Waiting

Do you enjoy waiting? I never mind waiting in a shopping line for the check out. I sort of go into a day dream while I stand there, but waiting for a red light to turn green when there’s no one else around?! That makes me impatient.

When I left Australia on August 1^st, I expected to arrive to the ship and sail away from Durban, South Africa only a couple of days later, but when I arrived the ship was still in dry dock and not ready to be back in the water. We were delayed a minimum of 2 weeks and some days it sounded so bad that it looked like we might be there much longer.

DORMAC dry dock

DORMAC Dry dock

Full hard hat policy in the shipyard

I’m all about mental preparation. I’m okay with being spontaneous but if I get called up last minute for a shift at work, it throws me right off. If I’m mentally prepared for a long run in the afternoon, I can do it, but don’t spring it on me, I can’t handle it. So arriving at the ship and hearing that we could be in Durban for weeks more was a big mental shift. Many nurses have been re-allocated to other departments and are working in the dining room or galley, but I have stayed in the hospital department working on a resource project. It’s been great for learning and growing my knowledge but I find it extremely hard to sit in front of a computer all day reading research articles and writing documents. So it’s been hard. Each ship meeting that I have been to, we have heard new challenges and set-backs and all sorts of problems. So last week our managing director called an impromptu prayer meeting at 0745. My community gathered together and sat before God before our day started and we asked and listened to what He had to say.

Trying to make the most of hard hats becoming every day wear.

The waiting period this year has been very small in comparison to the months the crew on the ship spent last year when the Ebola virus hit the hardest and we had to change our course. During that time I was at home, lapping up the luxuries of my family and friends while my ship community were challenged and stretched. This year I have had a small taste of it and I have learned to make the most of the situation before me.

The waiting wasn’t all bad. I managed to squeeze a few adventures into my weekends. We made a trip up into the Drakensberg mountains and traveled into the country of Lesotho for the day. We took a hike among some pretty mountains and spent a weekend meandering through the midlands, checking out waterfalls and cafes.

Lesotho

We found some snow!

And had to have a snowball fight

Can you see who's face this is?

I’m thankful that we were able to find such great things to do during our time in Durban and that in the end the waiting wasn’t so bad.

It also highlighted to me just how much I love my job as a nurse. I have walked into D ward a few times since we packed it all up and tied it down for the sail. Each time that I walk in, I am hit with a thousand memories of a place that I have poured my heart into. I have carried lives of people who have walked in and out of that place, but who will stay with me forever.

Today we finally set sail for Madagascar. Right now we are bobbing around on the ocean, sighting whales left right and centre (it’s whale migration) and I couldn’t be happier.

Three whales. Captured from my bed! (With a long zoom)

Whale tail

Barefoot

You know that time of day when the sun is sinking and the light changes and begins to glow? Everything around you seems to be a brighter colour. This light flows into my parents’ lounge room and I often sit on the couch, letting this glowing light shine into my face. As it reflects off my eyelashes I see magical colours in my vision. It’s like fairy lights across your eyes. Needless to say, it’s my favourite time of day, not just here in Australia, but everywhere in the world.

I often struggle with what to write while I am at home in Australia. Just as the ship goes into maintenance, so it feels like I do too. There is general life maintenance like updating credit cards and my passport (thankfully now it’s done until 2025!), submitting a tax return, you know, all those things that no one really likes doing but are necessary for life. Then there is shopping for all the things that you need while you’re in a third world country for the next year with limited products available. And then the delightful part of being home, catching up with friends and family, seeing their little ones growing up, having tours through new house purchases, drinking wine and eating cheese, talking, talking, talking, drinking coffee and eating chocolate, taking road trips, walking along the beach and going barefoot in the middle of winter and not freezing.

I don't go barefoot in the winter much, but the other day I did. Warm boots and socks pulled off, tender feet reaching down to touch the green grass and feeling the soft sand slide and squeak between my toes and the cold sea water splash them as I walk. It made me think, there's a vulnerability to going barefoot. There's no protection to sharp things you might step on, instead you feel everything under your foot, be it sharp or silky smooth. I want to live my life barefoot, able to feel the things that God sees that hurt him, to not protect myself from the pain others feel, to be moved by compassion for another’s need, to be brave and vulnerable.

I have also been reminded that the path my feet are treading are so different to many others at home. My sights are set on different things. While some are buying houses, I am seeing make-shift homes on the beach from my port window or others who have nothing and sleep on the street. Some friends are having babies and I think of the maternal and infant death rate in Africa and thank God for the healthcare system in Australia and wonder when I will see a change in Africa. When I go shopping I can find everything a person could not only need but want in abundance, I wonder what to do with the discomfort inside me. While I sit in my parent's house, sheltered from the cold winter wind, I know it is a luxury for the hundreds of thousands around the world who wish they had shelter. I can count a thousand blessings.

