Just thought I'd give you a quick update! I've been in the Philippines for a little over a month now and have settled into daily life here. Culture shock hit harder and sooner than I expected, but it didn't last long thankfully.
I'm living in a bamboo house that has running water and electricity (most of the time). Having come here not expecting that, it feels like a luxury to have it! We have a gas stove that works most of the time too. We quickly learned which burner not to use - one of them has a tendency to blow up. I'll only have these luxuries for a short time, though, as a friend and I will be moving to another, more primitive village as soon as we've been trained in. The other village, Emrang, is a 2 hour hike from where we are currently. My friend and I will be reopening the clinic and school there.
The diet here consists of roots, bananas, and whatever is in season. Currently, some fruits, rice, and a few greens are in season. There isn't a whole lot of variety here in the mountains. We are able to order staples from the lowlands that make it up here whenever the PAMAS (Philippine Adventist Medical Aviation Services) helicopter is working and has reason to come.
We actually do get sketchy cell phone service in a few places up here. It's not terribly far to hike, though, to get really good service.
A few days ago, one of the other nurses and I went on a house call. We got word that someone was sick in another village. The other nurse, Carrie, knew how to get so far to the village, and knew someone who could possibly give us directions the rest of the way. We started off hiking on the main trail that leads down to the lowlands. About halfway to the lowlands, we veered off through a rice field and followed the very muddy trail up and down the side of the mountain. Finally we came upon a church member's place. The church member accompanied us as we followed a hardly distinguishable trail asking at each house where we could find the sick lady. They kept pointing further down the mountain. As we were hiking, we had a beautiful view of the lowlands (Brooke's Point) and the ocean. We finally reached the sick lady about 2 hours after we started hiking (that gave us two hours to assess her and hike back before dark). Carrie assessed her, encouraged her to go to the hospital in the lowlands (which was probably another 15 min hike down the mountain), then we took off for home. Thankfully we made it back just as it was starting to get too dark to see. As Carrie said, jungle house calls takes home health nursing to a whole new level!
The people here are super friendly. They've had enough foreign student missionaries come through that they know how to patiently teach us the language. It's so helpful to have them sound out words as I slaughter them trying to immitate what they say! Every Sabbath they hold a wonderful worship service in which I understand maybe 5 words. It's so beautiful to hear them sing, though. A lot of familiar hymns have been translated, which helps with trying to learn the language.
My roommate and I are busy training for Emrang - we spend about 3 mornings a week working in the clinic, 2 mornings a week watching the Kindergarten/1st grade teacher, and all afternoons language learning. Teaching is definitely not our favorite, but I think we'll end up enjoying it if we can find creative ways to teach (and when we can actually communicate and know what's going on). Language learning is very difficult. Or, I should say, finding motivation to language learn is very difficult. It's a relatively easy language (compared to our friends going to Thailand or Laos), but it takes grit to go out every day and try to learn a little bit more. It's really frustrating and difficult to make friends when you can't communicate, so that helps some with motivation. Our favorite place, obviously, is in the clinic. Carrie let us practice stitching an immaginary wound on her hand. We thoroughly enjoyed that, at her expense. Now, we're learning how to diagnose different tropical diseases that are seen up here. I'm really enjoying that! It's quite a challenging process to look at all the different symptoms and find a similar thread in all of them to finally make a diagnosis.
We have started seeing some major spiritual battles here. I just ask that you keep us in prayer. We're definitely on the front lines of the battle between good and evil.
I'm excited to see what God continues to have in store for us here! Already, my faith has been challenged and tried, but God always proves faithful! It's been amazing to see tangable evidences of His work in both my character and my health.
