I hope Teanu doesn't mind me sharing his e-mails. Reading his news makes me to ask forgiveness for all the murmuring I do each day. And the first question is "how can we, mankind, let this happen?". Our sense of entitlement and our desires for more become sins. What is better for the soul? to live in abundance with our heart buried under a pile of things to do/ to have/ to learn? or to have a difficult life with a raw heart exposed to suffering? I guess the heart and the spirit have to expand and yearn to reach our Father in both situations. May I learn to give.


today i went running again and found a nice area of beach just 2 blocks from the hospital close to the road i run on. i think from now on i will run a few miles, go to the beach and rest, then run a few more miles. it will hopefully give me a little break from the routine schedule of chaos here in the hospital. it is actually very nice at sunset. too bad we can't be here together. some day. hopefully in tahiti/hawaii?

still very busy here, the pediatricians are starting to get lazy and only round in the morning. leaving me by myself in the afternoon. i have the adults by myself, but when they leave i have no idea how i will be able to do both adults and sick children at the same time. there are 2 rooms with at least 5 children each. and they are complicated. the intern here is going to have to step up and start actually working instead of disappearing all day. more of the same types of patients, by the time they get to us they are extremely advanced in their illness.

a 5 month old boy came in with his mother running through the door, body limp, severely dehydrated, in shock. his mother said he had been vomiting and diarrhea for 3 days, she was feeding him corn meal, no breast milk/formula, and he only had one vaccine so far. he reminded me of leo. i hope he is still alive tomorrow morning.

another young lady, was recently pregnant, she went to a roadside clinic for an abortion, then developed severe muscle spasms/rigidity of her entire body. she has tetanus. a disease we only read about in textbooks. probably from dirty instruments used for the abortion. she probably never got a tetanus vaccine.

tomorrow is supposedly a huge dinner banquet for a fundraiser for the hospital that is taking place at the city hall here at monrovia. apparently it is a gaza meaning very formal dressing and president sirleaf will be there. one of the doctors is president sirleafs son, he works with us at bridgeport hospital. so he will probably be upset if i don't go. but i really don't want to go. it sounds very formal and not interesting. plus i have my pants and white shirt but no belt and no church shoes. i didnt anticipate this. maybe i can find a way to get out of this.

(his wife replied: Oh, just find a way to go to the gaza, will you? What is the worse that can happen if you don't have a belt and nice shoes? It's Africa. Show some spirit of adventure. It will a great story to tell the boys when you're old. Go.)

well, off to bed.

i just heard japan had a huge earthquake and tsunami, hundreds/thousands killed. pretty sad.

je t'aime

Teanu