What Have We Been Doing Aboard the Africa Mercy?

So much has been happening that I haven’t been able to talk about, so let me give you an update on where things are at, aboard the ship! In the first 5 weeks of surgery we have provided 204 surgeries to 193 people. I did the math and that means that each surgeon does, on average, 2-3 surgeries a day. However, the number of surgeries per surgeon usually varies day to day, for example, when Dr.Gary performs a 12 hour surgery. Surgery times vary drastically based on the case and specialty. Of those 204 surgeries, 50 were maxillofacial surgeries, 69 were reconstructive plastic surgeries, 81 were general surgeries and 4 were ambulatory surgeries. Ambulatory surgeries are same day surgeries, or surgeries that don’t require an overnight hospital stay, and typically no anesthesia (I had to look that up). Our amazing statistician (one of his many roles) keeps such good stats that we know how many children vs. adults had surgery (79 children, 114 adults), how many men vs. women had surgery (130 men, 63 women) and how many came from Cotonou vs. elsewhere (104 from Cotonou, 89 elsewhere). I find this last number pretty amazing because so far we’ve only done screening in Cotonou, so that means those 89 people came here from other places, with the hope that we could help them.

Of the 50 maxfax surgeries that we have done so far, 10 of those have been cleft lip/palate repairs. One of these surgeries has been on Israel, an adorable 8 month old with a beautiful smile. Him and his mom have been discharged after his successful surgery and are back in their village now – about 2 hours away. Israel’s stay with us was rather short, only spending 5 days on the ward. Our plastics patients on the other hand, spend much longer with us. They go through many bandage changes, followed by extensive rehabilitation. Our first round of plastic surgeries will finish this week, with the second round beginning in January. In the meantime, we have lots of adorable children in various casts, running around the wards, dancing and playing. One of these cuties is Faith, a beautiful 3 year old girl with burns on her feet. She’s been with us for almost a month now and still has a ways to go before she is discharged.

When explaining general surgeries to guests, I typically only mention goiters and hernias, but general surgery also includes non facial tumours. An example of this is Wassiale, who had a lipoma, which is a benign tumour made of fatty tissue, on her neck. This beautiful mom of 4 kids was admitted, had surgery, and was discharged in a span of two weeks. She was able to go home to her family, noticeably transformed on the inside and the outside.

The path that our screening team will take this week.

Our Dental team has already seen over 1000 patients in the first 5 weeks that they’ve been at work, with around 400 people lining up every day Monday to be screened. Our Eye team started screening last Tuesday, and I haven’t yet heard how that’s going but I’m hoping to go this week and find out! They are finding patients for when they begin to operate in January. Our screening team is gone up country this week, holding screenings in three different cities further north in Benin: Kandi, Bembèrèké and Parakou. One of the National Geographic teams has gone with them to capture all the excitement. This year, they tested a new method for finding patients. They sent trained local crew throughout the country to make contacts with local leaders such as church leaders, imams, government officials, etc. and let them know that patients could come register with them to be seen at screening. Using a specially designed app, the local crew is able to get all the necessary information, take a picture, and send it to a member of the screening team on the ship who could immediately access and let them know whether or not they could be seen at the surgeon screening. It’s an interesting way of screening and I’m curious to hear feedback on how the processed worked.

Our very own Kat Sotolongo made this beautiful graphic!

Our Medical Capacity Building team has also been hard at work, putting on various courses. In the first 5 weeks of service, they have taught a SAFE Obstetric Anesthesia course, a Primary Trauma Care course and run a few sterile processing courses (how to properly clean surgical instruments after surgery – very important). The training courses also include a ‘Train the Trainers’ day, where some of the participants are taught how to teach the course to others, so that the knowledge can be passed on. So far 142 people have participated in these courses. The MCB team has also started their WHO Checklist project, which is a small team of people that travel to different hospitals throughout the country and teach them the WHO Checklist for safe surgery, which is proven to decrease operating room mortality by nearly 50%. Over the course of the field service our team plans to teach the checklist to representatives from 35 different hospitals in Benin. On top of this, the MCB has worked with the Ministry of Health to set up one on one mentoring onboard the ship with our surgeons and Beninois surgeons. Between vision trip guests, Nat Geo, Comms and surgeons being mentored, the OR sure has its hands full of visitors!

Add to this our Agricultural training course that will be starting in a few weeks, the 18 patients that our palliative care team has taken on, and the 13 Ponseti patients that are currently being seen, and you get an idea of how busy the last month or so has been! I know I mostly focus on the media/official visitors part (because that’s mostly what I see!) but hopefully this gives you a better idea of what the rest of this amazing hospital ship has been up to. And this doesn’t even include all the behind the scenes stuff, like cleaning engines, building guard shacks and staircases, fixing electrical systems, running fire drills, etc. but maybe I’ll get to that another day.

Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. ~ Genesis 2:7

When the Founder Meets the President

The chairman of MSGA with Mary and her mother.

