Monday night update

Photos; A happy family with a young boy that now has a new face. He had a terrible Cleft Palate. Jon, a farmer and myself gathering information at a local fish/rice farm.

It's Monday evening, and we're listening to another thunderstorm roll through. We got hit by a doozy about 5:30, and it's not even supposedly the rainy season. They get around 180 - 200 inches a year here, so I can't imagine what it must be like during the middle of the rainy season. The good thing about thunderstorms here is that it can't knock your power out. When you're pulling electricty out of a huge battery bank that was filled by the sun earlier in the day, you have more stable electric service than we do at home. One of the few things that is better than home, but......

Saturday we drove out to a family's home that is trying to make a living farming. He raises rice, banana's and pigs. He lives beside a swamp, so he's got this idea of raising fish. Jon and I talked with him for quite a while and figured out a way to make a device that will help him control the water level in his swamp so he can farm the fish. I'm going to make some concrete forms that will make a cement water spillway that will be adjustable when needed. They put the small fish in the swamp at the same time they plant rice, then let the fish and rice grow together with the fish fertilizing the rice and the rice feeding the fish. When the rice is ready to harvest, they drop the water level and harvest the fish at the same time. It is a great advancement for this area. There is another guy in the area that is doing it fairly succesfully, so we're hoping this guy can to. It's one of the many community development projects that Jon is working on, which can help the community in many ways.

Sunday we went to church and Stephen preached about "what Jesus means to you". Good stuff for all of us. After lunch we went for a walk and came back to the compound for a game of volleyball. Too hot for that kind of activity for sure.

Today was spent as another routine day working on the new house. We have to have it done for the Yaradouno family that is coming around Mid-December. They are a family from about 10 hours north in this country, and he has been in Gabon training to be a surgeon for the last 5 years. This will be another great step forward for Hope Clinic, and a greater step forward for the people in this part of the world. Watching the terrible things that walk in here everyday leave a few days later as a new person is just a thrill. The surgical team that is visiting right now fixed 4 more faces today. I hope to be able to get some pictures of some of the patients that are arriving each day to share here. We that take basic health care for granted can all use a good dose of seeing this kind of reality. Some faces hardly look human and it's really difficult not to just stare at them.

We had a tough event happen this afternoon around quitting time. I had came back to our house for a few minutes to talk to the guys at the shop when Batou came running out of the new house we are building very urgently. Dan, the guy from Alaska that is here for a month helping with plumbing and electrical, fell through the ceiling when a board broke loose and fell about 10' onto a tile floor. We rushed him up to the clinic where they treated a long gash on his head, misc bruises and two broken bones in his left foot. They took him into surgery about 7:00 this evening, and we are still waiting for the outcome. Doctor Van Roekle isn't sure if he can fix it or if Dan will have to have orthopedic suregery when he gets back home. We're praying for a small miracle here tonight. Dan has contributed soooo much to this clinic, this is about his 7th or 8th trip here. He has given an incredible amount of time and money to make this place happen and it's hard to see this happen to him. Looks like we'll have a little more to do now.

Oh, one more cool thing. Last week Sara and I made a cabinet that contains a wide screen monitor with a DVD player that was donated, and then put it in front of the waiting area. This will be used for health/hygiene lessons and evangelism as well. Friday night was our maiden voyage "movie night" for all the patients and patients families that are here for these surgeries. It was so fun to watch the people start coming when they heard the movie start, and then sit spell-bound while watching the "Jesus" film. That film is incredibly inpacting to people that have never heard the story or even seen a movie before. THIS is what it's all about! Tell em about Jesus! Doesn't get much better!!