I am writing this as the
electricity and water is off today from 8-6.
I finally stopped guarding the kids from opening up the fridge so things
did not spoil. The kids were hot and
resting under the shade. And the
computer was surprisingly charged so I thought this could be a good time to
blog – if I remember to post this when the electricity does come on J
Even
though we have had this month as a break from classes, the time has been used
to redo all our inspections (fire, health), work on immigration for ourselves
and students, insurance renewals, recruitment, and lots of meetings, And meetings (meaning 1 at a time) here
usually can last for a whole day, because the waiting takes a whole day until
you get inJ It never feels like you accomplish much, but
we are learning if we can get one things done each day- it was a successful day
on the business side of things!
This
weeks business things were…interesting.
One of the things was we had a meeting with the pediatric surgeon on the
Island. People often think health care
will be so amazing here with so much tourism.
But we have heard several scary cases.
Our current student had a sister go in for routine surgery to remove a
cyst this year and they operated on the wrong side – TWICE! So, we have thanked God we have not had to go
to the hospital.
That
changed when Naiyah fell and broke her arm.
So, we prayed. And since we don’t
have official papers here nor insurance still because of that, medical care is
through the roof. So just the xrays, reset,
iv, and doctors visit were over $2,500.
It would have been cheaper to hop on a plane to a doctor we know and
love in the States. But, we decided to
firmly plant our feet and stay here and trust God and the doctor here.
After
an hour wait for him to arrive, we realized all 5 patients in the waiting room
were given the 9am time slot, so that meant more waiting. After we were finally
called back, he immediately started telling us her break would likely need
surgery, would require Naiyah being put to sleep, getting a shot, cutting- she
was a mess and scared. I guess we
weren’t used to the directness with kids there. Then, he sound out we homeschool and were
missionaries and proceeded to interrogate the kids on what part of the
restoration movement we were from - to
our 5 year old! Pax, of course, had no
clue so then he pointed out homeschool was not working for them. Somehow we made it through the $175
appointment to be told to come back in a week after the swelling had gone down.
Later
in the week it was time to renew our driving licenses. Yes, we waited until the day before they
expired. The main office was close,
leaving open one office for the whole island.
We arrived, waited in line, only to find out a lady in front of us had
already been waiting 3 hours! We decided
to come back the next day- the day we had to get it done! And we would be genius and arrive 30 minutes
before the office open to get there first.
By the time, we arrived the line went way into the road! We are standing there with all 4 kids in the
sun for a half hour, when a security officer comes out and says we can’t have
the baby in the hot sun (yes, by 8am already hot here!). So he takes us to the front of the line and
has us go first. And that is when the
mob started. So many shouting, “Unfair
Americans. Pay taxes and then you can go
first. Of course, the Americans are
treated better. We have been waiting for
over 3 hours, etc.”
It
was horrible. We said we’ll just wait
like all the others. Because it was not
fair. And the officer said no, you have
kids. So we finished our business, tried
to apologize to the line on the wait and kept our heads down because we got
through in an hour.
All
this to say – this summer when back we heard so much on black lives matter, saw
firsthand foster care kids uncared for, and so many other situations. It made
us think we all are in situations. In
our situations we can sometimes feel like a minority for homeschooling, for
being American, for being a Christian, for having several kids. All of us are in different situations and
each and every life counts! Our family
goal we are striving for to learn and show is we don’t know everyone’s story
but we know they are each significant and to help love them to see that – no matter
our circumstance or story!
