Final Honor's Recital

Last night was the final honor’s recital at Hillcrest: an evening featuring the jazz music of George Gershwin and others. The event was just as elegant and classy as the first one last semester. Heidi Tolar, the Hillcrest teacher and wife of Coach Jay Tolar, did an outstanding job organizing and decorating for the event. She was also a participant herself, playing several piano pieces very well.

I haven’t said much about my other teaching position. I teach brass players at Hillcrest School on Thursdays. I have prepared and performed pieces a couple of times now with highschoolers, Heather Ardill on trumpet and Jessica Strydhorst on trombone. Once a week, I also teach the middle school trumpet players, and we are working on an ensemble piece for seven players right now. I can hardly wait to perform a Renaissance piece by Gabrielli at the final concert next month!

Never did I think when I was practicing and competing on trumpet in high school that I would be teaching young trumpet players one day in Africa!

Final Trip to Yankari

This previous weekend I took a trip to Yankari with my friend Ryan Devoe and his family. With this trip I have now been to Yankari three times. The drive there was a long drive because we stopped several times for petrol, food, and to get our room at a hotel in a nearby town. Once we were finally there we went straight to the warm springs. After five hours in the car we were ready for some swimming. We swam there from about one in the afternoon to 4:30 when we had to leave due to rain. On the way back to the hotel we stopped to get real Nigerian “suya.” The kind that is sold at Hillcrest is Americanized and doesn’t have the true flavor of suya. This suya that we ate was much spicier and tasted better than the kind at Hillcrest. After roadside dinner we drove to the hotel at which we were staying for the night. While walking in we saw what we thought to be a pool. It had a diving board, it had ladders on its sides, and a nice sitting area nearby. Once we got to go check it out we found out that it was so poorly maintained that it had become more of a pond with its own ecosystem. The water was so green that you couldn’t see the bottom even in the shallowest part of the pool and there were frogs and who knows what else swimming around in it. By American standards the hotel was mediocre but by Jos missionary standards the place was a palace. The rooms each had two double beds, a small tv, and best of all an air conditioner and all of this was for a third of the price of the rooms at Yankari. The next morning after having slept in a nice air conditioned room we took off for the wildlife reserve again. Once there we went on our safari which in the end turned out to be a great experience. For the first hour or so we saw nothing but a few water bucks and different kinds of birds but finally we came to a swampy area where we found the elephants. There were about one hundred elephants that crossed the road fifty feet ahead of our car. The most exciting thing was the big male elephant which was about one and a half times as big as the safari truck we were riding in. Once we were back to the main area of the resort we ate and headed down to the warm springs for the last time. Along the way home we stopped quite a few times also. One of those times we were fortunate to have spotted a Nigerian version of beef jerky. Ryan and his family had eaten it before but I didn’t even know that it existed. It didn’t taste much like meat, all I know is that was spiced with pepper and was quite hot. Overall the trip was bunches of fun. I had to admit that I was sad to be leaving such a beautiful place behind.

Sterling (16)

Better Than an Apple

It's getting closer to the end of the semester at JETS; I have only 3 more classes to go. There is so much more I want to cover with my students, and there is so little time. I am going to miss them very much! My prayers are already going out on their behalf for next year; I am confident that the Lord will provide for their needs.

In all the years I taught secondary math, I never received the thank yous that these students have lavished upon me regularly and as of late. In the U.S., I would get a few Hallmark cards hurriedly signed with a name only, plates of cookies here and there, and even an apple a few times (which, once upon a time, was the gift that you brought teachers.) I have recently discovered a teacher gift unique to the Nigerian culture (I suppose it could be unique elsewhere, but I haven't been there to know.)

I was actually quite puzzled why students suddenly began to insist that they have their picture taken with me. Actually, there were so many pictures taken a couple of class days in a row that I was late to my appointment afterwards!

Then a few days later, the puzzle was answered . . .pictures started pouring in back to me. White envelope after white envelope with pictures inside of them, each hand delivered by the person pictured with me. Each picture presented with a smile and a thank you. Some pictures even had handwritten notes on the back. I know these pictures took money and forethought to present. What a lovely custom! Nigerians know how to express their appreciation and take the time to do it. I will treasure these pictures always! More than that, I will treasure the memories that I have made with these students.

