life on the farm
first of all, happy birthday to my dad (!) whose birthday was august 30.
a friend wrote me an email a few days ago in which he was telling me of his heart for people around the world, his frustrations with american life and values, and his desire and readiness to be away from it all and "...to crash through rubble, dive through blocks of concrete, just to help somebody." we have been friends for several years now, and i smiled as i read his email thinking back over the many conversations we have had throughout the years about our similar desires in life, and how many times i have written these very same feelings to friends. however, i also smiled as i thought of how my life down here has not exactly been that way.
the fickers live on a farm that, if it was not in guatemala, would probably be a pretty typical farm in the states, but i do not have much experience with "real farms" (we did live on a small one when i was little that involved chickens, rabbits and a garden) so i cannot say for sure. here, we have chickens that we get our eggs from, a cow that we get our milk from, a few rabbits which we get nothing from, a garden which we get some vegetables from, a lemon tree we get lemons for lemonade from, a pond stocked with talapia (the guatemalans love fish and we have had a couple fish fries with some people from the local church while i have been here... in fact, the neighbors just stopped by to get some fish this morning...), a couple of horses for riding (when they first moved here, you could only get to a lot of the places on horseback because there were not a lot of roads, so they used their horses a lot more then), some trucks that are usually being repaired for the next trip, a couple tractors (which duane, aaron, ryan, and david have used to help the local famers get their crops of corn planted quickly... this is a new concept to the guatemalans since most of them still use cattle to plow and plant), four-wheelers which we use to get supplies to places that we cannot get to with the truck, a pressure tank (which i have learned to turn on since it supplies my morning shower with pressure), and a few dogs.
and life would almost be similar to life on a farm in the states except for the fact that it is completely different 8) "slower" is the first word that comes to mind to describe the way of life here, but not in the way we northern americans describe the south. yes, there is a taste of it: saying hi to every person you pass, people hanging out in front of their houses talking to each other, more farming and less industrialization (well, really no industrialization down here), and saying you will show up at 8:00 on monday night and if you are there by wednesday you think you are doing good. but these aspects seem to be due as much to the lack of technology and advancement as to the fact that these people value community and people over progress and time-oriented thinking. if i sit and think about it, it is sometimes amazing to me that i am in a country that functions this way while a few countries above us in the states, daily life is functioning quite differently. here are a few examples of daily life from this past week.
tuesday, we went to clinic in chiminisijuan. the way the clinics work is that the people wanting to be seen arrive early in the morning and receive a number in the order they arrive and then are seen in that order. this works out very well, but it leaves us with no idea how many numbers will be given out. it will usually be around 50, but there are of course days with more and days with less. the numbers also do not tell everything since there are always the families of 7 that will get one number, but want all 7 to be treated. this past tuesday, we started later than normal and seemed to have a lot of people. i loved it, though. leslie and i split up the patients and i actually was able to understand the problems "my" people were presenting with and figure out what the treatment should be. it was nice to actually start to feel like i am starting to get somewhat of a handle on life down here. it was a long day, though, and we had promised one of the patients that we would look in on her neighbor who was sick in bed and unable to get out. she told us it was only five minutes off the road that we had to take to get home, so we started on our way and met the lady at the beginning of the trail to her house. i then realized that when the woman said it was five minutes off the road, what she actually meant was five miles off the road. as we were walking our long walk, i looked around me, amazed that this is what these people have woken up to everyday of their life. we were literally walking on the side of the mountain, weaving around tree roots and rocks, walking up and then down again over rise and falls in the mountain, on pine needles and loose dirt, through corn fields and past houses made of sticks and adobe, all in the pouring rain. we arrived at her house soaking wet and tired, but i would do the entire walk again tomorrow. the view was breathtaking and i am still trying to take in the fact that people actually live this way still. this woman was lying on a bed of small tree trunks tied together with a few blankets thrown over it. it was barely three feet off the dirt floor that created the foundation of their house, about four feet from the "loft" above it that comprised the sleeping area for the children, and you could tell that it usually slept more people than could probably comfortably fit on it. after getting the woman's full story, we treated her for a urinary tract infection and then we and the family prayed with her before leaving. then it was a long walk back to the road where we took a four wheeler up the the main road (the other road is too rough for a truck to be able to drive it) where the 4 runner was waiting. at this point, it was still raining, aaron and david were waiting to meet us at a "short cut" further down the road to home, and the 4 runner got stuck. so, i take the four wheeler down to the shortcut (i have since fallen in love with driving the four wheeler...) to get the boys to help us get out. we finally arrived home at 6:30, in time to make dinner.
