a new one for me

Last Thursday, we got a call for a medevac. A man had broken his leg in a town called Beroroha. Without proper treatment, gangrene had set in. Due to a lack of communication with the village and some busy schedules, we would have been unable to do the medevac until Saturday. The doctors decided that it would be better to take a doctor team to Beroroha and do the surgery there instead of bringing the patient to 'Tana for surgery. So on Monday I flew a team of 4 doctors and one assistant to Beroroha to do the surgery. We left at 6:30 in the morning for the one and a half hour flight. After a one hour walk to the village, they were able to find the patient and move him to a clinic. The clinic had no lights so the operating room had to be set up in a room with an outside door and window to let in enough light. He is a mid twenties man who had a bad break in his leg while playing soccer. After looking at it, the doctors decided that it would be best to amputate the leg above the knee.

As the operation was taking place right next to an open window, I was able watch and take as many pictures as I wanted to. I figured I might not every have the opportunity to watch a surgery again. I guess I took a lot of pictures 'cause the doctors started calling me the reporter. I think they were a bit surprised that I wanted to watch. One of them asked me if I would pass out. I think he didn't want to have to ride with a pilot who had just passed out.

The operation was done and we were all back at the plane ready to leave by 3:00 P.M. for the hour and a half flight back to 'Tana. I wasn't sure how The patient would feel about the prospect of not having a full leg for the rest of his life, but he was very happy that we were able to come as he would not have lived for more than a month without the surgery and he was suffering a lot already.

Here are some pics. I took a lot more, but I'm not sure you'd like to see them. If you really want to see, send me an email and you can have all you want.




I am no expert, but I was quite impressed with the care the doctors took even in the bush. They were very careful to keep things as sterile as possible in the operating room. Basically everything you see here came with us on the plane.

Guessing Game

On Monday Matthew had a very interesting experience when he flew a team of doctors to the southwest. Can anyone guess what medical procedure he got to watch? His stomach is stronger than mine, that's for sure!

He'll blog about it in the next few days...

Canadian Guests

We enjoyed having (l-r) Andy, Jerry, and Pam staying with us for the last weekend. They are from Canada and came to work on the airstrip at Marolambo. (One of MAF's most frequently used airstrips that is currently being tarred.) They had never met each other before coming here, and we hadn't known them either. In spite of that, we had a great time together. :) They came out from Marolambo on Friday morning. Saturday we went out to Ambohimanga to the historical site of two palaces from the 1700s and 1800s. It was a beautiful day. (Pictures above and below.) We also made several trips to the market to buy souvenirs, ate out at least 3 times, had a BBQ here on Saturday night and went to church on Sunday morning.

Larissa latched on to Mr. Jerry and loved to walk around holding his hand. :) It was nice to see Jerry and Pam "grandparenting" our kids. Thanks for taking an interest in our kids...we sure appreciate it!

Pam works in the MAF-C office, but this is the first time that we met each other. She kindly offered to make perogies for us! Yay! Here she is showing Caitlyn how to pinch them. They were delicious!

Andy and the girls watched "Cars" together...the girls have certainly enjoyed having someone here that's willing to play with them and be a substitute uncle for them!

My munchkins.

A peach blossom I saw at the palace. It doesn't feel like the time of year to be having blossoms, but I guess they don't mind temperatures of about 8* C at night.

Now our guests are gone (well, Andy leaves tonight) and it's time for me to crack down on my to-do list. This morning the girls are at a play-day at the French pre-school, so I'm home alone. Let's hope that I get more done than normal. :)

Matthew is feeling busy at work, but it's good to see MAF busy at this time of year. Usually this is a slow time.

The girls are enjoying a more relaxed pace now that school is done for the younger three. Caitlyn and I still have some reading to finish up, but it's pretty minimal at this point. They spend lots of time riding bike, swinging on Judah's new swing, playing dolls and doing the ever-present drawing/painting/cutting/gluing/taping projects. :) They are so excited about going to Canada, since to them it seems like a bit of a fairy tale, what with the grandparents, cousins, fishing, playgrounds, snow and Christmas. :)

Lanterns

These lanterns are one of our favourite parts of Independence Day...in spite of the fact that at least one of them goes up in flames each year. :)

No More Excuses

In the past year or so, I've thought about trying to update this blog on a weekly basis. Our internet was so slow and unreliable that I usually didn't even try at all, or just became frustrated and gave up. Now, some radical change has come over our internet connection and I feel that my excuses are not valid any longer. :)

So, what are we up to these days?

