November 18, 2015
by Fenton Rees
We had to bail out early from the elk hunt (lots of rain) so Bambi elk still lives. But it was still a great “guy” kind of time, and now back home in Mukilteo, it is looking like this will be the second night in a row without electric power; it’s been off since yesterday afternoon when a big wind storm blew through western Washington. But with a portable generating grinding away, I still have lights and some heat, and the backpacking “JetBoil” stove works quite OK for cooking. Yes, it is kind of a pain, but at least the toilet still works! And it is not as tough as they have it in Bongolo.
I have had multiple e-mails and one phone conversation with Pat since returning. It is not easy there:
In one of my early e-mails I mentioned that being at Bongolo is like being on an island, surrounded by an ocean of tropical jungle. For most of the missionaries, it can be months before they get outside the hospital campus and the nearby village. That also means that even when you are not “on call”, you are still only a phone call and 200 yards away in case there is some kind of crisis. So from time to time, they all try and get off the island and take a break. Last weekend two of the medical families went to a beach about 4 hours away, not a resort but I think more like a cabin. That meant that Pat was the “go to” doc for maternity, not exactly her specialty. She survived OK, nothing too crazy happened.
As the rainy season really gets into full swing, the bugs get to be more of a problem. All the houses have screens for mosquitos, but there is a very nasty little No-see-um kind of a beastie that apparently can get through those screens and be a problem. Pat has always been a bit of a “bug attractor”, so this is a real pain for her. Who wants to wear insect repellant all the time? If there is a next time, maybe we should take some extra-fine screen material that will stop these little critters. And that of course is not even mentioning the zillions of tiny ants that appear at even the slightest hint of food scraps. Then just a few days ago, a nurse from Bongolo died when off campus. He was apparently 2 hours away in a village, started bleeding in his stomach and died before they could get him back to Bongolo. Around the same time, the Cameroonian wife of the Wycliffe affiliated missionary pilot, lost her first baby early in the pregnancy.
What with some of the missionary staff at Bongolo back in the US either on furlough or for medical reasons (why Pat and Jerry are there), it almost seems like the Enemy is having a whack at those that remain. So pray!
Blessings,
Fenton (& Pat).