This place is wonderful and crazy and every week I do things that I would never have imagined. Let me preface this by saying that I worked 70 hours this week, so there wasn’t much room for anything else! These hours were a strange mix of high level discussions, detailed planning and constant change. This week was the culmination of all the planning that has been going on for the last few weeks – our founder, Don Stephens, came to visit, along with several other members of our international board of directors. They are all remarkable people, and as they shared their hearts with the crew on Thursday night, we got to see their passion and heart for this place and the work that Mercy Ships does. The guests included the previous Vice President of the Democratic Republic of Congo, who stayed for less than 24 hours because he had to fly back to help with peace talks in his country as they try to avoid a civil war; a woman who served as the first ever Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Africa during the Bush and Clinton administrations, and now runs a consultancy group specializing in the same field; a woman who is a doctor and started her own practice in Ghana and lends her time and expertise to several NGOs; a man described himself as the least educated McKinsey senior partner in the whole world (he doesn’t have an MBA); a man who worked for many years as the head of Nestle in China; a man who was the Vice President of Marketing and Sales for Daimler in Japan; and a woman who self-professed as not being ‘anything’, not having any specific role or title or qualifications but having been involved in Mercy Ships from the time it was just an idea being discussed around the dinner table. This is just to give you a taste of the depth and breadth of experience that is contained on the board of Mercy Ships – and this is only a small taste of the over 30 people who make up our board!

There was a contest to see who could get the
best selfie with Don - this was definitely the
one with the most people in it!

Each person had their own goals for their time onboard but there were some common activities. One of these was the signing of a Siege D’accord at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday. This was signed to establish a regional West African office for Mercy Ships here in Benin. From my understanding, this gives us diplomatic status similar to what another country’s ambassador would receive (I could be wrong about this). It was a bit of a funny event, because we were all set up in this nice large room, including having lots of local media, our Comms team and Nat Geo all there, when the head of protocol came in and said we were moving rooms. He proceeded to bring us into a much smaller (and less well lit) room, where everyone had to cram in. However both the Minister and Don gave lovely speeches, both talking about how important it is to take action and help others. From everything I have heard and seen, the government seems to be very invested in helping their people and improving the health care system in Benin. Our leadership team has been meeting with the government often and I believe they are working on developing a national surgical plan, which is one of the recommendations of the Lancet report. This was followed by a Town Hall aboard the ship, where Don and our Group Managing Director, Donovan, answered questions submitted by the crew and shared a bit of the vision moving forward with two ships. Donovan talked about being pioneers, and also the importance of scaling up all our processes to be able to function with two ships. It’s always wonderful to hear them speak so candidly about various topics, whether it is money, conflict, changes, etc. Later I thanked Don for his answers and he told me that he very strongly believed in being open and vulnerable. Working on vulnerability myself at the moment, this meant a lot.

President Talon talks to one of the patients as Don Stephens
and the Minister of Foreign Affairs look on.

Wednesday, the President of Benin came to visit the ship for the first time. It was a short one hour visit, but parts of it seemed pretty surreal. The day before the visit, the head of the President’s security came to examine the ship and speak to us. He was armed with a concealed weapon and said all his guards would be as well; he asked about possible contamination from the patients; he said the navy would be patrolling the water very close to the ship so we didn’t need to worry about closing all the curtains; he requested that we turn off the internet network for the duration of the visit and requested that they be allowed to bring on a device that would also shut down mobile networks; he had us shut all open doors along the route. It was all very intense but they are doing their job, the same way we are doing ours. The President’s visit was very special; he spoke with many of the patients and showed as much compassion as his wife had when she visited. The amount of media was insane – even though we limited the number who could come down to the hospital, between Nat Geo, Comms and local media, it was a whole scrum. At one point, we had people filming all the people who were filming the President. It was like inception. The President finished his tour of the hospital, signed our guest book and spent some time talking with our founder. Once he headed for the gangway, everyone followed, including the Minister of Health and the Minister of Foreign Affairs and we thought we were finished. The hospitality team started to clear things away, and our crew started to eat some of the leftover food. It turned out they weren’t done yet – the President asked that the ministers be allowed to stay and visit. I rushed upstairs to tell the team and basically shouted “Stop! They’re coming back!” Everyone froze mid bite and stared at me. It was hilarious – our crew was devouring the food. We managed to set everything back quickly and no one was the wiser.

This is another one of our board members - the kids were
teaching her how to play the drums.

This week also provided the opportunity to hear some really interesting conversations, both formal and informal. During one meeting, there was a whole discussion about the best way to handle development, whether we should hand over infrastructure projects to other NGOs or to governments. There were discussions on the ideal length of time to stay in a country, on how often we should return to a country, on what our medical capacity building focuses should be. Being a chauffeur has its perks when you get to listen to the founder and chief medical officer reminisce about Mercy Ships back in the day when they didn’t have air conditioning or internet. You get to have debates about politics, aid, democracy, and economics with passionate people who do this for a living (and who tell you that your Canadian accent gets stronger when you are arguing). You get to hear people’s stories of how they came to Christ, and how they came to Mercy Ships. You hear remarkable stories about how God uses surgeons to perform miracles, and the number of miracles seen in a lifetime of service to God.

