Into Africa: September 2015

7 September 2015

The ice cream man is on my neighbor’s compound today. I can tell because an off key version of “My Heart Will Go On” is playing on repeat from his stereo. The kids run out with the pocket change they have to buy some overly sweet shaved ice from the cooler tied down to his bike. At least it’s cold on this scorcher of a day. I’m finishing up some documentation in my office. It’s the first room when you first walk in to the center, so my window looks right out into the front parking area and the road. For now it’s pretty bare; just a desk, chair, bench, and small cabinet. I hung up my Pittsburgh Marathon calendar. Today’s the 7^th. Not my favorite day, but then again, it’s just another checked box closer to cold draft beer and real ice cream every day.

I’m starting to get into a rhythm here at the center. At least I think I am. Most days are usually filled with language barriers (but my Luganda lessons continue nonetheless, twice a week, every week) and plenty of tea breaks – a must for me. Today was difficult when I was filling prescription bags with ARVs and when the nurse told me, “Thirty, thirty thirty, thirty,” I asked if she wanted 30 pills in each bag, alternating between the 2 different kinds of medicines. She said yes. That’s not hard. When I was done, I saw her dumping the smaller pill bags together to make them into bags of 60. Apparently the second “thirty-thirty” meant sixty. I mentioned to my counterpart later that I had some trouble understanding the nurse to which she replied,
“Yes, I know. I heard.”
“Oh, did she bring it up to you?”
“No, the sister did.”
“Oh…good.”
Just another example of how things aren’t directly dealt with here. If someone has a problem with you, you’ll never hear it from them, always from someone else. For me, that can be frustrating. Don’t tell me yes when the answer is no. I’d rather get it right than have someone fix my mistakes every day.

Besides that, though, things here are good. The staff found out I can type pretty quickly, so they’ve put me on permanent data entry duty. I don’t mind, it makes me feel useful. From that and mingling around with the patients and staff, running errands around the center, having weekly Luganda lessons, and learning all about the HIV Clinic, my time is filled I found walking around the village after the heat has subsided (usually around 530 or 6) is pretty relaxing. That’s when I don’t mind waving and greeting everyone within a 50yd radius. The matooke trees line the horizon, the sun starts to go down, and I’m happy.

But you know what sucks? Being sick. You know what sucks more? Being sick alone. But the worst of all? Being sick, alone, 7,000 miles away from home in Africa. I don’t do sick well. If I have to work and can’t get out of it, I’ll do it, but I’ll cry all day on in the inside and mope around. So when I woke up at 3:30AM Wednesday morning running back and forth to the bathroom like “Bathroom, toilet, now now,” I knew I was in for a rough day.

Side note: I am so so so so so times infinity thankful for an inside bathroom and toilet, especially for emergencies like these where I don’t have to use a poop bucket.
Back to it.

Technically I wasn’t alone when I was sick. I called my counterpart to tell her I would be sleeping until lunch to see if I felt any better, but she insisted on coming to check on me every few hours. She even made me ramen for lunch (the only thing I could think of eating). Then both Sister Immaculate and Sister Priscilla came periodically throughout the day to check on me. That was so sweet and caring except when they’d come mid-nap, and I’d roll to the door looking like a miserable kid down in the pediatric ward.

The next day, I had to go to Kampala. I had an appointment with the Peace Corps Medical Office to pick up some meds and get tested for a suspected parasite from when I zip-lined into the Nile. Crap. I caught a taxi around 730 and tried not to puke everywhere like I had earlier that morning. I’m sucking down the ORS I’m supposed to take still just feeling miserable, but I can make it. So my taxi conductor asks where I’m going and I say “Old Taxi Park.” From there I can grab another taxi to Kamwochya up near Kololo and walk to the office. Well the first taxi park we get to, my conductors like, “Here ya go, Taxi Park, see ya,” and ushers me out. I’m looking around thinking, “Is this it? It’s a taxi park, but where am I?” Before I can turn and say I’m at the wrong place, my taxis gone. And it’s not like I said “Old Taxi Park” wrong. That’s what it’s called. The locals know it as such. But here I am, alone, in some unknown taxi park, being heckled and pushed by boda men all shouting at the same time “muzungu, where are you going?” and “you first come and we go.” I looked at all of them with hollow eyes, and I really wished I knew how to say “I’m about to puke/poo all over you,” in Luganda. No such luck, so I find solace in a quiet corner of a shopping center next door.

When Maama K was here, I met her close friend, Sully. He’s a driver in Kampala and since I was in a pickle, I thought I’d give him a call. Well then I realized that Sully had a thick accent and wherever he was it was quiet noisy. So after many calls and failed texts messages, I said screw it and found a guy with a car. “Are you a driver?” I asked. He paused before he said “Uh…yes. I am.” I told him I needed to go to Kololo. He gave me a price to pay. It was way too much. But I wasn’t about to haggle with this dude if he’d drive me straight to the office, so I said, “Yes, we go now now.” And by some miracle of God, we got to HQ in once piece. And then I left my PC phone on the seat of his car. Double crap. This is not my day.

Got to the PCMO, the nurse gave me a hug, then tried twice to draw blood out of each arm, and I cried giant big embarrassing baby tears. Like “I want my mommy” tears. Oh man. I promise, it hurt. But more on that was just being stressed and sick, thus, excessive crying. Francis the doctor came in, propped me up on the exam table with a pillow behind my head, and talked to me in that soft soothing voice that Ugandans do really well as he got the needle in my arm.

HQ has a volunteer lounge. I found some other PCVs who were going to lunch, and by this point, I was finally hungry for something. We went to Acacia Mall, a hot muzungu place to chill, and I got some apple juice and a roast beef sandwich. Heaven.

The one PCV, Kelsey, asked me how it was going at my site. I said, “Well, every day has its struggles, but in the end, everything’s ok and I have a lot of time here to really connect with people.”
She smiled and said I had basically just summed up Peace Corps. And that was a really nice moment. So even when I’m crying and sick, maybe there’s a chance I’m doing this thing right.

That was until I got back to HQ and the nurse told me she tried calling my phone and a man answered and said I had left it on the seat of his car. Cue more crying sniffles. This wasn’t my day. Not to worry, though. Pius was on it. He’s head of Safety and Security. They told me to relax, stay at Fat Cat (a hostel), and come back the next day for it. It was too late to start traveling back to my village; PC doesn’t want us traveling at night.

I found more PCVs and basically asked them to be my friends as we went to the hostel, booked a bed to sleep in, and went to dinner in Centenary Park down near Garden City. They took me to a Turkish place, we had kebabs and a day bed as a table, and even though it was cold and raining at this point, I felt a lot better. A lot a lot.

I’ve just started my fourth month in country, and fourth week at site. I didn’t believe them when they said time really flies here. But it’s starting to feel more real every time I flip the calendar page back. And even though September 7^th shows up like gum stuck to the bottom of my shoe in every data file I enter and every form I start for a new patient, I have to remember that it’s just another day, and the gum can be picked off and forgotten. Tonight, I’ll make some pasta with veggies, maybe peel some obumonde and have fries as an appetizer, watch an episode of The West Wing, wash my feet, and listen to the bats fly around inside my ceiling before I fall asleep in my little village.

All’s well here.
Until next time,
Kelly