PRAISE THE LORD!!
What else can we say? We have just returned today, Thursday, Nov 17 from a 3-day eye clinic in the Menz Area of Ethiopia. We saw over 500 people and were able to fit them with reading glasses or sunglasses and even treat some eye conditions (we had a nurse practitioner and and nurse on our team of 10).
There is no way to express to those who have followed our adventure what we experienced or where we were this week. We were in the most remote, poor rural area we have ever been. It was about 200 miles north of Addis Ababa and the last 60 miles was on the rockiest roads we have ever traveled; not rocks, but boulders and gulleys. Another pastor we met described their roads as goat paths, since only goats could traverse them.
We drove 7 hours on Mon to Mehal Meda, which is the remote village where our host, Alayu grew up with his 2 brothers and sisters (all of whom now are highly educated and serving their country; one as an engineer, another as the director of the International Office of Compassion and Alayu is finishing his college degree in financial management and ministry). We stayed in a less than stellar hotel (squatters for toilets, sorta shower, and prison-like cells for rooms--we sprayed our beds and then slept in sleeping bags to avoid any unwanted creatures).
We held our first eye clinic in this village Tuesday. When we arrived at the church compound, there were probably 75-100 people waiting for us, and they had walked (many of them barefoot) miles and hours/days to get here in hopes of getting a pair of glasses. We were able to accommodate about 300 people that day and were not able to assist still more who were outside at the end of the day. That was one of our most gut-wrenching experiences. But, some of our best experiences were when we would here the patients say, "Ahh," when they were able to see for the first time.
On Tuesday, we drove about 20 more miles to Zemero, where we were shown the spring we hope to cap and make clean water available for the village and school. We also saw another spring that had been capped, but needs repair, and we are hoping to assist with that as well. We held an eye clinic in this village for the morning and were able to give glasses to about 115 here. We ate a packed lunch and then went to the home of Pastor and Becky's house helper from when they lived in this area, Truyeah for a "Bunna (coffee) ceremony. We then drove over the most,unbelievable terrain of gullies, ccaverns, boulders, rocks, etc. to get to our 3rd clinic at Tshai Sina. Again, there were about 50 people waiting and we were able to assist about 138 people here. It was AMAZING!!
That night, after a spicy (berbere)dinner, we returned to the church in Zemero for another Bunna ceremony where the leaders of the church expressed their thanks for all we had done. It was so humbling. When we left the church, we drove up on the hilltop overlooking Mehal Meda where we were able to view the night sky in all its glory like nowhere else in the world.
Thurs morning, we were up and on the road at 6am. However, about 15 minutes out of Mehal Meda, our vehicle began to spew water from under the hood. Yonas, our driver announced that we had lost our radiator cap. We are literally in the middle of NOWHERE. There is no such thing as a service station within 100 miles. The other lady in our vehicle and I started to pray, the Ethiopian men in our car started to walk back the road looking for it and Doc decided to look on the framework under the hood. PRAISE THE LORD!! It was there, we were able to use all the water in our water bottles to refill it and head on to Addis. Another of God's many miracles on our trip.
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