Sterilizing Department

Thank you, everyone, for your prayers for my Central Service Technician certification exam. The test went perfectly, inspite of all our anxiety over the internet not working properly. As many of you may already know, I passed! and I am so relieved that it's all over with.

On that note, here's a quick tour of the sterilizing department here on the Africa Mercy.

Central Sterile Supply (one of our many departmental titles) The hub of the hospital.

Autoclaves! Yes, I've burned myself already. Apparently that was my "initiation" in the sterilizing field.

The assembly table.

Assembling sets on the assembly table.

Decontamination area. Avec PPE

Orphanage Visit

Last Saturday I spent most of the day with some friends at an orphanage that is run by one of the day workers and his wife. We caught a bus from Freetown to Waterloo, and then when we disembarked from that, we were told that we had to get motorcycles to get out to the village where the orphanage was. I was super excited, since I had wanted to ride one for a while now! It was a lot of fun and yet terrifying all at the same time. Just imagine riding a motorcycle or dirt bike back home with someone that you don’t know driving and no helmet. You just try not to think about it too much, and enjoy yourself.

When we got to the orphanage, the children immediately came up and greeted us. They shook our hands and asked our names and told us theirs. They were all very sweet and outgoing! The day worker who works with Mercy Ships took us on a tour of the house where the children stayed, the garden, and the pig pen. As an extra source of income, the children help to raise pigs either for private slaughtering or to sell, and they must have had about eighteen. When asked why he didn’t have goats as well, the man said that pigs were harder to steal.

They insisted on preparing us lunch there, and while we waited for them to cook the meal (outdoors over open fires) we taught the children some American games. We played “red light, green light,” “duck, duck, goose,” and a few others. Then, once we were pretty well worn out from that, we sat on the porch and one member of our group made them all balloon animals. The kids loved it, but they especially had a great time when the balloons began popping. We also teamed up and played a game of soccer before lunch.

At one point, I was just sitting on the porch listening to some of the others talking, and the little boy next to me suddenly started rubbing my arm very lightly. When I looked at him, he began to grin, and he rubbed my arm again and rubbed his own head. He was feeling the difference between the hair on my arm and the hair on his head. Most people around here don’t actually have hair on their arms and legs. It was just really cute to watch him figuring it out.

When it was time for us to leave, we walked on a path through the “bush.” We had to go through a rice field and through a lot of thick undergrowth. At one point, my friends in front of me started shouting for me and the people behind to run as fast as we could through one section of the trail. I wasn’t sure why until I looked down and saw that the entire path was covered in ants; the big kind that really, really hurt when they bite. When we came out into one of the villages, the children would all point or wave and they would all be yelling the same thing. I wasn’t sure if what they were saying was a greeting or something else, so I asked a friend and they told me that the word meant “white people.”

The trip home was fortunately uneventful, and we were able to get a nice big van to ride in back to the ship! It was a great day, and I was only mildly sunburned afterwards which was a blessing.

Local Church Service

Last Sunday, I was able to attend a local church in the next town over from Freetown. A few of the day volunteers met us on the gangway, and we took a public bus to Waterloo, and then had to hike up this huge hill in order to get to the church. (I found out later that the muddy red soil here doesn’t wash out of anything very easily.)

We got there just in time for Sunday school. The different classes were all spread around and inside of the church, and ours was right outside of the side door. We sat in plastic chairs and listened to the teacher, very thankful that it was such a beautiful morning. The breeze was blowing, and we got a chance to recover from our long hike.

I will admit that I was pretty certain that I would be overwhelmed by the worship service, and I wasn’t disappointed. We joked later that not only were these people charismatic, but they were African charismatic! Which is a whole other level completely. It was really great though. They had a full band with drums, guitar, bass, keyboard, and trumpet, and a choir. One of the day volunteers who I work with in Sterilizing, lead the choir, so it was fun to get to see and hear him sing. Before the service started, the pastor asked everybody who was there from Mercy Ships to stand up and tell the congregation what their names were and where we were from. They were so excited to have us there! The actual service was very interesting; half of it was in “English” and the other half was Krio. We understood well enough though to get the bulk of the message. The pastor preached on I Corinthians 4:1-2. “Let a man regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. In this case, moreover, it is required of stewards that one be found trustworthy.” The message was to encourage those in positions of leadership to be trustworthy. It was really good, what we understood of it!

