Glimpses of our Lives

Recently we completed 7 months of service here in Sierra Leone.  It was time for stepping back, for reflection and planning.  And so it was appropriate that at the end of September we were visited by Michelle Harris, our director for Africa from UB Global.  She was here for encouragement, and to evaluate the work here, and then she was also the leader for a team retreat.  The team retreat was held at Cockle Point, a place on Number 2 River right on the beach close to Freetown.  Our ‘trusty’ Toyota 4 Runner provided transportation to the retreat for half of the team.  We have the word in quotes, because it seems on most trips, that it develops a problem. So far, it has never let us set!  This trip was no exception, as we started having the problem that was fixed before we started—that of a bulky fuel pump.  Loss of power and inability to ascend hills became more and more of a problem, so much so that close to Freetown, we called a mechanic friend. But it took him so long to get to us, that finally we called him back, and said that we would try to make it on to the retreat center.  The interesting thing is that the rest we gave the engine seemed to have cured the problem, as we never had any more trouble either going or coming back the 180 miles!  The last 15 miles were over roads that were so bad that anything worse would need prayer plus 4 wheel drive.  We were driving on slick bridges without sides over deep ravines and rivers, rocks and bumps that shook you to the core, and ruts that have been there for time immemorial.  But the beautiful setting was ideal for our team retreat! For the majority of the time there, we were the only guests.  A meeting room upstairs at the restaurant sufficed for our team time, and we had a gorgeous view of the mountains and the river all together.  It was a great team-building time as well as a time to bring us closer to God.

Highlights of the Retreat included times of recreation, playing games at night, swimming in the ocean, walks on the beach, boating, and Bible Study.  It was an excellent time of recharging and revitalizing, and showed us how it is possible to lose focus even while doing ministry.  

Richard & Cathy Toupin (see below), Matt (our engineer) and Lizzy, an engineer from the US
who joined us for 3 months and did an amazing job reorganizing some of our store rooms
and setting up systems.

The food was AMAZING! Like this stir-fried chicken with cashew nuts. We needed to put on some pounds and this definitely did the trick!

Our team was also given a boost by the presence of Richard and Cathy Toupin for 7 weeks, and they were also able to join us on our retreat.  They are former missionaries to Sierra Leone, and served here in the early 1990s before the war overtook the compound. He is a medical doctor, and she is a registered nurse.  They gave much needed expertise, particularly in surgery, and in help on the nursing stations.  We miss them now that they are no longer here, as it was nice to have someone to fall back on in an emergency.  Plus, because of their presence we were able to take a couple of nice breaks to go to Freetown, and we even braved the road to Bo again!

Richard & Cathy doing a C-section.

Our team with Michelle Harris.

It’s six weeks later now, but we still feel the impact of the retreat. Although life is often still a daily struggle, and some days we feel tempted to give up, we seek to stand united as a team and trust that God has a plan!

Below a few other glimpses of our lives!

We keep making attempts at raising chickens. This is their humble residence in our back yard. So far two chickens have been stolen, and two made a nest and started roosting elsewhere. We were also given a couple of roosters but they ended on our dinner plates!

Heleen keeps seeing victims of Gender Based Violence in her little office in the corner of the Pediatrics Ward. She is also working with some children with disabilities. 

And Jon keeps rounding the hospital, sometimes by himself, but often with a following. Recently he was able to help train three Community Health Officers who spent some time at our hospital. 

We have continued to go on evening walks - this is one of our favorite places to go!
It is a quiet place by the river side.

Eventful Week

As I was cleaning the dust away, I came across the little notebook that I use for my memory verses. I had been struggling with some fears recently, and decided to memorize Psalm 54:4 “Behold, God is my helper, the Lord is the upholder of my life.” When I read the verse again, I realized how true this verse had been to me in the past week. I will let Jon tell the story of what happened:

“Some time ago, someone at the hospital decided that there were too many big trees that could be dangerous if they fell down in the wrong spot.  So an effort was made to kill these trees by girdling the bark around them and then cutting them down when they died.  The same treatment had been given to a great tree that hung over our house, and yet a smarter head prevailed and they never cut that one down.  However, the thinking should have been done before the tree was girdled, as the tree was very strong and probably would have lasted for a long time yet.  We noticed that even though the tree still had green leaves, there were more and more limbs at the end of branches that were starting to die.

