Week 2

O'yaowrey (Good morning),

This week has flown by without a doubt. Projects are rolling along here. Two of our collegues have left for the States, but we have been joined by a Canadian college student, Ian, who works with non-profit aid and relief organization named Real Medicine. We have been very blessed to have him here. He has brought lots of supplies, a fresh perspective, and the ability for all of us to dog Canadians, especially fun on July 4th.
The clinic is doing more business than ever before. Mostly women and come in with their sick children but as benefits increase (new medicines, new certifications) more people are arriving. If this week has shown me one thing though, it's how little this clinic can do to stop the overarching feeling of helplessness in rural Africa.
Wednesday night, a man came in while we were about to eat dinner. We were sionging patriotic songs and touting our Americanism. He said hello, shook our hands and sat down quietly. None of our hosts were in the room: just us mzingus. Then, ten minutes later, Grace, Fred and Milton's sister, burst in and said this man has been waiting to be seen by the doctor because he has been bitten by a snake. Our eyes went wide. Here was a man who could very well be in mortal danger, and he sat on the couch calmly waiting for us to see him.
Dr. Young, the ObGyn from dartmouth in our crew, examined his foot by flashlight and could not find bite marks. 5 minutes revealed that he was not indeed lying because his swelled to at least 3 times its normal size. We asked him what kind of snake it was; he replied that he believed it to be a Black Mamba (my Kill Bill sense went off and I started taking very deep breaths; don't those kill people in minutes?). After several minutes of talking top the man, Dr. Young decided he should go to the hospital in nearby Rongo. We had no antivenom and he was in pain. The problem though, as Fred and Omondi, fred's other brother, was that if you drive a car down the country road at night, you run a great risk of getting hijacked and robbed. In the end, to my distress, we decided to carry him back to his home with a wrapped foot, and take him to the hospital in the morning. His foot continued to swell and he was taken the next day. The doctors agreed that, yes, medical attention was needed and he was lucky the snake had been small, or he would have been dead.
This story repeats itself constanlty in this village. People are bitten by snakes and refuse medical attention or are unable to get it. Many of them survive by "waiting it out" but many of them also get violently ill, lose limbs, or even die. The clinic has a long way to go.
One of the girls here,JoHanna, is conducting a study of parasites and bacteria in children's stool as part of her medical school research. She has so far found four different types of parasites, many of them pass mostly through fecal-oral contact, and found many cases in the 50 samples she has analyzed so far. The clinic can solve this problem very simply by giving the chioldren one pill (a pill i will be sure to take when i return) every three months. In hygeine education and availability though, the clinic has a long way to go.
Yesterday, a mother came in with a boy who was so malnourished (he was 2 years old) that his butt had lost most of its fat and could not support his intestines or his rectum. Most of his lower digestive tract passed through his anus and merged as a large sphere of flesh about the size of an adult fist. He did not cry, but tears streamed down his eyes as he was examined at the clinic before being referred to the hospital in Kisii where he was treated successfully.
My most enduring experience though was last week, the afternoon after I posted the last blog. I met with a few women in the village who did not speak very much english and tried my hand at communicating with them. SInce i didn't know anything but "Hey, how are ya?" it was very difficult. Eventually, a young girl came in the hut and started translating for me and them. We talked about our families, I showed them pictures of mine and we laughed for awhile. After some time, Flora, one of the women asked whether I would return.
"I would like to someday, but first I must continue going to school."
"And how long will that be?" she asked.
"About five years." I replied.
Her eyes went wide when she heard the translation. "Five years?!" she excalimed. "But the Aids will have killed me by then."
You can imagne the shock I felt. I had known going into this journey that I would be meeting lots of sick people, and that i should be careful not to get sick. However, the thought that the people I would meet now would not be here in a matter of months did not sink in until that moment. Flora does not look sick. She is rather beautiful, middle-aged, and except for a legion on her upper gums, I would never have guessed she was not in perfect health. SOme of the men here have asked us what AIDS does in America; does it affect as many people as it does in Africa. We tell them that it does not affect as many, but it is the same disease. They say they have heard that the US and Europe have a cure that they are unwilling to give African people. We try toi explain that this is not the case, but we are not sure if they believe us. The clinic is a long way from fixing the problems these peole are going through.
I heard an interesting reflection the other day. It was said that, in America, we seek medical solutions that allow us to live "forever" or until old age. Medicine here, however, is geared to giving five more years: five more years for a woman to be with her child, five more years for a father to provide. I hate sounding like one of those starving children infomercials, but to say that all is great and happy would be a gross error.
There is happiness though, because people are used to the constant threat of death and mishap. The children here are so fun and interesting. Apio, about 9 years old i think, carries her brother Erastus, about 2 around on her back everywhere she goes. The children are sop tough here it is unbelievable. Everyday I am impressed by the responsibility put in the hands of a small child. 6 year olds gather water, herd cows, chop wood and start fires for breakfast. It is indeed a different culture.
This week, we have started teaching at the school as well. It's been a great t ime. These kids are very smart and obedient. They never talk in class and ask questions pretyy consistently. Dani, just graduated from Vandy in May and going to med school, and I have been teachng science, energy specifically. We have agreed that the students are now more confused than ever. Between my wanting to distinguish between Kinetic and potential energy sources heat, and dani's attempt to describe chemical reactions on the molecular level, I don't see how they have a chance. To our credit, I think they are now fully prepared to recite the 1st and 2nd laws of thermodynamics, but...yeaaahhhhh...that's kind of how it went.
The spring prject is moving along too! We broke ground yesterday, and a group of three men cleared out all the brush in the morning. I brought them shovels and helped dig the drainage ditch for an hour (2 feet deep by 2 feet wide by about 30 yards). Because it was so muddy, the only thing to do was take off your shoes and get dirty (mud and water haf way up your shins), the problem of course, is that worms thrive in the surface dirt and mud, especially where feces might have been, and can pass through your feet up into your system...grrrrooossss. After working for an hour, I cut my feet and my fingers and decided that worms were one thing, but infection was something else entirely. I learned that there is indeed a price to clean water that must be paid by someone. This week we will be laying down concrete and placing rocks for a filter. I will be taking lots of pictures.
I hope this entry finds you well. I guess this is a pretty long one and the material is not that uplifting but if there were always smiles, we wouldn't be here. I am very excited to be home, with an ice cream cone in one hand and a hamburger in the other, unafraid of undercooked anything. Enjoy these things for me for now. I will be back soon!

Oriti,
Ben