Kids’ Doc in Jos

We still remember Bevelyn’s restaurant here in Jos as the "Broken Bridge Restaurant," since through the ’90s it featured the beautiful mural shown on the right, of a long bridge (across San Francisco Bay??). As you can see, there was one small problem with the way the panels were placed, thus giving the restaurant its nickname.

That name has been going through my mind in the past couple of weeks as I’ve spent nearly half my time dealing with a certain type of network problem, the kind where you’re on one side (usually the wrong side) of a broken bridge.

The problem is, you have to have both sides of a communication bridge working properly if they’re going to function. When there is a breakdown in a local setting such as an office, it’s not much trouble to go from one end to the other to sort out the problem. But what happens when one end of the bridge is a block or two away at another site, and there is no one there to help (and no good way to communicate even if there was someone)? The result is a lot of walking back and forth, trying one thing on one end, something on the other end, until the two sides can talk together again, to mix my metaphors.

Worse yet, our internet connections via satellite have broken down twice recently, both at Evangel and the SIM office. The network technicians could not solve or even diagnose the problem from their side, so I spent many, many hours following their instructions given over a barely intelligible cell phone, waiting and waiting to see what happened next, reporting back, and so on. If only we had the luxury of two connections, so that we could use the working "bridge" to get to the other side of the broken "bridge" and fix it.

In yet another metaphor, I’m learning (trying) to pay attention to which part of the branch I’m sawing off — the part I’m sitting on or the far end. It’s always tempting, when working over a remote connection, to change something and hope that it will work. It’s often a risk worth taking, but sometimes I fall with the branch.

Suppose I am working over a wireless bridge, with one end in the office and another across the street, and I want to reconfigure the radios to talk to each other in dialect Y instead of dialect X. I have to first tell the far radio to change to language Y, then tell the local one to make the same change. If it works, fine. If it doesn’t, I’ve sawn off the branch I was sitting on. I can change the local radio back to the way it was, because I’m connected to it, but the far radio is now dangling in never-never land–"I’m not hearing you, I’m not hearing you!" I have to walk to wherever it is and directly connect to it, to tell it "never mind, we’ll stick with dialect X."

A simple solution, which I’ve never seen or heard of being actually implemented, would be for the radios to have a trial period whenever you make a change that might break the connection. In effect, the radio would say, "ok, I’ll switch to dialect Y, but if I don’t hear from you in 5 minutes, I’ll assume that this didn’t work and I will go back to dialect X." Operating systems like Windows do that when they change your graphics settings, with a button that says "Click to accept these settings, or I’ll revert in 30 seconds" That saves you from the problem of having a totally messed up display and no way to change it back. Alas, with all their amazing technology, wireless network devices don’t seem to have figured this out. But then, many don’t even allow you to save and restore the settings that it took you so long to figure out.

As I finished writing this and sat wondering what the point was, it struck me that the greatest broken bridge story is the way God relates to people. He created a perfect world, including people, and loved his creation wholeheartedly, especially the people, but then they went and broke the relationship, the bridge. In the end, no kind of remote troubleshooting would to, and God put on his shoes and took a long journey to the other side of the broken bridge, to a zone barren and devastated by the long loss of contact. It cost his life, but the bridge was restored.

I case you missed some previous posts, I’ll say again that I’m no longer working at Evangel Hospital nor as a physician. For the present, I’m the computer support person for SIM Nigeria. The change has carried a certain change of perspective on ministry. Before, I was directly involved in bringing healing and comfort, and I was teaching other doctors the same. For now, my own ministry is no longer "front line," but involves enabling others in the team to carry on their front line ministries.

This is not an uncommon pattern either in missions or in other vocations. I think that these days, many churches and supporters have embraced the idea of teamwork in ministry (and in the life of the whole Church). There are still some who want to support only front-line missionaries, or even more specifically only church planters, only national missionaries, and so on. I’m sure, though, that they would be surprised and dismayed if they went to the hospital for treatment and found that only doctors and nurses were there. Clearly, a hospital couldn’t run effectively like that.

