24-ish Hours of Wow

It’s been a rare 24 hours indeed.  As I stood sopping wet from the shower getting ready to go to town for some errands, my friend Cici called.  Her very pregnant sister Maria was in labor, the baby sitting bum-side down, and things were not looking good.  Maria already has 6 children, and none of her labors have ever been as bad or long as this.  Cici asked if we might be able to help them get to the hospital in Lui (17 miles away - but an hour or so by car, owing to the bad roads).  'Of course!’

One minor problem.  Our main vehicle (Brown Sugar - the land cruiser that seats 11) had just been taken by another team to Mvolo.  Our other vehicle (White Bull - the water truck that sits 3 in the cab) had been taken by our friend Rooney to do a bore hole repair.  Someone had seen him pull back into town this afternoon, but he hadn’t shown up at our place yet.  And we couldn't seem to reach him by phone.


Heather agreed to drive with me, but since Rooney was still out, I took off on bicycle to make two quick stops and head up to Cici’s place while Shawn continued trying to get a hold of him.  That’s when I encountered the second problem.  The massive puddle in the road past the bridge.  Puddle is an understatement.  It’s a veritable lake that stretches right the way across the road.  We’ll call it the Red Sea.  Full of clay mud, spun and dug deeper into a horrid mud pit by countless massive and heavily loaded trucks of cargo and diesel that come from Juba.  One such truck was currently stuck in it on the left side of the road.  I wasn’t even sure how I’d get across this time.  Sometimes there are stepping stones through the middle where the ground is a little higher.  Not today.  And the attempted forays into the thick and thorny brush along the side of the road were calf-deep squishy ruts of red clay and mud puddle.  Obviously it wouldn’t be a clean crossing, but luckily someone has cut a jug-handled foot path through part of the thicket at the side … so I’d be able to pass if I walked my bicycle carefully.



Slipping, skidding, squidging in the muck, and nearly losing my flop flops in the suctioned mud holes made by my feet as they sank under my weight, I made it across and continued up to their place.  As I greeted my friend Nadi from the Miri-Kalanga market, I got a phone call from Shawn saying he couldn’t get a hold of Rooney.  Could we rent a vehicle from somewhere?  I had no clue.  Could we ask Bishop?  He has a car for the Mother’s Union (so not even his), and he was at a training today.  I felt terrible calling, but I had no other options, and I wasn’t about to give up without knowing I did everything in my power to help.  I called.  Bishop answered, whispering.  (Oh dear!)  He was in the middle of the training.  I apologized, explained the situation, and asked if we might take his vehicle.  Just one catch: He’d have to pick Heather up, and help her get across the Red Sea since she’s new to this kind of driving.  He thought it through, and with barely a hesitation, resolved to come - despite the fact that he’d have to back-track to our house before coming all the way across town to where I was.  Still, praise God, now we had a car.

When I got to Cici & Maria's, the kids were running around laughing and playing, oblivious.  Edita, Maria’s grown daughter - with her own baby in her arms - escorted me to the tukul (hut) and I bowed out of the sun into the relative darkness inside.  Maria’s white-haired mother was sitting on a chair just inside the door looking drawn, holding Maria’s head.  Maria was on the floor, lying on her back, all stomach, writhing.  The daya (midwife) was sitting on a stool by her bent legs.  I was surprised to see it was my friend Mary from the market.  (Didn’t know she was a midwife!)  Maria was clearly tired.  Her contractions had started yesterday (by this time it was after 4pm).  And the baby wasn’t coming.  We sat there for a while, her mother, sister, and daughter helping her through contractions, and keeping her legs bent since she no longer had the strength to do it herself.  Mary said she’d helped birth three babies breach in her time.  And though she herself was calm and collected and patient, everyone else was visibly nervous.  Cici and Edita knew this was nothing like Maria’s other births, and the longer it went on, the more risky it was.

All the while, I heard barely a peep from Maria, who was alternately breathing sharply and writhing when the contractions were bad.  The pain was increasing.  Tears streamed down her face, and she began talking.  Saying something was wrong.  That it’s too much.  When she started asking Jesus to take her is when I bit back my own tears.  Where on earth was the car already?  I asked if I could pray and everyone agreed.  I put my hand on her belly and prayed my heart out, crying the whole time, her daughter Edita whispering, ‘Jesus’ over and over, and the others murmuring their agreement when they heard something they understood.  This wasn’t a moment I was going to try praying in dialect … I just needed to pray without thinking about how to say it.  We finished, and I bowed out of the tukul to call Shawn and Heather to see what was going on.  Bishop had collected Heather and they were on their way.  Thank heavens! 

