida.  I interned with Ben at Rockbridge in 2009 and became friends with Joanna over the past year.  Also, a congrats are in order for my high school classmate Felicia Jones as she will be married to her fiance Tristan TOMORROW.  I know how excited Felicia is and I wish you all the best of luck!

Whoever and wherever you are, take care and thanks for reading!

ice cream

Ice cream is one of those universal treats.  Whether you are at the Dairy Queen in Uniontown, PA, or the Pink Hut in Lexington, VA, or Cone E. Island in DC, or here on the Africa Mercy in Freetown, Sierra Leone, ice cream is just always a good thing.

A few nights ago, some friends and I tried our hand at making homemade ice cream in ziploc bags.  It turned out really well!

Left to right: Jess (mango-banana), Christoph (Snickers), me (cinnamon), Laura (chocolate-Rolo), Miriam (mango).

don't carry it all

Almost three months in.  Can you believe it?

I'm glad this week is over.  Departures, unhelpable patients, stress, policies, blah blah blah.  Instead of listing specifics, I think I will just leave it at that.  Years from now, if I read this, I'm know I'm not going to want to remember the reasons that made my week cruddy.  And by then I will surely have forgotten.  So that being said, let's get the forgetting process on with.

As for the positive things that happened this week:

• I received a great care package in the mail! (Thank you, you know who!)
• With the departure of my peri-op nurse Lorraine came my new nurse Karen.  She's from Australia and will be with us for 4 weeks.  
• Additionally, the eye team welcomed Dr. Glenn Strauss and his wife Kim.  Dr. Strauss basically developed/mastered the cataract surgery that we use here on the ship, called MSICS (pronounced like M-6).  He is able to do them with incredible speed and accuracy, allowing us to operate on more and more patients than previous weeks.  
• While the Strausses are here, Kim will be taking over my role as Peri-Operative Coordinator as I will be filling in for my teammate Shannon during her vacation.  This will give me a nice three week break from normal duties as I become the scheduling coordinator.  
• I made a really good cake (pineapple, coconut, and banana) and even better cream cheese icing. 
• I received another entry in my Mix CD contest, this time from my buddy Dam Mallya.  While it is too soon to tell, he is currently in the running for the Best Cover Art.  And the music is pretty great too.  Thanks Dam!

Last Sunday at our worship service, we sang the old hymn "What a Friend We Have in Jesus."  The first stanza is:

What a friend we have in Jesus, 
all our sins and griefs to bear! 
What a privilege to carry 
everything to God in prayer! 
O what peace we often forfeit,
O what needless pain we bear, 
all because we do not carry 
everything to God in prayer. 

I really felt the Lord speaking to me this week through the lines "O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer."  Basically, as humans we carry all this crap with us all the time.  Work issues, relationship issues, financial concerns, stress, worries, etc.  And oh how this causes us pain and disquiet.  But in these instances, we totally bring the pain onto our own selves!  As the verse suggests, all we need to do is just give it over to the Lord.  Commit it to the Lord and he will bear our struggles with/for us.  Exodus 14:14 says "The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still." (Thanks Carolyn!)  I find this verse and song so comforting after a week like this one.  

In closing, I want to just highlight two blogs by friends of mine back in the states.  The first is called "Psalm 143:8" and is written by my friend Katie.  Kit, as she is also known, is on staff with Young Life, a Christian outreach ministry for highschoolers, in Chesapeake, VA (near Virginia Beach).  Her blog documents her amazing journey of pursuing kids for Christ.  Her most recent post, "Sing Oh Barren Woman," is so beautifully and honestly written and Kit's personality and passion for what she does is so evident in it.  If you know her, you know she is an incredible individual--I encourage you to check out her blog at www.toyouiliftmysoul.blogspot.com.  The other blog of note is called "Postcard Pen Pal" and is written by my friend Kari.  I met Kari through the Young Life circles when I worked at Rockbridge and she is another truly unique and inspiring person.  Her blog is a registry of postcards that she receives: some old, some new, some from friends, from herself, from family.  It is an awesome way to document all that goes in her life and a way to keep memories from escaping.  It's fun to see who pops up on the blog and where the postcards are coming from.  Oh and did I mention that I just think it is really cool?  Check it out at www.postcardpenpal.blogspot.com.  

Thank you all for continued support, prayers, readership, and love.  

like a ship at ocean

As I mentioned in a recent newsletter, the verse Proverbs 19:21 has been weighing on my heart a lot recently.  It reads "You can make many plans, but the Lord's purpose will prevail."  I've come to learn that sometimes the Lord's purpose prevails more subtly than other times.  Yesterday was not one of those times.

