Do I Have To Leave?

Friday June 12, 2015

Last day of our overnight trip to the Central Region with St. Thomas

Thats it. The outreaches are over. Just finished my last one today. I was with St. Thomas all week. It feels so surreal. It hasn’t quite hit me yet that I leave tomorrow. I still feel like I will go on another adventure, attend church on Sunday and be back driving across the country doing outreaches again on Monday. But that’s not going to happen and it makes me incredibly sad. Ugh I can’t think about it.

This week was great though. We were on another overnight outreach trip to the Central Region. We stayed in a town called Assin Foso. It was a pretty typical St. Thomas week. Average of 60 or 70 patients a day, Ema convincing us to eat fufu with him, Seth not smiling in photos and a lot of down time at the outreaches haha. 

Needless to say he was completely blind in
that eye.

The most interesting thing that happened this week was probably a patient that we saw on Tuesday. Seth came up to me and asked for me to come check out a patient that was lying down on one of the church pews. He said that it was something he had never seen before. And it certainly was! The man had nearly his whole eye out of its socket! I was instantly intrigued. A few of us sat down and with the help of a translator started asking him some questions. We weren't able to get much information but he said that it came on suddenly about 3 months ago. He woke up one morning and noticed that his eye was starting to come out of its socket. We don’t know how much medical attention he has had but he has to have seen a doctor by now. There is a decent hospital in town that he probably went to go see. I had no idea what was wrong. We all had theories but they were just shots in the dark. We weren't doctors yet. But when we went into the clinic on Thursday we showed a picture of it to Dr. Gyasi who immediately recognized it as a tumour behind the eye that was pushing it out. After he said that it made so much sense! We felt pretty foolish for not thinking of a tumour haha. He did come into the clinic the next day, Wednesday, for a consult. Dr. Gyasi wasn’t able to see him but he said that he would have referred him to another Ophthalmologist anyways, one that specializes in cases like this. He said that he would absolutely have the eye removed and probably have chemotherapy. But then there was the question of if he could afford that. Unite For Sight doesn’t cover extreme surgeries like that or chemo. So I don't know what has happened since we saw him but it was such an interesting case to see. Perhaps one that I may never see again, at least to not that extent. 

Mary Ellen, Rachel and myself with Kenneth, one of the assistants at the clinic

Dr. Gyasi the Ophthalmologist for St. Thomas Eye Clinic

The last couple of days Mary has been teaching me Korean! She served her mission in South Korea. I don’t know why I haven’t been learning this the whole time! I love Korean! It is such a cool language. I am able to read it now which is incredible. It’s a slow read mind you and I don't know what I read almost all the time but its fun to decipher the characters. One of new roommates in the Fall, Ethan Forbes, served in the same mission with Mary. We realized that connection while we were out here. So I hope to learn enough Korean to have a few half intelligent conversations with him at least. Should be fun!

Birthday party at Pinocchio's!

There were 6 of us on the outreach this week. Mary Ellen, Marissa, Rachel, Alyssa, Evan and myself. Arnold was the only one that wasn’t there from the normal St. Thomas crew. In his place was a guy named Ernest. He is the quite type but we all loved him. We were able to get him to talk more by the end of the trip. Evan is another volunteer that got here last week. He’s from California. Great guy. He and Alyssa have the same birthday! They were literally born on the exact same day. They both turn 20 today, Friday! We met up with the others working with Crystal and headed out for dinner. We had heard of another place (from the senior couples of course) called Pinocchio’s, an Italian restaurant with amazing gelato! There are a couple more volunteers that got here just last weekend, working with crystal, that came as well. And guess who else came?! Johnny!! It was so good to see him! He said he has never been out for dinner with volunteers before, so we felt pretty special. We bought him his dinner and gelato. I love and respect John so much! He has a beautiful wife and 5 kids with his 5th just born last week! he has been trying to build a new house for his growing family. When people build homes and other building here they have to do it over a long period of time because it takes so long to raise the funds for it. They almost always pay cash so they have to wait until they have money before they can pay for the work to be done. Everywhere you look there are unfinished buildings. So needless to say we had John covered. What we didn’t know was that Evan ended up paying for the whole dinner! He’s the birthday boy he shouldn’t have had to pay for any of it! He was incredibly stubborn though and had already used his credit card. We were very grateful and began devising plans on how to pay him back. Ultimately we decided that he payed out of an act of service and we know that there are certain blessings that come from those that serve others. We did buy him gelato though, a lot of it haha. Happy Birthday Alyssa and Evan!

We are pretty much full Ghanian now

If you are wondering why I look so freaking awesome in the photos it’s because I am wearing a shirt that I had made for myself by a tailor that lives close to the hotel. A bunch of us had things made by tailors. We bought fabric at a fabric store called Wooden or at the market. I had two shirts made and I love them.

I don’t want to leave tomorrow. I really like it here. I love the work we do and those that I work with. I’m trying not to think about it. I still have 1 more day. Make it count.

Saturday June 13, 2015

Then there was one. Our last day is regrettably here. We made the best of it though. This morning we went to the Art Centre one last time to blow the rest of the cedis we have left over. It was Austin's first time at the market. I felt so experienced haha even though its only my third time there. I got some great last minute souvenirs. After the art centre we met up with Daniels good friend that is serving his mission in Accra. We went to his bishops house where they made us fufu and jollof for our last supper. It was so much fun. We took trotro's there too which is always fun. for the first time I saw what it would be like to be a missionary here and it would be incredible! The amount of things that they put up with and learn while they are here is amazing. I respect the missionaries here a ton. When we got back to the hotel we had to pack and head to the airpot. Saying our goodbye's was the worst. I am going to miss everyone so much! Ugh I don't want to go home!