Well, it has been exactly a week since I have arrived back at Hospital Loma de Luz after my 5 week long support raising trip. I have officially survived the week. It has been an eventful one to say the least. It started with my arrival at my cozy apartment that smelled of horrible, eye watering, stomach churning, rotting chicken which took three days to clean out. Then, the power being out in the middle of the night resulted in me breaking my nose by running into the concrete corner wall in my bathroom when responding to a "Code Blue". And today I am sick in bed with some sort of stomach bug. Normally I would say that I would take a cold over the stomach bug any day but the fact that it is quite painful to blow my poor nose, this one time I am thankful that it is the stomach bug. God is indeed good!
Yesterday was having lunch with some other fellow missionaries at our founding surgeon's family's house when the topic of our conversation changed to our crazy travel stories. Believe me that we have some CRAZY stories! After telling one of my own stories, my buddy Caroline told me that I HAD to blog about it. So here it goes ...
It was it was almost exactly three years ago that I was making my fourth short trip here to Hospital Loma de Luz. The trip was just six days to interview with our founders to come full time. Travel plans were set up that would I would fly into San Pedro Sula, Honduras which is about 5 hours away from the hospital, spend the night at a hotel, and take a charter flight to a city closer to the hospital the next day. I was terrified to stay overnight in San Pedro Sula by myself. It is infamously known as the "Murder Capital of the World" for a reason. My first trips here, one of the other missionaries had always picked me up at the San Pedro Sula airport so it was my first time traveling alone.
The closer the dates for my trip came, the more nervous I got. I prayed or rather pleaded with God that I wouldn't have to stay in San Pedro Sula by myself. I was just a little thing traveling by myself and did not speak much Spanish at the time.
Well, the day came and the first leg of my trip went smoothly. I made it from Boston to Miami without any problems and then onto that dreaded flight into San Pedro Sula all the while still praying.
The flight was uneventful until a voice came over the loud speaker. "Ladies and Gentleman, this is your captain speaking. We are about 60 miles away from the San Pedro Sula airport. It has been temporarily shut down due to a thunderstorm so we are being put into a holding pattern. Please remain seated with your seat belts fastened." *Click* And so we circled for maybe an hour. I sat there anxiously watching the in-flight map as the little plane on the screen made huge circles around the airport and attempted to make small talk in Spanish with the guy sitting next to me.
"Just a little update from the flight deck. The weather equipment at the San Pedro Sula is broken and they don't know when it will be repaired." All the passengers on the plane start chattering. How long are we going to be up here?
About 20 minutes later, we hear the familiar *Click* of the loud speaker. "Soooo... we are running out of fuel so we need to land somewhere soon. We are being diverted to El Salvador." What??? That's a completely different country than we were supposed to be in! The chattering on the plane got louder as everyone started to panic. What were we all going to do?
Upon landing El Salvador, the flight attendants shuffle us all off the plane, through customs, and out onto the dark side walk of the airport. Now what??? Our entire plane load of people was standing on the sidewalk of the airport in the dark trying to figure out how to at least let our families know where we were and that we were alive.
After an hour of anxious waiting, the flight attendants informed us that we would be put up in a hotel for the night and we return to San Pedro Sula in the morning. They shuffled us all onto big coach buses while calling role off of a really long sheet of paper. Everyone was accounted for and we headed off. They took us to a gorgeous 4 star hotel, had dinner waiting for us when we got there, gave us all our own rooms with hot showers, and even put my room next to the rooms of a really nice short term missions team that had so kindly taken me under their wing.
A good night sleep later, the front desk called all of our rooms. "Time to get up!" Breakfast was waiting and we were then shuttled back to the airport and made the short 20 minute flight to San Pedro Sula. In spite of the unexpected little excursion, I still made it onto the charter flight and made it to the hospital exactly at the planned time.
God had answered my prayer! I didn't have to spend the night in San Pedro Sula by myself! And I met a whole bunch of cool new people. And got my passport stamped in El Savador. How cool is that?? God is good! It wasn't exactly how I had envisioned God working it out in my moments of pleading but WOW! Sorry to everyone who went on that crazy little jaunt with me but, hey!, it was quite the adventure!
Praise!