Anyway, now that I’m in the position of computer systems coordinator, I’m focusing on how I can support the ministry of the whole team, including those who are on the front line and others who are also on the support and enabling side of things. It’s easy to get so immersed in computer issues and technicalities that I forget the ultimate goals. So I’m trying to consciously think about the work that others are doing, work that I contribute to in a small part by keeping their computers and email running smoothly.

It’s inevitable that I will write about computers in this blog, now that that is my work, but I will also be writing about some of the people that I am serving, and about the work that they do. People like René Marshall who helps spearhead a youth camp ministry in this country where, with tens of millions of young people, even Christian young people, such camps are almost unheard of. Knowing that I am contributing in some way to that ministry really gives me a boost!

It’s funny how expectations change over time and how contentment is related to expectations. When we came to Nigeria 17 years ago, it was difficult and costly to make an international phone call.You had to call a number in another city t o book an international call. When you finally got through, they would try to call you back and make the connection. Then, for a while, we had to go to the phone company offices to make a call. When we first got email in around 1993, people had to pay about $0.50 for every message of a page of text. The connection was made by modem on an international phone call from the SIM office in the US to our house in Nigeria every night, and a special, high quality modem was needed because of the poor line quality. We printed out people’s messages, or put them onto floppy discs, and delivered them personally. If they got their mail once a week or so, they were happy.

Now things have changed. New missionaries arrive from the US and other countries where the internet and other communication services are everywhere and are cheap–almost free. Internet connections here have improved although the cost is still high. Now, for some people, being cut off from the internet and email for a few hours becomes a problem. Whereas once it was enough to get text email now and then, now people want to use Skype and even video Skype … all over a super-expensive satellite connection. Part of my new job as computer systems coordinator at SIM Nigeria is managing those expectations and trying to keep the connections running smoothly.

My big challenge in the past week has been dealing with the internet connections in the SIM headquarters and Evangel Hospital. In both places, our connection is over a satellite dish (VSAT), and is shared among about 50 users at each site. Until recently, we had relatively slow connections and just lived with them, since VSAT is quite expensive. The entire connection for 50 computers at Evangel Hospital, for example, was slower during business hours than a single home connection (ISDN) in the US.

Because of some reorganization in our provider (MWEB), including their changing to another satellite, the company switched everyone to new plans. They gave us, at Evangel and SIM, plans that provided dedicated bandwidth rather than channels shared with 32 other customers, as we had before. At the same time, though, they limited our monthly usage to very small amounts (1.5 and 4.5 GB respectively). So, it’s as if we have a bigger trough to feed from, but are supposed to be eating less. We didn’t know this (an email was sent out but apparently never got to anyone who understood or acted on it) until last week when MWEB sent out a notice that we have been exceeding our allocation–by a factor of 10 in the case of Evangel!

I’ve been busy, then with checking into different companies and different plans, trying to track which users are consuming the gigabytes and on what sites, trying to restrict the use somewhat by blocking some sites, and so on. The plans that will give us what we need cost in the range of $1000 per month, still for a connection that would cost only $20 or so in the US! We’ll have to go ahead and swallow the bitter pill and pass along the cost to the people who are using the connections, but it’s going to be a particularly bitter pill when they see the service level decrease at the same time as the costs double.

Barb, Luke and I went to Joshua Gidado’s house Friday afternoon for a short visit, and got a good dose of en-couragement by this courageous young man. If you haven’t heard about him before (see previous post), Joshua suffers from severe osteogenesis imperfecta (brittle bones) and has lived nearly his whole life in a child’s wagon. He has no use of his legs and minimal use of his tiny arms and hands. He relies totally on his family and friends for nearly every activity of life, from reading to eating and bathing.

For most of our visit, Joshua talked about the football (soccer) team he coaches. Yes, almost unbelievably, this man who cannot walk or even push himself in a wheelchair is an avid football fan and coaches a community team. He mixes exhortation and preaching along with coaching, believing that the lives of the players, the values they play by, and the example they give is more important than just winning games.

The team was recently invited to a tournament in Kantagora, many hours drive from Jos. Joshua told how the team raised money for the trip, including each of them paying 3000 naira, about two weeks’ salary for a laborer. They didn’t get to play much as they lost early in the schedule, but the association was so impressed by the team that they invited them to another tournament even farther away.