I believe these men and women are the future of Nigeria. They struggle for an education and better ways that we take so for granted in America. I feel privileged to be used by God to help them in their struggle.

Lisa

Junior Senior Banquet

So this weekend was the junior senior banquet at Hillcrest. The banquet is sort of a prom equivalent, but banquet is a lot classier than the prom I went to. Every year the 11^th grade students put it together as sort of a farewell gesture to the graduating class. They get one of the nicer restaurants in town to cater it and have some of the underclassmen serve everyone. Everyone dresses up really nice and spends quite a bit of time getting ready for it.

Now that you have the background, I can tell you my person experience with the banquet. Gabe, my boyfriend, asked me with a song a few weeks ago; so we went as a couple. Mr. Cunningham, one of the teachers at Hillcrest, is a chaperone for the event and asked Emily to go with him. Sterling was recruited as a server. The three eldest of the Mitchell kids ended up being at the event.

I actually spent two nights away from home because the banquet is on a Friday. I spent Thursday night at the house of Penelope Tait, one of my friends from school. We did as much towards getting ready as we could. That included nails and straightening Penny’s hair. She has really curly hair so it was quite an ordeal, but it turned out really nice. The next day we only had a half day at school to give everyone time to get ready. After school I went with a group of girls to go out to eat for lunch and then we got ready together.

The banquet itself was really cool. The junior class had made it a Hollywood theme and had gone to great lengths to make everything perfect. They even had a red carpet and a Hollywood sign, and that was just the outside. The inside looked like the Oscars. I couldn’t believe that I was still in Nigeria. Each person had a seat reserved for them. At the end of the night there was even an awards ceremony at which every senior got a little golden person for either they’re participation in the senior play or their participation in sports. After the actual banquet was over all the juniors and seniors went to the Niger Creek hostel for the after party that lasted all night. It was a really cool experience.

Keloids and Peanuts Keeping the Doctor Busy

Time flies when you are having fun and also when you are busy. I must say that my days are not always fun, but often busy. Dr. Aboiyar, the family medicine physician who is now a diplomate in otolaryngology, has been taking some well earned vacation time. Therefore, my days have been a little fuller than usual. In addition, we have two family medicine residents rotating on the service. While they try to help when they can, it does take time to teach. I do, however, find the teaching part of my job very rewarding. I feel that I can make a more lasting impact as well as making a difference for a larger number of people by equipping young Nigerian doctors with more knowledge and skills to better treat patients.

This week is barely half over and I have found that we have done quite a bit clinically. On Monday, we were in the operating room all day for our regularly scheduled operating day. Dr. Aboiyar came off of vacation for a few hours and repaired an eardrum beautifully and with very little help from me. I then went on to remove a tumor off of a vocal cord and then removed a thyroid gland. We got a late start, so the day went a little long.


Tuesday was normal clinic day. I coached the residents through seeing and treating our patients. Along the way we had a two year old boy come into clinic with a peanut in his airway. Peanuts are a mainstay in the Nigerian diet and there is little education at this point about safe foods for young children. Consequently, peanut aspiration is a common problem. This young boy had aspirated his peanut five days prior. He lives near the capital city of Abuja, a three hour drive from Jos. Medical care is so expensive there, that his parents brought him to Jos University Teaching Hospital (JUTH). The ENT surgeons at JUTH don’t have their equipment up and running yet, so they sent the patient on to Evangel Hospital, where the boy arrived five days after aspirating the peanut. He was obviously having some difficulty breathing, so we rushed through our patients in the clinic and got to the operating room in the afternoon. In the operating room, I found half of a peanut firmly lodged in his windpipe (trachea) just below the voice box (larynx). I suspect that he would have developed infection, a blocked airway, and eventually died had he not been treated. He was doing very well and went home today with very happy parents.


Today, we went to the operating room with an extra, overbooked case. This young man has many tumors called keloids that have been growing over the past 10 years. A keloid is scar tissue that has gone wild and continues to grow. Clearly, this is the worst case I have ever seen, much less operated on. Dr. Aboiyar and I spent several hours excising the keloids and then remodeling the skin on his neck. There are other large but significantly smaller lesions on the other side of his neck. I was very pleased with the initial outcome.


