Arrival in Galmi

I did not realize how early the “call to prayers” from the mosques is. Must have been around 4 am! Anyways, I fell back asleep and was awoken by my alarm at 6. Trying to adjust to the new time zone. Galmi is 8 hours ahead of Chilliwack – ie it is currently 22:46 in BC and it is 0646 in Niger. The Serving in Missions (SIM) pilot is coming to pick me up at 0730. Then we fly out to Galmi. Read through all the documents last night. Apparently in Niger you have to sign a will if you are serving at the hospital. Nothing that supersedes the one back home, just where you want to buried when you die – you know, routine stuff like that. Anyways – I went to bed early, so I thought I would get a bit of journaling in before the flight. The rest of this will hopefully be this evening before bed.

So Ian (Rideout) who is a pilot for the missionary group picked me up at 0720, and drove me to the airport where his brother Kevin flew me to Galmi in a ****Cessna 182Q models with an SMS deisel engine conversion**** 4 seat prop plane.

It took about an hour to get there, and it was an uneventful trip.

There were a few small villages along the way and some very muddy rivers and creeks.

When I arrived they were just making cinnamon buns, and I got to meet everyone in the main gathering area. No I can't remember all their names, but there were people from the US, New Zealand, Australia, and even another Canadian! I have lunch with one of the doctors today and dinner with another one. Apparently they are glad to have me, as they have a lot of sick pregnant ladies right now.

Apparently the job of the Canadians right now is to cheer up the Americans, as they are feeling down about their country at the moment (can't think of why). That aside, there seems to be a lot of work here, and I suspect I may not be blogging so much. I toured all the areas of the hospital, and this place is packed! Lots of things I would not ever see in Canada. Malaria is very common, HIV is fairly common. Delayed treatment is also a big issue.

Had lunch with 2 other physicians, and we talked about much of what is going on in the medical world, including the erosion of protection for conscientious objection, and the changed in approach to things like physician assisted suicide. I also found out that one of the doctors here has relatives in Abbotsford, and he showed me pictures of hiking Elk Mountain – small world.

The hospital is at least better than the one we were at in Nepal all those years ago, but it still is clearly a third world hospital. Also speaking French is not enough around here, most of the patients speak a local language and so I will be using translators a lot. I will definitely be out of my comfort zone, and seeing lots of things that I have never seen before. Fortunately they have some protocols to help me through some of it. I will need lots of support in prayer to do this well.

As I was feeling a bit overwhelmed, these verses came to me:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.  Proverbs 3:5&6