I asked Joshua how their team is different from others, how they would be noticed. He told me a few examples

• We stress sportsmanship and goodwill;
• We don’t lose our tempers and get abusive when referees make bad calls against us;
• We buy the other players minerals (soft drinks) if we can afford it, or drinking water

See why I say that Joshua en-courages us? He could be full of self pity and has plenty of reason to complain. I’d consider him a good example if he simply existed and had a good spirit. But he goes beyond that to an active service that is building bridges, making peace, and showing the world what God’s love is about. May I do even half as much as Joshua!

Saralynn’s husband David was away doing exams last week–a difficult exam with a low pass rate, two weeks away from home, in a city that’s hot and uncomfortable even for Nigerians. And he passed the exam! Congratulations, David! While he was away, Saralynn and I started working our way again through The Lord of the Rings films. Each film in the extended version is some four hours long, and we didn’t even get through the entire second film, "The Two Towers," but it was fun, anyway.

 Courage is one of the great themes of The Lord of the Rings. Whether in the main quest of Frodo to destroy the ring in Mount Doom, or in the various sub-plots, the characters are constantly struggling against seemingly impossible odds to do what is needed, to do what is right, to do their duty.

Professor Michael Drout of Wheaton College (Massachusetts, not Illinois) has a very interesting lecture series on fantasy literature titled "Rings, Swords and Monsters," which Barb and I listened to while on the road in the US early this year. At least half the lectures are about Tolkien and his trilogy. Drout made a particular point about courage that has really stuck with me. He reminded us, first, that sloth was one of the traditional seven deadly sins. I always figured that "sloth" just meant laziness in general, didn’t you?

Drout, though, says that its original meaning, at least as one of the deadly sins, was not laziness, but inaction because of giving up hope when all the odds are against you. It’s succumbing to hopelessness and despair.

I can certainly relate to that as a person and as a missionary. I see so many ruins — good causes gone astray; spiritual mentors crashed and burned; idealism and good will that seems to bloom again and again but is always blasted by the scorching sun of African realities; my own weakness and failures. It’s such a bother to keep trying. Sloth then, as it applies to me, is letting myself focus on these things and say, "What’s the use? Why not just coast? Why not just let life go by, do what’s easy?"

In The Lord of the Rings, sloth (personified by Wormtongue) has turned King Théoden from a brave ruler to a passive shadow, waiting for the events of the world, unwilling and unable any longer to work, fight, risk, and sacrifice to try to change those events. It takes an exorcism by Gandalf to restore Théoden’s courage.

That’s the kind of en-couragement I need, we all need, to clear away the cobwebs from my brain, shake me by the shoulders, dunk my face in ice water, whatever it takes to get me back on track. So, the next time you think of "encouraging" your missionary friend directly or in prayer, don’t think (only) of the soft side of encouragement, but also of this en-couragement that exorcises my sloth and replaces it with courage.

Thirty minutes from now it will be Monday, our first day back at work after our home assignment in the US and Nigeria. Barb will be going back to her usual job, two mornings a week in the office. I’m excited, though, because for me it will be the first day of not only a new job assignment but a whole new career field as I take on the IT (computer support) job for SIM. Dan Uland, the current IT person, knows much more about computers than I but will soon be leaving for 6-12 months. I get to have some fun!

…

Lizards are welcome in our home because they eat insects. I sometimes feel sorry for them thinking that they probably don’t have enough insects to survive very long, but I guess that’s life in the jungle. Here is a baby lizard I found in the sink this week, only an inch long. He escaped down the drain, perhaps to a richer life in the soakaway or septic tank.

…

While I’ve been happy overall not to have the responsibility of the pediatric service on my shoulders in the past few months, I do feel sad at times to be away from those particular patients I had grown to know, especially those in the HIV/AIDS clinic since I saw them so often and rejoiced to see their progress. As Saralynn mentions in her blog entry, one of those friends died some time ago and we just heard about it (I only heard the news from Saralynn). I’m sad he died, and sad not to have been involved with him since last year. I do miss these special little kids.