Each Monday morning, there is a ship-wide Communications Meeting where important announcements and information can be disseminated.  A few weeks ago some rumors of the ship's sailing schedule started filtering throughout the on-board community and it was announced that the true plans would be announced at Monday's meeting.  So yesterday morning, Donovan Palmer (the ship's managing director) announced that the M/V Africa Mercy will not be sailing to Tenerife (The Canary Islands) in December, as originally planned.  Instead, the ship will have a short break in the country of Ghana, before heading to the next-door country of Togo for a new field service!  The reason for the change is as follows: Typically, a field service lasts from February through November, with shipyard occurring in December and January.  This means that a West African field service spans the typically wicked rainy season, infamous in this part of the continent.  The new plan is to have field services be from about September to June, with shipyard in July and August, thus avoiding medical outreach during the rainiest part of the year.  So, the tentative plan for now is Ghana in December, a short Togo field service January-June, shipyard July-August, and Guinea field service for Fall 2012.

Long story short: I will still be home for Christmas, just not sure where I'll be flying home from.  Cue the "I'll be Home for Christmas" music.  Right now, there are no solid dates, but I will be sure to keep everyone updated as I know more information.

Onto other things: There isn't a whole lot new to report.  We began a series of screenings on Fridays, in an effort to find more surgical candidates.  We will alternate between Pastor Moses's church (see a previous post "freedom"), and churches in the surrounding communities of Hastings and Waterloo.  We screened in Hastings last Friday, so I will share a few photos from that.

One of the pastor's sons, outside the main entrance of the church.

This girl's immaculately white dress was odd to see in this dusty, dirty environment.

I soon had an audience wanting me to "snap" them.  The kid with the toothpick was cracking me up.

More local children.

The building had large open windows letting both curious children and pesky chickens into the church.

Inside the sanctuary.  The colorful banners are quite popular in churches here in Sierra Leone.

The pastor's daughter, helping us load chairs into the Land Rovers.  Note her new sunglasses we gave her.

One of the pastor's sons, sporting his new shades.

The Glory Assembly of God in Hastings.  Lorraine, the Scottish nurse on my Peri-Op Team, in front. 

As usual, I ended up with more photos of the children than of the actual screening!  Luckily, one of the ship's photographers, Debra, accompanied us on the trip, so I will soon be able to put up some of her professional photos.  

A few things to keep in prayer for the week:

• Eye screenings and surgeries
• My possible driving test on Friday (I'm getting pretty good at driving stick!)
• Two crew members, Todd and Gina, who were both admitted into the ship's hospital this weekend, with malaria and internal bleeding, respectively.  Both are recovering in stable condition now.  

On a final note, a few shout outs are necessary.  Congrats to newlyweds Hannah and Ernie Golen!  I interned with Hannah at Rockbridge last summer and I wish them the best of luck in their marriage!  Next, (comma) I'd like to say hi to Kathy Iannamorelli, (comma) one of the blog's most diehard readers, (comma) or so my source says. (period) <---- get it, La??  And finally, congrats to Anna White for winning the "First to Arrive" prize in my mix-CD competition.  I'm currently holding a contest for the best mix-CD, and Anna's arrived today and is fantastic.  Thanks for the new music!

That's all for now.  Thanks for reading!

addendum

I have a few photos I'd like to post that I didn't get around to posting in the past few weeks.  This blog serves two-fold: a way to keep my friends, family, donors, and supporters updated and also a written account of my time here in Africa for my own reflection.  These are just a few vignettes that I'd like to remember!

A few weeks ago, a long-awaited container was opened on the ship.  A "container" is a large metal shipping container that arrives from Mercy Ships headquarters in either Texas or the Netherlands every few weeks.  This one was long overdue.  Among other contents was a whole store-load of snacks and such for the Ship Shop.  After a day and a half of stocking the store with the likes of Oreos, Goldfish, cake mixes, Tootsie Rolls, Snickers, salsa, mac 'n cheese, etc., a line literally formed outside the door prior to the grand opening.  People had window shopped during the previous day picking out exactly what they wanted to buy up.  It was not unlike Black Friday in the States.  Within minutes of the lights coming on and the doors opening, the small shop was FILLED with crew members vying for their desired items.  I had planned on getting tortilla chips and salsa (one of my favorites), but I was distracted by the addition of queso dip to my mental list.  By the time I got the salsa and queso, the chips were all gone!  Here is a (posed?) photo and myself and Gemma, a patient life coach, fighting over a bag of Goldfish.

