wanders no longer

We finally got to move into our own home last month, On Easter weekend. We have done some remodeling on an existing home and love having our own place. It is small,@1000sq feet, but that is all relative. It is more than the mud hut many of the people here live in. Just today we finally got our own internet connection. We can be on line as much as we want and so I plan to update this site much more often.
I have been working at the hospital/clinic in the mornings and studying for the National nursing exam I must take in June. Dr Neese was here in April and met with the staff to talk about future plans for the hospital. Many good ideas were discussed with suggestions from the Zambian staff on ways to improve current care. One of the needs is for a delivery packet to be made up to give to almost due women. Just this week our worker told us at the end of the day that his wife had delivered their son at home. He lives in one of those mud floored huts. There is so much danger in these deliveries, that these packs could save lives. For ten dollars we can provide a pack which incorporates all the basic items needed to safely and cleanly deliver their baby. We plan on handing them out for a small fee. It would be about the equivalent of 50cents. This way we can have incoming money to replinish these packs and also one of the Zambian nurses said the family would value something not just given to them more.

I am astounded by the Zambian women who do so much here. They are the heart of each home and they are patient and persistent when they need something for their family. They believe in Christian education. They work hard to pay for their child to be able to attend school. All of the schools here have tuition and require a uniform to attend. Let me tell you about one of the boys here. Chimuka was working during the school break for the man who was doing some brick work for our house. He asked me on the first day of school if we could help him buy school shoes. They are not allowed, nor would they dream of going, to school without uniform shoes. So we took him to town and bought him some shoes. Then we drove him to the basic school here at Nawianga and found he still owed tuition from last term and didn't have money for it or for the new term. We paid for that and then got him some notebooks, and some extra clothes, and a trunk with a lock because he is a boarding student. Before you imagine this was very expensive, remember how much more U.S. dollars are worth. Anyways , it was little compared to our ideas from America. The joy on his face was worth every Kwawache spent. We hope to continue to get to know him and help him . Because school is beyond the reach on many kids here, he is 16 years old and now in the 7th grade. He hopes to continue on up through college. If we accomplish nothing more while we are here than to help Chimuka to finish school we will have done a lot.