Little Keny Survives and Thrives

9/13/2016

Achua mebe.  "Good morning, how was the night? How is the family?"  The African people are very social and personal. Greetings are important to them. They stop, pause, great and shake hands enthusiastically and ask how you are. It is quite nice!  I have to really make myself slow it down when here and take time to do this, esp as I tend to still want to operate under my typical American multi task speed. It is refreshing to just "be" in the moment and pay attention to people and not things, the phone. I  am still pulled in a lot of directions here but my team of Africans help a lot. The American team is not always easy as this experience can bring out many emotions and I am always surprised at what comes out of the woodwork of one's soul and insecurity or anxiety or fear of the unknown. Cultural differences also abound. I am not always a very patient team leader. I try to be cognizant of what is going on or brewing but I miss the boat many times. Personalities can clash especially in communal living and travelling. I also neglect to explain things thoroughly many times. For

many it is their first time. For me it is many times so I forget how it is.  So, please slow me down and ask.  Any questions?  No matter what, the experience usually changes or impacts people greatly. I always know everyone's hearts are in the right place and they are sacrificing, giving and loving.  Everyone copes  in different ways and takes home different perspectives.  Always I survive and come back for more!   I am grateful and miss some of you on trips like this. Your contribution adds a lot of dimension and creativity to activities and blessed the people immensely. Before each trip you all have to sign a Waiver acknowledging this is NOT a Vacation haha!  I am a terrible vacation tour guide that's for sure!   You all are doing great!! By the way!  Thanks hanging in there and taking the long road! 

- Meet little Keny. We first met him in 2006 at the Kitgum infant orphan care center. During the war and as massacres happened or mothers became abducted or died in one way or another, many babies were found under bushes or nearly anywhere. People would bring them to St Joseph's hospital where Terence was working. He saw such a need and opened the center for babies. A caregiver was required to be with the children as well. Hiring aids etc was not and option or feasible. The babies needed milk, health care, food, warmth and love. By the time they reached the hospitals they were usually very malnourished and ill, many of them barely alive. There was no such thing as infamil formula or baby bottles, so without mothers breast milk these babies would have all died. Keny, was one of them. His mother died of HIV and his father was also very sick with HIV. Keny turned positive for HIV and he was dying. Our team spent a week at the infant orphan care center teaching the caregivers all about healthcare and nutrition, as well as doing clinics evaluating and treating the babies. When we arrived they were all sick, nearly every one of them.  Dripping snot from their noses like I have never seen, goop from their eyes and ears. coughing, feverish, sores all over their bodies, bellies swollen, arms so so thin. Worst of all they were so lethargic, eyes dulled with hardly a spark of light. And they did not cry.  They did not cry. I will never forget it. Pneumonia, malaria, diarrhea, skin infections, ear infections - you name it. Thankfully on the Calvary Chapel  team we had one doctor (Dr Marty Lucas) , two PA's (including me), a couple nurses and a lot of loving people who pitched in with anything needed for the clinic, pharmacy, lab testing etc, while others loved, sang, and played with the children during a VBS.  We prayed and prayed for healing and showered on them as much love , vitamins, medicines and supplies as we could. Cheryl Morgan carried small, weak little Keny in her arms most of the time.  When we left we thought he would die. Well, he didn't - he lived!  God had other plans for his little life. ARV medications became available and others for treatment and prophylaxis.  He started to survive and then thrive.  His father also was able to get on ARV's and he survived and his health improved also. Keny graduated from the infant care center and his father took him home. Cheryl has sponsored him ever since. Keny is now in P 4 primary school. They come to see me each visit. He used to be very shy and now has grown into a bright eyed very talkative boy. Not a bit afraid to ask for what he wants and speaks great English! This time he asked for a bicycle!  I looked at his grades. They were not so good and he admitted he played a little too much last term so we made a deal - if he studies hard, pays attention and gets his grades up, I will get him a bicycle in January when we are next here.  He has 3 months to earn this - haha! Here I go again mothering these children - It would be easier on my soft heart to just give him the bike (and many team members would be taken by that grin and insist they wish to buy him the bike) but he understands and this is better for him in the long run I keep telling myself!  His father is taking very good care of him and so deserving of some help. Thank you and bless you Cheryl!  Hope 2 One life supported the infant care center in medical treatment and a visiting nurse since 2007 - until the center closed a couple years back due to lack of funding when the war was over and the government wanted all of the children to be integrated and cared for by extended families. Hundreds of babies were helped and saved over the years. Terence was the founder owner and director of the center and that is how he came to help us on these development projects. His heart is pure gold and the most trustworthy, competent and cooperative person with the financial accountability and feedback  we need for H2O to exist. We couldn't have expanded to these areas without him and now Denis and Bosco's desire to help. ----

Come along my friends, carry me along as we head next to Awal village, the home of my Bosco's family who suffered immensely during the war and still continue to struggle.  This is a hard one for me. We also met Bosco at the infant care center in 2006 when he was the child caregiver (10 years old)  of baby N. He carried her from the hospital to the children's activities and VBS on his back with an IV in her arm each day. We all cried as he carefully placed her tiny body  on his back, snuggled the blanket around her bottom to hold her to his waist, turned and looked back at us one last time...as he slowly walked back to the hospital and the nutrition ward. She had nearly died of malaria, pneumonia and malnutrition and he was nursing, loving her back to life. The whole team fell in love with them. Especially the Zinsers. I searched for his family all through the IDP camps and found them in a dispersement camp in 2007 and helped get permissions and documents for a family who wanted to adopt them. Tragically, that adoption didn't turn out so well. I blame myself for helping that process and not a day goes by I ask for forgiveness as children have been hurt. Bosco made mistakes too, he was a child of war...older child, afraid to trust and torn between their broken marriage. He was a child.  Only God knows his plan for these children. Meanwhile, I am blessed with the best kid ever - he has grown a lot through this tragedy. He gives me so much joy and I am so so proud of him!  Never mind, we will carry on....you will not want to miss this visit!  It is deep and remote and they struggle even more than palabek, although we have been able to help them some over the years, starting with cows, plow and seeds ......Bosco is sending greetings and gifts through me to them. He is working hard as an electrician and unable to come this time.  I miss him dearly. Their borehole had also broken down and they had no clean water, thankully we were able to drill a borehole this year (water well) for their village. I can't wait to see it for the very first time!   Come along.....