*Our upcoming trip to Canada is on our minds a lot these days. Only a bit more than a month till we leave. Right now our preparations are mainly mental and logistical (housing, etc), but will soon turn more practical (souvenir shopping, packing, etc).

*My (Rhonda) Mom just had a mild heart attack a few days ago, so that is very much on our minds as well. We praise the Lord for skype and e-mail that allows us to be in close contact with family. Mom seems to be in good hands, and God is giving us peace about being so far away at this time. I'm sure she would appreciate your prayers for continued healing.

*The girls are in their last few weeks of school for the year. Aimee, Sierra and Larissa have their end-of-school concert on Tuesday morning, and Caitlyn and I have a few more weeks to finish up her work here at home. We are planning to celebrate when that is all done!!

*Tomorrow is Madagascar's Independence Day. Tonight we are celebrating with friends and hoping to catch the city's fireworks display. It's usually pretty good, if you can find out what time to look for it. :)

*Matthew is having a quieter week this week, but will have a busy flying week again next week. We are coming to the time of year when it's rare for all 3 pilots to be here, and there will be times when only one pilot is available. (Due to furloughs, etc.)

*It's cold here! The last few weeks have been quite chilly - down to 8-10* C some nights. Without sealed doors and windows or central heating, this feels quite cold! I am so thankful for blankets and our fireplace.

*Today we are also celebrating with friends the finalization of a long-awaited adoption! It feels good to be able to thank God for this answered prayer!

*The current obsession in our household is the dramatized CDs of the Chronicles of Narnia! When the girls have a spare minute, you can find them huddled in front of the CD player in their room listening intently. :)

*Mandarins are in season and we are eating them with great pleasure! I wish I would know how many kilos we have eaten in the last few weeks. :) They are so sweet and juicy.

Here are a few photos for you:

This is a LOT of vanilla beans drying at an airport Matthew was at recently. He said it smelled lovely!

Matthew and a group of passengers that went with him to Farafangana. They were visiting a school for blind children.

Larissa's first day of pre-school.

The girls on a trip to the queen's palace (a historical site). l-r: Larissa, Caitlyn, Sierra, Aimee

This is at the same palace, but I thought you might like to see the poinsettias that were blooming then.

Things that make you go "HUH"

This is what we saw this morning on our way to church. I don't have any idea what happened, but it was still there when we came home so we grabbed the camera and took a couple pictures.

Mandritsara trip

So what’s new with us in the last weeks? Well, I’ve been pretty busy at work. We seem to have a busy period that starts in March and usually goes ‘till sometime in June. In July and August, the schools are out and a lot of Aid organizations slow down while their people take holidays. Also, the man who usually does most of the work coordinating flights was off for a little over a week. When he’s not there, most of that falls to me. That’s fine except that I don’t speak Malagasy and a lot of the people that call much prefer to speak Malagasy so I end up getting some of our other Malagasy staff to make a lot of phone calls for me. It usually works out; it just makes a bit more work for all of us.

I did a flight about a week ago with the Assemblies of God mission and Book of Hope. We went to Mandritsara where they showed a movie and gave a booklet away. I’ve been to Mandritsara many times, but it was the first time that I had been along when anyone had shown an evangelistic film. I helped some with the setup of the film. It was amazing and unnerving to me to have so many kids crammed all around myself and my friend Nate as we tried to set things up. It was hard to move ourselves let alone move any equipment. At one point, we had to move a table about 6 feet forward. We had to get some help to convince the kids that it was in their best interests to give up their places to let us through with the table. As soon as the video was playing, I got out. I just couldn’t quite stand to have people that close to me on all sides for very long. I stuck around and watched the film, I just watched from a bit farther away. Besides some technical problems with the dvd not playing well through some parts of the film, the kids (and adults) seemed to enjoy it.

setting up for the film

Nate translating for a Malagasy pastor, bit of a height difference.

March 10

Hi all, We are all doing pretty well. We have had some sick kids on and off for the past couple weeks. This necessitated a round of de-worming medicine. It's seems to have worked so far as the kids seem to be enjoying mealtimes a bit more these days. Yesterday was a really nice day. Not too hot, not too cold. Just right for a picnic lunch after church and a relaxing afternoon. I'm going on the MMR this week so I'll be gone tomorrow 'till Thursday. I'm planning on camping. It's only about the second or third time I've done this. I'll try to post some pictures next week.