This is the caption,
inserted by hand in HTML

This is a sample post created with Live Writer. If it works, will it be any easier than posting directly? Possibly. Though of course one wants to be able to work directly with the html, as well. Just use the "View-HTML Code" option. So far, the code looks pretty clean.

I started this just as a "testing one, two, three" post so I could see how Windows Live Writer works with my WordPress-based blog. The more I worked with it, the more excited I got, and in the end I decided to make this a mini-review of what I think is a great, free program. Somehow, I had never heard of Live Writer, even though it has been around for at least a couple of years. Oh well, better late than never.

Images are handled nicely. It’s easy to add a frame or drop shadow, adjust the size, use some basic filters including color temperature. The only feature I miss is the ability to insert a caption. I can do it manually by surrounding the image with a DIV tag, and LiveWriter displays it correctly, so that helps.

Maps can be captioned, why not photos?

A nice feature is that you can insert maps, which aren’t just static images but link to the online Microsoft Live Search Maps.  Of course, all you have to do is type in the location (place, street address, etc.) and select the zoom level. Rather surprisingly, it’s easy to put a caption on a map even though you can’t do it on a photo.

You can insert tables and videos too, though I haven’t tried those. OK, for the sake of completeness, I will!

Tables are easy. Alas, videos aren’t quite as easy. You can’t actually just select one of your local (on your own computer) clips and have it inserted. Rather, you must link to a video that is already published online. Still, since it’s so easy to put videos onto YouTube and similar services, it won’t be too hard to use this feature. Just upload your video to YouTube, select the URL, and paste it into the box.

    There aren’t many (any) options for inserting a video, so you may want to fine tune the final product by hand or using another tool, but at least this is a way to get a video into your blog easily.

John and Nancy Sawyer in Nigeria

If the basic functions aren’t enough for you, there is a whole catalog of plugins you can try, or create one yourself. Interact with Flickr or other services, insert emoticons, even one to insert a photo with a caption and optional tilt (see example)! ("Polaroid Picture" plugin)

The Flickr4Writer plugin is great if you use Flickr for your photos. It lets you select a Flickr photo and insert it into your blog post at a given size, with an optional link to the full size photo on Flickr. You can do the same thing manually by getting the link code on Flickr, but why bother when this plugin will do it for you?

Overall, I’m very happy with Live Writer! I realize that some of the features are already included in the mainline blogging sites, and to some extent you can already compose a blog entry off-line and later copy it to your site. Still, I think the Live Writer is exceedingly convenient, easy to use, and fun. Try it.

(Yes, the tags above are also a feature of Live Writer.)

It seems I’ve developed a case of blogger’s block. It’s not like I haven’t had things to blog about–I’ve had a series of ideas all along, if nothing terribly exciting, at least some things to think about, and news about our life here in Nigeria. So why haven’t I been writing? Anyone with a similar experience? Maybe it’s the hot weather?

A lot of ideas had to to with books I’ve been reading, but the ones I read back in December are getting hazy in my mind now. That in itself is a reason I should have blogged about them back then, just to refresh my own memory and give me something concrete to look back on. Oh well.

It wasn’t by design, but many of the interesting books I’ve read lately are some variety of science fiction or fantasy. My choices have been guided mostly by my kids’ recommendations — it’s wonderful to have kids who read, and who know what I might like to read also.

Saralynn had been telling me for some time that I should read A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller. I started it thinking it was just another story about life after a nuclear holocaust, an idea reinforced by the garish cover. Even after the first chapter or two, it seemed it was just going to be about the old-fashioned, ignorant, anti-technology religious monks opposed to progress.

Not so … the book developed in complexity and moral depth as it progressed, covering a period of several hundred years in three sections. As with any good science fiction, the point is not an escapist story but a deeper look at humanity and the world today. It was also a page turner, at least for me. Besides being an exciting and interesting story, it deals with thought-provoking issues including the roles of individual and state; ethical boundaries to technical knowledge; religion and power; and freedom of conscience.