    We realized it would only be a matter of time before someone would have to cut it down.  But how to do that?  That was the big question.  I got an idea one day when I saw a tractor in town, and thought that perhaps we could rent the tractor, attach a chain that would be fastened to the top of the tree, and then by applying leverage, we could perhaps turn the tree away from the house.  I mentioned the idea to the hospital staff, and they promised to see if they could find the fellow with the chain saw, and check out the tractor possibility. 

   The next morning, a crew of 8 showed up at the house, with machetes, 2 axes, and a very long rope—no tractor or chainsaw.  This was not what we expected, so we went out to see what the plan was.  The plan was apparently quite fluid.  The first part involved sending one guy way up the tree and tying the rope to a limb.  The rope was not nearly high enough in the tree for laws of physics, which would tell us that the higher you go in the tree, the less force you would need to exert on it to affect its fall. 

Then discussion ensued.  Some wanted to cut one limb at a time, and lower it safely to the ground, using the rope.  Apparently, that plan was nixed as suddenly we heard axes hitting the trunk of the tree. 

We went out and tried to tell them that such a plan was foolhardy.  But they insisted that they knew what they were doing, and we have seen Sierra Leoneans do things that are impossible so many times, so we thought—“maybe they do have a special magic this time.”  But I hurried Heleen to get out of the house, even though they said it would be fine to stay.  We headed towards the hospital because we didn’t want to watch, but when a large tree hits a tin roof, you can hear it a long way away…and that is what happened in less than five minutes…The following pictures show some of the results…”

Looking at these pictures now, I realize the truth of the Scripture I memorized: ‘The Lord is the upholder of my life.” 

Immediately after the tree fell, people rallied together to remove the tree and all the debris. The rains held off and our belongings were safe overnight. The next day it seemed as if all the carpenters of Mattru were on top of our house! Within 10 hours, the rafters were built back and covered with tin. And 10 days later, the ceiling has been put in and painted, the electrical wiring and plumbing fixed, and the layers of dust removed. We are back in our home!

We realize that while God upholds our lives, it still means that one day - in His time - they will end, and this end came unexpectedly for hundreds of people in the capital Freetown. On Monday morning we were in Freetown ourselves as we had picked up Dr. Richard & Cathy Toupin, missionaries in Mattru just before the war, who came to help for a period of seven weeks. We woke up to heavy rains, but the building we stayed in was strong, and the streets free from flooding. So we got our umbrellas out and headed out to the Immigration Service to get residence permits for our colleagues. While we were out in town, the reports started coming in: a large landslide, mudslides, flooding, people drowning… We started hearing more and more sirens as ambulances drove on and off. At the same time, life seemed to go on as usual: we got the passports sorted, made some purchases, ate a sandwich. Meanwhile, only a few streets down from where we were, the mortuary of the government hospital filled up with hundreds of bodies of drowned men, women and children…

The next day we traveled back to Mattru and from a distance we saw the big chunk cut out of Sugarloaf Mountain.

Now we are home again. Through our friends in Freetown we are hearing stories: the man who went to the house of his foster children only to find that all ten members of the household had drowned… The pastor who lost 60 members of his church…

As we cleaned up our house it was hard to feel bad about the cracks, the scratches, the stains that cannot be removed. We have a safe and dry house and a bed to sleep in. God upheld our lives and we are grateful. Please remember this country and those who are mourning in your prayers.

Love,

Jon & Heleen

House Keeping in Mattru

Some of you may wonder how keeping house in Mattru compares to keeping house in Atmore! In this blog we will introduce you to some of the differences:

One of the main differences is of course the frequent absence of electricity. This is worse in the rainy season when our solar panels struggle to charge. But I (Heleen writing this time!) am not complaining - in Freetown I have gone for many more hours without electricity and it makes for nice romantic candle-lit dinners and early nights!

