Trip to the Hospital #2

On Sunday, the teachers and the week of prayer speaker (Dr. Eustacio Penniecook) took a trip to Nge Nge, an island down the causeway. We went to the dock and hopped in a boat (the same one that I was on for the horrific return from Carlos). It was a beautiful boat ride with sunshine and wind and waves. When we got to the island, we started unloading the boat and taking our stuff to the shore. I was the last person in the boat besides the driver and I was handing things to the people to take to the shore. I was wearing my water shoes because it is hard to walk in flip-flops under water. When I got out of the boat, I took my stuff and started heading for the shore. All of the sudden something hit the side of my big toe on my right foot. It hurt immediately, so I started limping back to shore.
Once I got on the beach I found a place to sit, tossed my stuff and then started crying. I writhed on the ground, as the pain was unbearable. The closest description of the pain is that it felt like my toe was going to explode. The other teachers gathered around me to see if I was ok. They told me I looked terrible (in a nice way) and needed to lie down (I was told later that I was so pale it was scary). I lay there as Ryan held up my foot. I cried and cried as the other teachers tried to comfort me with what my mom jokingly says, “Amputation is always an option” (I was considering…). Lorraine offered her hand for me to squeeze, but I only held onto it because I didn’t want to hurt her and I felt too tired to squeeze. The boat went back to get the second group of teachers to bring them to the island. I would have gone back on that trip, but they were worried I would pass out on the boat since I was still so pale.
When the boat returned with the other teachers, Alan and Ryan carried me out to the boat. Alan asked me if I knew any good jokes and I told him I knew a joke about this girl who hit her foot on something and it really hurt (it wasn’t really a funny joke, but yeah). Ryan and Dr. Penniecook rode back on the boat with me. I sat in one of the chairs on the boat and propped my foot up on a backpack. It was still incredibly painful, but I tried to focus on the wind in my face and repeating part of the chorus of “I’ll Fly Away” (“when I die, Hallelujah by and by, I’ll fly away”…).
When the boat got back to Ebeye, Ryan and the Dr. helped me get up the stairs at the dock. I was trying to hop on one foot so I wouldn’t use my injured foot. They got a taxi and I rode to the hospital. I hopped into the ER where they put me on a bed (the one Megan was on last time). Mama Rose came to see me, saying that the pastor (her husband) told her Ryan was in the hospital. She asked why and he said that I was hurt. I was glad to have her there because it’s always better when “mom” comes. Anyway, the nurses and doctor decided to give me an anesthetic in my arm, saying that it would make me sleepy. It did make me sleepy, but I wondered the point when my foot didn’t feel any better and I couldn’t sleep because my foot was still too painful. I spent a little while in the hospital after the anesthetic because I felt too dizzy to walk anywhere. When I started feeling less dizzy, Mama Rose took me outside to get a taxi back to the apartments (all too familiar from the last trip to the hospital).
That night Dr. Penniecook took us to Litaki’s Restaurant, which is at the other end of the island. I decided to hobble my way there instead of taking a taxi for 75 cents. My foot looked alright when I left the apartment, and it definitely didn’t feel as bad as it did when I was on the other island. When I got to the restaurant, someone looked at my foot and said, “Your foot is huge!” I looked down and sure enough, it was very swollen. I tried propping my foot up on the bench across from me.

(My foot Sunday night.)

Since then, my foot has been gradually getting better. Monday was the Freshman-Junior class picnic, so I didn’t have to stand up and teach which was good. Tuesday we didn’t have class because of parent-teacher conferences in the afternoon. Wednesday I had classes and my foot was still kind of swollen, so I hobbled around the classroom. Students asked me about my foot and so I started on an incredible tale on how I had an encounter with a shark and I narrowly escaped. They didn’t believe me, but we had a good laugh. Currently, my foot looks mostly normal but it is still pretty stiff and somewhat hurts. I am hoping that this will go away so I can have full function of my foot. I am glad that I didn’t have to amputate my toe. : )

