Last week I shared with you that though Abrahamu was faithfully coming to work every school day, he was getting old. Was it possible that he could no longer see the dirt the new principal saw as his failure to do his job properly? Had the expectations as to how often fires were needed increased?

While waiting for some dorm leftovers, was his falling asleep sitting in the kitchen an indication that he was just too tired to keep up? Maybe there just wasn’t enough sugar in his Chawa. Is it enough just to be faithful? Doesn’t he still need to do his job?

What are God’s expectations of his servants? Are we not to be faithful to the end and continue to do what he gives us to do? I think we often begin to focus on what we are doing rather than the One for whom we are doing it! We may be inclined to give up when we feel we haven’t been successful, haven’t been given more recognition, a higher position, or more respect. When God is in charge and we remain faithful is it possible He wants more time with us and less busyness? Was Abrahamu a failure when he fell asleep on the job?

Ellen and I returned to the states for our furlough and lost touch with what was going on at Rethy.

It turned out that Abrahamu was retired by the new principal and his son Isaaka was hired to take his place. All was no doubt in order and he even received a watch as part of the thanks expressed at his retirement celebration. Everyone no doubt remembered his many years of faithful service to Rethy Academy. I wasn’t there but he did show me his blue faced Timex watch.

Ellen and I returned from our furlough to take up our responsibilities at the dorm. It wasn’t long before Abrahamu presented himself at our door stating his readiness to return to work.

We heard that he had refused to hand over the school keys to his son and had beaten him. Apparently retirement was a totally unsatisfactory solution from his perspective. I had learned about how retirement works in Zaire when we had retired Ebeli several years earlier.

In spite of the committee decisions, the official documents, and the retirement watch, I gave Abrahamu Longa the job of teaching his son how to do the work he had done for so many years. We called him a “Par Jour”, a day laborer, receiving his pay each month depending on the number of days recorded in Silavano’s roll call book. Though not officially an employee he was still one of the dorm workers and he now belonged again. Eventually Isaaka took over and I think he even got to carry the keys. I have no idea if Abrahamu came every work-day or if he actually taught Isaaka anything new that he didn’t already do better than his dad had. He did show up fairly often and spent time visiting with the men in the dorm kitchen. It was warm there and someone else built the fire. They also had tea and sugar.

A few years later all the missionaries evacuated Zaire as Laurent Kabila and his rebels swept the country to eventually depose Mobutu and put themselves in power. In view of the extensive looting that had taken place it was very unlikely that Rethy Academy would ever open again.

On my exploratory visit I found that the school had been trashed and two of the three dorms had been burned, but at the other end of the mission station the looting wasn’t so bad and miraculously the press was untouched. The FM radio broadcasting equipment had been saved, hand carried across several wet valleys to the Goikpa church. The four bay antenna and the materials imported to build the broadcasting tower were still in the back of the press and in the unopened container.

I made arrangements to initiate repairs to the house which was to become our new home near the press and the temporary radio broadcasting studio near the tree with the antenna strapped to its top.

Things in the country had settled down so we were allowed to return to Rethy and were assigned to again direct the work at the printing press and to continue working on the new radio station to be erected on Puu hill, halfway to Kwandruma.

A number of the former dorm workers showed up at our new home. Abrahamu was among the old men from the dorm that later joined us for tea. Hosea, the former head cook, Timona, the oldest one in the kitchen who monitored the baking, and Musa were there too. Ellen enjoyed serving her cooks the sweet bread she and Marko had prepared. Abrahamu placed several teaspoons full of sugar in his tea, showing his appreciation with his noisy sipping and the smacking of his heavy lips.

We saw Abrahamu from time to time when he came to visit. He asked us for blue air forms so he could write to his children in America. He brought his letters, written in Kinguana, for Ellen to add the address, fold, and seal. A phrase that showed up repeatedly was “Tuma dollards” (send dollars). Of course we needed to add the Kenya stamps in order to send the letters out through Bunia for mailing in Nairobi. Abrahamu visited often enough to have a favorite woven wicker chair that was by the door in the kitchen where he and Marco shared their tea.

The single sideband radio network monitored and used by the Rethy hospital brought us the message that my elderly mother has passed away. The ANNK bus service in neighboring Uganda was still operating in spite of a number of busses having been attacked and destroyed by bandits in the Murchison Falls Park. We would follow that road in route to Nairobi for me to get a flight to Florida to briefly join the rest of my family while Ellen stayed at Kijabe. Uwor had recently returned from purchasing medicines in Kampala and when responding to our concerns said, “If it is your day, it is your day.” We took the ANNK bus and got through safely. It wasn’t yet our day.