This is off the internet, but this is basically what the dancing
hay spirit things looked like.

On Saturday, we went to visit a village that had a long history with Mercy Ships from back in the Anastasis days. Our host was a surgeon who had previously been mentored by Dr.Gary and who had grown up in this village before being chosen to go study medicine in Ukraine back when it was part of the USSR. He has his own practice now, which he showed us – the majority of the equipment in his OR had been donated by Mercy Ships many years ago and still worked well for his purposes. He took us to this village which is on the water (a stilt village), where around 25,000 people live and get around by small boats. As we approached in boats, we were greeted by this amazing performance of water dancing (I don’t really know what else to call it). It was a group who combined tribal dancing and paddling and put on quite a show. Once we arrived in their town hall area we were treated to a very…interesting performance. It was very strange, voodoo like, and hard to describe. There are these giant hay things which dance and move and I think the idea is that they are filled with a spirit. We didn’t really know what to think, but when they gave Don a chance to speak he shared that we were here because we follow the 2000 year old model of Jesus and I appreciated that.

Many things happened this week, not all of which I have had time to process. One thing that I am incredibly grateful for is having a boss who always has my back. Rather than giving me more work and pushing me to burnout (as many bosses would do) she has done an amazing job of supporting me and has insisted that I take some time off. Today I had a wonderful (and very much needed) day of rest and reading. I can’t fully explain how much it means to be supported by someone who is incredibly wise and supports you, fights battles for you, encourages you, and ensures you are well taken care of physically, emotionally and spiritually. Truly, I am grateful for my whole team – an amazing group of people who write me encouraging notes and provide hugs, candy and love. A group who empathizes, listens and insists that I stay out of the office on my rest day (which is why I am in here writing this now that they are all gone….hehe). I also discovered how much joy I get from having my own private dance parties – we all need those from time to time! All that said, I have to work on keeping my eyes focused on God through everything. His ways are good! There are so many things that worked out this week solely by the grace of God – it’s amazing to be in a place where we can see Him so tangibly at work. May you witness God’s endless love and grace in your life this week!

You make known to me the path of life;

    you will fill me with joy in your presence,
with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
~ Psalm 16:11

I have twice been able to visit the Gate of No Return, built to show where over 10 million slaves were shipped off to Europe. It is very sobering and powerful to stand there and hear about all that they endured.
 [On a side note, I broke the camera on my phone so I won't have any personal pictures to share for a while].

Finding Rest in Him Alone

Juste was having a good time playing with bubbles.

This week continued along at the hectic pace that has become the norm, however I finally figured out what God is trying to teach me. It’s something that my friends have been telling me for a while, but I was being too stubborn to listen. The idea of boundaries. Saying no. It’s not exactly my strong suit. It took reaching a place of being physically unable to do all the tasks asked of me, that I finally started to listen. Windsor commented to me that people keep giving me tasks because I am someone who will get it done, no matter what. I never thought of that as a bad thing before, but now I absolutely understand the problem. In a community where the job descriptions can be fuzzy and people are constantly turning over, it is very important to make sure that we are training those around us and that we are staying somewhat inside our job description. In a place where people come and go, you cannot make yourself invaluable – that hinders the mission and the work God is doing here. You are helping in the short term, but hurting in the long term. It’s a little like the idea from the book, When Helping Hurts, which talks about the importance of long term missions and doing them in a way that helps make the people self-sufficient, rather than relying on charity. It’s very important to think long-term, to not be caught up in this mindset where you are constantly putting out fires and running from one thing to the next. The second reason that getting any task done, is a problem, is because this is the first time I have been in a community that will allow that to happen, until you are completely burned out. It’s not that that’s what they want to happen – it’s just a byproduct of often being shorthanded in various roles, of having to meet with high level officials with staff that is constantly new, of having volunteers who are here to serve, in whatever capacity that means.

Training during one of the MCB courses.

Realizing this has made me very thankful that God has surrounded me with wise women (and an especially wise boss!) who check in to see how I am doing; who constantly encourage me; who help smooth the way for me to do my job well; who back me up when I do push back or push back for me; people who tell me to come by whenever I want and they will pray with me; people who deflect others when they are trying to discuss work with me at 9pm; people who celebrate me when I do say no. It’s amazing to be a part of this community, to see how God works through each of these people. A few weeks ago I talked about realizing how God uses people to speak to us, and it’s been wonderful to see that manifested as he answers prayers for wisdom, for strength, for guidance, though these amazing women.

Michelle, one of our physical therapists,
with Valentin, the first patient to have
surgery this field service.