Afterwards we were able to meet the pastor and his wife, and the rest of the congregation greeted us as well. Unfortunately, we couldn’t stay very long since some of the nurses had to be back to work by 2:00p.m. But it was fantastic to be able to get out and see how the Sierra Leones worship. They’re so eager and exuberant for Christ! Very refreshing, but I’m not sure that I’m ready to go two weeks in a row yet. Haha! It was a really incredible experience!

"...Nothing you do for Him is a waste of time..."

Now that it’s the weekend, I’ll try to give you an idea of what my weeks are like. I apologize for the lack of posts, but my work weeks here just seem to fly by in a blur. I'm also going to actually take some pictures around the ship this week, now that I've got a better handle on everything; not feeling quite so lost on board anymore.

This last week, I’ve been working in the OR Sterilizing Department every day from 2:30p.m. until whenever we are done. Sometimes, it can run as late as midnight, since it takes so long to put a load through the whole process. Next week I’ll be opening however, and I’ll be there from 8:00a.m. until about 5:00p.m.. The items are brought to us and we have to clean the ones with visible debris on them by hand, then all of the instruments are run through a high-tech “dishwasher,” and once they come out of there, we have to sort all of the kits to make sure that the sets are complete, then wrap them in a special kind of cloth, and put them through the autoclaves. I have SO much still to learn in the Sterilizing room, but I’m catching on fairly quickly. I can now assemble some of the trays without looking at the picture book to identify the instruments!

Unfortunately, we’re pretty isolated back there in the sterilizing room, so I don’t get to meet any patients, but the day volunteers love to hang out in there, so I’ve been connecting with the local people through them. One of them has invited me and several others from the OR to attend his church this Sunday, and I hear that the African churches are quite an experience! One of the day volunteers who works in the Sterilizing department with me, has been trying to teach me some of the Sierra Leone language, Krio. It’s a strange mixture of local dialect mixed with French and English. Some of the phrases I've learned so far are: wassae you de go? (Where are you going?), na me name, Laura (my name is Laura), how di bodi? (How are you?), and ah de go na ose (I'm going to the house).

One very neat opportunity that arose from working in the sterilizing department is that I will be able to leave here a fully certified Central Service Technician (a.k.a. Certified Sterilizer). The day after I arrived on board the ship, one of the other sterilizers began telling me about how the two supervisors in the sterilizing department were just about to take their own tests, and that I was welcome to sit in on their study period later that day. When there, I had to opportunity to meet a local nurse who worked in the sterilizing department of her hospital, and while they studied, they were talking to this nurse about conditions in her sterilizing room. It was unbelievable to hear the conditions there; basically, they were just soaking the instruments in bleach water without even having the resources to scrub them off. The nurse talked about how she had started doing the same course that we are currently in, but she stopped because the information was just useless to her without the proper supplies to work with. It’s so heartbreaking that this hospital doesn’t even have brushes to clean their instruments with. The sterilizer who was teaching this course wants to start working with hospitals like this to teach them better techniques and help them acquire better resources.

Yesterday marked the end of the first week of course work! Another sterilizer and I are doing the program together, and we’ve got the schedule worked out to take the exam before our instructor has to leave in mid-November. It’s really been very cool how God presented this opportunity to me right away. I’ve definitely been able to reevaluate my plans since being here in a hospital setting, and this sterilizing position is very appealing to me. Not to mention, it’s an international certification, which is probably the most exciting part to me!

