Hard week at work.

Last week was one of the hardest weeks at the dental clinic. Ugh*
It almost made me want to go home.... Not! Ok.. It was hard but not so hard that I would pack up and leave.
We were working very late and had very difficult extractions. Seeing over 60 patients a day. It was every other patient we saw needed a surgical extraction.. Or 2 or 3. Many times we did surgical extractions. I think every night we came back we were all so dead tired.. The thing is there is so much going on, on the ship that you still don't slow down once you get home.. So many meetings and fun and that stuff.. I guess it's my own fault for going to bed late? :D

 The dream team photo above. AKA the nerd herd. :)
So now 3 dentists left us last weekend! We had so much fun working with them(even through the difficult times). Sad to see them go but also happy to welcome new dentists and friends and DENTAL ASSISTANTS!!! Most of my time here there has only been 1 other dental assistant.. For 4-5 dentists. Our day workers have been working hard and keeping up real well. But now we have 3 Dental assistants to 5 dentists!
I now know that I was needed here! Shortage of dental assistants these days. So many months contemplating to come to the ship or not. I feel like God really wants me to be here.
I've learned how to hold peoples hands and speak words of encouragement in another language. A smile goes a long way too. :-)  And when a patient looks me in the eye when we are done and says thank you.. It's so amazing and confirms  to me.. This is where God wants me to be right at this moment.
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And now.. Something I've learned. We are here doing dental work.. And yeah.. It does not sound glamorous at all. We are just extracting teeth and doing some fillings, when the tooth is saveable. We can't treat everyone but we try to treat as many as possible. We have a screening line 2 days a week where hundreds of people line up with great big swellings on their faces. And horrible toothaches that have lasted weeks. Maybe longer.
The bottom line ,that not many people realize is.. We are saving lives here in Africa. It blows me away. Because in a developed country(like USA) when someone has a toothache you can go to the emergency room and get help. It may take a while to be seen but most people can and will be seen by a doctor. The patient can get antibiotics. And go on with life
Here, people do not have this option. If they have no money. They will not be seen. They will not get antibiotics. They could die very easily from the infection in their tooth. Or if they do eventually get help for their infection they could have problems in their mouth for the rest of their life because the infection went on so long it destroyed bone or what not.
So, we see patients with major infections. Yes it's gross and we help them get rid of the infection. In the end we could be saving their life. The end. :)

Oh! Last weekend we had a ship holiday and that means.. We did not work Friday! Whoohoo!! So a group of 9 of us traveled by bus 4 hours to go to Dolosie. It is the 3rd largest city in Congo! Super cute city/village. We had a great adventure.. Almost camping conditions.. Bathroom left much to be desired..But we did have a roof over our heads and running water. So yep! It was good and hey! This is Africa! :)
We traveled to a little tiny village outside of Dolosie to see some waterfalls. Hiked about an hour to get to them through the most beautiful terrain! Also had to brings gifts to the chief of the village and pay a tribute kind of fee to see the waterfalls.. Quite interesting all these happenings as only 2 of us had much knowledge of French to communicate. But it all worked out well and the waterfalls were nice!
Got stung by a bee and scratched up nice by bushes and weeds.. But yes. Great adventure! :)

This week we have a whole new team at the clinic! A husband and wife team of dentists and 2 new dental assistants! yay! I'm working with the long term dentist(with Mercy ships) now and it's going great!
Today was sooooo much better than the days last week. :) I'm hoping to see very few wisdom teeth and premolars! Please and thank you. :)

Now I'm getting ready to start the sad goodbyes. A very good friend is going home this weekend. :( So far I've only had a few goodbyes. This is the worst part on the ship.. Saying goodbye.