In my previous post "freedom" I forgot to mention the Easter Monday Crew Open House.  A Mercy Ships tradition, on Easter Monday crew can open up the cabins for people to come and visit, share snacks, etc.  11 cabins were on the list this year and my friends Deb and Christoph and myself, set out to visit all 11 cabins in under an hour, as well as to eat a snack in each cabin.  Here are a few of my favorite photos from the Open House:

With the Ventura twins, Janice and Elisha, in their bedroom/playroom.

In the Cairncross cabin, with hostess Anne and the most unique feature of their room: the pole!

The Cairncrosses had a dress-up competition as their cabin's activity.

At the Davies' cabin, Luke insisted I get a photo of him with his Finding Nemo hat.  One with the hat on the top of his head...

...and one with the hat completely over his face!

i'll let loose with your praise

What a week.  I'm very glad it is Saturday.

On the weekend, the ship is very quiet, as many people are out for the day or on overnight trips.  I really enjoy the calm atmosphere on the weekends.  The Internet is faster, you have you choice of places to sit in the lounges, and it is just generally pleasant. 

This week was a little tough.  Eye surgeries began again and we currently have a surgeon with us who is a Mercy Ships first-timer.  To say the least, he was a bit slow and wasn't too familiar with our system.  We had a couple of 10-hour days, but things are looking better.  Wednesday was particularly crazy: in addition to 11 patients, our OR had two needle-sticks (OR personnel getting stuck with a dirty needle or instrument), AND a patient had to be admitted to the ward post-surgery due to high blood pressure (254/142 !!!!) and urinary retention.  It was a very busy day!  Thursday was a sad day for the Eye Team as my peri-operative nurse, Ellen, left the ship to return to her home in Switzerland.  Ellen was a cheery and hard-working teammate and will be missed!  Luckily a new nurse, Lorraine from the U.K. arrived Thursday night, so I will get to work with her on Monday.  

Friday morning, my teammate John and I went on a site visit to the town of Waterloo, about an hour outside of Freetown.  We were going to meet with a pastor and to see his church as a potential screening site.  Right now, we are looking at doing additional screenings on Fridays at rotating locations throughout the Freetown area.  The church turned out to be a very nice facility and it is looking good for it to be a screening location.  I drove a bit on the way back, as part of my lessons on learning to drive a stick-shift.  We were almost back to the ship as we approached a roundabout.  To set the scene, traffic was pretty thick and slow-moving; I was in the left lane on our side of the road, when a poda-poda (the ubiquitous 20-passenger vans) drives up onto the sidewalk on my right in order to get around a taxi in the right lane.  In doing so, the poda-poda scraped the corner of the taxi and then came to a stop diagonally in the road, blocking both the taxi and our Land Rover.  The taxi driver immediately got out, walked up to the poda-poda, opened the driver's door, slapped the driver (!), stole his Walkman-style CD player and then returned to the taxi.  At this point, the poda-poda driver got out, walked to the taxi, pulled the taxi-driver out, and then hit him back.  A slapping/punching/shirt-grabbing/choking fight ensued.  John and I could do nothing but lock our doors and watch!  A few passers-by joined in the mayhem when eventually a traffic cop appeared.  He took the poda-poda driver by the shirt, threw him back into the poda-poda, and motioned him along.  I'm pretty sure he didn't get the CD player back.  This is law enforcement in Africa.  This is Africa.  

Yesterday was also our first YAG day.  YAG (yttrium aluminum garnet) is a type of laser and is used to treat patients during their 6-week post-operation appointment after cataract extraction.  In non-scientific terms, the YAG treatment helps prevent the recurrence of the cataract.  YAG days mark the final appointment for a given patient, so it was fun to see some of the memorable patients from several weeks ago. 

 Looking back, these patients were nervous, scared, quiet, and sometimes even stone-cold on the day they arrived for surgery.  Now, six weeks later, they are laughing, smiling, shaking hands, and so thankful and happy with their results.  PTL.

Psalm 51:7-15 (from the Message, emphasis added)

   Soak me in your laundry and I'll come out clean,
      scrub me and I'll have a snow-white life.
   Tune me in to foot-tapping songs,
      set these once-broken bones to dancing.
   Don't look too close for blemishes,
      give me a clean bill of health.
   God, make a fresh start in me,
      shape a Genesis week from the chaos of my life.
   Don't throw me out with the trash,
      or fail to breathe holiness in me.
   Bring me back from gray exile,
      put a fresh wind in my sails! 
   Give me a job teaching rebels your ways
      so the lost can find their way home.
   Commute my death sentence, God, my salvation God,
      and I'll sing anthems to your life-giving ways.
   Unbutton my lips, dear God;
      I'll let loose with your praise.