Sledding!

Last Friday and Saturday Micah built a sled. It is not a thing of beauty. Ingenuity, yes. But not beauty. The important thing is that it worked! And it was a lot of fun.

On Sunday we went with Simon Angi and Zoe to a hill near here and sledded till we ran out of light. (is sledded a word?) We wrecked some, the hill had a curve in it and our sled lacked in the steering department as well as looks. Fortunately the snow was soft.

This is not our sled. But it is both of us. Our sled didn't really fit us both. We did try one run with me sitting and Micah standing behind me. That didn't end well.

You can't argue with happy eggs

At least the eggs are having a good day....

Things I will be happy about today:
- Micah did the dishes last night.
- the sun is shining
- Psalm 32:8
- You can cook tea cookie sin the microwave
- Micah does not like tea cookies = more for ME!
- I have warm slippers
- The Steelers did not loose the superbowl (that the didn't win is
something I'm not thinking about)
- We are almost done eatign turkey
- The chickens are laying again = free eggs. Happy free eggs.

The longer I look at the happy eggs, the better I feel. I am thinking
about not working anymore today. I will just sit here and look at the
happy eggs. Maybe you would like to join me in not working and
looking at happy eggs. I might put on some cheery music too. Acapella
music makes me happy.

Did I tell you about my music? I was running gout of free space on my
computer. I looked into this and discovered that when I loaded songs
from CD's they were loading in an uncompressed format. This means
that some files were over TEN TIMES what they needed to be. I
remedied this and it freed up over 15 GIGABYTES of space on my hard
drive. Even the eggs are happy about that.

Tea Cookies

In case you were wondering: Nutmeg is a key ingredient in tea
cookies. Without it, they just taste like pancakes with raisins. At
least I didn't double the recipe.

I am disappointed by this discovery. I am thinking however about
making it work to my advantage....wait for it.....Breakfast
sandwiches! (please read this like when the pigeon in Bolt says
aliens!) Oh Snap! Just think about it.
That's all I got.

ruffage

Let's just say hypothetically, that you had a husband who bought a 2.28 Kg head of cabbage (that's 5 pounds for the metrically challenged!) thinking he was getting a great deal on lettuce.

Besides coleslaw, what can you even DO with cabbage?

Would cabbage be good on pizza?

How long does a head of cabbage last?

Should it be refrigerated or just kept in a cool dry place?

Can you freeze cabbage?

Why do I continue to let my husband shop for produce? (He also got a zucchini....he thought it was a cucumber.)

*I have been requested to issue a retraction. My hypothetical husband might have known that it was a head of cabbage. He did not know that the posted price was per Kilo.

Micah's latest idea

We met this morning after language school with a missionary who is
living about 50 minutes from us in Ruzomberok. Because he is teaching
English in the local schools, he has a salary and a place to live
provided. We met another couple last month who have a similar setup.
This got us thinking about how much we dislike raising funds. It is
just not comfortable for us. So Micah had a great idea: He will set
up a booth at CampFest, paint himself brown, play native american
flute music and juggle a chain-saw (which we already have!) and
flaming bowling pins (which he is sure he will be able to find
somewhere). They jury is still out on wether he will wear a
loincloth or some other yet to be defined costume. We ruled out a
dunking booth and snake wrestling before coming up with this
brilliant idea. We will charge a Euro admission, and figure if most
people come once and a few come back or a repeat viewing, we can
match our annual salary in a weekend. He will look up how to juggle
on google this evening and start practicing over the weekend.

What will you discuss over lunch?

Turkey questions

Did you hear the one about how we bought a 40 pound Turkey in
October? By accident.
We meant to buy a turkey, just not one that big. For pete's sake
there are only two of us!

Mirka came to our front door one day out of the blue to ask us: "Do
you wanna turkey?"

What?! is she offering to cook us lunch? would we like a pet? did we
replace the goose-ducks? No. It was apparently going to soon be "the
time for killing turkeys" (who knew there was such a thing) and Milos
knew a guy who would sell us a whole turkey.

In our defense we DID ask how big the turkey would be... The answer
was: "you know...bigger than chickens....how big a turkey is." And
while 3 Euros a Kilo (± $2/lb) was a bit pricey, we figured that we
could eat turkey for a few meals, support a local turkey grower/
killer, and have our thanksgiving turkey ahead of time and without
searching a million stores.....

The Turkey (yes, capital letters) arrived on a day while I was 2
hours away in Presov. Milos came with The Turkey in a trash bag and
a bill for 56 Euros ($80!!). He offered to cut it up for us (thank
heavens) and asked Micah how we would like it cut.....Poor Micah had
no clue how he would like The Turkey cut up let alone how I would
like The Turkey cut up. He did well, or Milos did well. Either way I
came home and put the pieces in about 25 1-gallon ziplock bags and
the boys carried them to a big freezer under cottage one.

