Tue July 15, 2008 - email excerpt from Vicki Scribner in the village

[Here is an excerpt from a note from Vicki Scribner, feel free to share as you see fit. -Monte]

Hello Family!

What a blessing to be able to write to you!!!!! I have so much to tell you and I cannot decide where to start, and I also want to be courteous with the internet usage. Pastor Paul brought me to the Compassion International office across from the Clinic where we are working. The connection here is very primitive, so I had to realize that it was not me, but I was worried about messing up their ONLY system with my Vicki-jinx.

We are literally out here in the middle of nowhere, away from any civilization as we know it. We travelled about an hour and a half out of the town on a dirt "road" to get here! We have no electricity (except here in this office which is about a mile down the road from where we are staying. We have no running water...the water that we do get comes from a pond down the road, and the young men and children go down with bicycles and jugs to bring what we get for the day. The women boil the heck out of it (for germs) and make tea for us every day twice. The homes here are like mud huts. I have seen one being built, and I think it will be fun to build a small one (dog-sized) with all the leftover dirt that I have dug out of the gardens when I get home. It will be a look into how the people here live. I have so many stories already, and it is only Tuesday morning. (It is 1am Monday where you are) I will have so much to tell you when I get home. I try to journal daily, but there is so much! God's hand is definitely on this little village. Five years ago, they had never seen a white person. Now Compassion has an office here, and I am here with Acton Faith Bible through the relationship that has been built based on one young girl from that church who was first here five years ago. This is a great story which I have to share.

Yesterday, we went to the church for a welcome from the children and the locals, and the whole village surprised me with a birthday party. Pastor Paul had found out from someone before we even came, and had arranged a cake , a hat, confetti, and a beautiful gift which brought tears to my eyes. They put me in the middle of the church in a chair out in front of everyone and honored me for 30 minutes. Every time I thought they were done, there was more. I must have cried a gallon. I was so blessed. By the way, there are no ovens here, and there is no baking at all. He went through a lot , including a journey into town just to buy a cake. These people are so amazing.

It is difficult for me to leave now, and know you can't write back, but what fun it is that I even had the blessing of coming into this office. I am going back to work. We are stocking a clinic that has been in the works for five years (started when Kelsey came with three other people the first time). It is such a blessing to see how far they have come. We have two nurses with us, so one is training the local nurse how to use a scale, a blood pressure machine, and how to take a temp with one of those electronic readers. We are building shelves to stock the things we brought, like sterile dressings, IVs, tape, syringes, etc. I'll just have to tell you when I get home about the ROWAN office that we are building. (Rural Orphans and Widows Aid Network). We hope to be able to dedicate the building at the end of the week. They are working on the roof now. One of the guys on our team is an engineer, and is quite helpful to this team for that work. God put together the PERFECT mix of people on this team to meet the needs of this village today!!!

I have to go. Please forward this to everyone you can think of who would like to hear. Maybe Pastor Terry could share in Church on Sunday. Please also look in my sent items to Elaina Griffith to find the list of email addresses that I sent to her with people who wanted to be updated.

I love and miss you very much. God's presence is all over this place. I wish you could be here. Please remember when you pray that we are 10 hours ahead, and think of what we might be doing at the time. -email excerpt from Vicki Scribner