When I arrived here on the ship, I was given a brochure to help familiarize myself with ships schedule, ect. There were several verses throughout it in the margins, but one really stood out to me. “Don’t hold yourself back. Throw yourself into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for Him is a waste of time or effort” I Corinthians 15:58. I’ve been trying to apply this every day down here, and I have not been disappointed. Everything that I’ve been involved with here—every opportunity, every open door, everyone that I’ve met—has been teaching me the truth behind this particular promise of God. Of course, I’ve known this concept from a very young age, but never have my eyes been more opened to it than through this outreach. Nothing here has been a waste of my time. Even during recreational activities, I’ve been able to engage with people who make it worthwhile and who encourage me to know God better. I kind of dread coming back home and having to return to a work environment where everyone isn’t happy to be there. Being with people who are passionate about what they’re doing, and who are here because they want to be and because they’ve felt God’s calling in their lives is just so absolutely refreshing. I hope to never forget the importance of saying “thank you.”

Beach Weekend

Oct. 6, 7, 8

On Friday some friends and I hired a taxi to take us to Sussex Beach for the weekend. Since it was a ship holiday, we had no program reporting times on Friday which gave us a three-day weekend to enjoy! The ride to the beach was fairly smooth, but it was down pouring the whole time. The roads weren’t paved and the rain had washed away huge potholes, and we had a couple of slippery slopes to make our way up as we moved away from the city and further along the coast. It took us about three hours to get there in those conditions.

Thankfully, by the time we got to our resort, the weather had cleared up, and we spent a wonderful evening there. The beach was located across a large, flat tidal area and behind a ridge of dunes. We thought we might try to see if we could walk out there when we arrived, but since the tide was coming in, we would have had to swim for it. We had dinner outside at the restaurant that was attached to the resort. It was all Italian food, and pretty good! For those of you who have never ordered food in Africa, there is a lot of “No, we don’t have that….We don’t have that either.” The safest thing to do is just to ask them straight up what they have that evening. It’s very entertaining sometimes. While we were eating, the generator shut down and they had to bring us a candle until they were able to get it working again.

The next morning, we awoke to the sounds of roosters crowing, and some fishermen outside of our window repairing a boat as our alarm clock. After breakfast, we started to head out to the beach. While we were walking out across the flat area, eight or so boys—all about ten years old—ran out to meet us. They said, “The way you are going, the water gets too deep. We will show you a better way to cross.” And they took us on a route that bypassed the deeper areas of water and followed us all the way down to the beach to play in the water while we read our books and enjoyed the sun.

After an hour or so, it began to rain, so we took our things back to our room and then set out for a walk down the beach. It was raining very hard at this point, but the rain here is so warm that you hardly notice at all. We passed a couple groups of fishermen who were pulling in their nets; that was interesting to watch! One man goes out in the water to get the rope, then men and boys of all ages pull the nets in, chanting as they do so. We didn’t actually get to see them retrieve a net, but it was still fascinating. We made our way back to the resort after maybe an hour or so, and we were joined by one of the fishermen who was going the same way as us. He told us about his family, and how his son loved to talk to the “white people.” He may have been one of the boys who was following us earlier!

When we arrived back on our beach, we found the other two “Mercy-Shippers”—as we call each other—who had come a day later than us to join us. We all hiked back to the resort so they could drop off their backpacks, and when we got there, the staff informed us that we did not, in fact, have a room there that night. There had been a mix-up over the phone, and they had given our room to another party. They were very kind though and helped us to find another place to stay nearby, and they even drove us there.

We relocated to River Number Two, and were pleased with the quality of the rooms there. We all immediately ran down to the water, which was about a hundred yards from our front door. It was raining again, but in spite of that, we had a great time cutting loose, and expending some of the energy that we had pent us after a few weeks on the ship. It didn’t take long for the storm to clear, and we spent a lot of time in the water. The sea was warm enough to feel like bathwater. The currents were extremely strong, but since it was so shallow—even far out in the surf—that wasn’t a big concern. After exhausting ourselves pretty well, we came back and settled dinner plans with the staff. While we were taking turns cleaning up for dinner, some of the girls began talking to a woman who was staying a few doors down from us. They invited her to join us on the beach for our meal.

