Day 6 - 9/27/08

This was our biggest day yet. If our patient flow continues as it has so far, we will have seen and treated about 12,000 kids by the time we close the camps next Tuesay. In our wildest imaginations, we could never have predicted this result.

Publicity-seeking is not my style. Generally, I prefer to fly under the radar and away from the glare of the flashbulbs. Here in Nairobi there's been no such luck; however, in this case it's been a good thing. Attention from the media, which has intensified as the week has worn on, has brought about the very best kind of result.

From the beginning, many of us have wondered what would happen to these children when we go home. Will anyone follow after us, or will they continue to be the forgotten ones? Today we learned the answer. Already plans are afoot to convert our mission camp site at Mukuru into a permanent children's clinic, thanks in large part to some significant funding from the U.S. government. Normally when I hear that our government is funding yet another social program, I would roll my eyes and cynically mutter, "Your tax dollars at work." But somehow this time is different. We have lived among the people here and have seen firsthand their needs and their efforts to help themselves. We have watched them eagerly soak up information about healthcare and wellness; we have experienced their enthusiastic assistance to us, turning out in droves to help in the camp in any way they can - even when the help we need is scrubbing dirty dental instruments and keeping our workspaces clean. No task it too menial for our Kenyan volunteers to accept. If our mission here has been the incentive for a new clinic in this area, as we've been assured that it has, we will have contributed to giving people a hand up, rather than a handout. What better legacy to leave behind than that! Maybe the publicity we've received isn't so bad after all.

The Kenyan people whom we're serving have not been the sole beneficiaries of our mission here. We, too - every last one of us -have been on the receiving end of a wealth of knowledge, experience, friendship, fellowship and yes, pure joy. Those of us who have been in the medical profession for a long time have grown accustomed to relying on medical science by way of fancy diagnostic tests and tools and high-powered medicines. Here we don't have those luxuries. We have only our hands, our eyes, our ears and our gut instincts to go on. Not exactly modern medicine ... and yet, we have honed our powers of observtion and our listening skills and learned to make do with what we have.

In the mission camp, the kind of medicine we practice is more art than science - at times more folk art than fine art - practiced more with the heart than with electronic gizmos and gadgets. In the process, I have seen the inner beauty of my team members shining through, as they cooperate, collaborate, communicate and share their special talents and skills with each other to provide the best care they have to offer to these little ones. The children we are treating probably won't see our faces again and certainly won't remember our names, but we will never forget what we've learned and experienced while serving them.