May 10, 2016

We worked in the office today and tried getting caught up on many of the things we let slide last week. We got a good start on it. I took our laundry into the mission home to do today because our well is low on water. We have run out several times and we just have to wait for it to recharge. Until the rains begin, we will be doing laundry at the mission home And we do buy our drinking water. We got an update on Brother Doe today. When he arrived in Ghana he was in very bad shape - he had a high fever, an infection and his proteins and "blood levels" were off. The doctor does not want to do surgery until Brother Doe regains his health. That was one wicked trip from Sierra Leone to Ghana. Plus the treatment he received in Sierra Leone did not help

May 9,2016

We went to Makeni today to visit with the Lebanese owner of the the material store which is the African equivalent of an old hardward store in the US with a little bit of this and little bit of that. Brother Doe's men need to be able to get supplies to finish their duplex they are building and are almost done with. When the owner heard of Brother Doe's accident, he cut off selling to them for fear of not getting paid. Don and Mr. Davis assured the owner he would get paid so he agreed to sell what he has on hand but will not special order anything. Which is OK. The project is very close to being done. They are doing mostly finishing work. We had a treat tonight. Elder Samchee, a young Elder who lives next door to us, made the Miles and us a Ghanian meal (Elder Samchee is from Ghana). It was a lot of rice with a sauce. Here a sauce is a stew. This is eaten most every night. They make sauces in many different flavors. The one we had tonight was quite good. It was made with black-eyed peas (beans), fish, spices and Pepe (which is an extremely hot pepper that looks like a small red bell pepper but it isn't a bell pepper). He did not use too much, it had a nice bite. We got home from Makeni around 4:00 and Elder Samchee was home. Last week was his birthday and I made him a chocolate cake. He loved it and asked me to teach him how to make a chocolate cake from scratch. So I went over to see how his dinner was progressing - he had it all ready. So I asked him if he wanted to make a cake for dessert. He practically ran over me trying to get out the door to come over here. He wasn't familiar with measuring cups or measuring spoons so that was the first lesson. We then made the cake. OH Good Grief! We put it in the oven and my stove is not level and the cake ran out of the pan, all over the oven and even ran out under the oven door and down the front of the stove. The back half of the cake was burned batter and the front half of the cake cooked beautifully but was very thick. It tasted wonderful. Oh I just had a good laugh! I just re-read the above and immediately thought of Duane Jones. He hates stew so he would be cringing at that and then to have it made from black-eyed peas and fish! His face is scrunched and (if he sitting down) his hands are between his knees and he is quivering all over. What a fun memory of a good friend!

May 7, 2016

Gabrielle's 17th Birthday. We called her and she was at the NASCAR races in Kansas City with her dad and Gavin. We miss her. Today was a day of recuperation.

May 5, 2016

Happy Anniversay Karen & Duane!

Alie was sent to the Kenya Airline ticket office to purchase the reserved tickets. He had to go to one clerk to get the receipt, which he received, and was for the quoted amount. He then had to take it over to the cashier to pay for it. The cashier re-worked the figures and came up with a higher price. The cashier told him he did not have enough money that he was $300 USD short . Alie tried having a conversation about the discrepancy between the clerk's figures and the cashiers figures but the cashier was "holier than thou" and refused to help discern the problem. Being highly frustrated and under a time limit, Alie left without the tickets. Today was zone conference and we had a General Authority, President LeGrand R. Curtis Jr., here to tour the mission and speak at zone conference. Alie was very much involved with this activity and did not have time to disagree with a cashier. At noon Sister Doe received a phone call from Kenya Airline telling her that the tickets had not been paid for because Alie was $300 USD short and they had to be paid for by 2:00 p.m our time because Nairobi closes at 5:00 and you cannot buy tickets after 5:00 Nairobi time and there is a 3 hour time-zone difference. Don had $300 USD in his pocket so he and two other men took off to Kenya Airline to assure them they had the money. On the way, Don Called Alie and learned what had happened. When Don got to the airline office the clerk was threatening to release the tickets for sale to others because they had not paid for them yet. To get her to not do that, Don called Alie and put the phone up to her ear so Alie could tell her he had the money. When Alie arrived, they went to the clerk and got another receipt showing how much was owed. It was the same as the quoted price and the amount Alie was going to pay earlier in the day. Alie was so frustrated and angry with this whole process. Don and Alie went over to a bench and physically counted the money to make sure it was the same as the quoted amount. They had the exact amount. Don took the money and the receipt over to the cashier and this time as she totaled it up she came up with the exact amount that they were quoted all along. Don made her count every $100 bill and every smaller denomination down to the last dollar. But before they received the tickets, Alie yelled from outside her cubical something about that is what he told her this morning and she refused to listen to him. That started a verbal fight between the cashier and the clerk. They got the tickets and left. Good Grief! Nothing has been simple. From here Don had to arrange for the ambulance shuttle. Mustapha met Don at the hospital and together they went to the logistic office and handed the man 6 uncirculated one-hundred dollar bills. He counted them 3 times in front of Don and drooled over them (he is from India). Don asked him to make sure the a/c would work and that the ambulance driver would be ready to leave the compound at 6:00 a.m. The airport is across the bay and you either have to take the ferry or take a 3-hour ride by vehicle around. The trip around the bay would have been extremely hard on Brother Doe. They elected to take the ferry. Mustapha informed Don that the President of the country had reserved the entire ferry for his entourage for the next morning. . Mustapha assured Don that he knew the head of security for the President and he thought they could get on the ferry. They were going to try it. Brother Doe's flight was at 5:20 p.m but he had to check in at 1:30.