Highly recommended and a book you’re almost sure to find at your local library. (4.5 stars rating on Amazon)

Well, here I am, still using Vista, three months after writing my blog entry about some of its frustrations. The frustrations are still there and I still consider scrapping the whole thing and loading XP. So why haven’t I done it yet? After all, I’ve already done a complete factory re-installation just to get back to a (semi)-stable system; why am I still struggling with Vista?

• Hassle: This laptop came with Vista installed, so if I install XP from scratch, I’ll have to find and install all the right drivers, and somehow obtain or live without the bundled software. Come to think of it, I’m using almost none of that software anyway, but Lenovo’s ThinkVantage utilities are sometimes handy. To switch to XP, I’d probably try to get Lenovo to send me an installation DVD, since I know they do or did sell this model with XP as an option (for an extra $100!).
• Features. Vista does have some nice features. Some, such as the search capabilities are actually user friendly. You can pretty much just type a word or two into the Explorer search box and get a list of files that match, instantly. Google Desktop does much the same thing, but the Vista version has its own advantages. Google Desktop kept crashing in Vista anyway ….. Reading Vista Toolkit, I am also learning about some of the fundamental improvements to the operating system which are not as visible, and I’m grudgingly convinced that the OS is probably superior, at least for systems with the resources to handle it. Of course, the book is written by Microsoft …
• Going with the flow. I think that sooner or later, I’ll have to switch to Vista along with everyone else [correction thanks to David, below: should be every other Windows user, since there are non-Windows alternatives]. Even now, it’s getting hard to find new laptops with XP pre-installed rather than Vista. It probably would have been better to wait another year or at least until the first service pack is public, but it’s what I have now.

I have, however, become a lot more cautious about loading up my new system. Within a few weeks of getting my brand new, fresh, laptop in December, I was getting so many program crashes and problems that I gave up and, as I said, reinstalled everything from scratch, going back to the factory-new state. This time, I am only slowly adding software.

Firefox is my favorite browser, but I haven’t installed it yet. My main photo editor doesn’t work right on Vista (unless I upgrade it), so I haven’t installed that, either. Ditto with Acrobat (the full version, not the reader). Before I install anything new, I make sure that the system has been running well for a couple of days. Then, if warranted, I make a backup or restore point. I keep a detailed log of everything I install, of each backup or system restore point I make, and of each significant problem.

There is one more key step, however, if you want to migrate to Vista and you have more than the most basic applications to migrate. After all, how can I cope when some applications don’t run, others crash, and I have to be slow and methodical about adding devices and programs?

The key is to run a virtual computer with XP, a virtual computer where I can install whatever I want that already runs in XP. A virtual computer is a program that runs on your “real” hardware computer, but acts like a separate, independent computer. There are many virtualization programs available, but I’m using the free (for personal use) VirtualBox by Innotek. I installed VirtualBox, then used it to create a virtual machine with a virtual hard drive. Then, it was easy to boot it with a Windows XP installation CD, go through the usual installation process and, presto, I have two computers in one. (See image, click for larger view. The XP machine is the main application running in the Vista desktop.)

Now, for example, when my scanner didn’t work in Vista, even with the new Vista-compatible drivers, I just installed it on the vbox XP system. End of problem. Of course, the virtual machine is theoretically a little slower than the “real” one, but it still runs faster than my 5-year-old laptop, and I don’t notice any performance problems.

Actually, I also cheat a little by keeping my old laptop running, since I know that everything more-or-less works on it.

There you have it, a piece of cake. If you want to eat your cake and have it too, go ahead and upgrade to Vista, but be sure to keep XP around one way or another. On the other hand, a friend tells me that most of his computer friends have dumped Vista and gone back to XP entirely, and I have to admit that this sounds like the simple road to follow.

Reading this again makes me wonder if I’m crazy … this is a lot of trouble to go through just to stick with Vista! On the other hand, how much trouble will I have trying to revert back to XP? (Yes, I can dual boot, adding even more complications …)

Photo by Flickr user Otzberg

You really want to avoid the Frankfurt airport if you can. If you can’t avoid it, then be sure you arrive well rested and alert. It’s unlike any other airport we’ve seen—a confusing maze of terminals and concourses without any detectable pattern or symmetry, at least from the inside. We arrived from DC at 7:30 this morning at gate B20. Our flight to Abuja was supposed to leave from A56, so we followed the signs that direction. Up the elevator, down a long bridge-walkway, around the corner, to where we saw a departure notice board: it showed our flight as being “B” with no number, and it wasn’t clear if that meant Concourse B in an unknown location or what, so we continued toward A56.