Headlights, Rechargeable Lights and Candles - always within reach!

It also means we don't have a fridge or freezer which I sometimes miss. However, our neighbours have one and every once in a while we use it to keep some leftovers. If not, there are always hungry mouths to feed around us!

Another difference is the water supply. The hospital has its own well and water is being pumped into the water tank several times a week. However, money for fuel to run the generator and pump is not always available so we have to be prepared at all times! There are buckets with water hidden under counters and sinks and in the bathroom we have a big container. When there is no water we take “bucket baths” while standing in a tub so afterwards the water can be used to flush the toilet! Of course we don’t have hot water which is fine in the hot, dry season, but in the rainy season we sometimes dread getting our bodies cleaned! So every once in a great while we boil some water on the stove and indulge in a nice warm “bath”.

Although the water from the well is relatively clean, we do have to filter it before drinking. Again, compared to Freetown we are much better off, since the water over there is so dirty that the filter gets clogged up frequently while here we can go for months without cleaning!

When I moved to Atmore I was so excited I got to own a dish washer for the first time in my life! But alas, it is back to doing dishes by hand, and here we even have to boil the water to get all the grease removed from our plates. Many dishes here are cooked with palm oil and it leaves a thick, orange film of grease on anything it touches. We use a bar of locally made soap called “72% soap”. We have no idea what the 72% stands for but it smells so good I wish I could ship some to America!

We are blessed with Kadi, a girl who comes in for a few hours three times a week to help clean and do laundry. She is very good at her job and it frees us up to do our work as everything here seems to get dirty a little faster and takes more effort to clean up! The main challenge in the rainy season is to get our things dry. It can take many days, sometimes up to a week, for clothes to be dry enough to wear again. At the height of the rainy season (July/August) nothing will ever be 100% dry and we have had to adjust our standards of freshness as we stick our noses in our clothes and towels to decide if they are fit to be used J

Culturally in Sierra Leone, you can never give your underwear to others to be washed, so we have to do that ourselves. Many years ago my missionary sister taught me the trick of using a plunger to give our undergarments a good scrub!

So far we have survived our stay without ironing any of our clothes, but since ironing will also help to get our clothes to dry, Jon fixed our charcoal iron today. I hope Kadi knows how light it because I don’t have a clue!

I will keep our cooking adventures for another time, but from Monday through Friday we are blessed to have this basket arrive on our doorstep every day around 1.00 pm. It holds two cute bowls with our rice and plasas (sauce) for the day. Thank you Yealie, for taking care of us!

Decorating and creating a “nest” has been a bit of a challenge but I am so happy with the large selection of fabrics with beautiful African prints on the local market. And hey, I read on a Dutch website that bright red, yellow and blue are expected to be the new trend in home decorating so we are setting a trend here!

Thanks to several donations we have on special occasions been able to treat ourselves to a real cup of coffee. It takes some extra effort but the result is worth it! However by now we have almost come to appreciate Nescafé just as much, so we are quite content with that! We can’t wait to have some of you join us for a cup some day!

Well, just before I completed this blog my dear husband came in with some Zinnias from our garden! Now we don’t only have candles but even flowers to grace our table!

We are grateful for a house that has become a home! Much love from both of us! 

Jon and Heleen

Joy & Lament

    In the space of two days, we had three maternity cases that brought to the forefront all kinds of positive and negative emotions.   Sierra Leone has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world, and for a lot of reasons, Bonthe district, our district, is at the bottom.  One of the main reasons is difficult access to care, plus only 2 hospitals to serve a population in the whole district of more than 200,000 people.  Bonthe district consists of an island, Sherbro Island, which is only reachable by boat ride of 1-2 hours, and many villages that are 4-5 hours away from the hospitals.  The current rainy season increases these numbers as boats and roads are unreliable.

