CMS Ireland Ken and Judith Finch

New beginnings

2013-01-16T00:00:00Z

Roger Cooke writes…

Ken and Judith are having some trouble accessing their blog from Kampala, so have asked me to send their greetings and to share their latest Link Letter, which we posted out from the CMS Ireland office yesterday.

You can read the Link Letter by clicking here

Ken and Judith will be sharing their latest news at a special Mid-Africa Focus Event in February, to which all are welcome. Here are the details:

Mid-Africa Focus Evening: with Ken and Judith Finch
Friday 8th Feb, 7:30pm; Knockbreda Parish Halls, Belfast

For further information contact CMS Ireland’s Belfast office

Change

2012-04-11T00:00:00Z

Dear Friends,

Conscious that not all of you receive our Link Letter, we have taken the liberty of including it here, on our blog. So here goes…

Kiwoko has seen many changes of late.

In March we moved back into the rainy season. The rains brought much relief as we had not had any since early December. The rains bring a complete change in the community with people out from early in the morning digging and planting – we pray that the rains will continue so people will reap a good crop.

The hospital has seen some significant changes too. There are many ongoing developments at the hospital including new staff housing and renovations to the paediatric ward. However it is changes in staffing that are often the most heartfelt.

After 9 years at Kiwoko we said goodbye to Alison Fletcher. Alison has overseen the development of the Physiotherapy Department at Kiwoko and more recently the HIV Department. We pray for Alison as she settles into life in the UK.

In addition Rory, Denise and Gideon have also returned home for a period of leave until September. We trust they will have a time of refreshment amongst their many visits and commitments.

Change is also on the horizon for us. We leave Kiwoko in September this year. Our future has been much in our thoughts and prayers. Ken has now gone part-time at Kiwoko – currently working 3 days per week at Kiwoko and 2 days per week in Kampala at the International Hospital. This is quite exploratory at the moment but may well lead to a full time post on leaving Kiwoko later this year. We pray that we will be faithful to God’s calling for the future.

Whilst working on the wards, Judith sees the change that Kiwoko Hospital makes in the lives and conditions of many patients. One such person is Prossy (name changed).

Prossy is a bright 11 year-old girl who, before falling sick, was doing very well making her way through primary school. She was admitted to hospital with multiple open wounds as a result of pressure sores. She has no feeling or function from the waist down, she is unable to walk, her back is unstable and she has difficulty sitting unsupported. She is suspected to have TB of the spine. Prior to Prossy’s admission it seems there had been little attention given to the care of her wounds or incontinence and at home she had just been spending the days lying on a mat, often indoors.

Despite needing continuing care, her hospital admission was nearly cut short as her mother stated they had no more money to cover her fees. The hospital agreed to cover these through the Good Samaritan Fund. This meant Prossy could remain in hospital until her wounds had properly healed – which they did.

During her time in hospital Prossy was provided with a wheelchair – far from ideal for her condition and size but at least a means of moving around having not done so for some months.

As part of her stay Prossy attended the rehab department. Through this she was able to engage in many purposeful and therapeutic activities to encourage function and enhance her quality of life and fun in the midst of her tragic reality. Hopefully with support from her mother, Prossy would carry on with some of these activities once home.

Though glad to be going home to see her friends it was not a huge surprise to learn that Prossy was sad to leave hospital. The nature of her medical condition would suggest that her long-term outlook was not great. We trust that her journey through Kiwoko Hospital made a positive change in her life.

As we write we are in the Easter season and at church we have been reading about Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. For Jesus, everything changed over the course of the next few days. From the crowds cheering him into the city as their political liberator they soon turned to condemn him to death shouting out “Crucify Him”. In those few days everything changed and has never been the same since.
Because he died we can look forward to eternal life. What an incredible message we have – a message that has changed, and continues to change, so many lives all around the world.

In the midst of whatever you are facing we pray that you would know the wonder of the Risen Lord in your life. He does change everything.

As ever, this comes with our deep gratitude for your continued support for ourselves and the work of Kiwoko Hospital.

God bless

Ken & Judith

Great expectations?

2012-01-24T00:00:00Z

Having been responsible for visitors and students for the previous five years, it is now a different joy and refreshing change for Judith to come back to Kiwoko in her capacity as Occupational Therapist. In practice this has involved working on the wards alongside the physiotherapy team. It is a steep learning curve adjusting one’s expectations and western mindset, and providing therapy that is appropriate to the local cultural context and environmental conditions.

Kato, a truly gentle and humble man has lost all movement and function from the waist down secondary to TB. His upper half is also weak and he has difficulty sitting up with no support. In a western context there would be a lengthy list of items that would be required in order to facilitate his return home and management at home. At the very least a wheelchair and a good bed. But Kato is going home to his one roomed thatched mud hut that is no bigger than our bathroom. He shares it with his wife and five children. Such items would only be a hindrance. So he goes home to be nursed on a mattress on the floor.

