One Abscess and 15 Chapatis

It’s been a very interesting few days!

I’m getting better at the eating less thing…I’m learning a little bit the intricacies of the fooding as I go...I have mostly not been stuffed-to-the-brim after meals, a great success!

I’ve gotten to see some interesting stuff at the clinic the past few days…The boy with the elbow injury came back and we sent him for an X-ray, but I never heard what happened about that…?

We had a case of typhoid so I got a lesson on the key differences in diagnosis of Typhoid, Malaria, Tonsilitis, and Amoebaiasis, which all have a few symptoms in common and are all common here.

I THOUGHT I might get to see a case of appendicitis when a teenaged girl came in with right-sided abdominal pain, but it turns out it was too high to be the appendix, and she didn’t have any of the other signs. Good for her, I guess!

Today there was a kid with an abscess on his forehead that we had to drain- the think was like a half-inch diameter ball was sitting on his forehead (WARNING here comes gory details, skip to the next paragraph if you don’t want to read it!) and so Jeff cut it open with a scalpel and I got to squeeze all the blood/pus out of it. There was a lot of it, it sort of burst out of there as soon as he cut it, like it was under pressure (well..it was) and so it was awesome. I really like pus!

Unfortunately the kid did not enjoy it and he was quite unhappy that we were inflicting pain on him, so afterwards I tried to make friends with him so he wouldn’t grow up with some strange fear of white people. :-P I think it worked?

This week I had githeri for the first time…It’s basically a concoction of beans, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, cilantro, chick peas…despite my general dislike of beans, chick peas, and cooked non-mushed-into-sauce tomatoes, it was actually pretty good.

What I did not enjoy at all was my first taste of liver. The flavor was not great but I could hadle it…what I could NOT handle was the texture; the way the meat crumbles into mushy crumbliness in your mouth…it feels EXACTLY the way I would have thought it would feel from having dissected so many livers. So basically I started putting the pieces of liver to the side in my mouth while I chewed the rest, and then swallowing them whole with the other chewed food. Success.

Saturday morning 30 seconds after I got out of my bed, a tiny cockroach (about 1.5cm) ran across my bed and up the mosquito net…so I grabbed a shoe and killed it. Proof that they are not indestructible: it only took one swat. :-P

I’ve started daydreaming about the next time I’ll get to use a laundry machine. :-P

Sunday was perhaps my best/favorite day so far…no clinic, but after church a couple people came over for lunch, and I got some very funny Swahili lessons (apparently they don’t like my definition of “pot”...what I call a “pot” has no English word to them, it’s just a “sufuria”…basically an aluminum pot without handles. They call something else “pot”….it was interesting to see what difference I give to “jar” vs. “bottle’ (the diameter of the opening relative to the diameter of the container) etc.

All three people I have said “this is a pot” (referring to a surfuria) in front of have given me this absolutely incredulous look like I’m CRAZY…oh well, perhaps I am.

THEN we went out to the main street to get some meat and carrots and cilantro for dinner. It was the farthest I’ve walked since I’ve been here (and we basically went one block…) ….and I thought it was bad when I walk by myself! Not only do the little kids yell “mzungu” but the adults also ALL have a comment to make to whoever I’m walking with, and sometimes me. If it’s with a guy they congratulate him on “getting himself a mzungu” …and today I was walking with the woman who lives across the hall and a guy followed me into the clinic compound asking me “Will you please give me a chance Mzungu!?” mmmm….no thanks, I’m not really into the habit of picking up guys off the streets. :-P Thankfully, he left when I said “sorry, no” But they never do that when I’m alone. Someone said seeing me walk with a Kenyan signals to them that I’m :approachable” so they feel comfortable talking to me. Makes sense I guess.

But anyway… THEN when we got home we made CHAPATIIIIIIIIIIIIII! Which is the Kenyan version of a flatbread…tortilla/pita-like bread. SO GOOD. I’ve loved them since the first time I came here, so it was fantastic to learn how to make them and get to eat them (for the next few days)! I never realized how much OIL goes into them! But it tastes sooo good so it’s ok. :-P There’s pictures….that I will eventually get to putting online. :-D

Mathare Day 2 and 3

Day 2 and 3at the clinic were more very slow days! This is a common occurrence for me…it seems that the more I want to see interesting medical things, the less likely they are to happen. Oooh well. At the very end of the day yesterday two people got minor cuts and I got to clean them out and bandage them. Today at the very end a kid came by with a veeery swollen elbow that I thought at first might be dislocated but I think he had too good of a range of motion for that. (perfectly fine up to 90 degrees and painful after that…opinions???) But the doctor had left a few minutes before, so he got some pain medicine and was told to come back tomorrow.

Yesterday was difficult…I had a moment sitting at lunch eating WAY more than I wanted to where I was thinking that this was going to be a VERY long month in Mathare if I had to continually eat like this…feeling obligated to eat these huge amounts of food until I was stuffed beyond belief, and then I would feel gross until dinner, when it was time to stuff my face again. I don’t really like feeling full..or the thought of being constantly full for a month, or how huge I would get if I kept eating like that.