Hungry and Thirsty

Several of us have been concerned about the elementary students getting enough to eat. Many of them come to school without eating breakfast and we sometimes wonder if they are getting lunch either. The school already has a little store where they sell soup, cookies (more like cookie shaped bread with four chocolate chips on top since they are expensive), frozen ice things, and sometimes candy. The problem is that some kids cannot afford to pay 25 cents for a cup of soup. Ashlee and Lorraine were talking about getting some kind of food program for the 2nd and 3rd grades so that they could get some kind of food. We were discussing this and thought that the students would behave better if they had something in their stomachs. One student, in particular, comes to mind. He behaves poorly (in attitude and class work) at school, which is a reflection of the neglect (I was told) he gets at home. I know that we would not fix the world if we fed the kids a cup of soup per day, but I think they would feel a lot better and might be more willing to learn. The problem is money. The soup is made with rice, coconut milk, salt, seasoning, and chicken (most people are not vegetarian here), which can really add up when things on Ebeye cost sometimes 2x what they would in the U.S. We are still looking into how much it would cost to do a program like this, but we did tell Mama Rose the suggestion. She seemed to think it was a good idea.

I was thinking about my Bible classes the other day and wondering what I could do with them to help them learn. I have brought up Bibles from the library and dispersed them to the students to use during class time. One question from a junior struck me: “Miss, are these for us to take home?” I told the student that the Bible was from the library and that it needed to stay at school. The question got me thinking, though. Do these students have their own Bibles? I don’t know why it hadn’t occurred to me until recently. It seems like it should have come to me earlier. I think that all of the high school students should have their own Bibles. I know the school would like to give them Bibles, but money (again) becomes a factor. Even getting them Marshallese Bibles would be expensive. I would especially like to give Bibles to my juniors (I’m their sponsor). None of them are Adventists, but I think that giving them their own Bible could help them grow as Christians. I would love to do Bible studies with them in class and have them underline favorite verses in their own Bible. I believe that the students of our school are thirsty for the Word of God. If you know of anyone who would be willing to send Bibles to the school on Ebeye, please let me know! I would love to give out Bibles! :)
My address:
Emily Lorenz
Ebeye SDA School
P.O. Box 5070
Ebeye, MH 96970

Review week for 1st Quarter exams

This week was review week for the 1st quarter exams. I had a test for my music class on Monday, and then the rest of the week was review for my classes. As I was reviewing with the Algebra classes this week, I came to the realization (though I had noticed before) that most of them are still counting on their fingers. How can they be freshman and juniors and still be counting on their fingers? I don’t really know, but I think that is one reason why the freshman were having such a hard time with positive and negative numbers, even though I taught them how to use a number line.
I came up with a suggestion this past weekend about getting the high school students to help the elementary students with their reading. We have quite a few struggling students in all grades in the area of reading comprehension. I was thinking that getting the high school students involved with the younger students would help both groups with their reading skills and also bring the school together. Some of the seniors already tutored struggling students, but now other high school students are helping. This week the elementary classes were divided up into reading levels so that they could have tutors come from the high school for help. Each grade has their own reading class in the morning and in the afternoon they have the divided reading classes. I hope that this program will help our struggling students to improve their English and reading abilities.
Wednesday night we had our regular prayer meeting at the school. Afterwards we had a Yokwe party for people leaving Ebeye. There was a potluck and people talked about those that were leaving. A Filipino family and our school’s accountant are leaving in the next couple weeks for the Philippines. Our accountant is going to finish her training to be a CPA. As part of the Yokwe party, Mr. Batlock played the guitar and sang a Marshallese song while all of us walked around the room in a circle. I must say it was kind of weird to be walking in circles and not knowing the song they were singing. After the song finished, we each placed a dollar in the bowl in front of the people leaving. It is a farewell offering to them.
The Pastor was supposed to fly to the Philippines on Thursday to attend the meetings for the Southern Asia Pacific Division and Guam Micronesian Mission, but Continental had mechanical problems and delayed his flight 24 hours. On Friday, he went back to the airport on Kwajalein to get his flight. They rerouted him to Honolulu (about a 6 hour flight) to take a direct flight to Guam (about a 12 hour flight), and then on to the Philippines. I cannot imagine spending that much time on a plane!
After school and chapel on Friday, I went back to the apartment to finish making quarter exams. Some of Megan’s 7th grade students came and invited us to a birthday party. We followed the students as they led us to the house. As we walked past the school the students were saying something about girls from the public school fighting behind the store across the street (right by the ocean). They left Megan and I to go watch the fighting, so we waited a few minutes for them. When we got to the house the birthday boy told us to sit down at the picnic table. Agnes, a teacher’s aid at the school, gave Megan and me bottles of water. They served homemade pizza (it was amazing and greasy), ice cream, cake from Kwajalein (expensive cake), and Barbeque Lay’s chips. After we finished eating they brought out a piñata and a little boy was hitting it, which was really cute to watch. When they finally broke it open, candy and toothbrushes (yes, toothbrushes) spilled out onto the ground and the kids were scrambling to pick them up. It was interesting to be somewhat of an observer at the birthday party (and the tallest one there). Megan pointed out some of the students who didn’t eat their food but covered it to take home, saying that they most likely ate very little at home. It was interesting to see the contrast between the well-off family and the kids that were at the party. The great part is that those who have more money are usually willing to share what they have. I think that is something we could all do well to practice.

