well.. i tried.

Before I joined this ship I thought maybe I would want to do something in the medical field. I mean, where better to find out if that type of job would suite me than on a medical ship right? after shadowing surgeries.... well, lets just say I wouldn't make a very good doctor. I was really excited because it was my turn to shadow surgeries.. so i scrubbed up and skipped on down to the ward. I wasn't feeling very good this paticular day and we were really rocking-- which isnt the greatest set up for watching a surgery. Anyways, The surgery I was permitted to watch was prob. the most disturbing one I could watch I'd say.. first of all.. the placement on the body was a little gross, and it was a big tumor, full of fluid that they needed to get into and drain.. so they cut him open, and as soon as i saw the blood i started feeling a little light headed. so I started talking to the aneasthesiologist (i cant spell.. ) trying to distract myself, looking at all the machines this person was hooked up to.. and asking him alot of questions-- i know alot of random facts now.. but anyways, they burn the edges of the incision so that it will stop the bleeding, so then the room smelled like burning flesh-- yummy.. my favorite smell. So i thought i should prob look back at the surgery because thats why i was there, and alot of people wait a really long time to ger to see a surgery. so I should watch. BAD IDEA. i looked back as they had just cut deeper into the tumoresque thing to drain it.. which resulted in yumness oozing forth. which resulted in me on the ground. hahaha. yes. I wouldnt make a great doctor I don't think. One of the nurses came over and put water on my neck and i started laughing. and she assured me this was "normal" but i just kept laughing.. till i got to the bathroom.. and then i was just sick. and another nurse came in and told me I could go up to my room. i didnt have to come back. yes.. so that was a little bit of a disaster I'd say. My room mates told me i should go watch the eye surgeries.. because they're really interesting, and not so gross.. so i may try that. but you know? I tried.



Market

Chelsea lost her camera at Grand Popo.. which was a little unfortunate.. actually very unfortunate. I feel bad for her :( but we went into town to try to find another one on the street.. because they should be cheaper there. So we went in and found one man that was selling them but he asked us to wait while he went and looked for a digital camera.. so we sat down on these stools outside of a "shop" that was selling (prob. stolen) TV and DVD players.. and Chelsea and I decided it'd be funny if we were the shop owners. and were just talking about how funny it'd be if we started offering "our" merchandise the the people passing by.. like the real shop owners do. Right about then a man came up (into "our" store mind you) and offered us fishing nets of some sort.. and in response chelsea and i both offered him a TV or a DVD player... and he just looked really confused and said "no merci... " and walked off.. ha. I dont know if you'll find that funny. I found it funny.



hospital

chelsea and i adopted a patient together.. the language barrier is always a little hard. Cheslea's learning french though-- and she's gotten to use it a little bit which has been cool.. but whenever we went down to see our patient she had had jaw surgery or something, so i dont think she could talk. We just painted her nails and her toenails.. and the girls nails in the bed beside her.. it's always super awkward at first when you're down there.. becuase you just dont really know what to say or do. It's like that anywhere really. If you go into a ministry site-- at the psychiatric hospital, or the orphanage.. you show up. and then its kindof awkward trying to figure out what to do with yourself. Like I was saying earlier, it's so different to be somewhere for longer than a week or so, becuase you actually have to build relationships with people. You can't just be entirely fake with everyone.. which is usually the temptation-- at church, at school, on a missions trip. You can keep up the mask and not let someone truly get to know you as long as it's only for a few hours or a week or so. You can put up your lovely happy mask or whatever mask you choose.. but here-- im surrounded by people literaly all the time. So i've had to let them get to know me. whether i really want them to or not.

speaking of a hospital... i got pretty sick a little while ago and i spent a night in the ICU. now before you start thinking I was dying or anything.. it was the only ward with an open bed. calm your hearts. I had just been pretty sick for the past week and a half so i was pretty dehydrated. When they took my temperature it was too low... so they retook it.. and retook it. and decided my temperature was actually too low. so they kept me down in the hospital to try to get my temperature back up.. and to rehydrate me. My doctor said she might have to give me an IV to get fluids into my body, but me being my stubborn self didn't want to be stuck with a needle. so i woke up every hour or so and drank this lovely chalky liquid meant to rehydrate you. O! and I went down to the ward just to get some medicane for my throat. It had been hurting for a little while and there were some random white bumps on it.. so i just wanted to make sure I didn't have strep. ANYWAYS. Im okay now, but that was my exciting night in the hospital in Benin! (which actually wasn't that exciting).

Goodbye :(

I hate that word. I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate it. Im sick of it. three of my good friends left tonight-- Leah, (with the braids--from Germany) Kate (from australia.. my room mate slash mother figure), and Irina (a girl from Russia who was also in my small group).. It was so depressing seeing all of them pull away. Life's going to be quite different without them here on the ship. I'm really going to miss Irina. I became really close to her when we started a small group. We have a lot in common, and it was really nice to have someone to talk to. I'm going to miss her a whole lot.

Normalcy

I know I've talked about this before, but it's the thought thats been consuming my mind for the past few weeks or so. The days have begun to go by seemingly without meaning. It's so strange to me. I don't know what I can do more to make myself wake up to the world around me. I know that ultimately it isn't within my powers to "wake myself up" I have to rely on God to keep my spirit awake... i just hate these times when I feel like nothing is happening. The "normal" times. I talked about this during small group, and I was really encouraged by Kelsey (she's semi-new.. she joined our small group 2 weeks ago). She just reminded me that these times aren't bad. It's when we use faith. For me at least, when I get into a routine and the days start to go by I do my devotion and i wonder if I have the right heart about it because i don't feel anything, nor am i really motivated to pray. I don't know, it's just frustrating to me. I don't know if I'm making any sense at all. I've also been really frustrated because I feel like on the ship they make sure you feel like what you do on the ship is enough-- "you're serving those who serve.. you're job is important bla bla.. " so on your days off you just chill out or go to the beach or go to the market. WHAT IN THE WORLD???? if i wanted to volunteer in America I would have. I came to Benin because I wanted to serve the people of Benin. I need to remember why Im here. When we go out into the city we don't just go out as tourists. We're here to love these people. Every person we see we are supposed to be showing the love of Christ to, but it's almost like the attitude is when you go off the ship you're on a "break" This is the atitude I've had within myself. I'm not judginng the people of the ship. I just feel like we're all wrong. My small group and I were discussing this last night and talked about how we just pass the crippled beggars on the street and the sick people lying there without even giving them a second look really.. "we can't help them" we think. But we could pray with them, we could talk to them, we could smile at them we could hug them. we COULD do so many things other than just walking by excusing ourselves because we cannnot help them physicaly. my own mindset makes me angry. We we're studying the story of Jesus walking on water, and peter getting out of the boat to walk to him.. we decided that together, we would "get out of the boat" haha i just realized how cheesy that is.. because we're on a ship. but seriously, we are going to step even more out of our comfort zones. We're going to go into the city and pray with/talk to the different crippled and blind people. We're taking a week to pray about what we think God wants us to do with this ministry. I'd appreciate it if you'd pray about it with me :)

I apologize that it took me so long to write this... I haven't been very motivated to get on the computer. I hope you all have a very blessed week. O! by the way, on October 9-11th Im going to Togo and Ghana! I'm so excited! everythings worked out... :)