Strike

Tuesday afternoon Kevin was out playing soccer on the field with boy's team. The cross country team was running laps and students were hanging out under trees socializing. It was a fairly wet overcast type of day, with storm clouds threatening. When the rain started to fall most of the students went inside, most of the athletes continued to work out. Suddenly the light rain turned into a torrential downpour. I was inside with the kids, Louisa recovering on the sofa when I realized that the shutter to the window right over my bed was open. Many times the rain blows sideways right through the screens into the rooms, so during rainstorms we run around slamming the wooden shutters shut until the storm is over. So down to my room I dashed... no one likes a wet bed! When I got to the kitchen window, I looked out to the field, wondering when the soccer players would give it up and come inside. It was really pouring. At once the entire field went white and a loud boom shook the house. It was as if someone on the other side of my window had taken a flash photo right into my face. Wow, I thought. But then I heard Louisa screaming about rebels and gunfire. the boom being as loud as a very close big gun. So I rushed in to assure her that this was thunder not a gun and that everything was okay. That's when I saw Kev at the door looking wide eyed. Evidently the strike had come down very near the field. Kevin and all the other boys on the field were knocked off their feet, pushed down to the ground. Kevin felt like his hair was standing on end, another coach's head felt like it was on fire. Everyone jumped up and ran for cover. Once the storm passed and it was safe to go back out, Kevin headed over to school to make sure all the boys were okay. Fortunately they were all fine, just shaken up. However the power system at school wasn't so lucky. The strike took out all three power systems. We are in process of getting everything back up now. And feeling very thankful that inverters, fuses and charge controllers were the only things seriously struck.
I do have to admit that after our trauma with Louisa and this latest strike we are emotionally shaky. Life here has never been described as easy, I guess some days less so than others.

Louisa update

Thank you to all of you who have prayed for us. Louisa has now been fever free for 24 hours and is feeling well enough to go back to school and hang out with her friends. We are grateful for her health and recovery and remain humbled by how heavily we depend on so many of you to support us through your prayers and words of encouragement.

Fevers continue

After appropriate malaria treatment, Louisa continues to have high frequent fevers, but no more seizures. We're feeling the emotional cost. Please pray..

E-mail to my parents

The following is an e-mail we sent out yesterday to my parents. One of those I guess you don't like getting when your grandchildren are living in a remote, isolated village in Africa. After living here for ten years and always sleeping under mosquito nets, with very little sickness, we got slack about our malaria prophylaxis. As in, we figured we didn't need to take our weekly dose to prevent getting malaria. Nor did we discuss this decision with our team leaders the Drs. Myhre. In a place where Malaria runs rampant this was a mistake.



"Scariest morning of our lives. We were watching a video as a family and Joe turned to Louisa and said, "That's disgusting Louisa, nobody likes to be slobered on like that." Warning bells went off and I turned to look at her and she was blue,limp and not breathing. She had a big glob of slobber coming out of her mouth. I screamed and Kev jumped up and picked her up and she voided, urinating all over. We thought the worst had happened. Kev ran with her to the car, still blue still not breathing, still completely unresponsive, eyes open. Everyone jumped in the car and we took off race car style beeping the horn continously, house wide-open, as fast as we could to the Myhre's. They were still in church, so Joe dashed out of the car and ran across the street into the church to get them. Jennifer punched Scott and they came quickly, until they met Kev half-way to their house. By this time he was in full panic and screamed "She's not breathing!" They both took off running. By the time they got there, Louisa had opened her mouth and was breathing. She had opened her eyes but still totally out of it. They took her inside and checked her out, gave her a malaria test and some ibuprofen. Her fever was spiking again. Her malaria test was POSITIVE. So they gave her a fast acting Malaria treatment injection and an another injection of a strong antibiotic. 10 minutes later, the fever was gone and her color was back to normal and after the screaming about the shots seemed to be okay. Kev and I were still shaking. The most of the church emptied out when the Myhre's ran out, so everyone here was aware and came by to check on her. We are now all back on the sofa, pretty shaken up, thankful for the Myhre's and thankful to God that Louisa is okay. It all happened so fast that it was scary, from normal to not breathing in less than five minutes. No more forgetting about our mefloquine in the near future. thought you should all know.
We love you."

Little Mice

Usually we like to play rat hockey with the rodents that dare to try to make their home with us. Don’t get me wrong, in America; I am a big fan of hamsters, guinea pigs, mice etc. During my high school days I kept an entire lab of rats, raising them from babies to crawl around my shoulders, passing in and out of my huge loop earrings. But in Bundibugyo, I have declared war on these little and not so little creatures. Perhaps, it is their constant chewing of my Tupperware, or endless black poops in cupboards that I have just scrubbed. Maybe visions of diseases carried in by these once friends. For whatever reason, I have drawn my personal line in the sand. Lizards are welcome, rats are not. They seem to come in waves, invading our house and attempting to set up residence at the most inopportune times. Kevin and I have our strategy down. We dress up in boots and armed with tennis racquets and brooms we do our best to swept out, squash, chase and otherwise rid our house of these unwanted guests. On their part, they dodge, jump, climb walls, hide in the stove, behind the frig or along the bookshelves.

For the last month, I have been noticing that the kids have gotten sloppy in putting away their playmobil toys. Some of the toys weren’t making their way all the way into the basins but were lining the bottom of the toy shelf instead. Most specifically, the little helmets and other accessories that snap on and off of the 2-inch plastic playmobil people. I began to get suspicious when little pieces of feathers and sequins from Louisa’s dress-up clothes also began to appear. Finally an unpleasant odor in the room got me into major cleaning mode. Gross. Under the toy shelf, a massive collection of bits and pieces of bright colored stuff had been assembled. If I had been in a better mood I might have marveled at the sheer amount of the glitz, kind of like a modern piece of art right there in my house. All I could focus on, though, was the tiny nest at my feet. 5 tiny mice babies were huddled inside.

In two seconds, we had gone from Rat Hockey mode to “Aren’t those the cutest things you ever saw?” and “Maybe that’s Ralph S. Mouse’s family!” Joe and Louisa were enthralled, I was partly grossed out (I still had to deal with the smell and general mess) and partly sympathetic, and Kevin was miles away at the National Football Tournament. So for an afternoon the kids played with these little creatures and we spent some serious time on the rat and mice society’s website learning all we could about mice and their young. Later that day we released them into the wild of our back yard. My guess is that they will re-surface in a few months somewhere in the kitchen.

Smiles

A quick shot of several of the nearly 100 small kids NOT watching the game! How many of them dream of coming to Christ School??? ... football games are a wonderful recruiting strategy.

The team

Not a smile on their faces until after the photo has been taken. Then they are off to play.

Favorite time of year

Football season has to be my favorite time of year. The crowds pour into our gates for an afternoon of games. Small kids run to and fro, sometimes they watch the game, mostly they do cartwheels and sit in the grass and laugh with their friends. Men line the fields and shout advice to the players and refs. Our girl's congregate near the opposing team's goal and pound their drums and dance and sing. I remember years ago having only 40 or so students (many of them on the team) and dreaming of days like this... with 350 students cheering our boys on. I must say I am intensely proud of the whole program. This team has practised faithfully for weeks. Kevin has coached many of these boys for years and it shows. They are a delight to watch. Their high level of skill, control of the ball and the way they conduct themselves on the field has become second nature. No small accomplishment in a place where riots are common and cheating is rampant. They have worked hard and this season they have reaped the benefits. We continue on to the National Tournament in Jinja, undefeated in the district with only one goal scored against us. What a sweet taste of success for these young men and what an opportunity.