THE DENTAL MISSIONARY FINDS HER WAY AROUND

   Helen prepared for her life’s work by taking a general nursing course as well as studies in dental work.  Upon arriving in a village and before taking care of their non-urgent health needs she would ask the village chief if she could present a program including music and song telling them about her spiritual work.  Africans are very musical and loved the time given to song with the help of her accordion.  “The first few years we used our own feet for travel” she tells us, “If we heard a truck was going near our destination we paid for a ride, sitting in front with the driver or in the back on top of a load of coffee bags or some other produce.  Sometimes travel was in an open windowed charcoal-burning train crowded with people, chickens, goats, sheep or dried fish.  If there was a wind and the train made a fast curve, pieces of burning charcoal would blow in the open windows and burn holes in our clothing or skin.  If the train did not have enough power to make it up a hill because the charcoal was not burning hot enough, it would stop until the fire got hotter.  One always brought food along because there were no fast-food places along the way.”

    Through her letters to us or when visiting us when she was on furlough, we learned of adjustments required for living in another culture.  A close school and church friend in Alberta kept all her letters in case she might write a book about her time in Africa.  When it was necessary for her to return to Canada due to breaking her hip she wrote about her 52 years in the Ivory Coast.  It may be out of print now.

   On one occasion Helen needed a ride to Diebongon, a two day trip.  After several days of search she learned that two Frenchmen were going by pick-up to choose a site for building a school in that village.  The two men agreed to take her with them.  Over the rocky roads Helen saw, for the first time the Lobi women whose clothing is a sheaf of leaves tied in front and back.  They paused to let the vehicle pass.  “For an evening meal the men asked their African cook to kill a chicken for dinner and invited me to eat with them.  An old army cot had been given to me and a small round hut with a straw roof was granted me to set up my camp bed.  I was using it for the first time.  It had a canvas sling for a mattress.  The first time I turned over the canvas started tearing down one side.  There was no chair or box to sit on and I realized many unpleasant creatures would be crawling on the floor.”  Helen said she spent the night hanging on to one side of the bed where the canvas had not torn and praying for those in need and the mission in Africa.