Hospital Visit

It all started Monday morning. I wasn’t feeling very hungry so I just ate a little Wheat Chex cereal. I had some leftover, so I took it for lunch with my PB&J sandwich. At staff worship I was feeling kind of blah, but it didn’t seem too odd. As my morning classes went on, though, I felt worse and worse. I finally made it to lunch and went home so that I could try to take a nap. After being unsuccessful, I went back to the school. I still had about 40 minutes left because I have a free period after lunch. I just sat in the teachers’ workroom and stared at the wall. I ate the rest of my cereal, even though I wasn’t hungry at all. I went to my last two afternoon classes and felt really exhausted. I did some teaching in Algebra 1 and I was trying to walk around the classroom to help students, but I was getting so tired. For music class I was going to play some examples on the electric keyboard, but the plug-ins weren’t working and when I finally tried one that worked, I was too frustrated to play anymore and so I had the students copy the information on the board. After the class was over I went down to the library to talk to Mama Rose about not feeling well. She told me to just go home and sleep. I got my things and went home, took a shower, and tried to sleep. I kept tossing and turning but I think I fell asleep. Around 5 pm Megan made supper for the other girls. They offered me some, but I still did not feel like eating. I tried to keep sleeping and drinking some water. I was feeling very warm in my bed and the thought finally occurred to me (after seeing Megan bundled up in jacket and pants from cold sweats) that I might have had a fever all day. The girls turned off the AC so Megan wouldn’t be cold, but I was burning up. I took some ibuprofen and that seemed to help break the fever, but I still felt really warm. I got up for a while and sat in the “living/dining room”. I was mostly staring at the cabinet island in the middle of the room. I finally went back to bed.
Around midnight, the vomiting began. Midnight, 1 AM, and close to 6 AM I got up to go to the bathroom. I had pretty much nothing in my stomach except for activated charcoal (disgusting coming up…). They had told Megan and I that if we didn’t feel good in the morning, they would find someone to take over our classes. Obviously, we weren’t going to school. Mama Rose came to our apartment and told us that she was taking us to the hospital. We weren’t too excited, but we packed up some things and got ready to go. Megan went out to the taxi first, but I started to feel like vomiting again. Fortunately, that was the last time I vomited. When we got to the hospital around 9 AM, Mama Rose took us to the ER where they put us on beds and started IV drips and took blood samples (Yay for letting IRR majors at Union practice their sticks on me!). Then they asked for a stool sample. First of all, Megan and I both had diarrhea (which is disgusting…). Second of all, the bathroom was disgusting. It looked like someone had taken a stool sample and wiped their fingers on the wall, and someone else had spurted blood on the wall (yeah, pretty gross). Anyways, they took our “stool” to get tested for things and we stayed in bed. Mama Rose stayed with us for a while and then Ryan came. While he was there we got some Gatorade, which was nice. Lunch came when he was there too. I took one look at the food and wanted to vomit, so I told Ryan he should eat it. After a while a nurse came and told me that if I didn’t eat something, I couldn’t go home. I understood, but I was not about to eat something that made me feel sick to look at (it might not have looked bad ordinarily, but I wasn’t hungry in the first place). When Ryan left, Lisa (the school secretary) came. After six hours of observations, they decided to admit us, so at 3 PM they took us in wheel chairs to a different room, which we shared with three Marshallese women. I took the bed by the wall and Megan took the bed next to me. They set up our IV stands and we were set to go. They told us they needed urine samples, so we got those (much better bathroom). The Marshallese women laughed at me because my IV stand wouldn’t roll very well so I had to carry it. I had to laugh too, because I thought it was pretty funny. Laying in my bed I looked at the walls and ceiling and saw many cockroach nymphs crawling. I was afraid of sleeping at the hospital. At supper, I ate corn and two scoops of rice and that was it. Megan and I tried to sleep, but the nurses kept coming and asking us when the last time was that we had a bowel movement or urinated (Nurses: just let your patients sleep!!! They’d get better faster…). Just when I was actually sleeping on my very springy and poking mattress, they would come back. Now, if my mom was the nurse, I probably wouldn’t be so annoyed, but some of the Filipino (most of the workers at the hospital are Filipino because they are educated) nurses weren’t as nice.
As with Tuesday, we had rotations of people to watch us on Wednesday. By far the best person on the rotation was Mama Rose because she is like a mom, which is really nice. We spent our day getting IV drips and going to the bathroom. They refilled my IV and then Megan’s ran out and she got her IV out. I was sad that they refilled mine, but Megan got her IV out. Mama Rose said that when she was in the hospital for having her kids that she had turned up her IV when the nurses weren’t in the room. I turned up my IV a little, and it made me happy when I finally got my “ball and chain” disconnected (although when Megan had her IV taken off, I got her stand which actually rolled). They let us go home around 3:30 PM with some meds, and we were very glad to leave. It was raining when the taxi pulled up to the house so we tried to hurry.
We still didn’t feel very well on Thursday, so we stayed home. I felt light-headed/headache most of the day so it was good I didn’t try to teach. By the end of Thursday Megan and I were feeling well enough to try going to school on Friday. We were feeling alright for the first bit, but then we were feeling nauseous and light-headed. We both went home at lunch time and took naps. A bit later we decided to make chocolate chip cookies to eat with our pills so we wouldn’t feel so nauseous taking them. They were yummy. We felt a little better after having naps, so we went to vespers.
Currently, I still do not feel hungry. I haven’t felt hungry since Sunday. I am hoping that when I finish the medicine I will start to feel hungry again when I need to eat. I have just been eating because I need to.


