Art Imitating Life or Life Imitating Art?

I decided that a novel I was writing would climax in one of the most dangerous countries in the world. At the time, rebels were hacking off arms and legs in Sierra Leone. Delicious for a fictional plot but not exactly the place I’d like to go to research. Our State Department warned about visiting. I settled into a plan to interview former missionaries and search the internet for detail. Then a friend told me about a relief organization that was sending teams even before the civil war was over. He put me on the spot! I could no longer claim it was impossible to go.

Two days later, I heard from the director of World Hope International: he was flying into the country in UN helicopters. I searched the internet for what kind of choppers the UN was using and what kind of pilots. Thanks to the number of crashes reported in the news, I was able to determine that the UN was flying Russian-made helicopters with Ukrainian pilots. But how could I not take the opportunity to research my “bush doctor” character for the novel? I was beginning to think God had no scruples!

I listened to all my friends, who thought I was crazy. I updated my last will and testament. Then came the immunizations and many prescriptions required to keep me healthy in the country called “the white man’s grave.” I studied up on the nine species of poisonous snakes I might meet “up country.” And then I took a deep breath and acted the part of a bush doctor so that my fictional doctor might have an authentic voice.

In five days, our team of three doctors and a handful of nurses saw nearly 5,000 patients. I’m grateful to the Sierra Leonean nurse who worked with me side-by-side . “I may know what,” Brima told me, “but you know why.” We worked as quickly as we could, and I sketched mini-lectures for him explaining the biological basis for some of the medical conditions we were seeing.

Something happened on that trip I hadn’t counted on. I fell in love with the people of Sierra Leone. Next month I’ll leave for my third trip working with the native nurses who’ve been running the shop since the doctors fled home to the West. (In the hospital where I work, even the surgeon is a nurse!) My novel is finished, but God isn’t finished with me. Little did I know that at the time I chose Sierra Leone for a novel, God was planting a desire in my heart for a new role in retirement. Doctor-friends at home are helping me develop a continuing education course for these wonderful nurses. Others are sharing of their wealth to support the medical work up country. Oh, there’s one more thing. The main character in my next novel is a fascinating nurse by the name of Brima.

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