Cyclone pictures

Temporary bridge repair north of Tomatave. We were headed to Fenerive Est to finish the assessments of the cyclone damage.

One of our colleagues in Helimission was also involved in transporting assessment teams that day.

This house is by the coast and I guess that about 25% (maybe less) of houses were damaged to this extent.

Lots of people were drying mattresses and other things. This was the first sunny day after the cyclone.

Rhonda's perspective...

I wrote this on Friday morning, but due to a very busy day on Friday and then a very relaxing weekend, I just didn’t post it! :) Here it is now…better late than never, right?

So far Cyclone Ivan has left behind an interesting week for our family. We were without electricity from about midnight Sunday night till Wednesday evening. That changed things up a bit around here! (You should have seen the laundry that piled up!) I was very thankful that friends who had power before us shared their hot showers and washing machine! You know, after so much candlelight, the electric bulbs actually seem a bit harsh. :) Still don’t want to give them up, though. :) We also had a few days of what seemed like unceasing rain. It was refreshing to see a bit of blue sky yesterday.

Then on Tuesday morning (about 5:00, actually) Matthew left for the east coast. He flew several representatives from a few relief organizations out to see what the damage from the cyclone is. They have been based in Tomatave all week, and have been taking flights and road trips to assess the damage. So far, it seems that while things are bad, they could be much worse. Praise the Lord for that. Also, we had heard reports of people being killed in a collapsed hotel, but it seems that they were discovered buried under the building several days later. I guess they took shelter in a bathroom and it protected them as the building collapsed. I don’t know if they were injured severely or not, but at least they are alive! There is much damage to rice crops, which will eventually cause difficulty because of food shortages. Because of all the rain, there are actually quite a few homeless people even as far inland as Tana. There are reports of bridges being out, as well, but I don’t know too much about that. I’m sure Matthew could write more when he returns. (Maybe if you all request it in the comments, he’ll post pictures, too. You know, positive peer pressure, or something.)

Please keep Madagascar in your prayers. Reports have it that there is a second cyclone preparing to follow Ivan’s path, and if so, this could cause much more damage as it hits an already traumatized region. (Updated 25/02: it seems that this cyclone is not forming as thought.)

This morning Aimee and Sierra have a concert at school which we ladies are all attending. (Matthew won’t be home in time, unfortunately.) Because it’s Carnival, Aimee is going dressed as a caterpillar, and Sierra as a snail. Maybe I’ll post pictures later. :) They are quite excited.

This evening we are scheduled to host two MAF visitors for dinner. These men are here from Kenya and the UK to do some sort of audit, safety and training, I believe. (I can never keep all of that stuff straight – it could be quality, safety, training, operations, finance…who knows. :) It’s always good to be able to put faces to names, since these visitors are often the ones we only meet in e-mail.

If all goes well, Matthew will be home today. I’m praying for a restful weekend, because I’m sure that the coming weeks will continue to be busy. I dread these “cyclone season” weeks, yet feel a sense of purpose – this is why we came to Madagascar, isn’t it? To be the hands and feet of Jesus. To be the donkey for the good Samaritans to Madagascar. To serve agencies that can directly serve the Malagasy people better than we are trained to do. But pray for our family life, if you think of it. It’s hard to remember that the sacrifice the girls and I make is our part in the relief efforts. It’s hard to have Matthew coming and going. Pray that we all do our part to the glory of God and (for me, especially) are able to lay aside our selfish desires to have a “normal” life.

~Rhonda

Feb. 24, 08

This week I spent most of my time in Tomatave. I went early Tuesday morning with 9 people who were going to asses the damage caused by cyclone Ivan in the Northeast. Tuesday I flew quite a bit moving people around and doing a couple overflights to check on some places that are difficult to get to over land. Wednesday, I went with one of the NGO teams by road as they didn’t have any flights for me. It was good to get an on the ground perspective. There was a lot of wind damage with houses and other buildings having been blown down or over, but it actually wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I guess the small, Malagasy huts are often short enough that the worst of the wind goes over them. The biggest concern is that the rice crop was destroyed in these regions and while some parts of Madagascar get multiple rice harvests per year, these areas only get one or two. People have food right now, but will have a shortage in 3 or 4 months if nothing is done. The relief organizations are looking at trying to replant for the next rice harvest if possible and they also might try to use this to try to introduce some different crops that won’t be so affected by cyclones. Anyway, the trip was only supposed to be a couple days, but I ended up having to stay from Tuesday to Friday. Not really what we had planned, but it was OK.

