A very UN-relaxing weekend
For about three weeks Dan has been feeling like he needed to take a long weekend to get away and relax a bit, however one thing after another kept coming up so our trip was delayed and then delayed some more.
Finally, this was the weekend! We were to leave Saturday afternoon to return on Tuesday afternoon. We’d heard of a nice group of inexpensive cottages on the beach about 2.5 hours from our house – almost a glorified camping situation. There are houses with electricity, from sundown to sunup, and someone who can cook for you, though you do need to bring all your own food, charcoal, and such. We were so excited. Several days before leaving we began having trouble with our car and thought we weren’t going to get to go, however a teammate offered us his truck if we couldn’t get ours going. After doing a few things that others suggested Dan felt the truck was running well and so we were going in ours after all.
Finally Saturday arrived. While Dan went to work that morning I was busy finalizing the packing and all the kids were busy playing. Just about the time Dan arrived home and began loading things onto the roof rack I asked Josiah to do something (that he didn’t want to do) to which he responded that his neck hurt. I immediately took his temperature but it was normal so we assumed that the subsequent whiny-ness was due to the fact it was nap time (especially since he gained quick self-control for the things he wanted). As we thought, he immediately fell asleep in the car and took a wonderful nap!
We left later than Dan had desired (he did not want to arrive in the dark), but found ourselves pulling into the general area about 5:15 pm. No worries I thought, that would allow enough time to finish getting to the cottages before it got dark. Following the directions which friends had given us, we found ourselves snaking along a sand road that really was more suitable to a 4-wheeler than our SUV type truck. We weren’t too worried – they’d told us the road was sand and there were tire tracks from where others had gone through. Unfortunately after a bit longer the road came to an end. While Dan was turning around I telephoned the owner to tell him we were lost. “No problem” he’d meet up with us and take us the rest of the way. As we snaked back to the point in our directions where we knew we were correct it finished getting dark and also began to rain (2 big uh-oh’s; 3 if you count that we were not completely sure our belongings inside the trunks on the roof rack were not getting wet). While continuing to try and connect up with the owner, which to this point hadn’t shown up, the cell coverage stopped due to the rain. Now we had no way of connecting with him and it was dark and rainy and there wasn’t really anywhere we could go. Finally after about 45 minutes of waiting (combined with traveling short distances around the area to see if we saw him close by but not exactly where we were) Dan decided we needed to just turn around and head back home to Nampula. (Sigh)
Things really began to get interesting as we turned towards home. First of all, our truck started acting up and Dan made comment that I needed to be praying – he wasn’t sure we were going to make it home. Second, Josiah became a bit whinier and when I felt his head he was burning up with fever! Third, because of the rain, the road was a slick muddy mess. Remember, we were in the bush where there are no street lights.
On we crept, with the car lurching the entire way and on several occasions dying completely. Karunia, who was already nervous over the car situation, got further upset when we made her move to the back so that Josiah could sit up closer to where we were. Esperansa’s car seat was unbuckled and thrown to the back so Josiah had space to lie down and I began to hold her; it was however well past her bedtime and she was crying. Even nursing her only seemed to pacify her for a bit. We finally managed to gain cellular coverage sufficient enough to contact teammates in Nampula. We were able to ask them to pray, tell them where we were, and secure a phone number of another missionary who lives between where we were and Nampula. Three telephone tries later (and several episodes of the car dying) we finally connected with Paul Fosse. He agreed to come meet us – saying it’d take about an hour for him to reach us. When we finally did connect up, he fiddled around with the car some (felt the problem was the fuel filter, but he couldn’t locate it) and then said we should proceed on as best as possible towards where he lives and where we could stay the night at his colleague’s house. On we crawled, usually not able to exceed more than 20 km/hr, and finally we arrived! At this point it was 9:50 pm and we’d turned around to head towards home about 6:20.
As for Josiah, once he was lying down in the car he was more comfortable and managed to fall back asleep despite his high fever. Upon arrival at the house, we managed to quickly give each of the kids a bowl of cereal and glass of milk to supplement their “supper” of banana bread and corn bread which they’d eaten in the car. Mr. Fosse and his wife were able to dig up some medicine so we could start treating Josiah for malaria. Karunia crawled into one bed, Asher and Esperansa were placed in the cribs we’d brought for them, and Josiah was placed in the bed to sleep with Dan and I.
After a fitful night’s sleep we awoke this morning. Josiah was of course still feeling rather miserable but managed to crawl out of bed to go sit on a chair in the living room. Mr. Fosse came over and was able to find the fuel filter, clean it out a bit and reconnect things so we could at least make it home.
We left his house around 10:30 am to head home. The car still wasn’t running correctly, but at least it was no longer lurching like the night before and we were back on paved roads. This time we managed to travel around 60 km per hr, again with Josiah lying down on the seat, Karunia in the very back and Esperansa on my lap. Teammates in Nampula went to the pharmacy on our behalf to buy the antibiotic, needed to supplement the malaria medicine we used. We arrived home around 12:45pm.
Well, this weekend wasn’t the relaxing family time that we’d desired, however we do praise the Lord that we at least found lodging last night and were able to get Josiah started on the malaria medicine. Scripture tells us to “give thanks for all things” so we’re trying to do that.