 On Thursday evening, we had a lady referred from a neighboring PHU (peripheral health unit) who went into labor, and the umbilical cord of the baby had prolapsed.  Often when that occurs, the baby dies, but fortunately the cord still had pulsations which meant the baby's heart was still beating.  (The 2 umbilical arteries carry blood from the baby's heart into the placenta, where it receives oxygen from the mother, and then returns the blood to the baby via the umbilical vein--our bodies our fearfully and wonderfully made as the Bible says.) The treatment for this problem is relatively straight forward, unlike some of our medical decisions here--the pressure needs to be kept off of the cord, and a C-section needs to be done.  The best way to keep pressure off of the cord is to press up on the baby with a gloved hand while preparations are done.  I had a difficult time getting anyone to persist in this job. Although I had several nurse volunteers, no one seemed to get the idea of staying there, so eventually I assumed the position.  My hand and fingers all went to sleep, but I stayed put, while my capable assistants, Pa French and Michael Josiah actually did the C-section. Soon we had not just 1, but surprise! 2 babies crying healthily.  A success story that makes everyone feel good, since the possibilities initially were not good.

Jon and his team preparing for a C-section.

 Less than 24 hours later, a lady due to deliver was brought by ambulance from a village about 5 hours away with respiratory distress and she was having bloody, frothy sputum.  This is a sign of pulmonary edema, or fluid in the lungs.  She had a very low oxygen level, and was unconscious due to that.  Her blood pressure was extremely high, so with our limited equipment (no xray, but it is coming, PTL!) we felt that she had pre-eclampsia (high blood pressure during pregnancy, or toxemia) with resultant pulmonary edema--a rare complication of untreated pre-eclampsia.  Once again, the decision to proceed to C-section was made, but this time before the patient could be transferred to the operating table, she went into cardiorespiratory arrest.  In an effort to save the infant, we did surgery right there, and although the baby was pulled out in no time while doctors and others were performing CPR and resuscitative measures, we were unsuccessful in saving either one.  As I went to talk to the father to tell him that his firstborn and wife had perished, this stoical father burst into tears.  To see an man cry in Africa is quite soul wrenching, and my heart and soul were crying with him.  

   The same day, a lady with term pregnancy was laboring, and although the labor was proceeding slowly, she was making progress.  I checked her with ultrasound in the afternoon (to rule out twin pregnancy which was a question) and saw the heartbeat of the baby, strong and reassuring. She was making progress, so a couple of hours later, I popped into the labor room. No nurse was present but I saw the mother of the laboring patient holding a baby in her arms, and felt that wave of relief that everything had come out okay.  That is, until the mother brought the baby to me and said, "Bebi don day" (The baby has died) with sorrow in her voice, and I looked at a perfectly formed stillborn child.  Once again, that thud of weight landing at the bottom of the stomach, and the questions came, "What happened?"  No answers from the nurse--an unexplained happening here in Africa..

   Laments from the Psalms speak to the despair I felt, "How long O Lord?", and " Will he never again be kind?  Is his unfailing love gone forever?  Have his promises permanently failed? Has God forgotten to be gracious?  Has he slammed the door on his compassion? But then I recall all you have done, O LORD;  I remember your wonderful deeds of long ago.  They are constantly in my thoughts.  I cannot stop thinking about your mighty works.  O God, your ways are holy.  Is there any god as mighty as you?  You are the God of great wonders!  You demonstrate your awesome power among the nation." (verses from Psalm 77) In this hope we go forward....

A little baby girl who arrived safely.

