How good it is to know that we belong to the
family of God. No matter where we go there are Seventh-day Adventists,
who greet, are friendly and caring.
Knowing that I was retiring and being not quite ready to accept it,
I decided to retire, and so applied for overseas service in general office
work, almost twelve months in advance. Nothing came up, but as the Lord
led and opened the way, two weeks before retirement, the call came for
an AVS position in Karachi Adventist Hospital, in Pakistan.
Wheels do move slowly at times, and just more than three months later
I arrived in Karachi after an 18-hour flight, having had a superb view
flying over Kilimanjaro, a four hour stop in Nairobi and an hour's stop
at Dubai. We arrived at 05:00, three hours ahead of South African time.
I have a large flat with some tiled floors. Just as well, as the summer
temperature at 06:00 was 30 degrees Celsius, although the air-conditioner
has been on low all night. By midday, temperatures ranged from 39-49 degrees
Celsius; humidity up to 51 deg. C. Winter is very mild here, but
to the north it is very cold, with snow. Karachi Adventist Hospital has
been in operation for 43 years. At present it has a staff of about 500
of which only 20% are Seventh-day Adventists. There are 163 beds, with
occupation varying. The Outpatient Department attends to an average of
120 patients on a daily basis. There are 52 doctors, the consultants only
work certain hours, because they have other commitments. |
A hostel for female student nurses has been in operation
since 1956. In June 1994, a male nurse's four-year course was inaugurated
for the first time.
The cafeteria has recently been renovated, and now has air-conditioning
installed. It serves an average of 890 meals per day to staff and patients.
Only vegetarian food is served.
Adventist Lodge, which is about two blocks from the hospital, has 21
apartments, and also has a Primary/High School. There is a second property
and four apartments about 6 km from the hospital.
Statistics of the population figures vary from l28 000 000 to 140 000
000. I have seen both published in the newspapers The population of Karachi
alone is 14 000 000. There is a lot of everything here besides people:
cars, trucks, scooters, buses, 3-wheeled scooters which serve as rickshaws,
yellow and black taxis, fruit stalls, cubby-hole ships, crows, crime and
heat.
The church/chapel is on the same property as the hospital. It is next
to the block of flats mentioned above. The membership is about 200 with
about 50 attending Sabbath School and about 100 attending the church service
each week. An interesting fact is that the English Sabbath School class
is attended mainly by Pakistanis, and when the offering bag is passed around
and does not reach its goal; it is passed around again, no matter whether
there are 5 or 10 people in attendance.
There are 51 churches in Pakistan. Pakistan is divided into two Sections
(not missions or conferences). Southern |
Section has its offices at the back of the hospital
on the West side. The Northern Section has its offices in Lahore, and they
come under the Pakistan Union with the office and publishing house also
in Lahore. The Union is under the Trans-European Division, based in England.
There are about 35 literature-evangelists in Pakistan.
ADRA plays a very significant part in development in the rural areas.
KAH, as the hospital is familiarly called, is associated with ADRA. We
also have a Public Health Department, and a contingent of nurses that go
into the community several times a week.
Salaries are very low here, food prices are comparable to those in
South Africa and even the imported foodstuffs are not exorbitantly priced.
An incident that happened not so long ago really made us chuckle. Before
Karachi Adventist Hospital was renamed it was called the Seventh-day Adventist
Hospital. If you want to take a taxi to come back to the hospital, you
say: "7-day hospital" and ask the price. There was a very sick man, who
had visited several medical institutions in Karachi and couldn't get better.
He came to "7-day hospital" and within seven days was well and discharged.
He then came back and asked permission to call his newly opened shop "7-day
Coffee Shop". He was given permission and I have noticed two signs outside
the shop. One is "7-day Coffee Shop" and the other on the pole says "7th
day Coffee Shop".
Pray for the workers in Pakistan, the hospital and all Muslim countries
- the work seems so far from finished. |