Realities

Due to our lack of frequent internet access here in Dodoma, updates and e-mails have not been flying. Right now I'm in the health office of my sister, Jo's, church. She is working here in Dodoma with MCC, doing home-based care facilitation for people with HIV/AIDS.

We've been here for about two weeks now, and head to another language school in Lushoto on Sunday. While we've been here, Kurt has done some research on a potential water development project, I've been able to accompany Jo on a couple of home visits, and we've had some down-time to spend with Ben and get to know Johanna's life here.

Johanna is a local. She lives with two Tanzanian friends and her Swahili makes mine embarrassing. They just moved into a house three weeks ago, and have had non-stop company since. Her roommates, Vero and Janet, have shown us exemplary hospitality and helped us use our Swahili a lot (they don't speak much English). We have enjoyed cups of chai and swinging in the hammock on Jo's porch, eating rice and beans, watching sunsets and getting eaten alive by mosquitoes.

Because of those same mosquitoes, Kurt and Ben were both diagnosed with malaria last weekend. Ben's temp spiked to 40.5 on Sunday night and we, with Jo's help as well as her pastor and pastor's wife, managed to find a dispensary open on a Sunday night that could test Ben. He had been negative that morning (I had suspected something was off), but I guess it just took some time for the little protozoa to spread enough to test positive. Anyway, he was quite positive this time. Then Amos and Esther (pastors) led us to another pharmacy that had all the medicine we could have asked for. We were so blessed to have people who cared with us and who helped us navigate our way through Dodoma and get the help we needed. The whole thing was a lesson in faith and trust for me. I even let a stranger give Ben a shot in the rear. Which helped a ton and within 20 minutes he was perky again. It had been quite scary for awhile to watch Ben burning up and acting so lethargic.

Anyway, four days later and my family seems to have recovered. We are thankful and feel like locals now. What with malaria and eating dried fish, what else do we need to learn?

Some other realities have hit me as I have gone on a couple of home visits. I knew they would hit but still felt unprepared when they did. We went to see a woman in Jo's program who was quite sick. We pulled up to her home, made of mud walls, greeted everyone, and then sat down to talk and figure out what was going on. I can't give all the details, but I know I witnessed suffering that I will never be able to understand. She had three children, and the eldest, 12, was running the house...cooking the meals, feeding the babies. Her 3 year old was quite sick with a cough and her baby also had a runny nose, swollen eyes and rattly chest. The woman would take long pauses to cough and right away I suspected TB. I know I will need to learn how to co-treat TB and HIV...so many questions. To hear this woman try to talk, to watch her pain, to watch her tired children...I can't describe it.

During the visit Jo and the other counselors brought along an MCC HIV care kit which are distributed by the material resources center. My heart was encouraged as I saw the contents: cough medicine. tylenol. nystatin. multivitamins. vaseline. polysporin cream. bandaids. and then clean sheets and towels. The woman was in tears as she received the sheets...she doesn't have any.

Since then Jo and her coworkers have taken her and her 3 year old to the local hospital. We visited her yesterday and she seems to be feeling a bit better. I can't articulate at this point all of my thoughts. I only can sense my own passion for this work growing the more exposure I get. A combination of feeling helpless to deal with all the issues - from health to economics to justice....and feeling empowered that even little things, like clean sheets, can make a huge difference.

As Kurt has visited some nearby villages to research water issues he has faced some realities as well. Families collecting water, literally cup by cup, from dry river beds. People who are facing the fact that their water supply will run out in two months. How can people function without water?

So that is a bit of an update. Please pray for us as we learn how to be here. How to balance life and work and family and relationships. How to live with integrity amongst people who suffer. It is not an easy thing when we have so much.