On the left hand side of me is Jemima.  And yes, I did make fun of her by calling her Aunt Jemima which is a popular syrup and buttermilk pancake product in the United States(which as I remember, was also delicious).  Nope, I am not going to apologize…I explained it to her and she thought it was funny and EVEN she had heard of it.  BUT you want to know something more interesting than funny about her name?  Her mother named her after a woman in the Bible.  Yes.  Its true.  Remember Job?

Job 42:14 (King James Version)

14And he called the name of the first, Jemima; and the name of the second, Kezia; and the name of the third, Kerenhappuch.

Now if you are truthful you will admit it never occurred to you or remember it, or you would have questioned whether it was the true by running to find it in your Bible.  But there it is…plain as day.

Jemima was another one of those people who always looked serious but would ‘break out’ in a big grin when you talked to her (or threw water on her, after the scream of course).  Jemima worked in the dining room but would come up to the galley to get food to eat or help us with something we were doing (because we were always short a hand or two, but you probably realize this by now from my posts).  We would enjoy sitting around and talking while we ate in the galley (instead of in the dining room) because that’s where they wanted to be, plus its where the ward food was made which was/is true Liberian food.

Jemima is a hard worker…nobody in dining room or galley would ever question that, but she is a great friend as well.

Korpo came to the dining room to help out because the work load was too much for the current volunteers we had on staff.  I may be wrong but I believe she was already working on board but was ’shifted’ over to the dining room from another department.  She too would come up to the galley like Jemima did, but I think it took her a little while to get used to me.  Because just like Jemima, she thought I was a little strange and crazy.  And to her/their credit, I am.

I did not know her as well as the others but I enjoyed her friendship as well.  She was surprisingly a little more aggressive in talking to me and giving me a ‘hard time’ in return when I aggravated her on purpose.

I hope they all are doing well, I wish I knew.

Kind of quiet, HARD WORKER, and loved to wear all the odd head and apron gear he could find in our galley cabinet!

John (sorry Foday) was the real dish machine!  He would just let them pile up till they were worth doing (a few at a time while they trickle in is wasting time) and in the mean time he would help the ward cook, the cooking team, and/or the salad team prep their food for the meals.

You know that one person at school, church, or work who is always the one you add to every team that works great with others?  John was/is that all around good worker.  No complaints.  I tormented John a little bit, but torment is probably a strong word.  He had this bad habit of leaving a lot of water in big metal bowls after he washed them, and since we stack our bowls on a rack right side up, the water would stay in them instead of draining out. (which by the way is the WRONG way in the food service world, but you have to go with what works in situations like these…)

I used to ask the dishwashers repeatedly ever week to drain this water out, but they could never remember…so I started tossing the water on them if they were close to me when I retrieved a bowl to use and it had water in it!  That surprised John a little bit and he started to remember to drain or dry them better. 

Don’t try to start in on me for being mean, its WATER!  And they loved it, it was fun…and it created more jokes and laughter.  Later I would just surprise anybody close to me by throwing the water on them, and then say, ‘Don’t forget to remind your friend John to empty the remaining water from the bowls before stacking them up…’ then they would start aggravating John about the water left on the dishes…worked quite well.

The rumor is that John may show up in Benin to work in the kitchen/galley for the next outreach.  That will be good for Peter if both John and Oretha can make it back!

Foday needs an exclamation mark at the end of his name.  Believe it or not, (and it was hard for us to believe) Foday is about 50 years old with 9 kids!  The last baby he had was born in 2008 and he named it Peter (after my boss, the Chief Steward) because Foday said he wanted his child to grow up big and healthy like Peter! (I think it was meant as a compliment, but Peter looked a little skeptical)

Foday is one of two dishwasher, they (Foday and John) rotate on their assigned cooking team…so they don’t work together.

We have talked about Ophelia in a previous post where I described her and Foday having those heated arguments in the kitchen.  Foday can/will drive you crazy and have you laughing hard at the same time…and sometimes separately.  BUT…

Somewhere along the line Foday has blurred the reality between dreams, his imagination, and being conscious - but of course living through a civil war, in poverty, and having 9 kids to feed may do that to you…and I mean that seriously as well as humorously.  Foday tells us great stories of killing 50 foot eagles and knowing the ‘Bong Mine’ Troll (search bong mine for other posts on Bong Mine).  And he is adamant about them being true and correct, which of course makes for some interesting conversation and questions from new crew/staff/volunteers to the galley.  Of which we, the people who are long term, get some very great entertainment out of it!  And of course Ophelia does her best to get him ‘riled up’.

The downside to this is that Foday has a hard time concentrating on getting work done, or paying attention to instructions.  When this happens I aggravate him by comparing him to John, the other dishwasher.  This usually does the trick, but then starts him on a new tirade of undecipherable English.

I could share more, but it probably wouldn’t be appropriate in a public post…got to leave him some dignity, right?

It has been a long time since I have posted anything. Sorry for my silence. My silence was not due to lack of blogging material but a time of personal reflection. This year has been so many things to me and I want to soak them all in. I want to be a better  woman because this year. I have learned lessons from the Lord, lessons from crew members, lessons from girls at the orphanage and lessons from my patients. The Lord has drawn me closer to him by teaching me that I am not alone, He is all I need, to cast my cares upon the Lord, and so many more things. I think about the impact that these lessons have had on me and will continue to have and I am so grateful.

