A Cold Day In Liberia

Yesterday was a good day for us, it was 80 degrees and overcast in the morning, that is the coldest it has been since we got here. The sun did come out for a while about midday, but it cooled down in the evening to 80 again. Everyone was complaining about the "cold", except me and D'Linda. In the morning D'Linda, Jamie and I went for a walk on the beach, the men were carrying sand, I asked one if I could take his picture, but he said " I would not like that". I have been asking people first because some people really don't like their picture taken. Others are really excited about it and I usually show them after I take it and they are thrilled. I decided not to wait for another one because the picture wouldn't have gotten the effect I wanted seeing that they were all wearing long sleeve shirts because of the "cold".

After lunch I went to work with Rusty for a while. The air conditioning in the OR is still not working right, the one that was repaired seemed to be making heat, the one that was taken from the morgue was working, but not as good as it should. We met the AC tech, Morris, there and went over the problem, he was going to check the refrigerant levels and see if he couldn't fix the problem.

Rusty has lots of projects that his people could work on, but he doesn't have the funding for them, so he is always scrambling to keep them busy. I helped one worker fix a "spoiled", nothing is broken, it is spoiled, Basketball hoop. It should have taken about 15 to 20 minutes but because tools and material are scarce it took over an hour. What tools they have are pretty worn, especially the wrenches, we had to scavenge a piece of wood and cleanup and reuse the bolts.

At about 3:30 D'Linda and I went with Jamie and the kids and some of the other missionary families down the road to a resort that lets them swim in the pool. It is a 5 star resort, by Liberian standards, it was comparable to a nice motel back home. It is pretty new and they don't get much business, so they let the missionaries use the facility, they were going to charge them, but decided to just let them use it for free. They all had a good time, I went down to the beach with the boys while they played in the surf, the guard was concerned for their safety, but I assured him that they would be alright and that I would stay with them. It seems that most Liberians are afraid of the water. The guard didn't know how we could go in the water anyway because it was so "cold" out.

Rusty met us there after he was done working, he was a little late because he was arrested on the way. He has a little, 100 cc, motorcycle that he rides most of the time to save on fuel. On the way to the resort a Police Officer stopped him and told him he was in serious trouble because he wasn't wearing a helmet, that the fine was over $1000. Rusty had to give him a ride to the police station, most police are on foot. While standing there a missionary friend drove by and honked and waved. When Rusty waved back the Police Officer asked if he new them and Rusty said he did. The Officer asked if Rusty was a missionary and he said he was, the Officer asked "why didn't you tell me?" Rusty said "you didn't ask". The Officer told him that he was free to go.

The guest services manager at the hotel came over and was so excited to see how good Blessing looked. He couldn't get over how much of a difference the surgery has made. He is Liberian, but grew up and was educated in the States. His grandfather was the President of Liberia for 27 years. He told us that he really believes that things are getting better, he said you can even criticize the President and not "disappear". There is an election coming up and one of his uncles is running for President, but he said he was going to vote for the incumbent. He said that he thinks she has done a good job despite all the criticism. He believes that it is better to have a woman in the office because the African male mind set is too confrontational and that her motherly approach is better.

I had thought that after a few days I would run out of stuff to write about, but so far that isn't the case, I have quite a few more things to report on, and it seems like everyday I get more stories. I'm a slow typist so I get tired before I run out of things, which is probably lucky for you, these posts are long enough. I have gotten feed back from a few of you through email and that is encouraging, I'm never sure if anybody is interested or if I am just rambling, but either way this is kind of fun, see you later.