Up another elevator to a tram platform where you have to leave your baggage cart behind, then 200 yards on the tram, down stairs again, and – what? – security check! If you start from the tram, you can get onto your flights in Concourse B without going through security, but to get into A you have to go through security again. Go figure. I had felt cheated at Dulles because the inspectors didn’t query any items in our carry-on bags, but the Germans didn’t let us down: they opened Barb’s bag and found the packages of 5/16” light-duty staples. The first inspector wasn’t sure those were ok, so she had to check with someone else, but fortunately they were allowed. Who would have guessed.

We were finally in the right place, about half an hour after we had arrived. There was no information person around at the moment so we rested a while and changed clothes. Then I found a Lufthansa agent and asked about the gate number for the Abuja flight. She looked it up on her paper – B30. I told her our boarding passes said A56, so she checked with whoever it is who really knows, and said it had been changed again, now to B43.

It took only 15 minutes to get back to B concourse now that we knew where we were going and, as I said, we didn’t have to go through security again. We were really thirsty and started looking for a drinking fountain. Nowhere. Hmm, what about in the little rest area? Yes, if you have to go through Frankfurt and have a layover, you can try to get a chair in the rest area on the top floor of the B terminal. They have showers, too, if you want to pay something over $10 for a shower. Alas, there wasn’t a drinking fountain. Perhaps a pay drinking fountain even? Didn’t see one.

We did see, though, that you could buy bottles of water for only 3 euros for about a pint bottle. Let’s see, that comes to, 3 euros is about $5, a pint is an eighth of a gallon, so about $40/gallon. Looked at another way, it’s only five cents per teaspoon, not bad considering it’s bottled water in an airport, but we really needed a lot of teaspoons.

We finally discovered McDonalds, where we found we could buy large tropical delight drinks for only 1.50 euro. That was pretty good for thirst, but I still needed more water. I had noticed in one bathroom (but not another) a sign that said “drinking water,” so I carried my MacDonalds cup inside, filled it up, and chugalugged. I don’t think the other travelers in there were too used to people coming in to drink the water

A large, multi-lingual sign proclaims that this is indeed drinking water. Photo by Vicky van Santen

[As I was writing this, and looking for pictures on Flickr, I found one of a drinking fountain at Frankfurt airport! Perhaps it is still there somewhere. If anyone knows the location, we can post it here!]

By now it was getting near boarding time and we went in to the gate area to wait. Surprisingly few people were waiting for the flight (I guess others know about Frankfurt, too). There was the usual announcement about preparing to board, except that they said we’d take a shuttle bus to the plane. Then not 5 minutes later the gate agent was shooing us all out the door–I barely had time to shut down the computer.

The best surprise was the last: we got on this little tram and drove and drove, past the various concourses we had already been walking around, beyond all the concourses, beyond the fuel depot, and to the air cargo section. Then we de-trammed, walked across the tarmac, waited at the bottom of the stairs gazing at the engine that must have been a good 10-12 feet high, and finally boarded. We realized, too, that no one had checked our passports or visas the entire time we were in Frankfurt.

Maybe this whole boarding procedure doesn’t seem unusual for you more seasoned travelers, but it seemed a bit strange to me. How did we even know we were getting on the right plane? And at the cargo area? Maybe they had said, hey, we’re booked light today, let’s let the passenger crew have a day off and we’ll just send these people with the cargo plane? Or, was it some kind of reverse hijacking, where we were all going to be flown to some strange destination? Reality TV? (OK, I didn’t think of that one at the time, not having lived in the US long enough).

Naturally, all went perfectly well and, I’m sure, it was all routine. We had a great flight, nice food, and arrived in Abuja half-an-hour early.

Final thought: fill up your water container (if you’re allowed to have one) on the plane before you land in Frankfurt.