Then some other news.. This weekend my friend and I are traveling by train(12 hours) to Brazzaville. The capital of Congo. We will be going to a wedding potentially. :) We are becoming "wedding crashers". Should be interesting! A Congolese wedding! :) We then fly back Sunday night. It's going to be another adventure.
And my cough of 4 weeks is mostly gone! Thanks for the prayers!
And I'm off to bed!
Good night!
Don't mind the grammar errors. I did not proof read this. I maybe need to come back to read later and edit. :)

Thursday and Friday outreach.

Our Orphanage dental outreach went fabulous!
We had kids from 2 different Orphanages come to our clinic and were able to do dental treatment on them! I was thankful it was a lot of older children. :)
But still there were some young ones that were  scared. They were troopers though(and so was our children's dentist.. she is AMAZING). Again, God bless all Children's dentists.. What would we do without them? In Africa??? Well.. Probably a lot more children getting very sick or even dying from abcessed teeth. Sad reality. Parents.. Help your children keep their teeth healthy. Brushing morning and night.. Please.
 So all of our hard work with the orphans was awesome!! I rode home with some of the orphans and was discussing things in my broken French. :) The kids invited me to come to visit any time. :) It's about a 45 minute walk from the ship so I hope to do it some time. :) 

 Here are some working photos from the clinic and outside with kids at the hope center.

  

 3 coworkers of mine on the ship and I. :)

Working with an orphan.:) She was super sweet!

Yeah, so our week was fabulous! Great dental team! Now they are talking about a prison outreach.. But I think I will be gone. :( Can I stay longer?

Great week at the dental clinic!

We've been having a fabulous week at the dental clinic! So much smoother and easier than last week! The second week is always better for new dentists. Teeth are difficult here to extract! Mostly because the teeth are so badly decayed that they break when we start taking them out. :(
We also have gotten two new dentists and a new dental assistant. One dentist from Bulgaria(Very cool accent!!!) and the other two from Germany! 
It's real fun to meet dentists and assistants from other countries and then to listen to their delightful accents..

Tonight we are eating BBQ chicken and mashed potatoes.. YUM! Can't wait. I'm writing this before dinner.:)
My schedule during the evenings in the week is real busy!
Monday is Bible study night, Tuesday is Survival French class. Wednesday is Free... But then Thursday is the community meeting on the ship with ice cream after and Friday we are always doing something. :)
I feel like there is not much time to do things. And time is flying so fast!! 

So, tomorrow and Friday the dental team has a special assignment. We are going to be seeing orphans from the local orphanages. Hard days ahead but also rewarding. I thank God for all Pediatric Dentists. They are amazing.. I can't imagine a harder job.
I work with an amazing children's dentist from Australia! She does a fantastic job with the kids!
Tomorrow will be interesting for me.. Please pray for an easy day and not much noise.. If you know what I mean. :D
I am happy though that we have the privilege of working these orphans. These kids have no way to get dental treatment at all. So we may be the only chance they see dental people until they are out of the orphanage. And the chances of them getting to a dentist after is very slim as well.
The number of fillings that we've seen coming into the clinic you could count on a few hands.. Out of hundred of patients we've seen already. So, not many people here get to see a dentist.
I'm always touched when people smile and thank me when I'm helping them out of the dental chair.
It's such a privilege to be here and serve.
Ok, I'm signing off.
Please remember to pray for our dental team tomorrow and Friday. And also.. I've had a cough for 3 weeks now.. It's not going away. I'm going to try to get to the ship doctor by Friday.
So please pray for my health and then also.. The ship is waiting for 3 containers(with FOOD and medical supplies.. like GLOVES). The containers are stuck in the port.. So.. Lots of prayer requests. Thanks!
Have a great evening! 