---I want to say a HUGE thank you to all of you who were praying for me and thinking of me. God definitely answers prayers!---

Weekend Trip

Since Friday was a holiday, the staff were going to Carlos Island (30 minutes boat ride from Ebeye) for a retreat. On Friday morning, Mama Rose came to tell us that there wouldn’t be a boat going in the afternoon, so I quickly took a shower and started tossing things in my bright blue bag (towel, clothes, flashlights, bedding) and my backpack. We went to the dock and loaded the boat and set off for Carlos Island. When we arrived at the dock, we unloaded the boats and started bringing our things inland (it was an inhabited island with radar globes for the Army). After looking at the stuff, I concluded that my bright blue bag was not there. I was pretty frustrated because it was at the dock, but it didn’t make it to Carlos. I was wearing my swimsuit to the island, so I did not have any clothes. At night, Mama Rose let me wear one of her muumuus (moo-moo, which is a dress) so that I could have something to wear. Fortunately, I had underwear in my backpack and enough jackets and things to wad up into a pillow to sleep in the tent.
On Sabbath, I took a lot of walks on the beach and collected shells. I took pictures of the island and hung out with the other staff. Sabbath afternoon a boat came with my bright blue bag. I was so glad to have it! I had been praying about it. Somehow it was left at the dock so the taxi driver took it back to the apartment. Sabbath afternoon I went swimming with Lorraine and then we went walking to the end of the island with Emily F. and John Mark. We saw a white sandy beach and figured out a way to get through the jungle to get to it. It was gorgeous! When we finally got back from our shell-finding adventure, it was time for worship. We all shared our favorite Bible verses and sang a few songs. After that, someone said there was a boat going home (it was starting to get dark) with Megan, Landen, and the auditor. I made a split-second decision to go and I grabbed my things and headed to the dock. We could see a storm coming, so we tried to hurry. The boat was going pretty fast since there wasn’t much equipment or people on the boat. It was getting pretty dark as we went along and it started raining. I still had my towel around my neck, so I spread it among Megan, Landen and I so that we could shield our faces from the pelting of the rain. The towel was quickly soaked, as were our things. We were riding for quite a while when the boat slowed to a stop. We looked up and saw an island with only a couple lights on it, which was obviously not Ebeye. The boat driver asked if anyone had a flashlight (hinting that we were lost). I had my flashlight in my bright blue bag so they could find where we were. We started for Ebeye again and it was pouring. We picked up the towel again which was soaked, using it as a shield. After a while, the rain stopped and we looked up to see Ebeye coming up. We were so glad to get to the dock. We were soaking wet and cold standing at the dock waiting for a taxi. I had never been so glad to be on Ebeye before. When we got back to the apartment, we were going to do laundry, but about 30 minutes later the power went out so we went to bed.

