Chaos + 104 = Love: Day 4

Today, I was away for a chunk of the day. Thursday’s are our Ladies’ Bible Study at Sean’s and my house. We’re doing a Beth Moore bible study titled Beloved Disciple. It’s based on John. It’s REALLY good.

Anyway, even though I was away for part of the day, I can still talk about what happened today.

Update on Melissa: Oh the joys of Kenyan hospitals, especially the public ones, and the doctors. Originally Melissa’s eye surgery was scheduled for Wednesday but then somewhere along the way, the doctor realized that it was a holiday (the end of Ramadan) and therefore wasn’t coming in. Thankfully we found that out before she went in and got admitted on the Tuesday. But the doctor told us to bring her on Wednesday, have her admitted, so that they could do the surgery first thing this morning (Thursday).  So this morning, we find out that the doctor, who told her to come and be admitted so he could do the surgery today, took off to Nairobi this morning. He didn’t bother to tell us. So another doctor said that he would be able to perform the surgery but then realized that the hospital didn’t have “sutures numbers eighty” so he couldn’t do the surgery. Eliud (a staff at In Step) went around town to see if he could find these “sutures number eighty” so that the doctor could perform his surgery. Unfortunately Eliud couldn’t find any and neither could the doctor.

Long story short.....Melissa is SUPPOSED to have her surgery tomorrow morning.

If it doesn’t happen, we will get her out of the hospital tomorrow and arrange for next week. They usually don’t do surgeries (unless emergency) during the weekends and Melissa and Hoglah will have already spent two nights in the hospital unnecessarily; they don’t need to be there all weekend either.

So please pray that the surgery does happen, sooner rather than later.

Yesterday, Sean found a rat in the storage area and he had mentioned to the older boys he had seen one. Well, this put the older boys in a rat hunting mood. This morning, the boys were knocking on our bedroom door, “Baba Sean, Baba Sean. Can we go and kill the rats now?” Sean had them wait until the cleaners had finished cleaning and the floors were dry. In between the first knock and the time Sean gave them the go-ahead, there were two more knocks on the door, “The cleaning ladies are almost done. Can we go kill them now?” or “The cleaning ladies are done. Can we go now?” and then the go-ahead, “The floor is dry. Can we go NOW?”

I must mention that one of the reasons the boys like killing rats is because for every rat they kill, they get ten shillings (about 11 cents). The other reason, I believe, is because boys are boys and there is the “warrior” in each of them.

So right away, Bafo found ten baby rats nuzzled in a medical bottle (like the ones used to collect urine). Gross; in a medical bin!  They found a big rat (probably the mom of the babies) but with all the stuff in the storage, it was able to sneak away. The boys are determined to get it though. Maybe tomorrow?? We’ll see how many knocks we have on our door tomorrow.

There were four children that went to the clinic today:  the first had a boil on his leg, the second one was getting her second injection for her diaper rash, the third and fourth were diagnosed with malaria.

It may seem like a lot of children going to the clinic but in the overall picture, there have been just a few in the past few days (not every day) and out of 104 children, it’s not that bad at all.

After the younger kids went to bed, Sean and I got together with the older children. Sean read them the first two chapters of Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew. They were very excited about it. We’re hoping that we’ll be able to do that with them a few nights a week. This will help us to build a relationship with them, where we can discuss things, whether it be personal or every day sort of stuff and to just spend time with them.

The power is not working right out here at this time (has been this way for about five hours); it didn’t rain so who knows why. And we can’t find out why because the phone network isn’t working for us to call them. The power seems to have low voltage in some areas. Only a few of our lights work in the house; for example, the hallway works and where the children are all sleeping; our bathroom light works but our bedroom light doesn’t. And no, it’s not that the bulb is out.  J And no, Genny hasn’t arrived yet. L

Well, it’s getting late. Miss Cindy Lou is curled up beside me on the bed, telling me that it is almost feeding time and then bed time. Actually Sean just sneezed; Cindy Lou jumped and now she’s crying.  Sean’s consoling her; he’s afraid she’ll be afraid of him now. I don’t think that’ll happen.  He’s such a gentle giant that people love him way too much. And now she’s talking his ear off; she’s forgiven him.

Sean’s happy.

And so am I.

Good night everyone.

Much love,

Meredith