Chapter 26 - I Am Down Here! Where?

“He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out

of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and
established my goings.”

—Psalm 40:2

Living in Ivory Coast meant that we sometimes

needed medical attention. The best place for
us to go was a Baptist Hospital about twelve hours
away in Ferkessedougou, close to the Burkina Faso
border. Most of the time we would drive up to
Bouake where missionary friends lived, spend the
night with them, and then head to the hospital the
next day. Upon arriving at the hospital, we would
be assigned to a little house. On this particular visit,
a doctor was off to the United States, so we were
lodging in his somewhat more comfortable home.
    Our favorite place to eat was a little restaurant
that served the best steak and fries you ever put into
your mouth. However, we usually cooked at home
rather than eating out. One day Linda and I were
preparing lunch when I heard a faint cry for help
coming from somewhere. Since the sound was very
faint, I dismissed it at first. We continued to prepare
the lunch, but I did ask my wife, “Honey, do you
hear that?”
    She answered, “No, I don’t hear anything except
the birds singing.”
    I kept hearing this faint cry for help. I suggested
to my wife that we go outside to listen. We both
walked outside, and then Linda said, “I do hear
something, and it sounds like a cry for help, but
where from is it coming?”
    We decided to investigate further, we walked
toward the sound, which grew louder and louder,
especially as we neared a small house. We looked in
the window but saw no one. I yelled out, “You that
are calling for help, where are you?”
    A woman’s voice answered, “I’m down here.”
I asked again where she was, and again the voice
responded, “Down here.” I thought to myself, If she
says “Hell,” I am running! Then the voice explained,
“Down here, under the kitchen window.”
    We ran to the kitchen window, and lo and behold,
there was a hole in the ground right under the
window. We looked down into it, and there stood
a woman in four feet of green, slimy, yucky, nasty
looking water. She told us that the kitchen sink’s
drain hole had fallen in as she was walking around
the house, and then she begged, “Please help me get
out of here!” I grabbed hold of one of her hands, and
Linda grabbed hold of the other one, but the woman
was a big woman and, of course, slimy, we could
not get a firm grasp on her. She was slicker than a
peeled onion.
    While Linda tried to comfort her, I told her I
would go for help. I soon returned with four men.
They could not believe what they were seeing, but
we all agreed that we had to get the woman out
of there. First, we got a towel from the house and
dried her hands and forearms. Then two of the men
grabbed hold of one hand each and lifted her up a
ways. Then we dried off her arms as far as we could
reach and heaved her out of the pit that she had been
in for two hours.
    Needless to say, the woman was a real mess and
very smelly, of course. But she was not hurt in any
way. She thanked all of us and asked one of the men
to put something over the hole to keep others from
falling in. Then she was off to take a shower, which
we all agreed was a good idea for all of us. This
little adventure had certainly been “the pits”!

(Copyright by Jay B Ayers)