on wednesday, duane and leslie got up early to drive to quiche so that they could meet with a doctor there who we thought was in charge of the medical work in the petin, the northern area of guatemala that is only reachable by plane in the wet season. the fickers went into the petin in april and found that there was one doctor for this entire region and that he has no supplies or equipment. the doctor in quiche told them that last month 3 women died in the petin because there was no way to get them the help they needed. we are hoping to be able to fly into the petin and assist with the medical care once duane brings the plane down from the states in the beginning of october. so, leslie and duane made the 2 hour trip into quiche only to be told that the doctor had been called to guatemala city for the day and would not be in quiche at all. they then went to the lawyer's office where they hoped to get some more information on the progress of the adoption of abi and grace. however, the lawyer was not in that day either. so, they had lunch with a pastor friend of theirs who needed some encouragement and then got in the car and made the 2 hour drive back, having spent the day accomplishing nothing they had hoped to. as leslie would say, "these are the days you trust that God was working even though you can't see it." as aaron would say, "welcome to guatemala." meanwhile, i spent the day here at the house where rachel and i took care of the babies, cooked lunch (yes, it actually was edible) and did other domestic things... things that, i have to admit, are completely foreign to me. i feel like this time here is almost as much of a preparation for motherhood as it is about living in a new culture 8)
on thursday, aaron and david went down to the river to get sand they needed for concrete that was going to be laid on friday in the hanger that is being built for when the plane comes down. the fickers are building this from ground up pretty much by themselves except for the help of a couple american teams that came down this summer and a group of men from the local church that come out to help on fridays. while getting the sand, the tractor got stuck, so they brought down a truck to get it out. the river winds down from the mountains and often it will be raining in the mountains unseen to a person here, and a huge wall of water will come rushing down the river, raising the water quickly and causing a current that could kill a person. leslie said that every year they hear of at least a few deaths from drowning. well, wednesday was the lucky day for the "wall of water" phenomenon to occur... as aaron and david were in the truck and on the tractor in the middle of the river. the river got so high that in a matter of moments, the tractor went from water lapping around its tires to being almost completely covered. thank God both aaron and david were fine. it then took about four more hours to get the tractor and truck out. it was quite an experience, and while it was scary to realize the potential danger of the situation, there was nothing more beautiful than seeing all the people come out to help. the mayor himself came out, and they were finally able to get the tractor out and up the hill while being towed by another tractor and a backhoe that someone in town came and offered to help with.
friday, the men from the church were supposed to come and help, so we started making the basketfull of muffins for a mid-morning snack, bought the chickens and ordered the tortillas for lunch, and were just about to start making a rice/cinnamon/milk drink that the people here love (i love it too - it tastes like cinnamon toast crunch with rice instead of "toast crunch"), but the pastor called and said they would be unable to make it. this actually was not a problem since there really wasn't enough sand due to the incident on thursday and the fact that the tractor was not working due to water damage, and then at about 10:00 in the morning a missionary family from a town a few hours away stopped by unannounced with cookies and stories to say hi and catch up on life. it was fun to meet them and hear about the work they do and where their hearts are. he is a mennonite pastor (yes, mom and dad, we talked about mcc and i told them you worked with the mennonite church in canada) and we have actually treated some of his parishoners in one of our clinics. then, it was pre-market at night (which i love) and getting ready for clinics on saturday and sunday.
so, not quite the glamorous "barreling through concrete to save people's lives" that i also once dreamed it would be, yet i can say without hesitation that i would not trade one moment of it. there is an oswald chambers devotional i read in "my utmost for his highest" when i was a sophomore in college and while i do not remember it exactly, the point of it went something like, "live in the everyday of life, and give the depths to the Lord." i like that. i am learning that there are very few things in this life that are in my control, and i am finding it much more fulfilling to be content to live in the everyday, and trust the Lord with the rest.