It’s a strange thing coming home and seeing friends whom I haven’t spoken to since being home last year. I don’t really have any news. (Tsy vaovao) Nothing big has changed or happened, except that I have loved one hundred more people since I was home last, each with their own story, who have touched my heart somehow. How do you sum up a life of building relationships?

Recently I went to visit friends who live five hours drive north. At first I loathed the drive ahead of me, but once I was in the car on the move, singing my heart out at the top of my lungs, enjoying the beauty of the ever changing scenery around me, the sky stretched from horizon to horizon, it became a blessing. It’s not every day that I can sing with no one listening, when I can drive on my own wherever I want to or when I can stare at the beauty of the Australian outback.

Right now I sit with a roaring fire in front of me, a glass of wine at my side and I know I have every blessing. I have family and friends who welcome me home with arms out wide. Despite our different stages in life, we have many loves in common. I am so very thankful for the abundance of gifts in each friend and conversation, for the deep discussions and vulnerability, for trusting little hands in mine to share life with, however small the moment.

Reflections

I’m sitting on the bow, wind in my hair, sun on my face, staring out at the horizon, watching for sea life.

So far this sail we have seen a few dolphins within a few hours of setting off but since then there has been very minimal sea life seen, but the hours of staring at the ocean with no sightings has hardly dampened our hunger to see more. Any time someone points out to sea, we all look, eager to see the creatures we know are beneath these deep waters. 

Today is the first really sunny day with calm seas. My heart jumped for joy this morning when I heard the familiar bing-bong "Good morning crew, this is the Captain... The bow is now open." Yeah!! Within minutes people starting scuffling down the halls and up the stairs to the bow, some for the first time, others knowing the view and layout of the bow as well as the back of their hand, all eager to see the unique view the bow offers.

On the bow there is the opportunity to chat with old friends and to make new ones, to sit and read, stare off into the distance waiting for dolphins or whales to show themselves or reflecting on the recent time that has passed. 

This morning I had a conversation with a friend about how this ship has changed lives and I'm not talking about our patients. I mean the lives of the crew members. How has my life been changed by living on this ship? In some ways I think that question is way too hard to answer because so many things are hard to articulate, but as I sit here, floating on the ocean, water as far as the eye can see, a few things come to mind.
I have seen true community at work in the wards between patients who have never met but treat each other as family. I have been challenged to do the same with the community around me.
I have learnt the value of learning the host country's language and being sensitive to their specific culture.
I have learnt the value of money; be it little or much.
I have never felt emotions as deeply as what I have seen and felt on this ship with patients and in community life.
I have learnt generosity.
I have learnt to make friends and to invest in them even when I know they will leave again, but it is better to have opened my heart than to keep it closed and protected.
I have learnt that when everything feels overwhelming and out of proportion to look at one life we have been a part of changing and remember why we are here, because every single life counts.
I have learnt that being in the centre of God's will is the most satisfying place to be, no matter how hard it is.
 

 
 

A few days ago I saw a photo of a friend of mine with her three friends from high school. 12 years later, all four of these women are married and each of them have two or three children. It was beautiful to see them all together, knowing that they are walking similar roads, able to support each other through the good and hard times. So much of me wishes that this was me too, but it's the furthest thing from my life. I live in a transient place, full of people coming and going, my home moves from country to country, culture to culture, language to language, ever changing people and places. I visit my home country feeling more and more out of place the longer I am away, unsure of where exactly I fit anymore. I know this life on a ship is only temporary but I don't know what the next step is.

As I get ready to visit home in the next 6 weeks, I prepare my mind for the questions that will come from family and friends. This is one of the things I love about the sail away from the country we've spent the last outreach in, there is time to ponder, to ask God questions, to think over these last months. Have I spent my time wisely? Am I living my life well? And by that I mean, am I listening to the prompts of the Holy Spirit and walking them out?

I watched the movie About Time recently. Have you seen it? The main character is told by his dad when he's 21 years old that he can time travel. He uses this to go back and fix mistakes but he can't change everything without undoing others. It was a good challenge to me, reminding me to appreciate life's challenges and live every day to the fullest, taking the opportunity to be a blessing to others, to invest in relationships and keep my mind focused on what is important.

Tonight I lay under the most beautiful blanket of stars. It stretched for as far as you could see, the milky way lighting up the sky. All 166cm of me, lying on a 150m long ship, bobbing around in an enormous ocean, makes me feel pretty small, but I know the maker of the universe walks life with me. I think that’s pretty cool.