I still need to find time this week to take care of a couple of patients in the hospital with broken jaws. I think my remaining time in Nigeria will go very quickly, just because it is so busy. I look forward to the weekends for a little more fun, which will also make the remaining days go by even quicker.

Michael Mitchell, MD

A Trip to the Library

Lisa the Librarian! That’s my most recent hat to wear. Recently, I discovered that my students, who are freshman in a university, don’t know how to use a library. We in America are very fortunate to have great public libraries and school libraries with regular classes to help us become familiar with how to use it. In the past week, I have met with my students twice outside of our usual class time to teach them some library skills. It was a voluntary class, so I was quite pleased at the turnout!

It was amazing to me to see an actual card catalogue again (ever tried to use a computer catalogue with no regular electricity?) It was even more amazing to me that grown-ups had no idea of how to use a card catalogue. The students listened quite attentively as I first told them how to find their title or author in the files and how a library filing system works. I felt like a mother duck as my students followed me around to different parts of the library and we found some of the books we had looked up together. Then it was their turn to go solo; it brought me great pleasure to see the looks on their faces when they found their very first book all by themselves! Many came up to me proudly waving the book in my face!

Next week, I am going to assign a project where they have to select a book from a recommended reading list that I compiled for them from the card catalogue. My hopes in doing this is that, well after I am gone, my students will continue their education and improvement in English through reading. The books I selected are very practical books on marriage, finances, and living out your everyday life in faith. I tried to get books at a lower reading level since many of them struggle to get through their textbook readings.

To “help” my students explore this goldmine of information sooner rather than later, I am going to borrow an idea from my grandpa. I’ll never forget one of my favorite Christmas presents: a toilet roll with dollars stuffed in it. I have never unrolled a roll of toilet paper so fast! I am going to have a treasure hunt, so to speak, in the library. I figure a little bit of pocket change stuck in the pages of random books from the list will be a good motivation for my students to explore the books I have recommended. I’ll keep you posted . . .

Lisa

Easter Day

To our friends and family back home, Happy Easter! We are a little bit ahead of you so we are able to give a full report of our activities for the day.

We went as a family minus Sterling to our Nigerian church, ECWA Seminary Church. It was a more lively service than usual with lots of familiar music. Afterwards, we went to the home of Rick and Brenda Naatz, who are another missionary family on the Evangel compound. Rick heads up the medical lab at Evangel, and Brenda works in the SIM travel office. Jacob is their son and Sterling’s close friend. Also invited was a short term nurse that we have gotten to know named Simone, who is from Switzerland. You would have never known we were in Nigeria; the menu was ham, roast chicken, mashed potatoes with gravy, rolls, salad with raspberry vinaigrette, green beans, sweet corn, and 3 kinds of homemade pies (French silk, mango, and lemon meringue.) It was a feast. No short cuts here . . .homemade piecrusts, handsqueezed lemons, home frozen corn, etc. I don’t think Brenda had to slaughter the animals, thankfully!

After our great meal, we headed next door for the annual Easter egg hunt with all the missionary families on the compound. A good time was had by all.

Later that evening, we were the guests of our Nigerian pastor, Barje Maigadi and his family: wife Amina, sons Sulmane and Surane, and daughters Kauna and Kiota. (I hope the spelling is correct!) It was a real treat to be invited into their home and see how a Nigerian family of 6 lives. We had an American friendly meal, but the best part of all was the time spent sitting around chatting and getting to know one another. The Maigadis lived in America for several years when their children were at a very impressionable age. Our families, especially the kids, seem to hit it off. We laughed quite a bit as we realized that despite our different cultures, we had some striking similarities: mothers who can’t seem to finish sentences, fathers who like their remote controls and who don’t listen, and teenagers who like music and can talk silly (at least by adult standards.)

The longer we stay in Nigeria, the more people we meet and become attached to. The Maigadi family is yet another family that will be difficult to say goodbye to in just 7 short weeks.

Lisa