The Clinic..

The Karamajon culture is so steeped in the value of cows that men over the age of 25 feel that is what is most important. As I have said before, they value this over lives of their own wives and children. If a wife or child die they can be quickly replaced, but it is harder to replace a cow.

There was a man in the clinic yesterday, mid 40's, well dressed by village standards. He had brought his wife who was pregnant and ill. She looked old and very tired, and not well. He insisted on many types of tests, brucellosis, typhoid, malaria, a few others, that we could not do. His bill was 8000 shillings, $4.50 US, and included all of her antibiotics. He was very unhappy with us, he was arguing with the staff about how we were so bad and are stealing from the Karamajon people and not helping them (not giving them free treatment). When I went to find out about the raised voices, the staff dealing with this man told me what he had said. It is hard not to get very mad at them, because they just don't see it the way we do, or understand that there is not a magic fix for right now healing. But the staff and I told him again the same thing that had been said a few minutes earlier, we have to charge for the tests because we have to buy reagents to do the tests with and they are costly and we buy our medicines, they don't come free to us from the Government, that is why we have the medicines to treat his wife, and an injection won't made his wife well immediately. He wanted her to have an injection so she could walk home and carry the water can while he rode the bike. I asked him why he came to our clinic and did not go to Tokora where treatment is free. He said what everyone says, "because you have staff and medicines and can do the tests". We told him again that is why we must charge some small amount for the tests or we could not afford to do them. And then we offered to pray for his wife and her unborn child, all along he was saying that she is no good to him if she is sick, who will cook and work if she can not. The wife was sitting there very quiet and I kept thinking about how low her self-esteem and self-worth must be. And I wished we had an instant fix pill for that.

We all know that only God can change the heart of this man and heal both the physical and mental state of this woman, but when they are not wanting to hear of truly believe we feel useless in what we can do. We can only keep our faith in His word and keep plugging away, in hopes that someone will hear and they will want the Word.