Ouch, more tsetse flies!

Three months have literally flown by since the last update in February.  And our family is trying to catch our breath from it all. 

Family & Friends

1.  On February 23, 2014, we had the opportunity to invite our friends over for lunch.  One of the first friends we made while in the country, Karla and Jonathan Kanyanga, and their son Christopher, are near and dear to our hearts.  Mari & Katungu are friends we met through the others, and they are a lovely couple.  Cherry and Ben Liu (and their four incredibly cute kids, Elijah, Abigail, Benjamin, and Naomi) are also amongst our first friends in Zambia.  Both Cherry and Ben are U.S.-trained doctors, and Cherry also happens to be my Ob/Gyn.  We are so sad that the Liu family will be leaving Zambia early next month, and we wish them the best as they return back to the U.S. to start their new life there again.

2.  During that time, we also met Anthony, who works with Maranatha.  He is a very precocious 20-year-old young man with a heart for the Lord and who has been instrumental in the building of hundreds of churches across the Southern African region. 

3.  We had the privilege of inviting another wonderful family over for lunch on March 30, 2014!  Pastor and Mrs. Song and their three children are a missionary family from South Korea who has been serving in Zambia for about 4 years now.  They are a delightful family, and we are so lucky to have them as friends.

4.  From March 29 – April 12, 2014, we were honored to have Helen Zakrzewski join us for a medical school rotation.  Helen is a bright and budding future ophthalmologist, in the throes of her medical school training in Canada.  

As we happened to have quite a bit of surgical variety during her 2 weeks with us (scleral sutured lenses, strabismus surgery, corneal tattooing, traumatic cataracts, glaucoma procedures, corneal transplants, etc.), she had a great time learning about international ophthalmology.  

Guess what, Mom!  I've become a tattoo artist.  =)

Patient #1 - PBK in nearly blind eye OS

Patient #1 - immediately following corneal tattoo

Patient #2 - dense endothelial scar in OD (6/36!)

Patient #2 - immediately following corneal tattoo

The Thank You cake Helen bought on her last day with us

A farewell party for Helen

5.  From April 7 – 25, 2014, we had yet another set of visitors. Audrey Hunt, a senior ophthalmology resident from Loma Linda University, and her husband, Pastor Bill Hunt, spent a full 3 weeks with us.   

 

 

The first great feat that she managed was to bring over 5 corneal tissues over from the U.S.!  Again, thanks to Midwest Eye Banks, 5 patients were able to undergo corneal transplantation on that Monday that Audrey arrived. This case below was of a patient who had a corneal perforation/cataract and had previously undergone glycerol PKP with open sky ECCE/IOL placement.  He was so happy to get his fresh cornea at last!

With the opaque glycerol-preserved cornea

Immediately postop, fresh graft in place

6.  Also in April, Paul and I got to attend our first Zambian wedding.  Congratulations to Jones and Nsekwa Simamba on tying the knot!  Jones is an Accounts Clerk at Lusaka Eye Hospital, and we are so happy that he has decided to venture into the world of marriage.

7.  Finally, we’ve been so lucky to have Annie (Paul’s mom, aka “the best mother-in-law in the world) spend the last 5 months with us in Zambia.   

 

Having left her home in beautiful Hawaii to act as a gourmet chef and professional babysitter for the last half year, she has truly made great sacrifices for our family.   

As we prepare to bid farewell to her next week, our hearts are saddened.  But all we can say is, “Please come back soon!!!”

Accomplishments and Achievements

8.  Lusaka Eye Hospital now has a website!!!  Ever since we’ve been here in Zambia, we’ve known that we’ve needed to have some presence on the internet.  Because of all the drama of trying to turn our institutions around, we put this need on the back burner.  Only when someone on Facebook randomly contacted me and offered to help us build our website free of charge did we start to look into it.  But, finally, I can say that we have a basic, far-from-fancy, informational website for our eye hospital!  Feel free to visit us at lusakaeyehospital.org.  Thanks, Laurentiu, for your help with this!!!

9.  These last few months, we’ve also been working hard to repaint the entire hospital – both inside and outside – thanks to the generous donation from Standard Chartered Bank.  In addition, our small library project for the Eye Hospital is well on its way.  The bookshelves are now made.  All we need now is a table, some chairs, couches, curtains, computers, and some books for the bookshelves!!! =)

 

10.  Lusaka Eye Hospital continues to be involved in various eye screening programs throughout the year.  The most recent one has been for a health expo as part of an evangelistic series preached by Pastor Pardon Mwansa and held at the Government Complex in Lusaka. 

 

11.  The Lusaka Eye Hospital SDA Church that we attend now has tiled floors and benches!!!  Truly a work in progress, this church has really come a long ways in terms of infrastructure.  Our knees are no longer caked with dust after a long prayer.  Our backs are no longer tired and sore from balancing on thin beams that served as benches for many moons.  Thank you to my parents, Jennifer & Edward Lee, who felt moved to sponsor all the benches at this church!

 

 

Travels and Tsetse flies

12.  April 18 – 21, 2014, marked a long weekend in Zambia.  Never have I lived in an area that celebrates Easter Monday, so we enjoyed a 4 day weekend, starting on Good Friday, to explore a bit more of Zambia.  We ventured into Kafue National Park to get away from the crazy life in Lusaka.   

 

 The lodge we stayed at was a 20-year-old dilapidated resort that a family decided renovate into a nice lodge.  We were its first clients!  A four-hour drive from Lusaka, deep into the heart of the national park, we arrived at a “pick-up point.”  We then had to cross the river to get to the lodge.   

The hosts were pleasant and accommodating, especially catering to our dietary preferences.  =)   

Happy Birthday, Carla!

The game drives were mostly duds, although one cheetah feasting on an impala and one pride of lions lounging around did make up for the lack of animals.   

 Both Paul and I got attacked by Tsetse flies once again, mostly on the back and arms, and we do have pictures with “tsetse eye” (right upper eyelid bites) to show for it. 

 

 

 

Jaycee decided to take us on a game drive

Our little girls

13.  Jaycee continues to grow and learn.  She loves to play with her friends.   

With Omega

  

With Natalia

With Inge

And with her best bud, Cino

At 19 months old, her vocabulary is blossoming, and she’s learning how to put 2 or 3 or even 4 words together.  =)  Her favorite words lately include, “Aya” (“ouch” in Korean), and talking about how the “Cheetah impala aya” or how “papa aya swing crying” when she fell while with Paul on the swing set, and the swing hit her head and she ended up crying.   

She loves to play piano!

 She continues to impress us with her intuition and apparent understanding of basically everything.  She has been awful jealous and clingy lately (does not let daddy or grandma touch mommy).  

Perhaps it’s just the natural progression of character in toddlerhood, but we wonder if it is because she knows that a little sister is baking in the oven.  =)  But overall, she's still a ray of sunshine in our lives, and we love her to pieces.

The end.

p.s.  For those of you (you know who you are) who always demand more of Jaycee photos, feel free to scroll down below.  =)