Anchored: We have arrived!!

We have finally arrived at the Mercy Ship!! I cannot even begin to explain to you the excitement we experienced on the bus as we pulled into port on Monday evening. The bus ride from Tana to Toamasina was a long 10 hour, windy ride through the absolutely breath taking country side of Madagascar. It was a great time to sit back and reflect on the work we have decided to lay down our comfortable lives to do. The stories of the rest of the volunteers are inspiring. People have quit jobs, left incredible homes or apartments, left their families and friends for some time periods as long as 2 years. All to serve the people of Madagascar. It is an amazing environment to be welcomed into. Four hundred people both medical and not have come together with a single purpose. To help serve the forgotten poor in the world. To heal not only their bodies, but their souls. There may be communication barriers at times, but radical life change and love for these people is felt. That is for sure.

It has been a VERY long week of lectures, orientation, training and living in community. So I’m sorry for already being so terrible in writing blog posts. Things are finally settling down so I should be able to write more posts as the weeks go on. For the majority of the week it has been a lot of information overload. Lectures on the different surgeries we perform, scrubbing the hospital down from floor to ceiling (not an exaggeration, every inch of it), safety procedures, how to live on a ship with 400 people, how to order 25 cent coffee at the Starbucks café (yes, that’s right I said 25 cents… thanks Starbucks), how to find your way around the ship, how to do your laundry, where to eat in Toamasina, where all the incredible beaches are, taking entire hospital group photos with the ship, trying to get all the times of the community meetings down and learning how to take a shower in under 2 minutes…

Ice cream social at midships

All in all, life has been incredible. The moment I boarded the ship my heart felt at home. It is an amazing feeling to know that you are exactly where God is calling you. I feel like a sponge, soaking up every inch of the ship and every medical procedure we perform. I want to know all of it. Every morning so far has felt like Christmas morning. And today, we get our first patients and tomorrow surgeries start.

When I have more time I will write a post giving you a tour of the ship as well as posts on the specific procedures we perform on the ship!

I am excited to announce that for the time being I am working on the plastics/ortho ward. Plastics surgeries will be our first round of patients and these will include surgeries to treat burns, perform contractures releases using split thickness and full thickness skin grafts, treat syndactyly/polydactyly, remove lipomas and benign tumors, and debulk neurofibromas. I am incredibly blessed to get to expand my nursing skills and knowledge. My nerves definitely are getting the best of me at times, considering this falls nowhere in my area of nursing expertise, but I am excited to learn from both the seasoned nurses in these areas but also the incredible patients here.

We have been lucky enough in our minimal downtime this week to explore some areas of Toamasina including some restaurants, ice cream parlors and beaches. So I’ll leave you with some pictures of this week!