Some Challenges of Living Here

I want to share a few of the challenges we are coming to grips with as we have been here long enough now to know what some of them are. What I don't want is for any of this to be misconstrued as complaining. It's just an attempt to let others know what we face on a daily basis and maybe give an idea of how to pray for us.


Probably the biggest challenge is that there is no place here to get away from it all, not even really for more than a minute or two. Anywhere you go on the ship there is bound to be someone there as there are about 400 people who live and work on the ship. Anywhere you go in Monrovia there are people and often lots of them. Even at the beach last weekend it was not possible to sit for long without Liberians coming to sit with you. Don't get me wrong, it's often very nice talking with them, but there is no real possibily of just being alone for very long. I have always found personal interaction to be somewhat stressful in most cases, whereas I think Jenny is more energized by it than I am. In addition, there is no real distinction between work and personal life except the lines you choose to enforce. This makes getting away from work very challenging. There is no driving home in the evening from work. Another challenge is eating in community. We eat in the galley for nearly every meal except breakfast with hundreds of other people. We have found that bringing food back to the cabin is rather work intensive so we don't usually go that route. We are very grateful that our meals are provided and that we don't have to go to all the extra troubles of just living that some land-based missionaries here endure. That enables us to have some energy for work and more of a capacity left for compassion toward those we are here to serve. That said, we do face an extraordinary amount of daily fatigue. I have been trying to understand the reason for this. I think this is very common for those living on the ship for an extended period. I have talked with others who believe that it is almost entirely stress related. Not that any one thing in particular is that stressful, but rather just an accumulation of small stressful things related to living in tight community, living without much in the way of real respite, and living with a few other logistical struggles that come with the territory. Jenny and I find that we are very often at the point of collapse from what would appear to be physical exhaustion. I don't doubt that there is a spiritual element to this as well. Another challenge is that we are used to living in a 1600 square foot house with a yard. Here our cabin is just over 400 square feet including all our storage areas. That is rather generous too as cabins go here, so you won't catch us complaining about it. It is challenging, though, primarily because our bedroom is also the living and dining area that has to be shared with our children. We sleep on a fold-up couch that has to be stowed every day. And none of this is really a problem for us, but not having any real space to ourselves, that we can call our own, that is not shared by the kids requires a bit of extra mental energy. But, so many of the comforts of home are provided for us here through the hard work of others, like clean, running water, electricity, air conditioning, a Starbucks cafe', items for sale in the "ship shop", and the list goes on and on. It really is remarkable! We don't have to go far beyond the gangway to put this all into perspective as the conditions of living for most in Monrovia are far less desirable.




Suffice it to say, energy is what we need most so we are finding that we will just need to allot more hours to sleep than we are used to and continue asking God for quiet time and strength.

John