Nebo

Watching 12-year-old Nebo Briand awaken from surgery to find two perfectly-straight casted feet touched Roberta Weaver more deeply than she thought possible.

He repeated over and over again in the Marshallese language, "Don't take the casts off, don't take the casts off!" thinking that once they came off, his feet would return to their original, crippled condition.

"The look of wonder and joy in his eyes was the most heart-rending thing I've ever seen in all my years of surgery," says Weaver, who was Nebo's operating room nurse. "His big, magnificent smile was all the thanks I needed."

In a developing country like the Marshall Islands, people with "special" problems usually must resign themselves to a life of discomfort, inconvenience, even ridicule. Young Nebo already had been walking on his painfully-twisted ankles for more than ten years, and no doubt he knew the even deeper pain of childish taunts and barbs.

The team that did Nebo's surgery, and several dozen others, had to fly in all of their own supplies and equipment, three pickup loads, most of it donated.

Nebo's physician, Dr. Leisure Yu, says working with the people really opened his eyes. "You realize that these people are just as important in God's eyes as you are," he says. "It's a great equalizer. You see patients with pain and problems; it makes you want to reach out to them, and also humbles you a bit.

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