Monday, 17 September 2012

Settling in Salone - Part One

S'up?

Hope you are keeping well and loving life like I am.

Went running on Friday evening and I got carried away only to come to realize I have been running for more than an hour.  Well, I normally don't like to over-exercise because I don't want to be too tired to do it again the next day.  Anyway, that is not the point here.  The point is, I don't know what to marvel about.  I didn't know whether to marvel at the wonders of God or the "wonders" of God's creation.  I mean, I was getting slowed down admiring the clear setting sun just above the waters beyond.  I was also having to dodge the waves because I did not want my trainers (sneakers) to get wet.  May be next time I should just run bare feet and I won't have to dodge the waves.  Plus I will get a natural pedicure.  All the sisters say Amen.  My only restraint to that is that the beaches around here are very dirty.  On the other hand, a few meters along the path I was running along with a lot other noble Salones (Sierra Leonians), there was this creature of a human being who....well, let's just say you don't want to know.  I was taught in literature that in writing, there is sometimes an element of suspense.  And there is mine right there.  Well, I just have to deal with it, keep running and mind my own business and may be pray for him if he is sick somewhere in the head (which I actually think he was - like mentally challenged you know).  

We went to the beach yesterday and the scenes were just beautiful.  From the drive itself which did not take so long to the beach where we went to.  The beaches around us are not clean but just a few minutes drive out and we find some cleaner beaches.  This is because the place is less crowded and therefore there is less that gets thrown into the ocean.  Also, there are not many houses in the hills in the area so no garbage get swept by the rains into the ocean.  Salones have not a clue of something called hygiene, they just throw trash anywhere and everywhere.  No wonder when there is an outbreak of a disease (especially water-borne) many of them catch it.  It is not only general hygiene that they are not aware of but also personal hygiene.  Many of the pikins who get brought to our Centre for treatment have skin diseases or hygiene related ailments.  Anyway, back to the beach, I was able to swim in the waves for the first time though I was afraid of going into the deep waters.  I only wish, if Jesus were here maybe I would have even walked on water....hehe.  But because he wasn't I only stayed in the shallow waters.  Just kidding.  We afterwards enjoyed freshly caught fish which they call barracuda and I was calling it okada (the motorbike that carries people just like a taxi)....ha ha.  I crack myself up sometimes.   Just as a side note, I don't normally call things which are what they are not, ha ha.  Anyway, the barracuda does not even have the bad smell that fish normally have.  You know having been raised in the country side, all the fish that got to us usually had the smell.  Yeah, that's how fresh they were.  I am saying all these to say that, I am loving it here.  I am enjoying every bit of it apart from the part I go to buy something and they take all my money.  They go make my mohni disappear.....you know, you know....:)

Church today was beautiful.  Loved the preaching of the word.  The pastor really taught the word using the Greek and Hebrew words.  Reminded me of my Pastor back in New Jersey.  He did rightly divide the word of truth.  Oh and the interesting part about the preaching is that he mixed both English and Krio.  But the more interesting part is that I understood it all.  My listening and reading a Krio bible has helped.  Clap foh mi naw, ah.  Wetin yu do?  (Clap for me now. What are doing?)

At work, camps are starting tomorrow.  Unlike the camps in the children's home in Kenya where I taught bible study, these are quite different in that the women with fistula will be operated on.  A doctor has been flawn in from Nairobi to perform the operations.  I am not sure if I will have the courage to go into the operating room to watch one being performed but if I don't then I think I will just pray for them.


PS - I am calling the update settling in because henceforth you will be receiving shorter and shorter updates (hopefully).  I hope there will still be a few things here and there that will catch my eye and knock my brain off that I will be writing to you.

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