Well, I am here safe and sound in White River, Mpumalanga, South Africa!
I think I said in my last post that I was overweight on both my bags, and had to repack things, and leave a few things behind! A lot of the stuff I actually had to put in my carry on, which was literally back breaking! I think my carry on weighed 50lbs!!! It was horrible to carry, and to maneuver on the plane! Stuffing it under the seat in front of me was an Olympic event! Not to mention getting it out again……
The flight to South Africa from Atlanta was looooong! Each seat had its own personal television with different movies and TV shows and music, though, so the entertainment was lovely! I watched the Hannah Montana movie, and I am a bit ashamed to say so, but I LOVED it! I think I watched, like, 5 movies, which unfortunately is not a very spiritual thing to report on my blog……I guess maybe I should have held revival services or something, but I don’t think that would have been well received by my fellow passengers. Plus, the flight attendants were unwilling to sing “just as I am” over the microphone while I held an altar call in first class ( I asked….Just kidding!)
Speaking of first class, there were no extra seats available on the plane, in fact they were bribing people to give up their seats, and offering them a seat on first class the next day! If I wasn’t so eager to get to South Africa I definitely would have taken that offer! So, I did not have an opportunity to upgrade, unfortunately, because let me just say-they have BEDS in first class on international flights now! That, my friends, is an especially depressing thought when you are crammed in coach trying to sleep 7 hours in to the flight!
Besides the normal fun things that international flights have, something slightly exciting happened! About 8 hours in to the flight there was a commotion next to me, and all the flight attendants were gathered around the middle seats across the aisle from my seat. Turns out this lady had lost consciousness and was going in and out of consciousness. So, I grabbed my stethoscope (which thankfully I had to take out of my checked bags at the gate!) and climbed (literally) over the 2 people sitting next to me, and told the flight attendants that I was a registered nurse and what could I do to help? Turns out the poor lady who was about my age had a history of altitude sickness.
A South African MD came over to help with his “nurse”, who I think was actually just his wife, because she was a bit useless until it came time to take the BP….so the doctor is going on about testing her Blood sugar blah blah…I suggested we just give her some OJ, which we did and she perked up quite a bit. Then he gave her some coffee (her BP was low and he thought the coffee would raise it…I was a bit skeptical, but I didn’t want to question him-even on the plane I have a doctor phobia!) Even though she was perking up her BP continued to be in the high 80’s, which I think as long as someone was keeping an eye on her was fine, but the doctor and his wife decided to start an IV and run a bag of fluid! Honestly I wasn’t expecting him to be able to start an IV, but he did it on one try! I was very impressed, and my respect for him raised quite a bit!
As I said I am planning on posting these first posts over a few days, because there’s so much here! I’ve almost written a novel here, and I haven’t even gotten off the plane yet! Here is a picture of my first “proper African” meal, Beef and Pop, which is basically a tasty beef stew over a starchy mashed rice tasting stuff…it was very good, although I still would prefer mashed potatoes!!
So, when I finally landed in Johannesburg the flight had ended up being an hour late due to tail winds apparently! They checked and stamped my passport without saying a peep to me, and since I didn’t have any seeds or vegetables to declare I bypassed customs entirely! I’m still a bit puzzled about that, but since my luggage was last to come off the plane I was grateful for any timesaver, poor Janice, I think, was worried that I wasn’t on the plane! She looked soo relieved when I walked through the gate!
Janice had planned for us to stay in a guest house in Pretoria; I became a little alarmed when she told me that I would have to navigate for her, as my spiritual gift is definitely not navigation! Long story short we spent 2 hours driving around Jo-burg and who knows where else trying to find our way. Between the driving around and the 15 hour flight I was ready to toss my cookies! In fact a few times, I was *this close* to asking Janet to stop so I could “cast up my accounts” on the side of the road! Thankfully we finally made it to the lovely guest house, I was never so grateful to see a bed!!! It gets soooo cold at night here, but my mom made me a lovely fleece sleeping bag which keeps me so toasty. Here is a picture of it; it’s like having a hug from my mama every night!
The next morning we headed up the mountains to White River, Mpumalanga. Its lovely scenery and Janice says that in the summer (its winter here) the hills are covered in flowers and green grass! She gave me quite an orientation to the culture and the ministries and the politics of South Africa! Honestly its all a bit of a jumble now, but I will eventually be able to formulate my own thoughts and opinions and I will share them here as I acquire them : )
Something exciting that I will be a part of while I am here is helping Janice prepare her mobile medical clinic! She has lots of resources as far as some training manuals for the community health advocates. Its very interesting to read her training manual for teaching the HIV/TB workshops! I am already learning sooo much! So, I will be coming up with something definite for a manual for the mobile medical clinic. I’m also looking into getting some basic textbooks from Amazon to leave here as references for people working at the clinic. We’ll be primarily dealing with women and children, so the references will be for those mostly.
I am learning so much about the culture here, its very interesting and the politics are crazy! Its funny because they all hate America, but looooove Obama! He is incredibly popular here! More so than in the USA! Its wild!
The coffee situation here is very nice, there is a cute coffee shop with yummy espresso drinks within walking distance of our cottage, plus I have my precious little French press, and praise the Lord Janice is one of the chosen people (coffee drinker)!! So, in case you were concerned now you can rest assured that my coffee addiction is being enabled and going strong here!
Pastor Marie and her husband are the pastors here. Pastor Marie also heads up the home based care ladies and the children's church, she does all of this with her baby strapped to her back, and he is quite squirmy. Here is a picture of her and him together