And so, what has been happening on this beautiful hospital ship this week? Well for one, plastics and rehab are fully underway, with casts being applied and cut off daily. This means little kids screaming as their casts are cut off (it doesn’t hurt), being grumpy as a new cast is put on, and then shortly after dancing and laughing in the wards. It’s an adventure every time we go down there now, with kids running up and down the hall, blowing bubbles, dancing, riding bicycles, and just having a good time. Dr.Gary performed another 12 hour surgery, amongst the many others that he did. A member of the Nat Geo team filmed a surgery and then later showed parts of it to the nurse who had admitted the patient, really bringing it full circle for her. Each of our nurses cares so much for the patients and gets so invested in them and their success. Last weekend, we had a volleyball tournament and Nat Geo found out and came to film the final – the director said he wants to play in the next one (my team was 0/4...). This weekend, we had a trivia night on the ship and my team came in second place (10/10 in the Harry Potter category, too easy). Our Medical Capacity Building is well underway, with a Primary Trauma Care course taking place on the ship in one of our empty wards, and one on one mentoring happening in the OR with our surgeons and local surgeons. The Dental clinic is also hitting the ground running, with around 400 people showing up each Monday for the selection of patients for that week.

In terms of media and visitors, this week we gave a tour to some members of the petrol company we partner with; a tour to an NGO from France that has been doing great work here for a long time; hosted another local stringer (someone who writes stories for international publications); and got ready for the large number of visitors that we will be hosting this coming week. Of course, these are just the things that I see happening – there are many, many amazing things that go on every day, that I am unaware of.

Visiting Arbre de Vie!

Yesterday, 5 of us were able to go up north and visit this orphanage about 2 hours from the ship, called Arbre de Vie. It is run by a couple of Americans, and they have been to the ship a few times to help give us cultural pointers. God is doing amazing things there and it was such a blessing to go and visit. They have children all the way from 2 years old to 23 years old. They have around 30 kids, but support far more outside the orphanage itself. They just finished giving around 150 kids school supplies (school started this week in Benin) so that they could attend school. They also pair up children in the community with international sponsors and visit monthly to check in to see how they are doing. We played volleyball with them – they were very competitive and beat us (although they had about 20 people on their team!). We had a lovely tour, lunch and then helped them with a few projects before we headed back. They had asked that we bring some pallets, so one amazing crew member, Manda, came out in the pouring rain and helped us to tie the pallets to the car rack. Days like this are truly special and I'm grateful that God provided this opportunity.

I had another realization this week. For all the people telling me that I was doing a great job, I felt nothing when they told me those things. I didn’t feel joy or fulfillment or pride or anything. God reminded me that we don’t find fulfillment in those things, but rather we find that in Him alone. With all the work I have been doing, I have been neglecting quiet time with God, and I received clarity in that moment, that all the work I was doing, leads only to human praise of me, and that brings me nothing. It is only in God that I find my rest, my peace, my comfort. He was gently telling me, Renée you can continue to work very hard and do all these things, but you won’t be satisfied. You won’t reach a point where you feel like it’s enough or finished. Only by spending time with me and resting in me will you find the satisfaction that comes from knowing I love you, enough to send my Son to die on the cross to forgive your sins. Only by reading the Word and simply being with me will you be filled with the peace you seek, a peace that comes from knowing that you are enough, that you are worthy of love and belonging. 

For whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. ~Hebrews 4:10-11 

As funny as it is, I think there is rest to be found in exercise as well. During one of our cross fit workouts this week, we ran the beep test.

When You Are Lost For Words, Just Pedal

One of our maxfax patients, also named René.

Okay so I’m a little late with this week’s post…I would like to say it's because I've been so busy, but really I think it's just because I can't find the words right now. Recently I realized that being on the ship long term is far different from being on the ship short term. When you are only here for a few months, every weekend is an adventure, many nights are spent eating out and every spare moment is spent having conversations with others. But that would be entirely unsustainable in the long term, and so those who are here longer have to find a way to have a routine and some sense of normalcy. This is everyday life. How do you do that on a hospital ship in Africa? You engage in more planned activities and less spontaneous ones. You have a workout routine. You spend your lunch reading by yourself. You go to bed at the same time every night. You spend many weekends relaxing and catching up with family and doing chores. You have to find a way to have a somewhat normal life, even amongst all this craziness, because there is always stuff going on and it is easy to get burned out if you do too much. But those are just some of the ways I do it, I’m sure others have a completely different approach. I’ve also noticed that I spend far more time with other crew who are here long term. It’s not because I don’t want to get to know the short term crew, I just cross paths with them less, especially when I’m avoiding the dining room. There are around 200 long term crew onboard, with the other 200 being short termers who come and go. It’s just a different mindset.

The First Lady of Benin came and visited with some of the
patients in the ward.

Now with all that said about routine, somehow every day is still a new adventure. This week I have hosted the Managing Director of a seafood company who donates money to the ship; helped with the hosting of media at our Ponseti clinic as they filmed some training and the ‘graduation’ of students from the program; assisted with a cheque giving presentation where MTN (the local internet/cellphone provider) donated 5 million cifa to us; attended a meeting about the new ship; assisted National Geographic as they interviewed our captain, as well as patients;  and planned 4 vision trips, including a visit by our international board and founder. And that’s just the work side!

This last week or so has also included a HOPE Center dedication service, where we danced and sang to celebrate the opening of our HOPE Center; a Hebrews Bible study with an animated discussion that went on for 2 hours and would have continued if we didn’t have curfew; a visit to a local church, which had the most amazing choir and was in French (meaning I could understand!); listening to Dr.Gary talk about facial tumours, which is mindblowing; babysitting the three cutest Portuguese kids ever; a visit to the local craft and fabric markets with a girl from our small group who is visiting from the IOC; a murder mystery night at the team house, which had a 1960s cold war theme, with a murder in a British college and included double agents (I got to be a male character, complete with a fake 5 o’clock shadow); and lots of other random fun activities.