So I went back inside.  More sitting and waiting.  More writhing and crying.  Maria grabbed our hands and necks and kept talking.  She’s courageous, and thick-skinned, and does not give up without a formidable fight.  So to hear her talking to God as if he were right there in the hut with us, ‘God ... baba (like papa), it’s enough ... I can’t … please, I’m ready … bring me up to be with you,’ well I didn’t stand a chance of keeping it together.  I’ve known her 5 years.  I’ve seen her pregnant with her last two, I’ve watched them both grow up.  I’ve played with them.  All of us have talked under the stars with while we shelled g-nuts, danced and sung at church, I've slept over, we've eaten meals together.  And this could be it.  And there was her daughter Edita, holding her hand, and foot, worried as I’ve ever seen her, listening to her mother talk like this.  It was awful.  Cici and the midwife decided to try and get her up so that she was on all fours for a bit - to relieve the pressure that she kept feeling on her rib that she swore would break.  But first they warmed a wooden mingling stick (kind of like a spoon) on the fire, and Cici kept pressing it into the place at her ribs where it hurt.  I guessed it was to make the baby move a bit??  But what do I know about birth, let alone home births and midwifery in this culture and country?!  

Another text came in from Heather.  They were at the Red Sea.  Two trucks were stuck in it, making the road impassable.  My heart clenched.  Sometimes these trucks can’t get out.  They get stuck for days.  Cici saw my face and asked what was going on.  Ugh…

Another text: they got one of the trucks out.  My heart leaped.  They could be here in five minutes.

Another text: another truck got stuck ahead of them.  Are you kidding me?!*  Apparently Bishop was furious at this point, which I found out myself when he called to tell me in raised tones that they were not able to pass because of the other vehicles.  I wasn’t sure what to say.  Did this mean he was going to abandon ship (oh inopportune pun) and turn back?  Or wait and see what happened?  So I said I’m sorry, and I’d pray that God would make a way.  More waiting.

Yet another text from Heather.  They’d gotten the truck out and her and Bishop were about to cross!  I said I’d walk to the main road so they’d know where to come when they arrived.  With Ema (short for Emmanuel) and Jima, Maria’s sons, I walked under the mangoes, past the football pitch where young men were getting their cleats on, and to the edge of the market where I saw my friend Alex.  I shook his hand, and the three others that were with him.  He offered me a chair and meanwhile he balanced the broken leg of his own chair under the seat until he could sit down without falling over.  We say, ‘it’s not over until the fat lady sings.’  Well here, 'it’s not broken or trashed until you literally can’t do anything with it.’  They asked what I was up to and I told them about Maria, the car, and the Red Sea.  I waited impatiently.  Fidgeting, turning to check the road.  Empty.  Only the dust kicked up from several bodas (motorcycle taxis).  And we talked about how it’s definitely turning to dry season.  The half-hearted talk you try to distract yourself with when there’s something more important on your mind.

The next text read: 'We’re stuck.'  I thought I would throw up.  Good Lord.  What to do?  I found out later that Bishop promptly peeled off his shoes, rolled his trousers up to his thighs, and got out.  How he did that, I’m not all that sure, because the water line was well past the wheel wells.  And besides that’s a big thing for someone of Bishop’s status in this culture.  Heather told me later, just how moved she had been to see him slop around in the mud for the sake of a pregnant woman he didn’t even know.  He was talking animatedly to everyone around.  Heather had no clue what he was saying, but it wasn’t hard to guess.  There was no vehicle that could pull them out.  I think he phoned me again at that point, to tell me so.  I was feeling desperate.  Finally, not wanting to sit at the market when I could be with Maria, I asked Alex a favor.  If they got out of the mud, and came up, could he meet them and show them the way to the house?  He was happy to do it (God bless these Moru people), so Ema, Jima, and I walked back.  Just as we turned the corner to go down the path, I saw a huge truck lumber by, going in the direction of the mud pit.  I silently prayed that it could help pull them out.