How did he get home? On the back of a motorbike, sandwiched between the driver and his wife with his lifeless legs strapped to his wife’s legs to prevent them from dangling into the wheels. On a follow up visit to his home with Solomon the physiotherapist, Kato’s caring wife describes the journey home with laughter.

Whilst I find myself feeling somewhat helpless and thinking this is all very unsatisfactory, I realize how different our expectations are. Despite all the pain, anxiety and uncertainty, Kato must be passing through, his only request is a photo and he simply smiles and thanks us for caring.

How often do we find ourselves in situations where we wish we could wave a magic wand and make everything better. The inability to do so can make us feel inadequate or worse still can cause us to shy away from the person or situation. Yet, like Kato, so many just long to know that we care by simply being there alongside them.

Thank you for your continued prayers and support for the work and people of Kiwoko.

Our Kiwoko Christmas

2011-12-07T00:00:00Z

If you were to come to Kiwoko today,with just over two weeks to go to Christmas you would see little outward signs of it being Christmas apart from the occasional Christmas carol from somebodies radio. If there is already a decorated Christmas tree on a ward it is only because last years tree was never removed!!

Nevertheless, the excitement is very much there and behind the scenes people are busy preparing for the first Christmas event which will be the Hospital Christmas party on Dec 16th. This takes place in the gardens outside our house. This is a time when all hospital staff and students come together. Different wards and departments present skits,songs and dances. There is much laughter and fun followed by a meal of roasted bull, a chappati, soda and cake.

By this stage many of the wards would have gone to town to decorate their wards with streamers and balloons and tree branches decorated with cotton wool and sweets.

Christmas Eve is a very special time when several staff come together and do carol singing by candlelight on each of the wards. Gifts are distributed to all patients -usually some sugar, soap, biscuits and sweets and a toy for the children.

On Christmas day we shall be at St John’s where we normally worship followed by a ‘bring and share’ lunch in the garden. This is usually a ‘fusion’ of flavours as we come together with ugandan and western dishes including a bit of a BBQ and of course plenty of games.

This Christmas we are very much looking forward to our friends Carl and Vicky joining us from St Albans, England as well as Dr Raul, Christiane, Lars and Joshua from Germany. They worked in Kiwoko for four years and returned to Germany over a year ago.

And before we know it we will be into 2012…

Wishing you every blessing,

J&K

Wedding bells

2011-10-31T00:00:00Z

Before going on leave Asiimwe, the Kiwoko Hospial Personnel Manager, had shared with us that he was to get married. We had met Keren on quite a few occasions – in fact often she stayed in our house in Kiwoko when she came to visit Asiimwe. It was out of the blue however when Asiimwe asked Ken if he would be his best man on the big day. We were truly delighted. As we would not be around for the intervening period a lot of measurements and discussions took place back in February / March. On coming back to Kiwoko we only had 2 weeks before the big day.

There was some worry when the suit jacket and the trousers were short on both arms and legs. Thankfully Tania came to the rescue for both Ken & Asiimwe. With fittings sorted, shoes and waiscoats bought everything seemed to be going perfect. Groom and Bestman were at the church in plenty of time but then the minutes passed by.

In fact, we were still waiting at the church when the wedding party arrived about half past twelve. The wedding was to be at 12.00 noon. That would have been ok except this was the wedding party for the next weding after ours!

The bride finally arrived another 15 mins later and then it was all systems go. The church service went quickly as the church tried to make up time and the final festivities drew to a close about 10.30pm after many photos, food, dancing , present giving and eating.

The happy couple are still on their honeymoon and we look forward to officially receiving the back to Kiwoko.

Back again!

2011-10-27T00:00:00Z

How have you left them?

This has been the most common question that we have been asked since coming back to Kiwoko.

People are genuinely interested in knowing how the people at home are, how we left them and also and maybe most importantly did they send greetings.

So of course we have brought the many and varied greetings from people at home to the friends here in Kiwoko which have been received with great warmth and gratitude.

On the run...

2011-04-27T00:00:00Z

It is sometime since we have mentioned any running event…so here we have the Belfast Marathon…We are glad to say it is a team effort. Both Ken and Judith will do a leg of the marathon as part of a relay team.
We have two teams of five- male and female- made up of CMSI staff and will be running to raise funds for the work and ministry of CMSI.

If you would like to sponsor the run you can make a donation online via the cmsireland website.

Many thanks!!

Back Again

2011-04-16T00:00:00Z

We arrived back to the UK on 1st April and relieved to find that the worst of the cold weather was over. In fact it has been sunny everyday since we arrived (at least on the North Norfolk Coast!!).