Cyclone Ivan

Last night Cyclone Ivan hit the northeast coast of Madagascar. You may remember that this same area was hard-hit last year as well. MAF is already receiving calls for booking the planes for doing flights next week to assess the damage. Please pray for the villages on the coast - some of them are probably just recovering from last year. Also, pray that the planes are used efficiently and to further the Kingdom.

If you are interested in seeing up-to-date info on the cyclone, go to this page. It will show you many different views of the cyclone. Today we have very windy, rainy weather, but we are far enough inland that it should lose a lot of strength before it is near us.

I just think of all the people with poorly built homes...please keep them in your prayers.

Dedication Celebration Pictures

The new plane, front and centre. Thank You, Lord!

The choir...really talented and really loud! :) Larissa couldn't keep from dancing with them sometimes.

Entertainment for the kids.

These cakes have 5R-MKE written on them...the registration of the new plane.

L to R: Josh, Matthew, Haja, Andry and Jakob. This was during their prayers of dedication.

Tantarika and Gavin - Gavin is our pastor at Vision Valley and Tantarika is on the leadership team there, as well. Tantarika is an amazing translator and it was a blessing to have them both there.

A part of the crowd!

Airplane Dedication

Last night we had a dedication service for our new Cessna Caravan. It was quite a party. There were probably around 300 people there for a supper. There was a Malagasy choir that sang for about 45 minutes during and after the meal. This choir was a bit different than I was expecting as they had a couple guitars, keyboards, drums, and were loud. Overall, they were pretty good. We had a big bouncy castle rented and set up in the hangar next to ours for the kids to jump in. I looked like they were having a good time for the most part. The most exiting thing was that Jakob was able to announce that we finally have received all the papers that we need to use the airplane. Up until now, we have only been able to do training or test flights. The funniest part to me was that I seemed to be the only MAF person who was surprised. I’d gone home for a little over an hour just before the party started and that’s when we got the papers. We’ll try to post some pictures soon.

In other news, Cyclone Ivan is about to hit the northeast coast of Madagascar. It looks like a pretty serious storm, but it’s often hard to know what will happen once it hits land.

January 17, 2008

Today we celebrate THREE years in Madagascar!

We’re back! Well, we’ve never been gone, really, but this blog has been woefully neglected. I’m ready to play again, so here are the first posts to get you caught up with what’s going on here.
I was going to put pictures on, too, but our internet connection tonight is less than agreeable. So, that will wait till later.

The girls' news

We’re getting back into routines again after the Christmas holidays. Caitlyn is doing well with her homeschooling. We’re now well into grade 2, and she’s enjoying it for the most part. In spite of doing well in math, she just doesn’t enjoy that part so much. Aimee and Sierra are back to school 1 full day and 2 half days per week. They are gradually using more and more French and are happier at school the more they learn. They are doing some pre-reading workbooks here at home, too, and are showing a real interest in reading and writing. Larissa spends a lot of her day colouring, playing with Play-doh, riding her tricycle and playing with her Polly Pocket dolls. She is learning to write her name, which makes her feel very accomplished.

All four girls are also involved in a girls’ Bible club and are enjoying it so much. I am teaching Caitlyn’s level and enjoying that, too. It’s good to see them memorizing verses, doing the crafts and spending time with their friends in that context.

Caitlyn has swimming lessons once a week and is making good progress. We all go to the pool once or twice a week, which is a pleasant relief from the heat and also a fun way to have some family time. Today I took all 4 girls by myself for the first time and it was manageable, so I’m sure we’ll be doing it more often.

The three oldest girls and one of their friends are taking art lessons from a lady that attends our church. I’m so grateful that they have these kinds of opportunities here, both for social activity and also for learning things that I can’t teach them.