By this time, it was worse with Maria.  Plenty of people had gathered around and were in the tukul - friends from church, friends from the community.  Everywhere there were concerned comments.  Tabita, Maria’s absolutely darling 5 year old daughter came up with her face all smiles, so unaware of what could happen and what it would mean.  She smoothed her hands up and down my arms (white skin is still so alluring. :)  When Cici came around to ask where the car was, I told her it was stuck, and then there was more chatter.  Some of which I understood, and some of which I didn’t.  But something was going on.  

Another text: “We’re getting pulled out.”

I found out they were mobilizing to take Maria to her mother’s tukul in the next compound.  Bad sign.  When people are doing really poorly (and sometimes if you think that nothing can be done), you return the person to his or her father’s house.  It seems like a last-ditch effort of sorts, but I’m still not entirely sure what it means according to the culture.  We barely got her up and out of the tukul before it became apparent that she could not walk, so we all lifted her up (six of us) and carried her over.  

We set her down on the dirt just outside the tukul, where there was now a large crowd gathered around. 

Another text: “The rope broke.” 

Everyone fell silent as we kneeled and squatted around Maria and her sister Cici began to pray.  What ensued was one of the most heart-felt and moving prayers I had ever heard.  The cry of a humble, faith-filled woman for her sister.  Her closest friend, really.  “You know we are just people, God.  We’ve done so many horrible things, and we don’t deserve your help.  Please forgive us God.  You know we love you, and we cannot do anything else without you.  Please remember your child, please have mercy on her … please help us … ”  

By the time she finished, all of us had tears streaming down our faces as we sat in the dust.  I stood up, and no sooner did I turn to greet some people, but yet another text came through.  “We’re out, and we’re coming now.”  I thought my heart would stop for joy and relief.  Once again I half walked, half ran out to the road, this time with Tabita.  I felt like I stood there in the dust and grass for an eternity, waiting to see the car, wondering what could possibly be taking them that long to come up this easy piece of road, my stomach in a solid knot.  But finally they appeared.

The car stopped by the edge of the field, was immediately surrounded by a crowd, and Bishop got out, bare-foot and caked in mud as I headed down the path to help get everyone and everything to the car.  Two men carried Maria; several women hefted a basin of goods, blankets, and a sack of flour on their heads; and the rest of the community followed us to the car, everyone looking to see what was happening, giving commands to do this or that, and pushing things and people into the car.  Doors slammed, I got in, and Bishop quieted the crowd in order to pray.  I looked over at Heather with a panicked expression, 'wait, I don’t remember how to drive stick on this side of the car.  Which pedal is which?’  I literally could not remember.  Our car’s driver’s seat is on the left.  Bishop’s is on the right, so everything is the other way round.  I’d driven it plenty, but in the worry of the moment, my mind was completely blank.  Prayers finished they told us to run, so I put my feet down and thankfully they knew what to do better than my mind did.  I began to pull out not even realizing that the final person, Maria’s husband, was still squeezing himself, standing and hunched over, into the last remaining sliver of space in the vehicle.  I jerked to a stop, the door banged shut, they shouted to go, and we were off.

The road to Lui, thanks to the change of the season from rain to dry, was great.  It’s funny how your standards change based on all the options that you’ve encountered in the past.  In reality, it's a horrid stretch of road, riddled with massive holes.  I was in second gear for most of it.  But despite that, it was a clear day, and the road was dry, which meant that no matter how awful it was, we’d actually get there.  We stopped several times, when the contractions were the worst and she couldn’t handle it anymore, and once so she could try to relieve herself and drink some water.  Once we passed the large turn in the road signaling the half-way mark, the horizon suddenly changed.  In the place of blue skies and bright sun all last week, there was an ominous wall of angry storm … as far as the eye could see from east to west.  Please God, don’t let it rain until we get there.  My brow and shoulders were solidified in concentration, navigating the road, but once those blue granite mountains of Lui came into sight, I could have cried with gratitude.

We made it.  It was nearly dark as we pulled up to the maternity ward and helped Maria in.  I picked up Jima, who was standing around as the adults unloaded, looking as though he were about to cry.  “Why didn’t you bring her sooner?” the nurse asked.  “We had no car.”  Lui hospital is now being run by a group of Italian doctors through the organization, Doctors for Africa.  God bless them.  The hospital had been run by Samaritan’s Purse, but they pulled out a number of years ago, and it had really suffered in their absence.  We are extremely lucky to have a legitimate doctor and surgeon anywhere near us in South Sudan, much less only one hour away.  