We have not bought meat (except pork for New Years) since October! We
are. Still. Eating. The Turkey.

I am thawing 5 gallon ziplock bags in as I type. I will bake it up
this afternoon to put in our small freezer and to make soup with.
There are still another 6 or 7 bags of turkey in the freezer. The
only question now is, can you really make soup out of turkey lungs?
And do I really even want to find out....

Please pray

Micah & I attended MTI training with the Ralstons (Art, Danielle and their son Michael) before we came to Slovakia. We became friends and continue to pray for each other and keep in touch. They are serving at the Pioneer Christian Hospital in the Republic of Congo. Please pray for them and the rest of the staff at the Hospital.  I know this is long, and if you don't read the whole letter here is the summary: Our friends and their co-workers are on the edge of a war zone and are asking for your prayers.

Dear Team Members, Friends & Family,

 

    Since October 28, 2009, we have been in a state of heightened security at PioneerChristianHospital here in Impfondo, Congo.  That was the day that we received the first civilian casualties from fresh fighting in Dongo, a town in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).  Since October over 77,000 refugees have flooded across the OubanguiRiver into the Likouala Region of Congo from the Equateur Province of DRC. 

 

    We received two more waves of war wounded in November, and hear that more are on the way.  From collateral damage, streams of very sick refugees and residents have been flowing into PioneerChristianHospital for HELP.  Currently more than 50% of our patients need nutritional support, have only the clothes on their backs, and no means to pay for the care we administer.  At the same time, we are trying to stem the tide of a confirmed Swine Flu epidemic that has already taken the lives of 3 of the 10 contagious children.

 

    We are glad to be here doing our best to stretch our limited resources and minister effectively to very real needs, but the stress of being so close to a war zone is starting to take its toll.

 

    Things seem to be getting noticeably worse instead of better.  God knows if things are about to turn around, or descend into complete chaos, but I believe He wants us to be prepared either way.

    A lot has happened just this week:

-        On Tuesday, Laurent Fuka (17 year-old son of our surgeon) arrived home after evacuating from Bwamanda, DRC, where he has been attending boarding school for the last year and a half.  He and 7 classmates spent a week, fleeing from the rebels on foot, pirogue, UN motorboat, and truck.  They had several close encounters on the way.  Before leaving one of Laurent's classmates went to the market to buy some food and was killed by the rebels.

-        Tuesday evening we were called upon to treat two wounded rebels at the government hospital.  One is a 14 year old boy with a bullet in his right humerus.  The other is a 22 year old with a bullet in his buttocks. 

-        Tuesday night some people came to the government hospital looking for the wounded rebels, intent on rendering vigilante justice.  The staff was able to hide the patients, but this significantly delayed them from getting the care they need.

-        Wednesday morning during morning report at PioneerChristianHospital our maintenance staff heard gunshots coming from the river.  This was around the same time a Central African Riverboat was released by the rebels after being held overnight.  Occasional gunshots have been heard several other times this week too.

-        On Thursday local public high school students went on a riotous rampage after the government teachers went on strike instead of administering final exams for the semester.  The students trashed their school, then attacked several private schools in town, beating up other students and staff, destroying classrooms, and smashing computers.  The gendarmes and police were called in and ended up arresting 11 students.

-        Thursday night a river boat and barge hired by the United Nations to bring emergency food rations for the refugees came under repeated attacks from armed men in dugouts, and motorized longboats recently stolen from the UN refugee agency in DRC.  The barge was flying the UN flag and the pusher was flying the Congo-Brazzaville flag.  The attack was finally repelled with support from a Congolese military attack helicopter.

-        Friday we were interviewed about this crisis by a correspondent from Bloomburg News Service.  Maybe it will play on National Public Radio.

-        Friday night a river boat barge loaded with fuel for Impfondo was also attacked.  Congo-Brazzaville government soldiers traveling with the barge opened fire, reportedly killing a number of DRC rebels, whose bodies fell into the river.  The boat arrived in Impfondo this morning with a helicopter escort.

-        Saturday the regular Air Congo flight was postponed, and some people say it is because of the increased military activity downriver from Impfondo.

    I think we have no choice but to raise our security alert level and review and implement emergency planning. 

    I didn't want to write this message.  As far as we know, we are not in immediate danger, but we do need your help.  If you would be willing to join our intercession team to pray for our protection, wage spiritual warfare, and ask for peace on this part of the earth, please send a short message to Danielle Ralston (dralston{at}laborersfortheharvest.com) and let her know what day(s)/time(s) you will be praying

-- 

Danielle Ralston

Communications on behalf of 

Joseph Harvey, MD, MPH&TM, Medical Director

Pioneer Christian Hospital 

Republic of Congo, Impfondo

Cell Phone: 011 (242) 960 6289