We are also very thankful for the help of our teammates and other missionaries who are so willing to help at a moments notice.
As for a restful break – that will have to come some other time!
Finally, this was the weekend! We were to leave Saturday afternoon to return on Tuesday afternoon. We’d heard of a nice group of inexpensive cottages on the beach about 2.5 hours from our house – almost a glorified camping situation. There are houses with electricity, from sundown to sunup, and someone who can cook for you, though you do need to bring all your own food, charcoal, and such. We were so excited. Several days before leaving we began having trouble with our car and thought we weren’t going to get to go, however a teammate offered us his truck if we couldn’t get ours going. After doing a few things that others suggested Dan felt the truck was running well and so we were going in ours after all.
Finally Saturday arrived. While Dan went to work that morning I was busy finalizing the packing and all the kids were busy playing. Just about the time Dan arrived home and began loading things onto the roof rack I asked Josiah to do something (that he didn’t want to do) to which he responded that his neck hurt. I immediately took his temperature but it was normal so we assumed that the subsequent whiny-ness was due to the fact it was nap time (especially since he gained quick self-control for the things he wanted). As we thought, he immediately fell asleep in the car and took a wonderful nap!
We left later than Dan had desired (he did not want to arrive in the dark), but found ourselves pulling into the general area about 5:15 pm. No worries I thought, that would allow enough time to finish getting to the cottages before it got dark. Following the directions which friends had given us, we found ourselves snaking along a sand road that really was more suitable to a 4-wheeler than our SUV type truck. We weren’t too worried – they’d told us the road was sand and there were tire tracks from where others had gone through. Unfortunately after a bit longer the road came to an end. While Dan was turning around I telephoned the owner to tell him we were lost. “No problem” he’d meet up with us and take us the rest of the way. As we snaked back to the point in our directions where we knew we were correct it finished getting dark and also began to rain (2 big uh-oh’s; 3 if you count that we were not completely sure our belongings inside the trunks on the roof rack were not getting wet). While continuing to try and connect up with the owner, which to this point hadn’t shown up, the cell coverage stopped due to the rain. Now we had no way of connecting with him and it was dark and rainy and there wasn’t really anywhere we could go. Finally after about 45 minutes of waiting (combined with traveling short distances around the area to see if we saw him close by but not exactly where we were) Dan decided we needed to just turn around and head back home to Nampula. (Sigh)
Things really began to get interesting as we turned towards home. First of all, our truck started acting up and Dan made comment that I needed to be praying – he wasn’t sure we were going to make it home. Second, Josiah became a bit whinier and when I felt his head he was burning up with fever! Third, because of the rain, the road was a slick muddy mess. Remember, we were in the bush where there are no street lights.
On we crept, with the car lurching the entire way and on several occasions dying completely. Karunia, who was already nervous over the car situation, got further upset when we made her move to the back so that Josiah could sit up closer to where we were. Esperansa’s car seat was unbuckled and thrown to the back so Josiah had space to lie down and I began to hold her; it was however well past her bedtime and she was crying. Even nursing her only seemed to pacify her for a bit. We finally managed to gain cellular coverage sufficient enough to contact teammates in Nampula. We were able to ask them to pray, tell them where we were, and secure a phone number of another missionary who lives between where we were and Nampula. Three telephone tries later (and several episodes of the car dying) we finally connected with Paul Fosse. He agreed to come meet us – saying it’d take about an hour for him to reach us. When we finally did connect up, he fiddled around with the car some (felt the problem was the fuel filter, but he couldn’t locate it) and then said we should proceed on as best as possible towards where he lives and where we could stay the night at his colleague’s house. On we crawled, usually not able to exceed more than 20 km/hr, and finally we arrived! At this point it was 9:50 pm and we’d turned around to head towards home about 6:20.
As for Josiah, once he was lying down in the car he was more comfortable and managed to fall back asleep despite his high fever. Upon arrival at the house, we managed to quickly give each of the kids a bowl of cereal and glass of milk to supplement their “supper” of banana bread and corn bread which they’d eaten in the car. Mr. Fosse and his wife were able to dig up some medicine so we could start treating Josiah for malaria. Karunia crawled into one bed, Asher and Esperansa were placed in the cribs we’d brought for them, and Josiah was placed in the bed to sleep with Dan and I.
After a fitful night’s sleep we awoke this morning. Josiah was of course still feeling rather miserable but managed to crawl out of bed to go sit on a chair in the living room. Mr. Fosse came over and was able to find the fuel filter, clean it out a bit and reconnect things so we could at least make it home.
We left his house around 10:30 am to head home. The car still wasn’t running correctly, but at least it was no longer lurching like the night before and we were back on paved roads. This time we managed to travel around 60 km per hr, again with Josiah lying down on the seat, Karunia in the very back and Esperansa on my lap. Teammates in Nampula went to the pharmacy on our behalf to buy the antibiotic, needed to supplement the malaria medicine we used. We arrived home around 12:45pm.
Well, this weekend wasn’t the relaxing family time that we’d desired, however we do praise the Lord that we at least found lodging last night and were able to get Josiah started on the malaria medicine. Scripture tells us to “give thanks for all things” so we’re trying to do that.
We are also very thankful for the help of our teammates and other missionaries who are so willing to help at a moments notice.
As for a restful break – that will have to come some other time!