Packing up our home in Kiwoko, handing over responsibilities, tying up loose ends and saying good byes brings its own added business. We were very grateful for the opportunity to have a week enjoying the turquoise sea of Zanzibar –off the coast of Tanzania – prior to then flying on to the UK. This was a very welcome break and being away from the demands of computers and even mobile phones for a full week was wonderfully liberating.

We are back from Uganda for a period of six months leave. Home leave is a time to visit our ‘link’ churches and supporters updating them on our time and the work of Kiwoko Hospital as well as time to see family and friends.

We shall be based in Northern Ireland from mid April through to the end of June and then England for the bulk of the summer (if Judith gets her way!!).

Our first challenge is for Judith to run a leg of the Belfast marathon on 2nd May (for which she has done no training having forgotten she had signed up to be part of a relay team raising funds for CMSI…Click here to donate to the team (and select AAA-Fundraising)but don’t worry team if any of you are reading this I am making up for it now!!!)

We are scheduled to return to Uganda on 30th September. We anticipate returning to Kiwoko Hospital for at least another year but beyond this our future roles there remain unclear. This is a topic for discussion during our leave.

We look forward so much to seeing many of you and catching up during this time.

More about the Belfast Marathon in the next blog…

Kiwoko Bible Week

2011-01-24T00:00:00Z

Dear Friends,

One of the events that has become fixed in the Kiwoko calendar is the Kiwoko Bible Conference. It has now been running for 7 years.

This year was especially pleasing for us as the main speaker was Andrew Forster who took the participants (over 800!) through the book of Jonah together with other specific talks. He was certainly kept busy during the course of the week in all giving 13 different talks. That was a bit beyond his original expectation of 4 morning talks on Jonah! Anyway he pulled it off and we have been getting very positive responses back.

It was a joy for us to have Andrew this year as he is not just the rector of St Anne’s in Dungannon, Northern Ireland but also our brother in law as he is married to Heather, Ken’s sister who worked with Kiwoko in the early days and so he has a long standing relationship with Kiwoko.

The purpose of Kiwoko Hospital is to present the gospel and although our day to day responsibility to that end is the provision of healthcare, it is important that we do have forums that allow us to clearly present the gospel to church leaders.
It was a great week and we trust that participants will have benefitted from some clear Bible teaching.

Thanks Andrew!

Whats been going on....

2010-11-07T00:00:00Z

Here are a few of the events that have been happening in the life of Kiwoko in the past few months:

The Kiwoko Chase

On the 25th September we held our 5th Annual Kiwoko Chase. This is a running and walking race over 16.5km , followed by an afternoon of fun and games at our Training School grounds. It has become a major focal point in the annual calendar of the hospital with much training and anticipation leading to the big day. This year proved to be again a big success and we were very glad to have Dr Steve Bennett with us as our Guest of Honour this year. Steve has worked as a surgeon at the hospital and although now a consultant in Dunfermline in Scotland remains a close friend to Kiwoko Hospital and the community here.

Summer Visitors

In the summer two teams were hosted at Kiwoko. The first from St Patrick’s Coleraine in Northern Ireland. They came as a group of builders working alongside our own builders in the building of our new Antenatal block which they had also raised the funds for. The Antenatal block is now almost complete and will provide a much improved working environment for the staff as well as better facilities for the mothers to be.

The second team was the CMS Ireland Ekisa (Grace) team which came for two weeks of intensive childrens work with staff children and also children on the hospital HIV programme. This programme has been running for a few years now and is much anticipated by all the kids here in Kiwoko. For us it was also an added joy that 7 of the team came from 3 of our link churches namely: Knockbreda, Seapatrick and Broomhedge.

Radio Kiwoko

As a spin off from the Ekisa team and fundraising that had gone on beforehand by one of the team members a very generous donation has allowed us to introduce “Radio Kiwoko”. We now have broadcasts onto the wards! From christian music and prayers to some inspirational words from our Chaplain and others we hope that this will be a huge boost in ministering to patients and bringing Christ to many.

Farwells

The end of June saw us saying good -bye to Dr Raul, Christiane and their sons Lars and Joshua. This was a sad time as they had arrived at Kiwoko just a month after ourselves in February 2006 and so had been very much part of Kiwoko life for all that time. Schooling needs for Lars meant that this was the time for them to go back to Germany. They are greatly missed and remain very much in our prayers as they settle into life there.

One of Christianes’ roles here was working in the hospital craft project where some of our ladies from the HIV clinic make crafts such as necklaces and baskets in order for them to earn an income. Crafts are then sold through the hospital to people visiting or by shipping overseas. Christiane did a great job in developing this work and supporting the ladies involved. Judith has now taken on that role and finding it very fulfilling. The interaction with the ladies is a great incentive to keep pushing on with learning Luganda…even five years on …

Weekends away

On a personal note we have been enjoying the benefits of getting away from our workplace more frequently over the last few months. It has been most refreshing and we are grateful for the opportunities to do so.