Alex, the Nat Geo producer, making
friends with some of our plastics patients.

I’ve been realizing lately how powerful words are, and that not everyone has a grasp on this concept. The idea of phrasing things positively instead of negatively (we can’t do this vs. what we can do is…). The way we can encourage, support, strengthen, and build up with words. It can be hard to teach this, but the Bible tries to explain this to us. That the tongue we praise God with should not be the same tongue that we gossip, discourage or diminish with. It also makes me grateful for The Word. For God’s Word – His ultimate truth. To have this, to be able to study it, is so special. I am thankful for all the things He reveals to us through His word, sharing things when He knows we can understand, when we won’t be too overwhelmed. It’s also ironic because I find myself struggling with my words this week. However, I know that it is not through my strengths that God is revealed but rather through my weaknesses that He shines. When I cannot do something, when I wrestle with sin, when I am weak in an area, and submit to Him, He comes in and does it in His strength, His way.

And so, I want to share a poem that Windsor shared with us recently that really touched my heart. I pray that we would all be able to trust Him fully and just pedal.

When I met Christ

it seemed as though life were rather like a bike ride,

but it was a tandem bike,

and I noticed that Christ

was in the back helping me pedal.

I don’t know just when it was

that He suggested we change places,  

but life has not been the same since.

When I had control, I knew the way,

It was rather boring, but predictable…

It was the shortest distance between two points.

But when He took the lead,

He knew delightful long cuts,

up mountains, and through rocky places

at breakneck speeds,

it was all I could do to hang on!

Even though it looked like madness,

He said, “Pedal!”

I worried and was anxious and asked,

“Where are you taking me?”

He laughed and didn’t answer,

and I started to learn to trust.

I forgot my boring life

and entered into the adventure.

And when I’d say, “I’m scared,”

He’d lean back and touch my hand.

He took me to people with gifts that I needed,

gifts of healing, acceptance, and joy.

He said, “Give the gifts away;

they’re extra baggage, too much weight.”

So I did, to the people we met,

and I found that in giving I received,

and still our burden was light.

I did not trust Him, at first,

in control of my life.

I thought He’d wreck it;

but He knows bike secrets,

knows how to make it bend to take sharp corners,

knows how to jump to clear high rocks,

knows how to fly to shorten scary passages.

And I am learning to shut up and pedal

in the strangest places,

and I’m beginning to enjoy the view

and the cool breeze on my face

with my delightful constant companion, Jesus Christ.

And when I’m sure I just can’t do anymore,

He just smiles and says… “Pedal.”

-          Author Unknown

Our surgeons hard at work! On a side note, Timmy, who took many of these pictures, left yesterday, but he will be back in January to continue capturing these beautiful moments. I love that people are so moved by our work here that they choose to keep coming back :)

One Week of Surgery Complete, Many More To Go

This past week, surgeries began and now 45 people have had amazing, life-changing surgeries. Some patients - like a young woman named Monique who had a small tumour growing behind her ear - have already healed and been discharged. She was very happy and even stayed later on Friday to do the interview we had asked her to do (the journalist was running late). Some patients - like Valentin who had a burn contracture around his middle and was our first patient of the field service - are still here, continuing to heal. One little baby was admitted just so that we could help to fatten her up – she is 2 months old and weighs 4 pounds – so our dieticians are working with her mom to help her gain weight. They said the mom has been working very hard to get the baby to eat anything (she has a cleft lip & palate) and it’s always encouraging to hear about how much love moms have for their children. Some patients – like Julien, the man with the large tumour growing out of his jaw/mouth – are having surgery right now.

Nat Geo interviewing Dr.Tertius on Deck 7.

The people in this place consistently go above and beyond anything that is expected. The OR team didn’t finish until late on Friday and so some of them were in there on Saturday cleaning up, sterilizing and preparing for Monday. The admission team lead wrote a letter for a patient’s mom saying that Mercy Ships requires a caregiver to stay with all patients under 18 and so she wouldn’t be able to go to work for a while because her son was having surgery and she needed to stay with him. Much of the engine room team worked on the weekend because we had some issues with the generators that needed to be fixed (something about governors not working…I don’t understand these things). Our hospitality team worked hard on Friday afternoon to set up the Queens lounge for the visit by the First Lady, and the crew endured not being able to use the room for 24 hours. Our HR Director brought up homemade coffee to the Nat Geo crew on Saturday as they were preparing for an interview with Dr. Tertius (and the coffee got used as a prop for the interview). One of our dining room team leads was working hard serving us breakfast and then ran upstairs to lead us in worship before our Monday morning meeting (still wearing his lovely uniform). One of our lab techs worked on Saturday to ensure that all the necessary tests had been completed for Monday. I say this not to show that we are always working, but rather to show the amount of love that the people on this ship have for others. They are always thinking about the little things, like a visiting guest from the IOC (who also trained us during Basic Training), making the whole ship his delicious cookies several times over the last week or so. There is nothing quite like warm chocolate chip cookies!