a friend wrote me an email a few days ago in which he was telling me of his heart for people around the world, his frustrations with american life and values, and his desire and readiness to be away from it all and "...to crash through rubble, dive through blocks of concrete, just to help somebody." we have been friends for several years now, and i smiled as i read his email thinking back over the many conversations we have had throughout the years about our similar desires in life, and how many times i have written these very same feelings to friends. however, i also smiled as i thought of how my life down here has not exactly been that way.
the fickers live on a farm that, if it was not in guatemala, would probably be a pretty typical farm in the states, but i do not have much experience with "real farms" (we did live on a small one when i was little that involved chickens, rabbits and a garden) so i cannot say for sure. here, we have chickens that we get our eggs from, a cow that we get our milk from, a few rabbits which we get nothing from, a garden which we get some vegetables from, a lemon tree we get lemons for lemonade from, a pond stocked with talapia (the guatemalans love fish and we have had a couple fish fries with some people from the local church while i have been here... in fact, the neighbors just stopped by to get some fish this morning...), a couple of horses for riding (when they first moved here, you could only get to a lot of the places on horseback because there were not a lot of roads, so they used their horses a lot more then), some trucks that are usually being repaired for the next trip, a couple tractors (which duane, aaron, ryan, and david have used to help the local famers get their crops of corn planted quickly... this is a new concept to the guatemalans since most of them still use cattle to plow and plant), four-wheelers which we use to get supplies to places that we cannot get to with the truck, a pressure tank (which i have learned to turn on since it supplies my morning shower with pressure), and a few dogs.
and life would almost be similar to life on a farm in the states except for the fact that it is completely different 8) "slower" is the first word that comes to mind to describe the way of life here, but not in the way we northern americans describe the south. yes, there is a taste of it: saying hi to every person you pass, people hanging out in front of their houses talking to each other, more farming and less industrialization (well, really no industrialization down here), and saying you will show up at 8:00 on monday night and if you are there by wednesday you think you are doing good. but these aspects seem to be due as much to the lack of technology and advancement as to the fact that these people value community and people over progress and time-oriented thinking. if i sit and think about it, it is sometimes amazing to me that i am in a country that functions this way while a few countries above us in the states, daily life is functioning quite differently. here are a few examples of daily life from this past week.
tuesday, we went to clinic in chiminisijuan. the way the clinics work is that the people wanting to be seen arrive early in the morning and receive a number in the order they arrive and then are seen in that order. this works out very well, but it leaves us with no idea how many numbers will be given out. it will usually be around 50, but there are of course days with more and days with less. the numbers also do not tell everything since there are always the families of 7 that will get one number, but want all 7 to be treated. this past tuesday, we started later than normal and seemed to have a lot of people. i loved it, though. leslie and i split up the patients and i actually was able to understand the problems "my" people were presenting with and figure out what the treatment should be. it was nice to actually start to feel like i am starting to get somewhat of a handle on life down here. it was a long day, though, and we had promised one of the patients that we would look in on her neighbor who was sick in bed and unable to get out. she told us it was only five minutes off the road that we had to take to get home, so we started on our way and met the lady at the beginning of the trail to her house. i then realized that when the woman said it was five minutes off the road, what she actually meant was five miles off the road. as we were walking our long walk, i looked around me, amazed that this is what these people have woken up to everyday of their life. we were literally walking on the side of the mountain, weaving around tree roots and rocks, walking up and then down again over rise and falls in the mountain, on pine needles and loose dirt, through corn fields and past houses made of sticks and adobe, all in the pouring rain. we arrived at her house soaking wet and tired, but i would do the entire walk again tomorrow. the view was breathtaking and i am still trying to take in the fact that people actually live this way still. this woman was lying on a bed of small tree trunks tied together with a few blankets thrown over it. it was barely three feet off the dirt floor that created the foundation of their house, about four feet from the "loft" above it that comprised the sleeping area for the children, and you could tell that it usually slept more people than could probably comfortably fit on it. after getting the woman's full story, we treated her for a urinary tract infection and then we and the family prayed with her before leaving. then it was a long walk back to the road where we took a four wheeler up the the main road (the other road is too rough for a truck to be able to drive it) where the 4 runner was waiting. at this point, it was still raining, aaron and david were waiting to meet us at a "short cut" further down the road to home, and the 4 runner got stuck. so, i take the four wheeler down to the shortcut (i have since fallen in love with driving the four wheeler...) to get the boys to help us get out. we finally arrived home at 6:30, in time to make dinner.
