Special Delivery to Gape Aloyi

Last weekend we made another visit to the village, Gape Aloyi. (You may remember reading our last post "Gape Aloyi Village Visit" back in May). This time we were there to see another historic occasion for the village and also deliver medical supplies. Having loaded up 2 landrovers full of supplies the night before, our trip started at 06:30 in the morning, along with some fellow crew members. The hospital supply on the ship were amazing in helping us find things that they could do without. We embarked on our very bumpy journey, having to take a different route due to recent heavy rain and potential flooding on the other road. We arrived to a sea of kids, excited at seeing us again and it was nice to see familiar faces from the last time. After greetings with the village chief we proceded to a grass roof shelter for a meeting. Everybody from the village gathered around, peering over the wall to hear the news that had been brought by our friends Eric and Fabienne. Eric and Fabienne have really taken this village into their hearts and are currently working to raise money to build a school. This is the site where the school will be built.

Already they have seen a clinic finished and the village are willing to help work to build it. This meeting was to see the start of this as they announced the sponsorship from the Air France foundation which will provide half of the money for the school. The school foundations can be started and as you can see by the video they were very happy with the news.

A contract was set up so that the village would agree to provide things like sand, water and workers to help the builder so that the cost can be kept down and they would take ownership of the project. This was signed by the chief.

Tim also gave a speech and he had the added pleasure of sharing that the Africa Mercy Crew had made a collection of just over $700 which will be put towards half of the toilet block or for the complete appatame (african style circular yard) When the builder got up to talk we found that we were talking in 3 different languages. The builder in the local language Ewe, then translated to French (one of the languages of Togo) then into English for us. This is often how a lot of people have to work on the wards in the hospital, you sometimes wonder if anything is lost in the translation.

The next item on the agenda was to present prizes to those that had passed their exams in the school. The students were delighted with their gifts and we hope that it inspires others to do well in the school.

Lunch followed with goat and fufu on the menu, cooked by the chief's, 4 wives!

We then proceeded over to the clinic to deliver the supplies.

The nurse was speechless, stunned, tearful, to put it in a few words, yet he beamed from ear to ear, as more and more boxes were carried in. He could not believe all the things that came in through the door.

We will never forget the look on his face when he discovered a set of baby weighing scales, something he had wanted for a long time. Many things like syringes etc have to be reused as they haven't got the supplies and our boxes of about 1000 syringes was just what he needed. 6 mosquito nets were the perfect match for the 6 beds in the little ward and gauzes galore will help cover healing wounds.

This is a visit we will never forget. It's great when God can make a difference in people's lives.

For Nathanael, the girls loved our little "Yovo" (name for white person) and he had a few marriage proposals whilst he was there, mainly from Mum's eyeing him up as a future son-in-law (we must say, one 2 year old was very cute!). At least he knows where to go when he's older and stuck for a wife.