Our town

This blog is about our town in southern Sierra Leone.  The population is uncertain, and the surrounding villages rather obscure, but it is where we live and we think introductions are in order! Mattru Jong is on the Jong River, and is a town that is featured prominently in the book, A Long Way Home, a story written about the war of 1991-2002 from the perspective of a local participant, Ishmael Beah.  
  The main road is Bo Road, which traverses the 45 miles to Bo, the 2nd largest city in Sierra Leone.  The road is paved for about 1/2 mile. It is in very poor repair, and if you want to be sane, you will take about 4 hours to get to Bo in a vehicle.  Other than Bo road, the roads of Mattru are unpaved, and treacherous in the rainy season. There are all kinds of little shops and enterprises that line the road.  Everyone has some kind of enterprise to make a bit more money.  There are tailors, carpenters, money changers, hardware stores, even a tiny restaurant with one table--which by the way, makes very delicious food and serves it in a dainty way.  However, those wanting non-Sierra Leonean food here need not apply...There is a market, government offices, several mosques, a Catholic church, and a few small churches.  

    We often take walks through the town, usually on the less traveled paths and lanes.  If you do that, you need to be ready for the children to incessantly call out "Hello" or "Pumoi", which means white person.  Answering the Hello with any kind of greeting does not stop the Hellos, or for that matter the Pumois.  The average child says Hello 12-15 times before the urge to greet is gone and there are on average 10 children at a household area, so go figure. We have been able to teach a few children to say Bye-bye, and that seems to stop it 😊 In between the houses, we enjoy looking at all the nice gardens, loaded with similar things--potato leaf (white sweet potatoes), peanuts, corn, okra, egg plant, and hot peppers. 

   Thursday is the big market day. There are multiple stalls going all the way down to the river where people sell their wares.  Heleen is always remarking how everyone sells exactly the same things, and that is true.  It seems like that each one would find a niche, but that is not necessary, apparently...You can buy fish, sometimes oysters, and crabs, since we are in a coastal area.  There are some things that you need the bigger city for, but we have been surprised how much we have been able to purchase locally....But let's stop talking, and take you on a tour!

This is one of the main intersections in town, close to the hospital. 

The DHMT building, which stands for District Health Management Team.  They provide statistic gathering, and support for the medical work done in the community, and is a governmental agency. The building also houses the Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children's Affairs, where Heleen sometimes attends meetings.

Mattru Jong is the distict capital and therefore houses the District Council.

Here is the local cabinet shop, with two employees hard at work.  Although it looks primitive, they turn out surprisingly nice furniture, anything from sofas, to stuffed chairs or tables,
or whatever you order. We are the recipients of some nice furniture from this shop.

Our cabinet shop is not too far from our tailor.  Tailors in Sierra Leone are almost always men, and mostly use the old Singer sewing machines with the pedals for power.  However, at the drop of a hat, and with only a few measurements, they can turn out fine clothes, curtains, pillow cases, etc.

Here is the Fleming United Brethren in Christ Church, where we attend most Sundays.  The pastor there is Reverend Gbando, who is also our hospital administrator.  This church is situated on the hospital compound, so is within walking distance for us (as are most places in town).

Market Day in Mattru is on a street which leads down to the River.  Here people congregate in great numbers on Thursday, but also every day of the week except Sunday for selling their wares. 

Perhaps you are in the market to buy fish or chicken feet. Usually you will be in luck.  

These children sell only onions in different sizes. 
Each little heap represents about 20 cents (US money).

This market area still shows the partially destroyed police station in the background.  It was destroyed during the war, but now functions somewhat as a warehouse and storage...

The one bank in town, and where we have occasionally gotten wired money.  This is not a task for the person with limited time, as it usually requires a long (up to three hours) wait.  

(Not unusual for Sierra Leone)

The one gas station in town fuels a lot more okadas (motorcycles) than cars, but it would be the only one for many miles.

A larger store where we can get milk powder, toilet paper, soap, etc.

One of the roads we walk on in the evenings...

Everywhere are gardens.... The laundry, sometimes spread on the ground, sometimes hanging on lines or bamboo sticks, takes many days to dry in the rainy season.

We have several contacts with Fula people in town. They are usually devout Muslims and often traders. At this store we often buy bread. These children are just coming back from fetching water.

We are very proud of these children living by the store, who no longer call us "Pumoi",
but Aunty Helen and Docta Jon! 

Thanks for coming with us on a little tour! Next time we will tell you more about what has kept us busy over the past few weeks!