November, the month of Thanksgiving. We immediately think of all of you who remember us in prayer faithfully and also those who contribute to both our personal and work-related expenses. Here are some of the many things and recent events for which we are so thankful.
Chuck Lindquist and Gene Bunkowske from World Mission Prayer League visited us for three days last week as a side trip of their trip to Kenya and Eritrea. The time went so fast, but we were able to show them "the land," (where the clinic will stand by next summer, hopefully), the grandiose Ceausescu palace, the orphanage where we serve as consultants, the emergency hospital, the small Lutheran church where Richard Wurmbrand was pastor when he wasn't in Communist prisons, a piata (open air market), an Orthodox church and a nearby village. We also prayed, and shared ways to be more effective, both as doctors and as witnesses for Jesus Christ.
Earlier that week we drove out to the Traistarus' for Flori's 6th birthday. A wonderful day! Flori's doing well and he and his little brother, Marius, are very active boys. Flori still needs to be evaluated for surgery at the children's hospital, but his parents are so afraid and want to wait until after Christmas to even see the doctor. We spoke with the surgeon last month, and he had just come back from United States where he had had an angioplasty done on the blood vessels going to his heart. This surgeon has a great deal of experience with Flori's type of problem, but obviously can't keep working forever. So one of our prayer requests is for courage, and wisdom and guidance for all of us for what to do, and how and when.
Various mission groups receive a lot of medicines and supplies brought here by short term missionaries. Often, when these mission groups don't know what to do with the medicines they give them to us. Last month we received a lot of meds, including a large quantity of one kind that was already three months outdated. We know a pediatric allergy specialist who had been very appreciative of some medicines we gave her last year, and so we brought some to her at the pediatric hospital, giving her the medicines that weren't outdated first, and then very tactfully telling her about the already expired medicine. She exclaimed that she uses the exact same kind of medicine even though her supply had outdated in 1995-- it was all she had or could obtain! "It is either this or nothing!" And so a small worry became a small victory, not just for us, but for the children and their families.
We've also helped Alina and Cristi a fair amount lately. They are a young couple who have so many needs--so typical here. She is pregnant with their first child, due the end of this month. They don't have enough money to buy adequately nourishing food. She was fired from her job when the employer (who had hired her on the "black market", which means that he wasn't paying any taxes or benefits for her) found out she was pregnant, and Cristi makes only 600,000 lei per month ($60) plus some on odd jobs now and then. Alina has had premature labor already, and the baby seems small for dates. Linda has given her advice on what foods are more nutritious and not too expensive. They live in one room in a 100 year old adobe house on the other side of Bucharest, but it needs a lot of work. So the last two Saturdays we helped them winterize the room (something that Minnesotans are good at), and fix all the broken windows and the lock on the door. We also bought Cristi a saw and a hatchet to help cut all the wood that is in the yard so that they will have heat this winter. Alina had asked us for money to just buy wood, but I said "No, you have all that wood from the big tree that fell down." When we came Saturday, Cristi was so proud when he showed us all the wood he had cut. "I worked three days, cutting this wood." Another problem turned into a success, especially for Cristi. We like him. He really seems to be a concerned and caring husband.
We are chomping at the bit to get more work done on our own clinic project. We signed a contract with the architect for the "P.U.D." (Urban Development Plan) that needs to be filed and approved before any other steps or approvals can take place. We are also waiting to get a more official estimate from the steel building company in the U.S. We can't sign a contract with the architect here to start getting the rest of the approvals until we know the approximate final cost of the building, since the architect's fees are a percentage of the total cost of the project. And it's difficult to get an exact price on the American building system without having architectural drawings.
Sanda, the other member of the Open Door Medical Foundation just completed her final residency test and so now will be starting to work for us part time and helping us work through all the bureaucratic details as well. Gabi starts her internship in January. Sanda and her husband Dragos met with Chuck and Gene when they were here. We see that they are becoming stronger and stronger in their faith and expressed their conviction and desire to share their faith in Jesus with others. We also see the same kind of growth both in size and maturity in the Trinitatea Romanian language church we attend after the English language service.
We got lots of feedback and advice about our bug story, but now it's back to a car story. A month ago we brought the receipts for the car repair from our accident to the other driver's insurance company. (7,300,000 lei was $802 at 9100 lei per dollar when we paid for the parts and labor). They had said we could pick up the money Wednesday, but when Linda got there they said they didn't have any money that day, and that it would be only 4,500,000 lei or only $450 at the current rate of exchange (10,000 lei to the dollar). So Linda explained and explained very carefully (in Romanian) that the repair man whom they had recommended found, while the original repairs were being done, that it needed one more part ($250 more!) But the insurance company man said, "No," that he wouldn't authorize any more money. So we were absolutely amazed when they called us two days later and said we could pick up the lei, and when we got there, it was for all 7,300,000 lei! This sort of thing just doesn't happen here.
So now we have all these lei which are devaluing daily, so the question is how to spend it before it loses its value. Some of the things we've found is a turkey for Thanksgiving ($1.65/lb, a real find!), 30 boxes (all we could find) of Romanian-made skim milk (good until January), and several copies of a new translation of the New Testament that has just come out (to help in our own Bible and language study and to share with our friends).
So these are just a few of the things for which we give thanks. Linda is in a women's Bible study of I Peter, and Milt is in new group of men studying Philippians. Both books talk about joy in spite of difficulties (the joy that comes from knowing Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior and friend). We wish to thank you again for your faithful prayer support! We hope that your Thanksgiving Day is richly blessed by our Lord!