This is a very long post. Read if you want:)

Monday I started working with a new dentist! This time a dentist from the states. :)
Military dentist also.. So I'm used to that. :)
Lots of difficult teeth this week. I really don't like when we have a premolar or canine to extract. Those can be the hardest teeth EVER to get out. We did some major surgery this week in the dental clinic. Again a lot of patients with large swellings. Our days were pretty long and we would go home exhausted.
Since the dental clinic is off the ship we have to bring lunch with us or eat peanut butter and honey bread or toasty cheese(grilled cheese) at the clinic. Can I say I hope I don't see any white bread when I get home? BLEAH.
The dental clinic is close to Mercy Ships " Hope Center". This is a place where patients recovering from surgery can go to after being discharged from the ship.
Our day workers get food cooked from the Hope Center and sometimes I will try it. But I admit to being a lazy eater. If the food has bones in it, I won't touch it. :D
When we are leaving the clinic there are lots of children wandering around outside the hope center and it's fun to play with them while we wait.
If you bring any balloons outside you get swamped with kids. They start calling out " Pompay Pompay!". At least that is what I'm hearing.. My listening skills for these other languages is AWFUL.

So even thought it was a difficult week at the clinic.. I am very encouraged with my progress with French!
I'm trying to come up with something to say to every patient that comes in. Learning how to ask about their family and whatever I can think of to say.. I have all the greetings down and now can locate the patients problems using french. Mwahaha!
I LOVE the communication!
I'm sure they all think I'm the crazy American girl, slaughtering the French language.

Tuesday we had our Survival French Taxi ride class. So we caught a taxi and had to take turns greeting the cab driver and then telling him where to take us. At first our cab driver was a little reluctant and confused by what we were doing.. But then he got into it, and even started taking the photos for us. :) We ended our class by going to La Citronelle(the icecream/pastry place) and got Eclairs. It was GOOD!

Wednesday after work my friend and I had our blood drawn to see if we could be blood donors!!
If you know me at all.. I have never given blood and am TERRIFIED of needles near any veins. Give me dental anes. But don't touch my blood. Can you take it from my finger? I could deal with that maybe.. :)
So yes. I am officially able to be a blood donor on the ship! Not sure I'll ever get called because I found out what blood type I am and it's not the greatest one to have I guess?
But I am happy to give my blood if they need it! :)
Here are  photos:) Photo on right is some of our dental team with the land rover at the clinic. :)

 Wednesday night I signed up for a tour of the Engine room.. Umm.. well.. It's not just 1 room. It's like.. HUGE!!! I had no idea what was going on beneath my feet. This ship is AMAZING.
I took a ton of photos and videos of downstairs.. Most of it I have no idea what it was. But yes. incredible. anyone interested in my video and photos(Dad?) I can show when I get home. :)

Friday was the last day for two people on our dental team. An assistant from Australia and a dentist from Switzerland. Very sad to see them go cause they are just wonderful people! And so fun too! Now I'm waiting to meet the new dental assistant coming. Not sure if another dentist will be coming soon or not. We are not always clued in to these details.
After work a friend and I went to the "Grand Marche" with two of the day workers to shop for a birthday present for a shipmate. So much fun because I was using my little French to communicate and joke around with the shop keepers. It's amazing how your shopping experience can change when you know a few phrases. :) My personal favorite to say?? Hehehe! "C'est trop cher!" It means.. "It's TOO expensive". And it's all about how you say it. You have to say it with a smile. :) Helps also to have native French speakers with you too to tell you what a good price is.

We then got a taxi home and I badgered him with every question I could think of in  French. He was confused. As was I. :) But it was fun and he ended up not minding us.
Helps to be friendly to your taxi driver and find out their name. Then they might not try to over charge you maybe..

