Had a hard time sleeping last night; woke up at 1am and couldn’t go back for hours.  Mike was also up most of the night, but he wasn’t keeping me up.  Thoughts were racing about what I had seen earlier in the day, and what I was anticipating over the next few days.  Spent time in prayer for Mark and Carmen particularly, but also for the entire team and my family back home.  Mike woke up feeling really bad, nausea and a headache…hopefully just something temporary.  Off to breakfast and then the 3 hour drive to Samfya.

                The drive was very long, but it was worth it.  I feel like I got a chance to see what Zambia is really like, going from town to town, seeing essentially small one room brick (mostly mud or cinder block, sometimes fired brick) homes with thatch roofs.  The countryside was very beautiful near the Kasanka Wildlife reserve and heading through the wet lands and swamp area.  This was the closest point to the Congo, which we could see from the bridge the crossed the Luapula River.    This river and swamp area serve as the headwaters of the Congo river.  There were no villages in this area, just nomadic fisherman that followed the fish and water.  There was very little water with it being the dry season, just the main river branch and a few tributaries.  The people were drying and smoking the fish right on the side of the road.  

                After the river, we were on a vast prairie and saw herd of wild antelope and then a solitary buck.  Mark was telling me that there were hundreds of thousands of antelope just 2-3 decades ago, but most were poached out.   They are actively trying to repopulate the antelope herds.

                We finally made it to Samfya, a town larger than expected and situated on the shores of Lake  Bangweulu, which is huge.  I really looks like Lake Michigan.  We went to Mark and Carmen’s house, which they designed and built, that overlooks the lake from a hill.  They really did a nice job, with 4 bedrooms, kitchen, living and dining room and a loft/play area for the kids.  I also met the local “wildlife”:  Spice and Copper their dogs, 2 ducks and 9 guinea pigs.  After lunch, we went to the health district to formally meet Dr. Kaonga, the district’s head medical administrator (also a physician).  After the formalities, we toured the recently partly opened hospital with Dr. Lishiku, one of 2 general doctors that is charged with overseeing the hospital.  I must say that this new hospital, which was started in 2005 and for various political and funding problems, is already in need of significant repairs.  The majority of the hospital is not opened and the majority of the equipment is still in boxes.  Over the past  few years they’ve had to transfer all the OB emergency cases to a hospital 60 minutes away and as a result have had higher that desired infant/maternal mortality.  This prompted the district to open the hospital in phases, with Labor and Delivery (including C-sections).  They’ve performed 8 sections over the past 2 weeks – all successful with only 1 wound infection. 

                We were able to find a bunch of unopened surgical equipment and started doing some inventory and planning for next week.  The plan is to finish the inventory tomorrow morning and then have the medical staff go to Mansa and buy the remaining equipment to OR planned for Monday. The 6 potential cases that have been identified are supposed to come to the clinic on Friday.

                Had dinner at the Lake Lodge – good local grilled fish and then prayer time with the group focusing on the fears or being on a mission and how Christ’s grace, through prayer, can strengthen all who call on Him (Phil 4:6-7).