(I wanted to post this Monday but wifi was not working due to power outage)
I think week four has gone by most quickly so far. A combination of coming off night shift Monday morning, the weather being a bit dreary all week, and ending the week with a 24 hr virus (or some horrid food poisoning) made the week a bit of a blur. I'm feeling much better today and wanted to write a couple stories from the last week.
One morning last week I went to the local mall with two other volunteers on our break from the nursery and I brought a little girl from the nursery with me, we'll call her baby "F" :) She is one years old and very sweet. I carried her around with me to look in a few shops - I bought some face wash and other toiletries. The women at the check out I could tell were trying to place how the baby and I were together. Many people smiled and just looked. We then went to Mugg & Bean for some coffee and a muffin. Well, coffee for me and a juice bottle for baby "F" and we shared the blueberry muffin. She loved it and gobbled up everything I gave her. Our waitress was so nice and helped me get her settled in a high chair when we arrived. When the other volunteers I was with joined us we ordered more food and while we waited we passed baby girl around and played with her. So much fun! Baby "F" ate up all the attention happily.
On Thursday evening I was invited to dinner with another volunteer (Maria, from Poland) by a retired couple here from the Netherlands helping in various capacities for a couple years. Their names are Burt and Willy. They picked us up at 7:30pm and brought us to their home about fifteen minutes away to show us where they live and then we went to dinner in a nearby town. I got pizza and wine. It was nice to get out for the evening and also to get to know each other better.
A funny story... A toddler boy was having his nappy changed last week and suddenly poured a cup of custard powder (which we use on bum rashes here instead of baby powder) on his face, in his eyes, and in his wide open mouth! I looked over from the nappy I was changing and see his face completely covered in white powder with his eyes wide open and he started to cry...while me and the other volunteer starting laughing at the funny sight. He started coughing as the powder had gone down his throat. Poor thing. And because custard powder turns yellow when wet, around his eyes started to turn yellow like custard. ;) a quick bath was in order and he was soon fine. The other volunteer and I also were fine as we'd gotten a good laugh out of it. :)
Last Friday I became sick within a couple hours of eating dinner and began vomiting. I thought it must be food poisoning for sure. Although quickly found out the girl in the room next to mine also started vomiting and she had not eaten the dinner. So maybe a weird virus we thought. We both spent most of the night by the toilet and ended up on the couches the rest of the night. We turned on a movie at 2 am and tried to get some sleep. At 6 am we were still both not well enough to work in the nursery so stayed in bed to sleep, though knowing the nursery would surely be feeling our absence but we just could not make it in. It turns out many of the other volunteers also became sick with similar symptoms that day. By noon I made it in the nursery for most of the rest of the day though felt extremely weak and tired. Thankfully many "day volunteers" came in that day and were very helpful to get through the day. I did not eat anything all day until finally before bed had one piece of toast as I felt hungry. Then went to bed early. Slept nine hours and woke up mostly better Sunday morning. I felt my patience wearing thin though during the day. But Monday was better and I felt more myself. Thankful to be on the other side of that and hoping no one else gets it.
A few praises and prayers:
-praise we got through the weekend even with me and many other volunteers sick
-praise everyone is feeling mostly better
-praise for a returning volunteer arrived today for a couple weeks to help out
-prayer for some of the babies not feeling well to heal soon
-prayer for grace each day to love well!
