Sarah's Newsletter: Freetown Sept 2011 to present day

The final Frontier....(ok, slight exagguration, maybe more accurate to title this “The final Year”)

Greetings from Sierra Leone! I'm now 2 months into my final chunk of time in Freetown. It's good to be back here after a restful, restorative time in the UK for the summer (or rainy season as it's known here: Sierra Leone saw non-stop heavy rain throughout the UK summer!)

Here is just a little up-date on some things going on here...

Visits to children:

It's been fab to see the improvement many of our children made while I was away (the local staff bravely carried on therapy sessions in spite of the crazy rain).

One of our children who made significant improvements is Fausatu, a 3 ½ year old girl. She has cerebral palsy that mostly affects the strength and control in her legs and the use of her right hand.

When we saw her for the 1st time in May she could only stand up for short periods of time and was crawling to get around. We taught Fausatu's family exercises to do, and they have worked so hard with her in between our visits. She is now walking, although a little unsteadily, and able to kick a ball around her garden.

Last visit she was starting to use both hands together for activities like threading and crayoning.

Sad news: Sadly as always a few of our disabled children passed away during the rainy seasons. They're particularly vulnerable to illnesses during the rains due to a combination of their condition and the poor housing.

Staff update:

Our new Rehab Assistant, called Ambrose, (not George as I originally thought) is a great addition to the team. He is enthusiastic and commited. He still has a lot to learn and much of the remainder of my time here will involve investing in teaching him therapy skills as well as more basic administration skills.

Drivers – Our driver Abdul has moved onto another outside of Freetown. We have not yet appointed a new one, but have had 2 different drivers come as needed to work.

The Landrover: Unfortunately the Landrover keeps breaking down (3 times since I've been back) and is always tricky and expensive to have fixed due to limited access to car parts and skilled mechanics...but even in this God has been amazing to us as it only ever seems to break down at the end of the working day and I have never yet been left broken down and stranded. Our founder Vez is looking into buying a more reliable car in the UK and shipping it out, but it may take a little while to get here.

Upcoming Family visit: I'm very excited that both my brother and sister are coming to visit (within the next week!).

My sister, Esther, is a speech therapist, so is kindly going to do some visits to the children with the most significant problems with swallowing/choking and with communicating as well as doing some training for our team.

Please pray....

My time here only serves to increase my belief that many breakthroughs only happen through prayer. Please continue to remember us, especially with regards to:

• Finding a new car, the shipping process (especially getting out of the port without paying bribes) & for the Landrover to last til it arrives.

• Ambrose to continue learn skills and to stay working with Enable the Children after he completes his year trainee post. It'd be amazing to have another trained up worker in the team.