One of the doctors appeared in the examination room as the nurse was taking blood pressure and checking Maria’s paperwork.  She checked the baby.  I was glad, at that moment, that I understood English and could over-hear her comments to the nurse, otherwise we wouldn’t have had a clue what was going on.  I couldn’t believe that no communication to Maria, or the family, or even to myself was even attempted, save for things like, ‘turn on your side,’ or ‘give me your arm.’  There wasn’t a 'we’re putting in a catheter, just so you know,’ not to mention, ‘by the way, you need a C-section to get the baby out, so that’s what we’re doing with you.’  It was a gift of God I was with them, and understood, so I could tell them what was happening instead of simply seeing their frightened clueless faces as they watched.  Even a brief smile of assurance from the doctor or nurse would have been gold.  But beggars can’t be choosers, and I’m prepared to overlook the bedside manner and thank God for ever after for these self-sacrificing Italian angels that saved my friend’s life.  

The surgery took place two rooms over, and beyond a door and curtain through which I caught the occasional glimpse of Maria’s feet on the gurney.  As we waited we talked over Maria’s situation and what it was like to get c-sections (Heather’s had the first-hand experience twice).  And as we recounted the events of the day, dusk ebbed into solid evening and then came the rain.  The rain that had held off on our trip, thank God.  And the rain that was a serious rainy season type rain, not the casual drizzle that we might still get at this time of year.  After some talking back and forth, and a phone call to Shawn in Mundri, we knew we’d have to stay the night.  If the roads weren’t precarious enough to attempt in the dark, and with heavy rain falling, it’s never a good idea to travel at night, especially two women alone.  But what to do?  Where to stay?  The only person I know in Lui is the Bishop and his wife, whom thankfully I’ve bumped into several times since I’ve been back, so I felt slightly less awkward about calling them out of the blue for suggestions of where to find three beds.  Our own Bishop gave us the number and I phoned, once again, feeling very silly to be calling an important enough person with his own important concerns, at 8:30pm at night no less, to ask if he knew where we might stay.  Our first hope, the ECS guesthouse in Lui, was not currently functional - at least not on a no-notice basis.  But bless his heart, Bishop was just as accommodating and kind as one could be and said he’d make some phone calls to see what might be done.  

So we waited with bated breath, peeking at the curtain and the bright overhead surgical light beyond.  When I first heard the baby’s hearty little cry, I thought I would either burst out laughing in delight or melt in a teary puddle of joy and relief.  Heather and I were elated.  And slightly baffled that Cici and the midwife didn’t share our giddy excitement.  Even when they brought the baby out - a BEAUTIFUL little girl - they just looked on with unaffected faces.  Ah, cultural differences are so curious sometimes.  

The baby was getting a rub-down for its first weight measurement, and just below, a basin on the floor contained the placenta!  Hello!  I watched in fascination as this is the first time I’ve witnessed any of this.  The nurse picked baby girl up by the feet and she hung upside down for a few seconds.  (What in the world?  Is that normal??)  I didn’t catch the weight, but it would have been in kilos anyhow, and they never make any sense to me.  And then they wrapped her up in bright cloth that Cici had brought, and layed her in a little wheeled crib.  She was crying on and off, and I thought, why on earth are we leaving the poor thing in a crib, with five of us women in the room all staring from two feet away?  Doesn’t this baby need to be held?!  But the nurse said to leave her in there, so we sat there awkwardly as Mary jiggled the crib and patted the bundle muttering, “Khalaas, khalaas” (Juba Arabic for ‘finished' or ‘enough', but in this case, meaning something like, 'there, there, that’s enough, you’re alright, you can stop now.')

Bishop finally phoned back and said he’d talked to the project manager of Doctors for Africa and they found three beds for us.  It was after 9, our stomachs were grumbling something awful, but we didn’t care one bit.  The baby was alive.  Maria was alive.  And by some miracle, there were three beds for us on a dark wet night in a strange town.  Three clean, bug-free beds in their own bedrooms, with two indoor flush toilets, two showers, and clean, fresh towels and sheets to boot.  If I’d been any more tired, I think I would just have gaped with my mouth open at our luck.  But it was hardly luck.  The whole trip, from start to finish, was so clearly planned for and rescued by God.  Even down to Bishop’s phone being on at the training.  

