First term missionary family adventures

Guyana

Adventure (verb):
1.  an undertaking usually involving danger and unknown risks
2.  an exciting or remarkable experience

There is no question that our family’s first year in Guyana met all of the definitions of the word adventure. By God’s grace we (the Wickwire Family) have come through relatively unscathed.  As for exciting and remarkable, we could write a book, and perhaps almost have if we look back at the stories posted on the website.

So what are some of the highlights and challenges?  Waking up with a rat sitting on the headboard six inches from my head; chasing a snake down the stairs and out of the house with a broom; discovering that by closing our eyes and using our imaginations, a lot of local foods can taste a lot like something familiar at home.  For example: breadfruit fries = French fried potatoes; cooked ripe plantain = apples in oatmeal; soursop = sorbet; whipped coconut milk = whipped cream; dried five finger (starfruit) = raisins and so on.

Making close friends among the local people takes time.  This has been particularly difficult for Jacob and Zack as they interact with the local boys.  We come from such different life experiences and world views. The people are wonderful though; nearly everyone knows us and greets us cheerfully. We struggle to learn everyone’s names or at least recognize who they are.  They assume we remember everyone. I will often get phone calls that start like this: “This is the mother of the girl that fly with you in the yellow plane, she ready to go outback.”  Often it can take quite some time to ascertain who they are talking about, where they are, and where they need to go.

The monthly AWA boat trips 30 miles up the Barima River to the village of Blackwater have been very rewarding. We have watched the villagers become a more cohesive group as they grow in the understanding of the message of salvation. They now meet every Sabbath with the guidance of a resident Bible/health worker we placed there. Just this week we took delivery of a brand new 24-foot dugout canoe that will be used to transport the Bible worker to homes as well as collect people for meetings at the church.

The impact of AWA’s yellow, Cessna 182 airplane on people’s lives has been immeasurable. I would love to post a list of how many lives have been saved, but that is impossible to know. However, this is what we can state for certain: 207 patients were transported to advanced medical care, 63 of which were critical cases where loss of life or limb was probable; 107 Guyana Ministry of Health personnel were taken for clinics, vaccinations or patient care; 131 patients who had completed treatments were returned to as close to their home villages as we could take them. Church workers, ministry and outreach personnel and AWA’s Wings for Humanity staff accounted for 110 seats. In total for the last 12 months (August 2007 to August 2008), we carried 763 passengers on over 450 flights logging just over 400 flight hours, all with one Cessna 182 and two pilots.

One recent case involved a 12 year-old boy named Godfrey Rammit from a village called Red Hill. He had a compound fracture of the radius and ulna, and it is common to see people here with permanent disabilities from fractures that don’t get properly set.  Godfrey was being sent to Georgetown alone. He had never been to the city before and was ill-equipped to deal with getting through the system of complete treatment. Our AWA Guyana Project team was concerned that he could simply fall through the cracks.

Laura LaBore, AWA’s Guyana Project pilot/nurse, asked for permission to send him to Davis Memorial Hospital under Davis Interior Medical Emergency Service (DIMES) program, which provides free treatment for patients from remote communities. The initial attempt to set the fracture was unsuccessful so he had to have surgery to have pins and screws put in place and then a cast.  He spent a few days at the hospital before we could take him back to Mabaruma, where he spent a few weeks hanging around the local hospital very patiently.  We then flew him back to Georgetown where he spent another couple of weeks at the Amerindian Hostel until he was able to get the pins removed. At that time, AWA’s Guyana Project team and its yellow Cessna 182 took him back to Mabaruma where he was able to catch a boat back home. It was a long process, but in the end our team sent a boy back home fully recovered and able to live a normal life with no disability.

After one year in Guyana, we are looking forward to God’s plan for us and his work here.