Thank you to all of you who responded to God's leading to begin or continue supporting me on my recent support raising trip. I couldn't be here without you!
If you feel led to support me financially, you can do so by clicking here.
Prayer requests:
Pray for our newest premature baby who is fighting for his life right now. "Baby R" needs a miracle. We have had 6 premature babies born in the last 2 months alone of which only 2 have survived. We are in desperate need of a baby ventilator and someone who can train us how to use it and care for ventilated babies.
Yesterday was having lunch with some other fellow missionaries at our founding surgeon's family's house when the topic of our conversation changed to our crazy travel stories. Believe me that we have some CRAZY stories! After telling one of my own stories, my buddy Caroline told me that I HAD to blog about it. So here it goes ...
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The closer the dates for my trip came, the more nervous I got. I prayed or rather pleaded with God that I wouldn't have to stay in San Pedro Sula by myself. I was just a little thing traveling by myself and did not speak much Spanish at the time.
Well, the day came and the first leg of my trip went smoothly. I made it from Boston to Miami without any problems and then onto that dreaded flight into San Pedro Sula all the while still praying.
The flight was uneventful until a voice came over the loud speaker. "Ladies and Gentleman, this is your captain speaking. We are about 60 miles away from the San Pedro Sula airport. It has been temporarily shut down due to a thunderstorm so we are being put into a holding pattern. Please remain seated with your seat belts fastened." *Click* And so we circled for maybe an hour. I sat there anxiously watching the in-flight map as the little plane on the screen made huge circles around the airport and attempted to make small talk in Spanish with the guy sitting next to me.
"Just a little update from the flight deck. The weather equipment at the San Pedro Sula is broken and they don't know when it will be repaired." All the passengers on the plane start chattering. How long are we going to be up here?
About 20 minutes later, we hear the familiar *Click* of the loud speaker. "Soooo... we are running out of fuel so we need to land somewhere soon. We are being diverted to El Salvador." What??? That's a completely different country than we were supposed to be in! The chattering on the plane got louder as everyone started to panic. What were we all going to do?
Upon landing El Salvador, the flight attendants shuffle us all off the plane, through customs, and out onto the dark side walk of the airport. Now what??? Our entire plane load of people was standing on the sidewalk of the airport in the dark trying to figure out how to at least let our families know where we were and that we were alive.
After an hour of anxious waiting, the flight attendants informed us that we would be put up in a hotel for the night and we return to San Pedro Sula in the morning. They shuffled us all onto big coach buses while calling role off of a really long sheet of paper. Everyone was accounted for and we headed off. They took us to a gorgeous 4 star hotel, had dinner waiting for us when we got there, gave us all our own rooms with hot showers, and even put my room next to the rooms of a really nice short term missions team that had so kindly taken me under their wing.
A good night sleep later, the front desk called all of our rooms. "Time to get up!" Breakfast was waiting and we were then shuttled back to the airport and made the short 20 minute flight to San Pedro Sula. In spite of the unexpected little excursion, I still made it onto the charter flight and made it to the hospital exactly at the planned time.
God had answered my prayer! I didn't have to spend the night in San Pedro Sula by myself! And I met a whole bunch of cool new people. And got my passport stamped in El Savador. How cool is that?? God is good! It wasn't exactly how I had envisioned God working it out in my moments of pleading but WOW! Sorry to everyone who went on that crazy little jaunt with me but, hey!, it was quite the adventure!
Praise!
Thank you to all of you who responded to God's leading to begin or continue supporting me on my recent support raising trip. I couldn't be here without you! If you feel led to support me financially, you can do so by clicking here.
Prayer requests:
Pray for our newest premature baby who is fighting for his life right now. "Baby R" needs a miracle. We have had 6 premature babies born in the last 2 months alone of which only 2 have survived. We are in desperate need of a baby ventilator and someone who can train us how to use it and care for ventilated babies.
I am new to following your blog and I found your post both humbling and encouraging at the same time. The next time I start feeling stressed this week I'll remind myself how blessed I am to have electricity and no broken nose. My best friend, Brooke, was a missionary nurse in Africa for a while and your experiences remind me a little of her stories. I've shared your blog with her as I know she'll love reading it too. I'll be praying for you. Keep up the amazing work! Your Sister in Christ, Ashley
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