on wednesday, duane and leslie got up early to drive to quiche so that they could meet with a doctor there who we thought was in charge of the medical work in the petin, the northern area of guatemala that is only reachable by plane in the wet season. the fickers went into the petin in april and found that there was one doctor for this entire region and that he has no supplies or equipment. the doctor in quiche told them that last month 3 women died in the petin because there was no way to get them the help they needed. we are hoping to be able to fly into the petin and assist with the medical care once duane brings the plane down from the states in the beginning of october. so, leslie and duane made the 2 hour trip into quiche only to be told that the doctor had been called to guatemala city for the day and would not be in quiche at all. they then went to the lawyer's office where they hoped to get some more information on the progress of the adoption of abi and grace. however, the lawyer was not in that day either. so, they had lunch with a pastor friend of theirs who needed some encouragement and then got in the car and made the 2 hour drive back, having spent the day accomplishing nothing they had hoped to. as leslie would say, "these are the days you trust that God was working even though you can't see it." as aaron would say, "welcome to guatemala." meanwhile, i spent the day here at the house where rachel and i took care of the babies, cooked lunch (yes, it actually was edible) and did other domestic things... things that, i have to admit, are completely foreign to me. i feel like this time here is almost as much of a preparation for motherhood as it is about living in a new culture 8)
on thursday, aaron and david went down to the river to get sand they needed for concrete that was going to be laid on friday in the hanger that is being built for when the plane comes down. the fickers are building this from ground up pretty much by themselves except for the help of a couple american teams that came down this summer and a group of men from the local church that come out to help on fridays. while getting the sand, the tractor got stuck, so they brought down a truck to get it out. the river winds down from the mountains and often it will be raining in the mountains unseen to a person here, and a huge wall of water will come rushing down the river, raising the water quickly and causing a current that could kill a person. leslie said that every year they hear of at least a few deaths from drowning. well, wednesday was the lucky day for the "wall of water" phenomenon to occur... as aaron and david were in the truck and on the tractor in the middle of the river. the river got so high that in a matter of moments, the tractor went from water lapping around its tires to being almost completely covered. thank God both aaron and david were fine. it then took about four more hours to get the tractor and truck out. it was quite an experience, and while it was scary to realize the potential danger of the situation, there was nothing more beautiful than seeing all the people come out to help. the mayor himself came out, and they were finally able to get the tractor out and up the hill while being towed by another tractor and a backhoe that someone in town came and offered to help with.
friday, the men from the church were supposed to come and help, so we started making the basketfull of muffins for a mid-morning snack, bought the chickens and ordered the tortillas for lunch, and were just about to start making a rice/cinnamon/milk drink that the people here love (i love it too - it tastes like cinnamon toast crunch with rice instead of "toast crunch"), but the pastor called and said they would be unable to make it. this actually was not a problem since there really wasn't enough sand due to the incident on thursday and the fact that the tractor was not working due to water damage, and then at about 10:00 in the morning a missionary family from a town a few hours away stopped by unannounced with cookies and stories to say hi and catch up on life. it was fun to meet them and hear about the work they do and where their hearts are. he is a mennonite pastor (yes, mom and dad, we talked about mcc and i told them you worked with the mennonite church in canada) and we have actually treated some of his parishoners in one of our clinics. then, it was pre-market at night (which i love) and getting ready for clinics on saturday and sunday.
so, not quite the glamorous "barreling through concrete to save people's lives" that i also once dreamed it would be, yet i can say without hesitation that i would not trade one moment of it. there is an oswald chambers devotional i read in "my utmost for his highest" when i was a sophomore in college and while i do not remember it exactly, the point of it went something like, "live in the everyday of life, and give the depths to the Lord." i like that. i am learning that there are very few things in this life that are in my control, and i am finding it much more fulfilling to be content to live in the everyday, and trust the Lord with the rest.
posted by katie at 12:07 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home