In a couple weeks we again used the ANNK bus service, passing three burned out wrecks in the Murchison Falls Park as we headed back to Rethy.

How old Abrahamu learned we had returned I’ll never know, but it wasn’t long before he came to visit. Ellen opened the back door in response to his weak knock. He may have been leaning on the door because he stumbled forward, falling face-down on the cement floor. She called Marko and I from the wood pile for help. Abrahamu had no strength to help Marco and I get him on his feet. I held him erect as Marko got his favorite wicker chair and put it behind him. When he was seated, he leaned against the counter-top, watching silently as Marco prepared his tea. Export quality Ketepa tea leaves from Kenya were used to make the brew.

To my question asking about where he had tea when we were away, his weak answer wasn’t very clear. I did discover that he had had no sugar since he had last taken tea with us. In the dukas the Rhino Chai that “makes you strong like rhino” was sold in little green packets but I am sure he would never buy tea like that. Tea was also sold in the market place measured out with small tomato paste tins into the customer’s container. That tea was the small stems, twigs and sticks that were heavier than the tea leaves and dropped first when the blower at the tea factory sorted the quality tea from the debris. I doubt Abrahamu could even afford that. He probably had hot water that tasted of smoke, if he had the wood to make a fire at home.

The fragrance of the boiling tea, his fascination as he watched Marko fill his cup, and the warmth of the kitchen was making him sleepy. Marko added some milk.

Abrahamu tried to sit up when Marco placed his cup, a spoon, and the sugar bowl within reach. Adding his own sugar into the cup took considerable concentration. Carefully he added one spoonful after another. Though a little spilled he scraped the last from the sugar bowl into his cup and began slowly stirring. He may have encountered resistance because of the quantity of sugar he had used to prepare his supersaturated solution. With two hands he raised the cup to his lips. The idea of this being a reverent ceremony crossed my mind.

Abrahamu became talkative. I began to ask him questions and he became ever more animated, raising his voice. He became more like the Abrahamu I had known all those years. He again began asking about my former classmates at Rethy wondering if they had sent any “dollards” back from America for him. By now he had drunk all the liquid from his teacup and was consuming, with relish, spoonful after spoonful of tea colored sugar from his cup.

Later I asked him if he wanted me to take him back to home to Bwa, but no, he wanted to go to the Kwandruma market place.

I was concerned that he would be unable to walk home from Rethy and now he was insisting that he wanted to go to the market. That would add about three additional kilometers to his walk back home. I had only a motorcycle so we would have to ride double to the market. Either he was uncomfortable holding on to me, or he was unable to hold on tightly. This didn’t seem like it would work very well. He wasn’t able to lift his feet up to place them on the passenger foot pegs, so Ellen helped him get them in place.

At first the road was fairly smooth and I drove slowly, but when we came to the old mud-hole near where the soldier’s camp used to be, I could tell he was about to fall off the bike. The mud had dried but the hardened ruts were so uneven that it was nearly impossible to keep the bike erect. With the help of Jeff, who had been following on his smaller motorcycle, we again got his feet on the pegs and continued our slow progress for a couple more kilometers to stop at the market. He didn’t want me to wait for him to take him home. A mutual friend told me he would watch him so I headed back home.

An earlier sponsor of the radio outreach effort heard that it was possible to continue the work and sent $25,000 to begin construction of the new radio studio at Puu. We used bricks from the Titchie dorm that had burned down and rock that was dug locally and hauled to the site. The work was progressing well and the 110-foot tower erected. Ellen had Abrahamu, Timmona, and Musa join us for tea and cookies several more times. We would visit for a while but I returned to work as soon as I could. We sent letters to America for Abrahamu, but I can’t recall any “dollards” coming from his friends, who were mostly my former Rethy classmates.

Our time in the new DRC abruptly came to an end when we were told by the church to leave Rethy. The Lendu and Hema tribes were in conflict at nearby Blukwa, the Lendu were killing and driving away the Hema. An entire village of more than seventy thatched huts was burned. The Lendu at Rethy were similarly hostile to the Alure. We evacuated again, this time by road.

Some years later we had an opportunity to send letters to our friends at Rethy and enclosed some “dollards”. When our missionary friend returned to Bunia he passed the letters on to trusted men to carry to Rethy. Charlie Lonu, who had worked for the Klines, was one of those trusted men.

In his two-page letter later carried from Bunia and posted in Florida, Charlie shared a lot of news from Rethy, relating that a number of our faithful dorm workers had died, including Abrahamu. Abrahamu served hundreds of MKs at Rethy Academy and never advanced above the level of a janitor. He lacked sugar in his tea, and wondered if those he chased to school would remember him and send him some dollards. God used him where he was and he was faithful. God used him to call me.