Manit Day Program

The staff was supposed to be at the school for normal worship at 7:30 AM. The students were supposed to be at the school by 8 AM (normal school time) so that there could be a run-through for the program. I was planning to have the juniors clean the classroom when they got to school, so I borrowed a broom and dustpan from the 8th grade classroom (my classroom doesn’t have either). As time passed and it was almost 9 AM, I got frustrated enough to clean the classroom myself and organized the classroom for the potluck after the program. While I was cleaning, one junior, Quinton, popped his head in the classroom to ask if any other juniors were there. When I said no, he left. After I was finished cleaning the classroom, Conny and Hemilson (junior and senior) came in carrying some food. I asked them to help me take the chairs down to the “auditorium” (three classrooms with the dividers taken down). After we finished I sent the guys to buy plates and utensils because no one was bringing them. One by one the juniors started showing up at the school. I was in the teachers’ workroom checking my email and waiting for something to happen. I walked around outside and then went up to my classroom. Some students were playing around on the guitar and ukulele. I walked around outside some more and then the prince got out of a taxi and came through the gate. It was now time to start the program, over an hour later than planned (it was supposed to start at 10:30, but the prince had to be at several other programs first). The program began with the pre-K class and went all the way through to the seniors. Grades pre-K to 5th did songs. Grades 6th through 12th did songs, dances, or plays, in different combinations. The 6th grade did a lot of dancing to the rhythm of an electric keyboard (which they had been practicing next door to my classroom for a week… my students were easily distracted). The juniors did a song and a play. I guess the play was about the bad effects of chewing betel (pronounced beetle) nut. Two guys, Danny and Quinton, wore dresses and acted like girls. I don’t really know what was happening because it was in Marshallese. (the picture is of the juniors)

The program lasted for more that two hours. By the time the program was done, everyone was really hungry. I went with the juniors to the classroom, blessed the food, and started the potluck. Even though I had told the students to bring only chicken, beef or tuna if they were going to bring meat, they brought octopus, crab salad, and other random fish. I must say that the octopus looked really ugly (I forgot to take a picture). Needless to say, I did not eat a whole lot at the potluck. Slowly the students finished eating and the guys left, also leaving a mess. I talked with a couple of the girls for a while as they gathered up the sparse leftovers. After the girls left I surveyed the mess in my classroom. The students had apologized for not cleaning last night, but they still didn’t help clean up after potluck. I set about picking up trash and straightening the classroom. I asked a couple guys to help me carry the chairs back up to my classroom. After all the chairs and tables were neat and the trash taken out, I closed my classroom door and started crying. Part of it had to do with getting 3 hours of sleep the night before when the power came back on, and from being stressed and frustrated. I honestly wanted nothing more than to just go home. Anyway, I sat in my classroom for a little bit and then locked it to go check my email. I got an email from my mom saying that she was sending me some packages. That made me feel better. I packed up my stuff and headed to the post office to mail a letter and then went back to the apartment. I was feeling “blah” and did not feel like doing my lesson plans, so I asked Lorraine if she wanted to go to Triple J with me and get things for the weekend camping trip. After Triple J (and getting macadamia nut ice cream), we went to the school so Lorraine could get her water bottle. We saw a storm getting closer so we hurried back to the apartment. Fortunately, it didn’t rain until a while after we got back. I worked on lesson plans a little bit and got ready for bed. I was planning to go on the afternoon boat tomorrow so that I could get more things done in the morning and pack.

Almost the Manit Day Program

--In Algebra 1 I offered the students to help them after school in my classroom.
--Last period music class with the sophomores, the juniors cam and said they wanted to practice for the Manit Day program in my classroom (I am their sponsor and it is technically their home room). I told them to find another room because I was having class. One of them said to kick out the sophomores so they could practice. I said no and they started arguing with me, so I closed the door on them and went back to teaching.
--After music class, the juniors came back to the classroom to practice. I decided to move my help session to the library and told the juniors to be done by 4 PM and clean the classroom. It turned out to be a good thing that I moved the help session to the library because there was staff meeting and I forgot about it.
--After staff meeting I went to check on the juniors, but they were gone. I was slightly irritated that they did not clean the classroom, but it was to be expected.