Zambia 2014 Day 7

We started the day earlier today. We woke up a bit after 5:00am to drive west of where we rest. We first visited a school for orphans.
Most kids lost both parents to AIDS. There are 300+ children attending this school from grade "0" to grade 9. They are planning to extend up to grade 12 with the current oldest students. All kids receive a breakfast and a lunch at school but don't have a shelter. Some sleep in a nearby church, others sleep wherever they find a place. Most don't have dinner. Our team gave the school some toys and  supply. Melissa and Linda who have known John and Luke, school headmaster and teacher, for many years were happy to connect once more. You can't imagine how happy Zambians are to see them again. There was a special gift to the team. The school nurse happened to be in charge of the
Traditional Birth Attendants. She is going to work on getting people for an HBB class next year. Plus, when we come back, we may be able to give all kids a physical exam and address other medical needs they have.

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After that blessing, we travelled back to a little village to run an HBB class. We had no cue what to expect. There were a bunch of kids and people to great us. We met the nurse who was running the clinic
and she asked us to see some people. The word quickly spread to the surrounding huts that there was a group of Muzungu (white people) doing some medical exam and teaching midwives and TBA. Once more our
amazing team split up in small groups to do a task. I was suppose to give a talk on menstrual cycle, pregnancy and menopause, but all the villagers were with my colleagues. I went to see the kids. We had fun with me trying to pronounce their name.

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They also had fun pulling all the hair from my body! Sense of duty called me back and I went to see my colleagues Andy and Robin doing physical exams. Although they saw some problems that could be fixed, we couldn't offer that much to all the adults that came to see us. On the other hand, they seemed to be very happy to talk to us. Some shook our hands forever to thank us! We had so many hugs! I asked my colleagues if I could help them doing the physical, but we were clearly limited by the lack of  interpreters. I moved to next room
where Linda and Beckie were trying on reading glasses with the senior people. You have no idea how these people were happy to be able to see close or to read again. They were full of joy. One man came to me and
said he war far sighted. By chance we also had some prescription glasses donated to us and he was able to find something that made
things clearer to him.

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Although Linda and Beckie were extremely busy, I couldn't help them much. At the end of afternoon, 72 glasses were enjoying their new life on an African nose. I then went to see how Melissa, Amy, Jen and Betsy were dealing with the HBB lesson. Initially there were only three
women but after a little while it was pretty crowded in that little room. 11 certificates were given to amazing learners. They quickly got the hang of it. There was no room for me to squeeze in so I went back to see those kids. Kathi was still playing with her camera and the
kids. They loved her so much. I asked Leonard, our main contact down here to help me triage all kids. We made 4 queues. One for the kidswith no complaints. one for the toothache, one for the ear pain, one for the abdominal pain and one for the other complaints. I browsed around with my otoscope to look all the ears and mouth needed to be seen and wrote the kids' name on a paper and what could be done to help them.


We were finally able to reunite with the rest of the group who were waiting along the roadside trying to convince the vendors that they did not need any fruits and vegetables!
We made it the rest of the way to our lodge in Choma uneventfully. Praise God!  After a round of musical rooms / roommates we were able to retire to our air conditioned rooms to stretch our cramped muscles. We learned that we do need to trust our difficulties to the Lord and
he will see us through!

We then looked at the aching tommies and the other issues.The clinic is going to follow up with a dentist or the proper medication as needed, hopefully. Then it was time to wrap up. Leonard made the children dance and sign and laugh. We waved them good bye and came
back to King's highway, where we lodge for a last night. Once more today, our path got drawn as we were experiencing it. We had no control and had to let it go. This is obviously nothing compared to those who don't even know if they are going to eat but this was a wonderful experience.

Marc for the team