Dear Friends,

We are completing our second month in Tshikaji. We have been here long enough to remember some names, to begin to have likes and dislikes, and to have begun some work.

We will begin with a bit of update from last month. We now have hot water. Real hot! There are two hot water faucets in the house, the bath (not the bathroom, only the bathtub) and the kitchen. The rainy season has begun, a bit warmer and a bit more humid—and daily rain. The rain falls for about an hour or less in the afternoon. Rarely does it rain all day. The rainy season also means that we can collect rain water. We are finally able to filter the water without having to boil it first. Also, it is a joy to have ice cubes without the reddish brown core. We have had several circuit breakers trip frequently and have finally understood that we can only use only one of the three appliances (water heater, oven and washing machine) at any given time. Now we are better at planning the wash, cooking, and the shower in a staggered time schedule.

We began to harvest from the garden we put in just after our arrival. We have enough Chinese cabbage, just the green leaves, to make kimchee, blanche and freeze, give away. They are now growing faster than the bugs can eat them. We planted 12 zucchini plants and have tasted the first yield, cucumbers are growing also. As yet, the yield is quite meager and we identify each zucchini and cucumber and give them individual names. We hope that in a couple of weeks we will have enough to share. Tomatoes and corn are not edible yet. The lettuce patch is open to the neighborhood, and the green onion is finally visible. One thing though, as described in Barbara Kingsolver’s novel, The Poisonwood Bible, many plants flower beautifully but fail to pollinate and bear fruit. I guess the insects here do not like to sample unfamiliar flowers. We also buy mushrooms from the market. We bought a mushroom that weighted one and a half pounds—yes a single mushroom, and tried all sorts of cooking methods. Finally, we concluded that we don’t enjoy eating building materials.

Simon found out that much of the children’s medicine goes unused because the nurses and doctors are used to portioning adult medicine for children rather than using children’s. So Simon sent out a memo urging the staff to use the available medicine for children whenever possible. Simon also sent a memo to Haejung urging her to use black pepper in her cooking whenever possible, as we seem to have brought more black pepper than other spices.

Around here everything seem to get promoted to a higher call of duty. A can of Spam takes the place of rib eye steak, while a can of corned beef takes a slightly less distinguished place, only because it is locally available while Spam is not. Other promotions are also necessary. Our Mr. Wipple’s certified Charmin TP sits prominently atop our dining table and coffee table as substitute Kleenex. Since our Nordic Trak is in a warehouse in Denver, a children’s stool serves as Simon’s aerobic exercise machine for use while watching video tapes—remember no broadcast TV. We already ran out of tapes, so we watched the "Informational Video for RYOBI Pressure WasherPlus" during yesterday’s exercise session. We don’t think we will watch that tape again though. Everything gets called to a higher service! That made us wonder whether we were called to higher duty that we are capable of. Well, it probably was, but in God anything is possible.

Just a few days ago, my staff went to town to buy rice, oxygen and other supplies. They were supposed to return by 4:00 p.m. When they did not return by 5:00, I went home and returned to the hospital at 6:00 just to make sure that they have returned. One of the doctors found me and gave me a message that the truck ran out of fuel and was stuck about three miles from the station. Since all the service workers have gone home, I armed myself with a water hose and took off on a rescue mission. Many on the road got very angry when I did not stop to give them a ride into town. When I eventually got to the truck, which blocked the one lane road, we found the driver did not have the key to the padlock on the fuel tank. We disassembled the fuel line and found a hole large enough to put the water hose in. Next came the task of siphoning the fuel from my pick-up to the truck. The difficult part was to find some one with a large enough lung capacity get all the air out of the long water hose. After about two hours, and after providing entertainment to the enjoyment of the village children, we returned to the hospital just in time to miss the downpour, (Simon with another notch on his belt as a roadside mechanic). Now Simon even sports a key chain which goes over the belt with retractable line, a certified gatekeeper, if you will.

A friend in the States offered to pay for the materials to build simple benches for the three-walled church we mentioned in our last newsletter. We pray that if we are a bit more comfortable sitting, we can have more joyful worship. For two-hour services, a flat surface to sit on would be a great help. The Nursing and Medical Technology school and the primary school at the station are both open. "Mutoke (white person), donnez moi une Bic (pen)" is the standard greeting. Either they are color blind, or Tshiluba does not have a word that separates Haejung and Simon apart from other PC(USA) missionaries. Or simply they have grater success rate with "mutoke."

On a more somber note, we continue to deal with death. One difficulty the hospital faces is that when a patient dies, most of the time the family refuses to pay the hospital bills. They may be partly blaming the hospital for the death, but it is simply not culturally acceptable to demand payment at a time of grief. The hospital staff is extremely reluctant even to present the bill. A clash of culture between Western institution and the local custom. Last year, the loss of revenue due to death was more than one month’s payroll for the entire hospital.

Our son John just completed his first trip to Thailand as a missionary and is now back in Florida for a while, and Kevin started his school year at the University of Toronto earlier this month.

We appreciate your prayers and encouragement. Thank you for so many wonderful messages. We get e-mail around noon each day from the States, and Simon comes home to check the mail first, then to have lunch. We enjoy being kept in e-touch.

Grace and Peace,

Haejung & Simon

(If you e-mail us, please don't send attachments. We have to pay by the byte.)

The 1999 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 33