Let me just say, he has four phones, with four different SIM cards which he uses all the time.  He’d turned all four off for the whole day, until a late afternoon break when he briefly turned one on to catch a message.  He ‘forgot' to turn it back off, and was embarrassed when it rang during the training, but simply stated later, that it was clearly God’s plan so that I was able to get a hold of him.  Amazing.

So Heather, Mary the midwife, and I slept clean in our beds, doubly surprised by Heather’s sesame snacks and mulberries in our bellies in place of dinner.  It took me a while to get to sleep for thinking over all the pieces of that day:  Maria laying on the observation table in the surgery, not a stretch mark on her after six children, grasping Heather’s neck in pain.  For a moment her Moru prayers suddenly gave way to a “Jee-sas … helepu me” when she realized it was Heather’s neck she was holding onto!  Maria’s hand clenching mine as they put in her catheter, opening her eyes to look at me for a split second and saying, “Satani ma indu guwa,” Juba Arabic for ‘Satan has no power.’  Damn right he doesn’t.  The two lovely nurses who introduced themselves to us when it was all over, beautiful smiles on their faces, kind-hearted care pressed into each laugh line.  

At some point I woke in the night - to monsoon-like winds outside, and then the crash of a million heavy streams of rain, unrelenting.  I heard it at the back of my consciousness for the rest of the night, a rain such as we haven’t had for weeks now.  The next morning Heather told me she’d wondered what we’d do, when she heard all that rain and wind.  But then “a peace poured over [her] as [she] thanked God for his provisions for just the last few hours.  Where there was no car, he provided.  No driver, he provided.  When we got stuck, he brought someone along to pull us out.  He kept Maria from delivering on the road or in Mundri where she surely could have died [or lost the baby] from such a trauma.  He put us just 17 miles from a hospital staffed with good doctors.  He got us to the hospital before darkness and rain hit.  He allowed this little one and her mama to live through this experience in a place where the odds are terrible.  He gave us shelter - and not just any shelter but one with a shower, mosquito nets, and an indoor toilet.  He gave good rest at night.  So this rain and these muddy roads - they were no match for him.  “Ok, God.  Do your thing.  I trust you.””

Exactly.  

The next morning we woke bright-eyed and bush-tailed, thanked our Italian host, and got back to the hospital.  Maria was on a bed in the maternity unit, with her little lady at her side.  The wound hurt, but she was alive.  And she will live.  Cici thanked us profoundly before we headed off towards Mundri, and was even able to laugh, finally, about the silly things Maria had said when she was still coming out from under the effect of the drugs for the surgery.  We got in the car and headed for Mundri.  Despite the crazy slip and slide, and a puddle in which the water came over the hood of the car, we made it without a hitch.  I couldn’t have asked for a better companion.  It’s the second time Heather’s accompanied me on a hospital run, but I told her, “as fun as our adventures are turning out to be, I do hope this doesn’t become a ‘thing’!”

We parked the car at the guesthouse of the Catholic Church (Bishop thought it prudent not to chance another Red Sea crossing until the waters have gone down).  And surprise of all surprises, we found there two Indian priests, Father Alex and Father David  - just as lovely and generous and delighted as they could be to have visitors - English speaking ones, that is!  Apparently they’ve been here for a year, working as missionaries, and plan to stay on indefinitely.  What luck!  No … not luck.  And so, despite the fact that Bishop was waiting on the other side of the Red Sea to collect us in our vehicle, the two men begged us with no lack of enthusiasm to sit down and have coffee with them.  So there we two white women were, with a Sudanese midwife, in the middle of nowhere in South Sudan, having morning coffee with two Indian priests, and having a grand time of it. They escorted us down the hill a few minutes later with eager hopes of planning to celebrate Christmas together, and hilarious comments about the amount of chili they take in their food.

What a beautiful and bizarre adventure.  

We stopped in the market to pick up a few things, including a rolex each for breakfast (flour tortilla-like chapati and fried egg, rolled up) from our Ugandan friend Gideon.  We asked Bishop if he’d like one, to which he smiled, shrugged, and said, “Well, can anyone say no to a rolex?”  

No.  

Can anyone say no to God’s lavish provision when it comes in all its splendid and unexpected shapes and forms?

No.  

I wouldn’t dream of it.