Birds are chirping bringing in the new day. In the distance I can hear the music from the
chapel playing for morning meeting. I look out my window and tropical plants
are all around me. There are palm trees
and a hedge of Lantana perfectly framing my yard with a mountain backdrop. It truly is prettier than any place I have
stayed since Hawaii. We have been at Mbingo in Cameroon for 6 days now and
there have been so many positive things and to be perfectly honest some
negative things since our arrival.
I had so much fear and anxiety about us arriving in Douala
and the process of going through customs, getting our bags, then getting to the
vehicle that would be transporting us to Mbingo before we arrived. But this process like the entire journey here
was smooth and without stress. We were
greeted by George in the baggage claim and he helped us load our 21 pieces of
luggage onto carts to be taken out to the van.
George spoke with a gentleman that was there and who was in charge of
customs. This allowed us to pass freely when
there was a very long line that was having every bag opened and gone
through. We then loaded into the van and
were taken to eat pizza at a Greek restaurant before arriving at the guest
house.
We traveled all the next day to Mbingo and when we arrived
we were in awe of the beauty and the welcome provided by all those who were
there. We carried in our luggage and the
kids quickly claimed their rooms and began asking if they could begin unpacking
right then. We were fed well and then
visited with Dr. Palmer and his wife Nancy.
Since that day we have been warmly welcomed by everyone
here. Dinners and visits have filled our
evenings. Then we took an intense trip
to the city of Bamenda to shop for household items, new phone service, and went
on a quest for a printer. We succeeded
in the purchase of the printer only to attempt to load the disk on our laptop
computer and it completely crashed the hard drive. Thankfully there is a brilliant IT guy here
named Josh that was able to salvage a couple of the important files we need but
the “drive is finished.” Downside is
that we are now going to have to purchase a new computer. The positive side is that we have been
graciously loaned a computer in the meantime.
It has been like that the whole time. We have something that would completely undo
us in the U.S. to have it salvaged in another way. It may not be the way we would choose or how
we wanted it, but the alternative still gets us to a place where we can
function.
The kids are doing really well. They have found more ways to entertain
themselves without electronics since we arrived. I have not heard them complain
once when I say, “Well, go outside and play.” If your children are like mine
this would have followed with grumbles and moans. Here though they simply go
outside and find something to do. I
never imagined that they would be adjusting this well. Micah and Micaja have
made friends with some local kids and have played both yesterday and today for
2 hours each time. They take a ball or paper with colored pencils and they all
play, play, play.
We are truly thankful to be here and be in the space that we knew God was leading us to. We still have more things to learn than I can even count, but we have already learned some things that we did not know before. Please keep us in your prayers when we come to your mind. Pray that Chris will find his place in the hospital that is beneficial to the people at Mbingo and also for him. Please pray that the kids continue to do well and flourish in their new environment. Pray that I figure out how to keep moving forward and taking in everything that is coming my way with a peaceful heart. My next post will simply be things we have learned that are vastly different to the U.S. I will also post pictures at that time, but as I said above with the computer going down we have been having some challenges.
In Christ,
Ashley
" The Will of God will not take you where the Grace of God cannot protect you."