Daily life

It is the end of week six in Africa, and I have been so excited to share the big events in my life that I realized I have yet to describe what happens each day. Each morning, I wake up around 7:10, dress in my scrubs, and head up to breakfast before it ends at 7:30. Lately, the meal of choice has been oatmeal with cinnamon, brown sugar, and peanut butter, and I look forward to it...mmmm . After breakfast Monday through Thursday, I attend a morning devotional or meeting with groups ranging from everyone aboard the ship to just the people working in the hospital. My favorite devotions are on Wednesdays, when all of the non-doctor/nurse health care staff meets to watch Rob Bell's Nooma series. These videos are incredibly insightful, beautifully made, and always very applicable in my life. A good friend and I have been watching them on our own and keeping each other spiritually healthy and growing as a result. Nooma comes with my highest recommendation for Christians at all stages wanting to learn God and life and how they are complexly intermingled.

After devotions, work begins around 8:15. I head down to deck three, the hospital level, and all the way to the aft of the ship where the cargo hold and Central Supply are located. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we spend the morning filling orders for the OR, Wards, and various outreach teams. I was so lost in the masses of supplies when I first started--imagine seven train car sized shipping containers filled to the roof with all sizes of cardboard boxes and only a small isle in the center to walk, in addition to an entire room of moving shelves in all of which to find one specific type of gauze! Thankfully, there is an organizational system. Supplies are organized by item number which we are able to search via a computer program. Each box has a bar code, and using our scanners, we can record the location of the box on a specific pallet. This information is transmitted from the scanner to the computer program, allowing us to see where each box of each item is located. Using a master list, we look up the location of the pallet then go to the corresponding container or shelf in central supply and search. I am smiling writing this because this system does seem logical, like it would be accurate most of the time, but every hour we don't spend filling orders, we work to make the system better match our actual inventory in both item location and number of boxes. The worst is when our computer says we have an item that the hospital desperately needs and we spend half an hour in the hold searching for it because the system was not correctly updated, only to concede that it isn't actually there. Let me explain that the hold is not a cool place. It is probably at least 85 degrees at all times and hotter when the welders are working--meaning instant scrub-drenching sweat after five minutes of work. In addition, there is a constant battle between available space and the arrival of new boxes. On any ship, you learn to value space as a premium commodity. Here, we receive new containers of supplies every few weeks at a rate that is a bit faster than the hospital uses them, sometimes requiring a good amount of creativity and box-battling in the unloading and placement process.

I finish work every day by five, have dinner and relish in the rest of my free night. Depending on the day, there is aerobics, ultimate Frisbee games, soccer, music, movies, games, meetings, and various bible studies, all of which anyone is welcome to attend. There are nights of conversation, both superficial and deep, and nights I spend on the top deck of the ship just praying and reading my bible. It is true that whatever you feel like doing after dinner, there is usually a place and people eager to join you. I love the nights, and more often then not, I'm counting down the hours of work until they come.

But more than nights, I love the weekends. There are always trips going out--I have been to two beautiful beaches, a pool, a forest, a historic slave trade village, the stilt village of Ganvie, and many times for walks into Cotonou for food, or into the markets, or just to see something new. I always try to save Sundays for rest, sometimes going to a local church in the morning, and other days just staying on the ship to do my laundry, have a nap!, read, email, and relax. Praise God for creating a break in our weeks!

Although sometimes the days and weeks run together, each one is made distinct by my personal interactions and what I'm learning. Our community is one of constant transition, so I am always meeting new people and saying goodbye to others I have grown to know. Having friends from so many backgrounds and different cultures is so interesting. It takes tangible proof to realize just how different various lives and stories can be from your own. I am coming to understand this much more quickly than I would have in the States and am so grateful for it. I have a bit more people time than I am comfortable with, but this is God changing me, teaching me to love in spite of just not feeling like it. At the end of each day, I am exhausted, but in a pleasant way. I am trying desperately to be connected to God more strongly than I have ever been, learning about prayer and how much spiritual conversation and friendship can carry you through a day. I am learning how to be open to loss and gain as it flows into my life. I am leanning that it doesn't take a major event to spark change in your life, but that you are shaped most powerfully by what you do normally, by living each day.