Rodrigue interviewing our Managing Director in his office.

This was another hectic week – I hosted a radio journalist on Monday and Friday, and was a little surprised when many of the day crew greeted him by name. They recognized him from TV or radio. It seems that he is pretty well known locally. That was a new experience for me. He also recorded me giving him a tour of the whole ship in French, which was so nerve wracking, but I survived and was helped by some of our lovely French speaking African crew. The patients and day crew were excited to see him and many gathered around to be able to share their stories. It’s pretty remarkable to hear day crew tell him that what we are doing here is really good, and that we take such good care of people and that the most important thing they want people to know is to have hope! We also hosted a large group of people from the American Embassy and I gave a tour of the ship to the U.S. Ambassador (which I thought was hilarious considering how many Americans we have on board). It was wonderful to be able to give a tour in English and share many of the amazing stories I have heard, and to see how touched they were by everything we are doing here. I feel very blessed to have this job because sitting in on interviews means I often get to hear the most wonderful stories. This week it was listening to patients share their stories of healing with the radio journalist, and listening to Dr.Tertius (our plastics surgeon) share his story with Nat Geo. It’s pretty amazing, all the work he is doing. He spends 10 months of the year away from home, away from his wife, doing the work that God has called him to. He works with other NGOs when he is not with Mercy Ships, and also tries to raise awareness about the need for access to safe surgery for much of the world’s population.

From right to left: Our Managing Director, Robin; the U.S.
amabassador, Lucy; Laurette, Robin's wife; Lucy's husband.

This week has also been full of emotional growing pains as I work out what it means to be vulnerable. Now that I have been made aware of a lot of the false thinking I had, and the idol I had built around being strong, unemotional and not caring what others thought, it’s been hard to find that balance. How to care but not be destroyed by the littlest things? Who exactly am I without those things, without those walls? How am I to behave, how much do I share? I always thought that the goal was to reach a point where I didn’t care what others thought of me, but now I’m realizing that that is the very thing that has impeded me from having deep and meaningful connection with others. I realized I often only share completely processed thoughts, but there is something to be said for sharing raw emotion, or raw unprocessed feelings, allowing room for the input of others, before having it all figured out. The other side of that vulnerability is understanding that I need others. That seems to be pretty obvious, yet still a hard thing for me to admit. That I do need others, that I need others to encourage me and pour into me, the way I pour into them. I think I felt like, I should be sufficiently filled up by God to be able to constantly pour out into others, but someone pointed out that often God uses people to fill us up. I am so grateful that He has brought people into my life to share wisdom when I need it. This kind of emotional growing has been painful at times but I know I will be stronger for it, and hopefully closer to the woman God wants me to be.

The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. ~ Deuteronomy 31:8

Three of the beautiful children who will be having orthopedic surgery to fix their club feet.

Surgeon Screenings, Partners Reception & Off Road Adventures

This morning they talked about how we’ve been here for a little over three weeks now, but really it feels like months, and it’s true! It feels like we have been in Benin for a long, long while and yet last night we had our first patients arrive onboard. Today is the first day of surgeries. It blows my mind to think that as I sit here and write this, two decks below me, lives are being transformed. Medical marvels, magical transformations, lives restored, hope given. What a unique place to call home. During last night’s service, we all went out across the ship to pray for different areas and departments, and especially for our patients and the surgeons, nurses and anesthetists who would be involved in their operations. Everything we do is done as a community.

Julien (who I mentioned in my newsletter), came to the ship
for his surgical screening, hiding his tumour with a pink scarf.

This week we had surgeon screenings on the dock, where the surgeon sees if they can operate on the patient. The admissions team also runs tests on the patients if necessary. They had surgeon screenings for plastics, general and maxfax this week, as all three of those surgeons are here. They also had surgical evaluations, which was where patients that we treated in 2009 (when we were last here), came back to visit us. It helps the surgeons to see how the patients look 6 years later, if they could improve their methods, how various treatments lasted as the patient grew up, etc. I love that we are able to have this kind of follow up and to show our patients that we truly care about them and how they are doing. On top of all this, screening was still going on at our offsite location. It seems like our radio advertisements must have worked at least a little because we seemed to get more plastics patients, which is what we were looking for. We typically only perform plastic surgery to help with mobility (ie. To be able to move all their fingers, or bend their arm properly), rather than appearance, and a lot of the patients we were seeing had very good mobility. It seems that their burns were treated fairly well, which is encouraging to know that the burn unit at the local hospital is doing a good job. Dr.Gary mentioned in his speech at the partners reception that he has seen a huge improvement, which is very encouraging. 

The Minister of Health shaking hands with our Managing
Director - he came to visit our screening centre.