She told us that she was an American with Unicef (if I remember correctly) and that she was an educational evaluator of some kind. Once we had explained to her what Mercy Ships was, and what we were all doing there, she began to tell us the history of the resort at River Number Two. During the course of her narrative, she told us that the manager of the resort was her boyfriend, and before she could tell us how they had met, he came down the beach and joined us. He then told us all about how the community in that area, at the time of the war, had tried to start a business of some kind that would benefit the community as a whole. He told us that they had had to bury all of the cutlery in the sand to protect it, and they had to send all of the women and children to nearby Banana Island to keep them safe from the so-called “peace-keeping” soldiers. The really great thing about this resort though is that everything goes back into the community. The community owns the resort, and because of the income that it creates, they were able to get a well and pump for the village, and a generator for electricity. A group of German workers even came through and installed solar panels with the capability to move to follow the sun. Also, not only do they take care of themselves, but they’ve taken in nearby amputees as well, and some of them are even employed at the resort.

Once he had finished telling us this, the resort manager told us that they were going to be playing Sierra Leone music at the bar and we should come listen. The bar was a circular hut, large in size, with plenty of floor space. Everybody was dancing, and some of us even joined in. You can imagine how comical that was! It was one of those moments though where I knew if I didn’t do it, I would regret it forever. It was loads of fun, and the perfect ending to our day. I finish up this entry as I sit outside our room on the porch railing, the waves crashing so close by, and a little ways down the beach, Sierra Leone music pulsing loudly. I am so grateful for the gift of this weekend. God has taken an event that was out of our control and made it into something utterly beautiful.

Sunday morning, we had breakfast on the beach, right above the water line, then some of the girl went back into the water while we waiting for our taxi to arrive. The taxi—a Mercedes Benz that looked as though it was from the 1970’s—then took us to Bureh Beach, another hour or so away. The roads there were even worse, with huge puddles in some sections of the road. Fortunately though we did not get stuck once! At one point, we were stopped by the police who had a barrier across the road. One of the girls sort of knew what was going on, but we all got kind of nervous when they made the drive leave the car and go into a hut next to the road. Luckily, they had just stopped us because there were two of us in the front seat, and the driver had to pay a fine. It’s really just a ploy by the police here to make money for themselves. We made it to the beach without further problems, and had a great time there. It rained again, but we fortunately had a hut to stand under until it passed. We left there about four-thirty; we had paid our taxi driver to wait for us.

When we were about forty-five minutes from the ship, in Waterloo, the taxi broke down. The driver flagged us down a public bus, which here is basically a large minivan with as many seats crammed into as possible. It stops just long enough for people to cram themselves in, and then slows down just long enough for them to jump out at their stop. Sometimes, when it’s only one person, they don’t even stop the vehicle; they just jump off while it’s moving.

We got back to the ship just after dinner, but we had fortunately been able to get a hold of someone’s roommate to fix us up some plates of food. We ate quickly, and then, sandy and wet, relaxed for the evening. After all that, there only remains one thing to be said; T.I.A. You never know what’s going to happen next. They say “hurry up and wait” in the military, but here, it’s just “wait.” Wait and see what happens next.

Getting to the Ship!

Well, I'm at the end of my first day here on Africa Mercy! I'm pretty tired though, so I'm just going to cover the trip here right now and fill in the rest later.

So, everything began around 7:30a.m. when I got up and placed an emergency call to the local computer repair shop to try to get my internet up and running by 9:30a.m. Fortunately, it was an easy fix and my netbook was ready in plenty of time. Ran into a little bit of trouble waiting for the Fedex truck to arrive with the shunt kit, and that adventure ended with us calling the company and managing to track down the courier so he could meet us in town with the package. We got off just in the nick of time to make it to D.C. on schedule. Once there, we got the Dulles Int'nl Airport, checked my baggage, and I said good bye to my family. (Mom did very well, not crying until the last minute. Hehe...)

All the flights went incredibly smoothly. I met up with one other volunteer in Dulles, and the other five or six were all on the flight from Brussels. We had a quick stop in Banjul, Gambia--giving me my first glimpse of Africa up close--to let off most of the passengers, and then the rest of us went on to Lungi International Airport. Once there, we met with the Mercy Ships drivers who loaded all of our luggage and us into two cars. Fortunately I was somewhat expecting the road and driving conditions over here, but it was still incredible to experience just how chaotic it really is; people walking in the road, cars swerving around eachother, and motorcycles weaving in and out of it all. And I thought Paris was bad! Funny thing was though, our driver was surprised a little bit when one of our group asked him if he'd ever hit anyone.