Ok,  If you want to leave the ship(after work) on your own, to go out on the town or the beach or whatever. Here is the deal. It's a 20 minute walk through the ship yard. Taxi's are not allowed in the port. If you spot a "Mercy Ships Land Rover" that has room they may stop and pick you up, so you don't have to walk.
I just realized I should not tell the story I was going to tell. You will have to ask me in person. :D
Sorry! Or should I say désolé which is how to say sorry in French. :)

I'll tell a different story.
Today we went on a bus tour since it's our day off. A dayworker from the hospital brings groups out each weekend.
We started out stopping at this market that people were cutting up birds and fish and making stews.. And Cassava root. We heard that the fish was very good. So we bought some. It was the scariest looking fish EVER. Looked like a mix of an eel with a cat fish. Ick!
And we ate it! I have photos to prove it.
Will post later.
Then we drove to a dayworkers home and met her Mother and random relatives that lived there. It was neat to get out in a small village in the bush and see what their life was like out there.
We got to play with the children running around. Cutest kids EVER!
They were real sweet and I tried to use a little French again. :)
After a short church service with some people there we went and had lunch at the beach. It was gorgeous! But the rip current was real strong there so we were not able to get too far into the water.
It was a fabulous day out! The most fabulous hysterical part of the day? Well.. Our guide likes Celine Dion.. A LOT. Can you imagine a 4 hour bus ride with Celine Dion's songs being BLASTED throughout a minibus with 18 people in it? And we heard the titanic song maybe 4 times? I think I will never hear Celine Dion the same way again..

And now.. I'm sitting upstairs midships with maybe 30 people from all over the world.. Watching the Olympics.
This life is simply.. Amazing!
I love being here and sometimes I wish I didn't have to return home..But I know this will end.. And I really think that this will not be my last time here.
If you could just imagine living in a community of 400 people in harmony? You don't know everyone. But there is a common bond we all have here. We are here serving the people of Congo together for Jesus Christ. God is SO good!

Thanks for reading if you made it this far! :) Lot's of love to you!

Another full week at the dental clinic has gone by. Wow!
It was a busy week full of hard work and blessings! We ended up seeing quite a few patients this week with pretty bad infections. I will spare you the details of what we had to do to help them. :)
They did leave feeling much better though which makes me feel happy!
We also saw a couple people that were treated for Osteomyelitis that are recovering very well. So good to see the healing cause that is a NASTY and can be life threatening thing to have. Just google it if you are curious what it is. Or don't..
My survival French classes are hysterically funny. And I can't wait for our next class on Tuesday because we are going out into town to catch taxis. We will have teams and will do a photo scavenger hunt around town. My team is lots of fun and I'm sure we will do very well! Or at least laugh a lot. :)
A team member and I already practiced our French skills this week walking around in our Mercy Ships Scrubs in Pointe Noire.

Not the best idea mind you.. But it was a last minute decision to go out shopping and we did not bring clothes to change into ,with us to the dental clinic.We had people telling us about all sorts of medical conditions they were having.. And we had to try and tell them in our poor French that we work only with teeth.  Just makes me more want to be able to communicate with the people here.
We did successfully ask for directions to the supermarche( super market) though and were quite proud of ourselves. Only later we found out there were two Supermarches.. And we ended up walking to the furthest one..
It was a HUGE supermarket and was very expensive.. We ended up just buying icecream... :D

On Thursday(after our work day) at the clinic we threw a baby shower for one of our day workers. She is due in a few weeks to have her baby and we are REALLY hoping she will bring the baby by so we can meet him/her.

Today is Sunday so it's a day off for the dental team! I went to the hospital Ward service here on the ship with some friends. It's wonderful because I am able to see our hospital patients here and the room is just filled with joy when we are singing and worshiping  God together! The service is translated either French to English or English to French. :)
Every Sunday night we have a church service for all crew upstairs in the international lounge.So that's what I'll be doing tonight..
Last night we had a HUGE game of settler's of Catan.. I had a challenge going with one of my friends from Germany. I lost.. So. I owe him an eclair. Maybe tonight after church my friends and I will walk to the bakery. :) The bakery is about 30 minutes walk from the ship. We walk a lot here.

Back to the clinic in the morning! With a new dentist! The dentist I was working with has gone home and one has come to replace him.
It's always interesting to see how another dentist works. :)
Let's hope I adjust quick!