There have been many crew members that that have been true friends  to me and then there were those few that challanged me to grow. I am so thankful for the hugs and encouragement during my ugly cries and moments of “what am  doing here?” I am amazed of the Lord’s provision of friends that have just learned these lessons and are  willing to walk with me on my journey. When I came to the ship the last time I was single and friendships were all I had but this time Tyrone and I came as a team and he is the best teammate ever. He helped me keep everything in perspective, he listened to me talk about my patients and  listented to me as I verbally processed this crazy year on a hopital ship in Africa!

I have always loved to laugh, you know that deep belly laugh that makes your eyes water and your shoulders to shake. I have learned from my girls at Mama Victoria’s orphanage that even in grim circumstance you can still laugh till your side hurts. Those nine girls know how to laugh and have fun. They are incredible women of the Lord and I miss them  so much, already.

The faces that occupied the beds were my patients but so much more than that. They were individually unique. Some drove me crazy and others became good friends. They all had a story.  Most of them include living  in a country that went through a 14 year civil war. All include tragedy and now they contain a new hope of being accepted back into their village after being out casted due to their illness. Being at their bedsides made me laugh, cry, shake my head, raise my eyebrows (the Liberian way of saying yes), sing my heart out, and hope for a better future for Liberia.

Thank you  for sharing this year with me.

Evelyne is pictured to the left in this picture.

Oretha (look at picture in previous Liberian Friends post) found and trained this replacement so she (Oretha) could leave to attend a discipleship training school in order to come back to the ship as a permanent staff/crew person instead of a day worker. [more about Oretha in another post]

Evelyne was a good worker, quiet, and was only with us for the last 2 months.  I think she was really starting to get comfortable and enjoy being in the galley (kitchen) when it was time to say goodbye.  Evelyne thought I was a little strange, but she was already warned by the others so she did good.

Ophelia is pictured in the middle.  She is short, feisty, and fun.

When she is cooking in the kitchen she has three favorite sayings:  Delicious!  Fantastic! and Mama G!

All three words/phrases are said loudly with a high pitch sound followed out with each syllable pronounced with a kind of singing cadence…yeah, I know, its hard to translate into text in a post!

‘Mama G’ is supposed to be a sign for something that tastes delicious.  As I understand it Mama G is an older West African woman who cooks extremely good food.  That may not be exactly right, but supposedly she is at least known to be someone in at least one Nigerian movie where she cooks good food.  ANYWAYS, it makes for a fantastic new way of saying something tastes great when Ophelia says, ‘this food is Mama G!’.  And Ophelia wanted to taste everything I/we cooked.

Ophelia is a live wire that also loves to argue ferociously with fellow day worker Foday about ’supposed’ Liberian politics…it makes for an interesting time for the rest of us.  But then I have to break the fun up and get them to quite down and do some work.  To somebody outside this cooking team they would think a big fight was about to break out in the kitchen!  The rest of us just know its fun and games.

I noticed right away that some of the West African women on board would have hair extensions or weave applied to the their head/hair at different time or intervals.  So I started giving Ophelia & Jemima a hard time about how their hair fluctuated from being so short to extremely long and styled.

They thought it was hilarious that I would ask them, ’so how long is your hair on vacation this time?’  Sometimes I would give them a hard time by saying, ‘those poor bald headed horses running all over Liberia’ and then I would roll my eyes at them. [I have no actual proof of this, I had just heard a couple of times before that hair extensions were made out of horses mane sometimes]

I know, I know, that’s probably inappropriate…but they loved having fun, telling stories and jokes, and giving each other a hard time while also working hard.

Even Stephanie would come to the galley/kitchen to visit so she could see what the latest ‘drama’ was and see what the day workers were up to (and to ask them how I was treating them)!

Being here on the ship I can’t say that I miss the big ‘hub-bub’ and commercialism of the ‘Happy Holidays’ in the United States.

Its Merry Christmas!  Remember that, M-e-r-r-y C-h-r-i-s-t-m-a-s (spell it out, I know you can do it!).

But what I do miss is friends, family, and eating ‘Happy Birthday Jesus Cake!’ with my niece and nephews.

My niece and nephews are full aware that friends and family are the gift givers of Christmas day and unless I am mistaken it was my niece who years ago asked ‘If its Jesus birthday why doesn’t he get a cake like everyone else?’  (that may not be exactly how it happened, but with a 6 hour time difference I AM NOT calling my sister to ask her!)  And so started the ‘Happy Birthday Jesus Cake’ tradition.

To my niece and nephews Santa Claus is just another funny looking man that comes out every Christmas to excite the kids and hang out at the malls for pictures to be taken and gift requests to be received while sitting on his knee.  They can’t be bothered with that…They want to know when Meme and Papa are coming to the house, or when is Oma coming? (German word for Grandma).  When can we open the presents or eat the cake?

Sometimes (maybe now in the past) Katy & Noah would play Mary & Joseph and not just for Christmas!  I can’t remember if they used VJ for baby Jesus or not, but it makes sense (if my sister would let them) to use him for the ‘baby’ since he was!

Maybe I can give VJ a haircut for a Christmas present when I get back to the United States? (inside joke, I cut his hair a little short one time with the electric clippers - when he was still ‘toddler’ size made him look like a bald headed baby again!)~

*I apologize for not posting the follow-up (day worker)  stories to the last post yet, but they are coming…as you can imagine I am busy with special meals and plans here on the ship for Christmas.