“A boy of about 10, one day came to us on foot from a village which is about 78 km from us. He had left four days earlier with his mother who was pregnant and about to give birth. Being faster, he ran ahead of her to get there first and to warn us to go and to help mom. We tried to reach the woman by taking the car, 2-3 nurses and everything needed to face the track which is rather bad, inside the forest. It was the rainy season, but we strongly decided to face that challenge too.
We found the woman about 40 km from the mission. She had already given birth with the help of her mother who had accompanied her. A baby of just over a kilogram was born and they had wrapped her in a very dirty cloth. Unfortunately the woman was dying of a hemorrhage. We had brought some medicines, but they did not help and in the end she did not make it. The baby had to be taken to the Center but first we had to go to her village to take her mother body. I do not know how things happen in the forest – probably the tam-tam is faster than a telephone because they already knew that the woman was dead and that we were going to the village to carry the body. Arriving at the village the people had already prepared two tree peels and placed the body on top of them.
We left to return to Sembé, but before reaching the point where we had picked up the woman, someone stops us on the road and tells us to go and to get a man who, inside the forest, had been bitten by a snake. They say it is close, but the Pygmies do not explain well and with a “it is there” they think we understand. But we know that a “ it is there” for them means “near”, that is 30-40 minutes on foot in the middle of the forest. We walked for that time and managed to find the man. We picked him up but the time went by and we realized that a storm was coming. Thunderstorms in the forest are very dangerous because the wind easily uproots the trees and there are bad consequences. We took the road in reverse, we managed to reach the car and we left with the man on board.
We would have travelled about ten kilometers, it was almost dark and here they stop us again. At that moment I asked the Lord to stop bringing people to us: the car was full, we had a baby and a man to take quickly to the hospital! We listened to what the person who stopped us said: a woman was sick. She had a very big belly, but she was not pregnant and they did not know what she had or what to do to cure her. It grew dark, we took a lamp and we walked another half hour to get to her hut and finally we found the woman. She was lying on the ground with this very swollen belly. We understood that it was an intestinal obstruction and she was going to die. There was absolutely nothing we could do on the spot, we had to take her to the Center. And time passed and the storm approached. We managed to get to the car and it started raining. We had to wait about 45 minutes for the flood to calm down a little.
When we were able to leave, a large tree had fallen on the road and blocked our way. With the machete we had with us it was impossible to clear the way; we should have taken a long detour. In those moments we really ask ourselves if God exists: we had all these difficulties and we were in a hurry to get to the hospital, because of the serious situation of the sick who were with us. Really many thoughts arise, but in the end I always leave situations in His hands knowing that those people belong to Him. And not long after we heard some guys coming from the forest, they were singing. I asked if, while they sang, they could also cut the tree that prevented us from proceeding… they did it; just the passage for the car and we were able to leave again. The Lord helped us also that time and we were able to get home.
The woman had an intestinal obstruction and she was saved thanks to surgery during the night.
The man bitten by the snake was still being treated when I left, I think he is still hospitalized, but he was doing well.
The baby went to be part of that group of children who, when mothers die, stay with us for about six months and they are looked after by everyone, then we try to find a family for them. Her little brother wanted to call her Malika, like their mother.”
-Sister Rita