The comms team has been busy keeping up with the patients they want to follow and identifying everyone they met at screening. We were also in charge of all the name tags, videos and banners for the partners reception that occurred on Thursday – the ship invites all its partners in the country, to welcome them aboard the ship. It was a very formal affair, with several ministers, and many partners from NGOs, businesses, embassies, and hospitals. The comms ladies were dressed all in black at the bottom of the gangway and got to be the first smiling faces to greet them and welcome them aboard. I also helped to host a tour of some of the officials in French (hopefully i’m getting better with all this practice!). Nat Geo has also been very busy, following many, many patients, doing home visits, and filming the hospital getting ready. 

Never a dull moment with these beauties!

Some of the best moments have been the random, unexpected ones. Tuesday was one of those nights. A group of us had a crossfit session led by ‘Coach Mike’, where I remembered how fun it is to train as a team. We then had an improv lesson from Anna, which I wasn’t even planning on doing, but then participated in last minute and actually really enjoyed! She is an awesome teacher and it was hilarious. We then headed over to our boss’s office and proceeded to fill it with balloons and have a dance party in there as we decorated it for her birthday. It was a wonderful, unplanned evening that led to all kind of team bonding and laughs. Saturday we got to attend a wedding - two crew members who are from West Africa were getting married and they invited most of the ship. We attended the civil service in the morning, which was proceeded over by the mayor and started an hour late, and then headed to the church service. It was nice to see them get married, and definitely an interesting experience.

On the back roads of Benin.

On Sunday, we had a slightly more planned adventure, which ended up being so much fun. I have been wanting to go for a drive up north and explore, so I found a forest about 2 hours north of Cotonou and decided that was where we would go. Thankfully, I am surrounded by the best people and found 8 people willing to trust me and come along! So we all crammed in a car and headed off, eventually finding the bumpy dirt road that I had highlighted on my black and white satellite map of the area (Kat thought this was hilarious). The road didn’t even show up on Google Maps, and when I saw it I understood why – it was more of a path, barely enough room for the car. But we made it! We proceeded to wander around the forest, no path, no destination, just wandering, until we finally did intersect with a path. We all took turns pretending we were the tour guide and knew things about the forest. We followed the path until we found a village, where we had a very interesting experience. One of their men approached the tallest guy in our group (Michael) and proceeded to try and convince him to marry off the girls in our group. It was hilarious (especially since I was the only one who spoke French), but soon a large crowd started to form so we decided we should go. One person mentioned, it’s like walking into an area where no Western rules exist – they have their own cultural rules and we have no idea what those are, and due to the language barrier, it makes it hard to find out, which is why we are so uncomfortable at times. Our car rides were filled with laughter and loud singing to the randomest songs (Avril Lavigne anyone?). It was one of those perfect days where you can’t help but marvel at creation; be thankful for blessings like landcruisers and cookies; be struck by how differently we live from the people we met; be in awe at how music transcends countries and languages; and realize how much you love every single one of the people you are with.

Someone had these for sale -
A little taste of home!

There have been times this week that I have been overwhelmed with the amount of work to be done, and way too focused on the little things, and I think God has an amazing way of bringing us back to those things that are truly important. He refreshes us constantly. In one of Pastor Tim’s sermons recently, he talks about the Holy Spirit, and that he isn’t there just to give us an extra push when we are struggling to open the jar of peanut butter. The Holy Spirit is there to help us do the things we could never do on our own. That really stuck with me. All of the things that this ship does, all of the things that I do, they aren’t things I could accomplish on my own – but with His help, we are able to do amazing, life giving things. On Sunday, one of our chaplains, Diana, shared a quote with us that said we don’t pray to impress or inform God, but rather to invite Him in. I had to really think about that. How often do I stop and invite God into what I am doing? Not often. I am so focused on just doing it. Most likely, the reason I am getting overwhelmed with the little things is because I am trying to do it all on my own strength, rather than on His. I think that’s what makes this place so unique, is that we live in a community filled with people who are inviting God into everything they do. This morning, before he went down to perform the first surgery, Dr.Gary went on the overhead speaker and asked us to pray with him. He knows that if we invite the Holy Spirit in, if we allow God to work through us, we will bring His kingdom to earth. I pray that I would learn to invite God into everything I do and that as a community we would proclaim that He is welcome in this place.

This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. ~ Romans 3:22-24 

[NIV notes: glory of God=what God intended humans to be]

Our nurses are ready for the patients to arrive!

Hitting the Ground Running in Benin

A before/after of one of the wards.

Ever since we’ve arrived in Benin, it’s been full speed ahead for every department. The IT department set up our new high speed internet and have been trying to get all the local cell phones working (for those whose jobs require it), and this is on top of all the regular work they have. The supply department has been unloading numerous containers, which have all the supplies we need to get underway for the field service. This week they also unloaded the container that had the stuff we shipped from Texas – we all were pretty excited to get the goodies that we had shipped ourselves. The hospital team has been busy unpacking and cleaning the wards, getting them ready for patients, while the OR team has been unpacking the operating rooms and sterilizing them. They have both had the added dimension of having Nat Geo filming them as they do this (who knew cleaning was so exciting?). Starting tomorrow, the day crew will be coming on board for some extensive training because the hospital officially opens in one week, and surgeries start on Sept.12^th. 