We made it to the ferry and enjoyed the sunset from out on deck. The ride was a long one, but it was relaxing after long, cramped airline flights to feel the breeze and walk around. The pictures, lower, were taken from the ferry. The first one looks towards the ship, which you can barely see, and the second is looking back at where we'd just driven through. Once we reached the other side we took our gear to the waiting Mercy Ships Land Rovers. More chaos ensued as waiting vehicles were trying to leave with their newly arrived passengers, and the vehicles on the ferry were unloading and trying to get out of the small parking area themselves. One large dumptruck came a few inches from squishing me against the Land Rover, but fortunately stopped in time. Somehow these drivers manage to always come inches from disaster and yet avoid it! All of this was going on after dark, of course, and there were a group of men all sitting in plastic lawn chairs who I swear were just there to watch the excitement. The trip through Freetown to the ship went very well. The streets were crowded and all, but we didn't get caught in traffic once, so we made it to the docks in record time.

Once we got on the ship we began the process of getting our paperwork and badges taken care of. Almost immediately the nurse who had called me to ask if I could bring the shunt found me and she went and got the doctor to recieve the packages. I passed them on to him, and he said that three days was record time and the he had discovered the equivalent to FedEx over here was a man on a bicycle with a basket behind him to carry the packages. About halfway through getting a meal and finishing the paperwork, a photographer came up and asked if I would pose for some pictures with the doctor, so I went and reenacted the transfer again.

One of my roomates met me when I arrived, and when I got down to my quarters, I wanted nothing more than to collapse on my bed. After doing the math, I'd figured out that I'd been about forty hours without sleep since I am terrible at sleeping during travel. However, once I got my bag opened, I discovered that a plastic Ziploc bag had gotten crushed during transit, and the top layer of my clothes smelled like Bath & Body Works' Paris Amour and Proactive revitalizing toner. Fortunately the former was fine as well as some of the other liquids in there. It meant, though, that I had to unpack everything before going to bed and sort out the soiled clothes.

All and all though, it was a great trip!

"I'm leaving on a jet plane.."

Well, it's finally here; tomorrow I leave Dulles Airport at 6:00p.m. bound for Sierra Leone! I am so extremely excited for this opportunity! There is no doubt in my mind that this is exactly where God would have me be at this time in my life.

I'm looking forward to my trip, but feeling pretty nervous right now, as I will be responsible for carrying a shunt for a 9 month old boy who needs it as soon as I arrive. Please be praying that the package arrives here at my house by 10:30a.m. from FedEx! and also that there are no travel complications that would postpone my arrival.

Thanks again to everyone for your overwhelming support, and for your wonderful prayers. I really feel so incredibly blessed by my friends and family right now!

THANK YOU!!

I just wanted to give a big shout out of thanks to everyone who has been praying for me and also those who donated. I now have OVER the amount of funds that I needed to raise! This is such a blessing, since my medical costs ended up costing a couple hundred dollars more than I had budgeted for.


Also, another note, we have the go ahead on a Zumba Fitness fundraiser at the Altavista YMCA September 10th from 2:00p.m. until 4:00p.m. My sister, Caitlin--who is now a certified Zumba instructor--will be hosting it! Hope you can join us!

Although, I have raised enough for this trip, any excess funds will be kept in my name for a period of eighteen months, so I can reapply to go again in that time frame!

Fundraising Effort

I just wanted to post a great big THANK YOU to all the people who have donated thus far. As of today I have 30% of my $3550 raised. This is such a blessing to me and to the Stateside portion of my journey!

It has been such a blessing to see such an outpouring of support from my friends and family. Be sure to keep my in your prayers as there's still quite a ways to go!

Thanks again!

Ouch...

Today marks the end of all the needle pricks necessary. I still have three more typhoid pills to go, and they also gave me this super-huge bottle of bright green pills so I don't get Malaria. How thoughtful...

Thus far I've survived without a paper cut.

In the midst of preparing support letters. Fortunately, there is such an invention as adhesive seal envelopes.