Chidamoyo Hospital in Zimbabwe

We had a good week before the end of the year although the hospital was busy after Monday was a holiday here. We did get electricity for less than 24 hours from Christmas Eve night at 8 p.m. until Christmas Day at 6:15 p.m. (only 1 hour off in the morning) and then a big storm hit and we were off again! the whole week we struggled with no electricity for X-rays and computer work, etc. NY Eve we broke off work at 2 p.m. and got a few hours to relax (take down Christmas decorations) at home before the start of our NY Eve celebrations at 7:30 p.m. We had a packed church with some of our local churches coming and the community. We sang, dance, had a video, prayed the NY in and then at midnight went outside the church for fireworks. We bought some Chinese ones at the flea market in Harare and we were unsure what they would do but they were fun--one rocket went into the sky and then head back into the crowd! They scattered and asked for more! After the fireworks we went back into the church ...

Our Christmas dinner theme was Hawaiian Retro Christmas--so we had dress 1950's Hawaii. Michael, Major's son decided to add some tummy to his costume to look like his Dad! Enjoy these pictures!

We had a great Christmas and hope you did too. I am sharing some of the highlights through pictures I am posting. We started the week by finding out that we made the NY times front page on Sunday the 19th of December. Wow--this was a surprise to be on the front page. Then we were reprinted in other newspapers and on the front page of my hometown newspaper on Monday the 20th. So if you haven't read it or seen the video (you must be in cave) here are the websites: http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2010%2F12%2F19%2Fworld%2Fafrica%2Fzimbabwe.html&h=ofb0b http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/2001220/news/12201041 Thank you for all the kind words and some donations that have rolled in. We are in desperate need for a new generator and we think we might have the money soon! This week we spent 6 days without electricity as we had big storms last weekend which burnt up a power pole. ZESA had no pole to replace it with and so it took several days to find one. Wha...

Well it is December and even though there is no snow on the ground—there are crops growing in the field, rain falling and days up to 90 degrees—sounds like Christmas for me! Major is back but he has spent the last 2 weeks in school in Harare to upgrade his ministry degree. So even though he is in the country, we still communicate by email and look anxiously to his return this weekend. Of course during the past 2 weeks the peanut butter machine needs new blades, the boreholes have broken 3 times and need new belts, rubbers and a pump, and the grinding mill needs a new circuit breaker, the chickens have some kind of skin disease and we need to pick a pig to kill for Christmas. Wow I can’t wait for Major to get back and take over those issues! Somehow I missed those classes in Nursing school on how to handle these hospital crisis issues! Now it must be my turn for holiday! Stacy, our visitor from TN left for Harare yesterday to spend a few days before she heads for Joburg on Monday ...

This week has been a busy week. We have already received 150 mls+ of rain in November, so people are busy in their fields plowing and planting. Mondays all day and Thursday mornings are days people can not work in their fields in our area in order to honor their ancestors—so that is when the patients flock to the hospital. Many wait until they are very ill because the family member who may need to bring them doesn’t want to miss days in the field. So we get some breaks in between when people are busy plowing and planting. The rivers aren’t full yet, but soon the rivers will prevent many people being able to get the hospital until the river goes down a day or so after the rain. This week we said goodbye to Liz Able who has been with us since August. She flew on to spend Christmas with her family in Shanghai, China and then will be enrolling in college in January in Portland, OR. We wish her well and thank her for her help! This past Saturday (Nov 13th) we decided to celebrate Thanksgivi...

Thought I would add some more pictures for all of you. Stacy is a visitor from TN and she is applying for Med School in the Fall 2011 so she is learning by assisting in surgery and sewing up lacerations. Some more pictures of our visitors and our animals we saw on safari in Kariba. Notice how close the elephants were to our room! Liz and Lauren sitting next to me on the boat over to the safari camp! The group with Dr. Zimudzi.

In mid-October the visitors (Chris, Amber, Lauren, Liz, Stacy and Kial) and I were able to spend 3 nights and 3 days at a wonderful safari camp called Rhino Camp. We actually got to see Rhino—there are only 14 in the whole National Park—so it was special! We had many elephants around our cabins and looked out on Kariba Lake which made us feel we were on a tropical island with African elephants! We also say lions with cubs and lots of other animals and enjoyed walking, riding and boating to see the many different animals. Amber's birthday was the day we arrived so made her wear the famous birthday hat (the picture with her and Kial on boat to elephant point). We had a special dinner with chocolate cake--too windy for candles! It was a relaxing and fun time by all. Amber left us on October 28th and returned to Lincoln, Nebraska. Her welcome home party turned into her engagement party when her boyfriend popped the questions—Makorokoto (Congrats) Amber! Our rains have started and peopl...