buying a cow

i could start off with yet another apology about not keeping the blog up very well. but, instead, i will just say that right now my heart is too full and too broken and my spirit is too tired to really be able to coherently share.

my cabin mate tayler was a bit startled a few weeks ago when i asked her to ask her friend tim how much a cow would cost here in benin. what?!?!? you want to buy a cow?!?!? this led me to sharing with her wasti's story.

wasti and his mama showed up on the dock a few days before the end of surgery. wasti had a cleft lip but along with his cleft he didn't look quite right. he also had not really put on much weight since his previous visit but it was just enough that he was okay for surgery from a weight point of view. what about his not looking quite right???? well, his labwork was quite skewed and so he received a CT scan which showed holoproencephalopathy...but just a mild version. so, we told mom the risks of surgery for him. she almost said no but she had fought so hard for his life to now that she didn't give up and said yes. we were prepared for the worst...even to the point of having to make a decision to withdraw support if he ended up on a breathing machine post-op. and yet, he came through the surgery great! and on the very next day after surgery, wasti had on dark charcoal eyeliner below his eyes. this seems a bit strange from a western view but it was a huge deal. mom was claiming him...claiming him as hers and showing her continued fight for his life. it was something to rejoice over.

the next few days were quite time intensive for me. i had him when i was at work but even came in when i wasn't on shift to work with mom. mom, who spoke a dialect none of our translators spoke directly, except one. mom, who had to learn to feed her baby with formula milk since her milk was dried up...how to prepare clean water and then to prepare the milk. mom, who had to learn to feed her baby on schedule rather than demand which is counter-cultural but necessary for wasti to survive. mom, who had to learn to tell time before she could learn to feed on schedule. and all of this from me to bio (our translator) to wasti's mom and then back to make sure she really understood it.

so, why did i want to know about buying a cow? well, wasti's mom shared her story with us as the days progressed. her baby was whole (at least on the outside now) so she was able to return to her village that had shunned her when her "cursed" baby was born. she was sure she could go back home but wasn't sure her husband would provide for her and the baby now. he had given each of his wives a cow and some land but, she had sold everything to care for her broken babies. (wasti's older sister had needed help with her eyes). so, how much to buy a cow to give her a chance at life, to give wasti a chance at life? 150 CFA which is around 300 US dollars. we took up a collection hoping we could do this for her. we had to tell people to stop giving! as i was doing some teaching about her going home and we gave a very small amount of money to her to get her from the port city to her village on the bus, she said no, it is too much, you have already done too much for me. (little did she know). later in the evening, several of us took her into a room away from others to give her the cow money. we showed a picture of a cow and she named it in her dialect. then we showed her the money and pointed to the cow and then to her. she was stunned and almost unwilling to hope even with the money there before her. but finally she accepted and began praising God (that surely came through despite the language barrier). and so, she went home with a baby that will be accepted and a chance at having a life.

and God let us be part of that! what an amazing and humbling experience to be part of what He is doing!