Last day in Sierra Leone. I think there were lots of mixed emotions, at least there were for me. It was an amazing experience, but my system was just out of sorts there and I was ready to feel ‘normal’ again!
More pictures trying to encapsulate the tiny piece of Sierra Leone that we were exposed to…
Palm trees
Chickens run loose everywhere. People tell theirs apart by attaching bits of string/fabric to the chicken somehow.
Breakfast time!
Eating outside by the pool! Breakfast was when we went over the plan for the day & handed out the ‘magic blue pills’ (Imodium) to anyone who needed them. And apparently talked about gross stuff “too much” according to one Freshman boy! To be fair bathroom related questions did factor into a lot of conversations, but we needed to keep tabs on the students and make sure they were getting meds & enough hydration!
A team photo!
The first order of business was to head into Freetown, but that proved to be a bit of an issue as the president was going “upline” and when he does this apparently they shut down huge parts of one side of the highway, so what used to be a two-lane divided highway becomes basically a city street.
Or in this instance, a jumble of vehicles really going no where! I was riding with my friend and so enjoyed watching her “Sierra Leone” side come out as she leaned out her window and took people to task in Krio for not doing what they were supposed to do!
Finally made it to the market! That was another cultural experience as people pulled on you to come to their booth and then you were supposed to barter…thankfully several of our hosts were with us and could help with that latter!
Next up was lunch at a beachside restaurant (or rather across-the-street-from-the-beach)
I think almost everyone was excited for the ‘american’-style food!
REAL Italian Gelato! The perfect dessert for hot weather!
While most of us were enjoying our lunches & gelato, one poor student didn’t chew his meat as thoroughly as he should have & only got it part way down. He wasn’t choking, but it was continually hitting his gag reflex and making him feel like he needed to throw up. Our host (& certified RN) evaluated him and said that it needed to go down, not up and while he was certainly uncomfortable he wasn’t in danger or choking and that the best thing we could do would be to get him out of Sierra Leone and on to Europe. Her words were: you don’t want to be seen here for this, you want to get to Europe! She even called an American doctor in country and he said the exact same thing. So, for better or worse, we handed the student a bag and loaded him into a car!
We had planned to take the water taxi from where we were in Freetown over to the airport, but then one of our hosts found out that for a group our size it was actually cheaper to just charter a water taxi! So, here we are boarding our private water taxi to the airport!!
Off we go!!
It was about a 30-minute trip across the water so they let us go up to the roof in groups of 3! Here we can still see to say ‘goodbye’ to Freetown!
Ezra thought this might be a Baobab tree
We took a boat to the airport & then began the arduous task of getting 19 people checked-in and through security. It’s no joke anywhere, but especially in a foreign country! Meanwhile, our poor student was continuing to gag and sputter. One guy at the airport said to me, “Your student is unwell” and I had to explain that he didn’t feel well, but that he wasn’t sick.
Finally, everyone was through and we were able to let the students just hang out by our gate while we made plans. We took some time to pray for the student that God would give him peace. In the way God works, there was a group of people waiting to get on the same flight who had just been serving on a Mercy Ship. Most were maintenance or crew of that sort, but there was one nurse in the group and Micah explained our situation and once again we heard the same thing: if he can breathe and isn’t choking, get him on the plane and out of Africa. The student was still really struggling and so finally I sat down next to him and asked, “Have you ever done yoga?” and he said he had. I told him that he REALLY needed to focus on deep slow breathing and trick his body into calming down. Thankfully, he was able to take those words to heart & there were times in the next hour that I would have sworn he was asleep, but then he would shift positions. I think it did help him get into a space where he could at least handle the terrible uncomfortableness of his situation. Also, let’s be honest, we had just prayed for him and God’s peace is incredible!
This is the screen shot I took as we made plans for our student while still in the Freetown Airport. His parents were called & told of the situation. We also figured out where the medical clinic was in Brussels and made plans for Micah to go with him taking both their passports in case they ended up needing to transfer him to a hospital there. I only had a few minutes, but I sent a quick email to my mom at work knowing that my childhood church would start praying!
Meanwhile…in the airport gift shot…I can’t decide if this is funny or sad!
We had to fly to Monrovia in Liberia, let people off, wait while they cleaned up a bit & then let more passengers on. It made our return flight longer by about two hours. So 9 hours after we left Freetown, we landed in Brussels at 5:00 a.m.! Micah & the one student immediately headed for the medical clinic while Kristy & I herded the remainder of the students through customs.
I still don’t fully understand how this worked out, but within 10 minutes of the large group getting to the food court & claiming an area for our 4-hour layover, Micah returned with the student. I guess the customs area they had gone through had been much shorter. Anyways, the Dr. in the medical clinic acknowledged that the student was in an uncomfortable situation, but that he wasn’t in danger and was “fit to fly” for our final leg to Zurich. It was while we were in Brussels that the student’s parents decided to have the dad fly to Zurich and meet us so his son wouldn’t have to fly home alone.
We were a VERY TIRED group!
Although some people were peppier than others!
Our flight to Zurich from Brussels was just around an hour and I think most of us slept the whole time! Parents were waiting with vans to drive us home and we were glad to step outside into the fresh air even if it was quite cold compared to what we were used to!
(The end of the story for the one student…his dad arrived about a half hour after we did and they went to the hospital in Zurich. They initially gave him some medicine in hopes that it would reduce the swelling. Next they did an endoscopy and ultimately they had to do surgery on Easter Sunday morning to remove the piece of meat. He was released later that day & flew home with his dad. I’ve since seen him at school & he sort of brushed the episode off & said it wasn’t that bad…now that it was in the past! I was glad to hear that was his attitude, because he had been so distressed in the moment. We’re so grateful for all the people who were praying – that truly made a difference in him being able to get through those 14 hours of travel!)
How to sum up this trip? I’m not really sure honestly. I think I will be pondering and processing all we saw for quite some time. For so long, I have known that I would not want to be a missionary in Africa and nothing about this trip has changed my mind. At one point, I made a comment to several of the ladies hosting us about how they are the “real” missionaries and one of them said in response, “But you have to work with teenagers every day!” It was such a reminder of how God made the body of Christ. We all have different gifts & callings and at this point in time mine seems to be to work with teenagers in Germany!
Before I end our posts about our trip to Sierra Leone here is a list of things that caught my attention about the life & culture which I jotted down in some of the ‘quiet’ moments:
Having to put Toilet Paper in the garbage
Lemon scented TP
Dust
Heat
Mosquito nets
Large black wasp-like bugs
Dogs
Goats
Chickens
People carrying things on their heads
Motorcycles with multiple people
Motorcycles with whole families
Crazy driving
No electricity
Exhaust
The call to prayer
Trash
Seriously sketchy scaffolding
Palm trees
Catholic Churches
Fancy gas stations
Wooden or cinder block stores/shops
Colorful fabric
Bags of charcoal for sale on the side of the road
Loaded down vehicles
Burning fields
Unique smelling BO (I checked with my friend on this one – she totally agreed that it’s different)
Cars painted with “To God be the Glory”
Haze
Colorful flowers
Lizards
Honking to pass
Beautiful smiles
Adorable children
Plastic bags of water
Round little cucumbers
Moot moots (teensy bugs that come out at night & bite you)
Wells of water
AC that has a slight diesel smell (because they are run off a diesel generator)
Bars on windows
Plastic Milla water tanks outside houses
Half-completed houses
Nice houses with barbed wire on perimeter walls
Kids wearing their best to VBS
Kids clutching their invitation to VBS
Micah & Heather's Weblog 