The tents are set up and ready to go.

The transportation team had several busy days when we first got here as they tried to get the cars all ready to go before screening started. They were stuck because of the typical bureaucratic issues, but apparently the First Lady heard about this and called the appropriate department and got them to come in on a Saturday to make sure we got all our plates. What a gift – I love how involved and invested the government is in our mission. Other departments have been helping to set up the tents outside (admissions, rehab, screening, outpatient). A lot of this was done by a Mercy team – these are basically groups that come as part of a short term mission trip. From my understanding, a team always comes to help us set up when we first arrive in a country. They were only here for two weeks, but they accomplished so much! Our HOPE Center (off ship hotel for patients) team has also been hard at work setting up and getting everything ready for patients to arrive. This year the HOPE Center is half the size of the one in Madagascar (120 beds) because many patients live close enough to go home in between appointments (once they have been discharged). We also had a Captain handover the other week – Captain Jon Fadely, who sailed us from Durban to Cape Town to Cotonou, handed over to Captain John Borrow, who will be our Captain for the entire field service. It was a great moment as we got to celebrate both of these remarkable men. 

A shot of the screening line - it stretches far into the distance.

And of course, the screening team has been extremely busy over the past few weeks. This week, they decided to take a new approach to screening. On Monday, they let in everyone who was waiting outside, around 1000 people and pre-screened all of them. They had a better idea of what they were looking for now, so rather than spend 2 minutes with each person, they spent 15 seconds with each of them. Around 350 people got yes’s at this point and headed inside for the screening portion. It was a long day for the team but they were able to completely clear the line so that no one was left sleeping outside. The rest of the week they still had several hundred people and maintained the same strategy, of letting everyone inside. They have been working incredibly hard to make all of this happen, and next week the team will be split in half as surgeon screenings begin on the dock, while regular screening continues out in town. Pray that they would have the strength and endurance to finish the task at hand! 

Some of the patients who have made it past pre-screening,
waiting to see a nurse.

As for the Comms team, we’ve been busy as well trying to document everything that has been happening. On Wednesday, Tiffany, Michele and I were able to visit the U.S. Embassy in Cotonou (Tiffany was pretty happy to spend an hour on U.S. soil!). We met with their Public Affairs team and they were very helpful, giving us an idea of what the media landscape is like here, allowing us to leverage their contacts to get the word out about screening, and even giving us a tour. On Friday, we helped to host a last minute visit by the Minister of Health and representatives from the WHO, UNICEF and various other NGO’s. The group (along with about 10 members of the media), visited the screening center and then came to the ship for a tour. Mix in screening, helping with Nat Geo and processing pictures, and that makes for a busy week. 

Our transportation team worked hard all weekend
to ensure the cars were ready in time for screening.

One neat thing has been seeing the ‘finished product’. Every week, the writers and photographers work on something called the weekly scoop, which compiles the best pictures and stories from the week and sends them out to the national offices. This is where they get all their material for Instagram and Facebook. It has been really cool to see all these pictures published by the various offices and shared many times over, especially because for many of the pictures, I was there, I know their names and their stories. There is something special about knowing the story behind every picture – I love being part of this amazingly talented team! We’ve also been able to watch many of the local news stories that have aired about Mercy Ships and that we got to host at the screening center. On top of that, the Danish team from TV2 BIGGEST program that I hosted a few months ago, just aired their program. I haven’t had a chance to watch it yet (it’s all in Danish…), but the producer told us it’s the best thing he has ever produced and that it still moves him to tears. I love seeing the way God uses this place to touch people’s hearts.

While it has been very busy, there has still been time for conversations where you laugh so hard it hurts; being victorious at board games; playing rugby/volleyball/frisbee on the dock; community worship of our amazing God; off ship dinner at a Thai place; swimming in the pool (and getting sunburnt); ice cream and profound conversations. I am so thankful for each and every person on this ship – what an amazing community we get to be a part of. I am also grateful that God has continued His work in me, breaking down the false images I have of myself, and showing me once again that I am His beautiful, wonderfully made daughter. His ways are good – He continues to reveal things to me, one piece at a time, knowing how much I can handle at once. This current season is for being – being with God, being with others, being truly seen, just showing up and being. The Holy Spirit is teaching me the difference between using vulnerability and being vulnerable. I’m a work in progress – we all are – but I love that our God cares so much about each of us that He continues to shape and mold us into the people that He intended for us to be.

 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end. ~ Hebrews 3:13-14

Timmy and I wandered down into the village that is just a few minutes away from the screening center, where it seems that
they make most of their livelihood off of the water. This is just one of the amazing moments that he captured. This is what
he had to say: It's a wonderful and humbling moment when you find yourself remembering that we really are no different at all. All it took was a smile from a stranger in a country where I don't speak the language; I suddenly felt welcome. I was reminded that underneath the worries of the world and the illusion of separation, we all - on a fundamental level - want to laugh and feel joy, to love and be loved, and to be acknowledged as part of this human experience we've all been thrown into headfirst - something we all too often forget. Can't put it any better than that! PC: Timmy Baskerville.