May 4, 2016

An amazing Day! Brother Doe began to have feeling in his legs and feet and in the small of his back that he had not had since the accident. He had gone to sleep and Don was sitting by his bedside watching him. Brother Doe entered into a dream state and had a look of pure joy on his face with a smile. His right arm lifted up and moved around. This is the only limb he has that functions but without control. After 2 to 3 minutes he woke up and said to Don "squeeze my toes". Don squeezed his toes on his right foot - left foot , he could feel it. He gave a big smile that he could feel his toes being squeezed. Then he asked Don to go get a doctor to poke his feet with something sharp. He had that test performed on Tuesday morning by a doctor and he could not feel anything. Don went out to the nurses' station and a doctor and nurse were there. Don asked the Doctor to do a pinprick test and he just stared at Don and then said something in Kreo to the nurse who in turn told Don "the doctor knows what he is doing, and brother Doe does not need this test". Don invaded her personal space and told her he had a gut full of her lack of care, compassion and understanding. He was so frustrated he unloaded on her. The doctor stood there and said and did nothing. So Don pivoted and went back into Brother Doe's room and took out his pocket knife and poked Brother Doe in the bottom and sides of his feet. He could feel each poke and he could tell Don which foot was being poked. He had sensation all over the bottom of his feet. Don had just finished when the doctor ,the same one Don had asked to do the test, walked into the room. Brother Doe asked the doctor to touch his legs. The Doctor touched his legs from his groin to his ankles on both legs and Brother Doe was able to tell the doctor which leg and where on the leg he was touching. Brother Doe has numerous friends. Brother Doe's good friend (I learned his name it is Mustapha) had gotten the travel nurse arranged and got the Kenya airline to reserve 3 tickets for the Friday evening 5:30 flight direct to Accra, Ghana. One for Brother Doe, one for the nurse and one for Sister Doe. But the only way to get the tickets is to go downtown Freetown to the Kenya Airline ticket office and pay with USD only. You cannot go online in Sierra Leone to get tickets on Kenya Airline and you cannot buy a ticket at the airport. NO Credit cards or leones (African money). Brother Doe had many friends who came to see him including 3 women from Liberia, but because Brother Doe was in ICU they could not visit. They hung around in groups outside. Don went out in the evening and told them the flight arrangements have been made and he is starting to feel things in his legs. They were encouraged.

May 3, 2016

I have learned a little more about the culture here. The reason Brother Doe was not fed yesterday is because the nurses only do medical things. They are not involved in patient care at all. That is for the uneducated, unskilled, and people from tribes that are considered of lesser importance. There are 115 tribes here. Only two tribes are of any importance. If you are not from either of these two tribes, your life has no value. So their culture and their tribal differences dictates what people do and how they do it as well as what kind of treatment you will get.

TO ALL READING - FROM CHO

Hello all - i am happy you can read these updates from Africa. Dad told me he could see the comments when he viewed the blog. So feel free to leave any comments on any post - but remember that it is a PUBLIC post, so Dad and Jeanne can see them, but so can everyone else.

I will try to post as often as the emails come in , which is usually once or twice a week.

Thanks for loving and supporting my parents!
Cholena