Chidamoyo Hospital in Zimbabwe

At our last Heads of Departments meeting it was suggested that we have a Clean up day for the hospital that the community could come and help.  We thought that was a great idea to give the hospital a thorough cleaning. So yesterday (Saturday)  morning we had over 150 people that joined us.  Each head of department came and took the number of people they needed and supervised and worked along side people to thoroughly clean.  We had 80+ year old grannies to 5 year old children helping, and all of our 9 month pregnant mom to be came out to help.  They scrubbed the labor ward top to bottom!  Even our doctors cleaned up their office! They worked for about 3 hours and then we had everyone sit to thank them and then gave them all a drink and then they were off! We all worked along side each other and we were laughing and had a great time.  Everyone at the end  said let's do this every month!  I am not sure about that it was a bit chaotic at times!  Now we can plan better what needs

This past week was busy getting ready for a big wedding.   Tapson Nyamaharo who works as our Diesel Mechanic/Driver married Tendai Masinire.   The wedding had been planned for several months and we had been having meetings to make sure everything go done and by who, and finally the wedding happened on Saturday, August 10 th . As happens with most weddings here, it was suppose to start at 9 a.m. and it actually got started at 11 a.m.   The minister came at 10:15 and finally 45 minutes later we got everyone to the church. People showed up before 5 a.m. to start cooking in my driveway   as the bridal party and family members and VIP came to my house in between the wedding and reception, to eat.   We decorated the dining room outside and had tarps up for the other tables.   As I was working with Mrs. Mereki the Maid of Honor (called Best Lady here) came running and hysterically crying   to say she had burnt her   dress on the back—a satin material.   We quickly figured out to make

This week we had visitors from Carl Junction, Missouri, Karen and Isaac Barringer.   Isaac grew up as a missionary kid here from 1990-1996 when his parents, Jeff and Debbie Barringer worked as our Maintenance Family.   Karen and Isaac have come back to explore the possibility of working as missionaries in Zimbabwe with their 2 daughter Lauren and Jaylene.   They are looking at helping out our hospital in Mhangura, Makonde Christian Hospital. They spent 4 days with us seeing where Isaac grew up and I put them to work doing month end reports (yeah they came right at the right time to do those!) and organizing some of the boxes that came in the recent container.   We had a great time with them and will meet them for a day in Harare when they leave on Friday.   They drove off to Doma to spend the weekend there and then will be at Makonde Hospital next week.   We sent them off with a patient to drop in Karoi for us.   His dad did a lot of ambulance trips for us—so just like old times