Matthew and Rhonda's news

Matthew has been busy at work helping to do the paperwork for the new aircraft that arrived about the middle of December. It’s exciting to have the second Cessna Grand Caravan and we look forward to seeing how it will change operations for the programme here. One big concern is finding a hangar facility for the plane. At the end of the month, he’s headed to South Africa to get some more training for MAF responsibilities and will be gone a week. We are grateful for God’s protection last Friday when a speeding car came towards Matthew while he was coming towards home on his motorcycle. He swerved to miss the car and then wiped out on the loose gravel on the side of the road. His bike was bent, but has been repaired. The worst part is that he hurt his foot just above the big toe and had quite a lot of pain and swelling at first. Thankfully, it seems to be getting better and today he saw a Dr that was sure that it will heal within a month or so. We were concerned that something was broken at first, but the Dr thinks it may be a tendon. Up until this accident, he was also playing tennis about once a week, which is a good form of “relaxation” for him. A lot of his friends enjoy playing as well, so it’s a nice way to socialize as well. At church, he’s been quite heavily involved in getting the sounds system up to par, and training several teenagers to run it on Sunday mornings, as well. That’s something he really loves and does well at.

I am mostly busy with normal household activities…groceries, cooking, driving the girls to their activities, supervising chores, and much more. Homeschooling Caitlyn takes a large part of my time as well, but it’s usually something I enjoy very much. To keep my brain active, I have a French lesson once a week. I am feeling much better about my French and hope to make a lot of progress this year. When I have a few spare minutes (or hours!), I still love to work on my scrapbooking, or pick up a book.

We are planning on being in Canada between August 2008 and January 2009, and then the plan is to come back for a two-year term.

So, that’s all for now, and we’ll try hard to do better at keeping this updated…

Feel free to leave a comment!

Ambovombe / Ampanihy

Vegetable oil donated from Canada to the World Food Program

A food distribution warehouse in Ampanihy; Rice and Beans.


A big hole used to collect water during the rainy season.

Happy 5th Birthday Aimee and Sierra

August/September

These first two pictures are from the opening of the new auditorium for our church, Vision Valley. What a blessing this new building has been.

Aimee and Sierra's first day of school - so far it's going quite well for them!

Larissa turned 3 on Sept 21. Hard to believe our baby is 3!

Caitlyn carrying her baby the Malagasy way.

Trip to Morondava

Matthew had a 2-night trip to Morondava, and there were enough empty seats in the plane for the girls and I to go along! That sure doesn't happen that often and we were very happy to take the chance to go along. We left Thursday morning and had a nice flight there. Here are some photos from the flight.

Madagascar has a number of these very old volcanoes. I find them fascinating, and wonder just how old they are.


We had one stop on the way and Larissa really enjoyed waving at the crowd that gathered to see the plane.


Here we are in Morondava and the girls are ready to head for the beach.


Caitlyn was so excited about being at the coast again!


Caitlyn, Sierra and I took a walk during low tide.

Beach and Swimming

Thanks to the kind stranger who offered to take this photo! I was very pleased to have it taken!



We drew a small crowd on the beach. Our girls are quite a novelty, and so far they don't mind the attention too much. Eventually all 8 kids were playing together, and Caitlyn decided that we really do all need to learn Malagasy for such occasions.


Larissa hadn't been swimming in months, and after some hesitation she ended up having a very! exciting! time! :o)


Aimee and Sierra kicked all around the pool and enjoyed the relative freedom these rings gave them.


Caitlyn enjoyed the rings, too, but her high point of the weekend was learning to swim with just water wings on!

Baobabs in Morondava

Morondava is known for the baobabs, and especially this area called the Avenue of Baobabs. It's really spectacular! They're huge!

These baobabs are called the twin baobabs, so here are our twins posing in front of them!

What have we been up to?

Wow. I can't believe how long it's been since we updated this blog. Hopefully someone out there is still checking in. :) We have been busy...my sister Robyn and her family were here for 5 weeks as well as 'normal' busyness. Of course we loved having family here for that long and the kids talk about their memories quite often. Daryl was gone for 3 of those weeks, working at a hospital northeast of here. Here are some pictures of their time here.

This picture was taken at a carnival that Caitlyn's school held. The kids loved this train, as you can see.

The lanterns for Independence Day are always fun...even if a few go up in flames. :)

Matthew thoroughly enjoyed hanging out with Daryl again.

Having the opportunity to show my sister where I live was a dream come true!

Cousins at the croc farm.

We loved getting to know Adrienne - what a sweetie.

Of course we had to take them to see the lemurs.