Tears of Joy

The last few weeks have already changed my view on my work here in Angola.  Even though I've seen pleny of people, including children and babies, die before, the statistics I studied before coming here were shocking.  If 1 in 5 children here dies before the age of 5, then I knew that I had to be ready for lots more severe illness and death than I had ever experienced before.  And I've definitely seen it already - and seeing children suffer, mothers mourn, and families try their best to care for a dying little one are daily occurrences.  I wrote a whole description of those experiences earlier this week that I am still deciding whether or not to post, so I may do some further editing and put it up at some point.

It turns out that I had done a "good" enough job of preparing that I wasn't particularly emotionally overwhelmed by any of these situations - it was very sad, yet still what I'd expected.  But today, as I watched a 6 year old child who has been in the hospital for over 50 days with tetanus start to take some shaky, wobbling steps with the help of a physical therapist, my eyes immediately teared up.  As it turns out, I was prepared for the disease and death, but completely caught off-guard by recovery and hope.  I know now that, after witnessing his recovery, I will keep that moment in mind as I continue to face so many obstacles here in the future.