I came back to the clinic after lunch and Jeff (doctor) said to me “I can always tell when you have eaten, because you are so …” (and then he flopped back in his chair like he was dead) and he’s right because I would feel like blaaaaah and I’d tell him I ate so much and I hate eating so much, and he was about to blame it on me being American when I said Noooooooooo , it was because I felt bad not eating all the food placed in front of me, I don’t want to offend my host! So he told me the most brilliant thing I’ve heard all week (haha) he said “Kenyans really know how to take care of a visitor. She wants to make sure you have had enough. So just be honest with her and tell her when you have had enough” And I’m thinking “wow…DUH”

In my mind, it was “offensive” to her to not eat what she offered me…but in her mind, she needed to make sure I have had enough to eat and it was offensive not to offer more and make sure I was satisfied. So I felt much better after that…so now all I have to do is say that I am “ok” (I think the phrase “I’m full” means nothing ) and we are all happy. I get to stop eating, not take another helping or any more fruit, and Beth has given me all the food I want. Win-win. So I’m trying this new tactic and so far it’s working. I was very proud of myself for saying “that’s good!” at lunch today while she was spooning stew into my plate with no end in sight. :-P

Something interesting: I’ve seen a good amount of cooking, but nobody uses a cutting board. Fruit is cut in the hand, with knife strokes towards the palm of the hand (and all the medical people and royal rangers cringe). The spinach (a different kind than what I’m used to…large leaves like lettuce, but still dark green) was gathered into a cluster, she’d make a fist around it, and then scrape the knife along the side of her hand to shred it, then move the spinach up as she cut it.

So the spinach-cabbage-meat-onions-peppers-tomatoes stew was eaten with…ugali! The staple of east African cuisine, I’ve heard…it’s made with corn meal and water, cooked into a doughy consistency. It’s almost flavorless, and they break it into pieces and use it to scoop up the stew, basically. I was offered a fork but elected to eat it with my hands the way real Kenyans do. It was kind of funny at first and I still think I don’t do it right (I flattenedthe ugali into more of a scoop-like shape, but I think they just take a half-inch chunk of it and pick up the food next to it)but I’m ok with that for now. :-p

Mathare Day 1

Tuesday

Today was day 1 of working in the Mathare clinic. In the morning we brought my suitcase over to my new apartment, on the third floor of an apartment building on the edge of the slum, very near the clinic. I just piled my stuff in there and went to the clinic.

It was a veeeeery sloooooow day today; the doctor and I spent much more time chatting with each other than with patients. Yesterday was apparently very busy, and hopefully tomorrow will be. So should the opportunity arise, I’m going to learn IVs, injections, and (this is rare, sadly…)suturing, and how to treat the common medical ailments.

The doctor’s name is Jeff. He made me a list of the few most common ailments they see, and gave me a book on management of common medical issues in Kenya, so I can read about them. They see a lot of respiratory infections, malaria (not common in Nairobi, but often people travel outside Nairobi, get Malaria, then come back and need to be treated), parasite/worm infections, urinary tract infections, and wounds (my faaaavorite!) so if we can get the patients flowing, this will be a good experience!

There is one room for the lab, one exam room, and one room for the pharmacy. It is free for the patients to see the doctor, but they have to pay if they need a lab test or medications. Unlike the US, where lab tests are hundreds of dollars sometimes, all of these range from 50-200 shillings. And 80 shillings is one dollar. Every now and then they have a free day, where even the lab and medications are free. Most hospitals around here charge to see the doctor, and then the people have to go elsewhere and pay a lot of money to a “chemist” for their drugs. So this is a very good setup for them.

At one point I stuck my face out the curtain(door) and the kids who were at recess saw me and started shouting "mzungu" so I went out there and they all came over and stood at a distance, until one got brave and came over to touch my hand, which of course started a mob of kids around me touching my hands and fighting to sit next to me until their teachers called them inside...I just can't get over how big of a spectacle I am around here...haha

At 5:00 we closed up the clinic and I went home, unpacked my suitcase and had some (instant) coffee. Then Beth (who owns a salon 30 seconds away) went back to the salon for a “few mintues” (that was almost an hour ago) so I’m here writing this!

First Church and Visiting Naivasha

Sunday:

Sunday morning we went to church at Kenya Assemblies of God – New Mathare. They have two services, the first is in Engliah and the 2^nd in Swahili, though a lot of the worship was in Swahili despite being at the English service. This one lasted from 8:30 until about 11, and apparently the Swahili one goes from 11:30 until 3 sometimes. Oh boy.

So Sunday was a lazy day, after church we had lunch, ran some errands and sat around for a while watching movies and stuff. J

Monday:

Today we went to Naivasha to visit the clinic, which is opening tomorrow for the first time. I will be in Naivasha from mid-February until mid-March, so it was good to see where I’ll be working and living. This also is a gated church compound, with a school and a clinic. I will be living in a house on the church grounds with 6 girls aged about 11-13, and the woman who cooks/cleans/takes care of all them. I’m very much looking forward to it!

On the way to Naivasha I got to see the absolutely gorgeous Rift Valley. Chrissy said to me “Ok Danielle, you’re gonna start seeing the Rift Valley soon and then literally 1 second later, bam, there it was. The highway we were on curved around it, there was a huge steep drop from where we were into this huge chasm, and then a mountain range on the other side. There’s also a dormant volcano in the middle, which was pretty cool. I didn’t take pictures of that because we were speeding along at like 70 and I like it when my camera doesn’t go flying out the window. Since I’ll be driving that way again, it’s ok.

On the way home we had a little adventure with the car…literally 3 minutes away from home, the engine just turned off and the car died. We coasted into pulling over, and realized that smoke was coming from under the hood…so we got out of the car and popped the hood…apparently the battery had come loose (this has happened to this car before…and frankly, I’m not surprised because the roads are SO pothole-filled and there are so many speed bumps few people actually slow down for…) and some piece of metal that was supposed to go over the middle of the battery to keep it in place had come loose and was touching a metal part of the battery…so it got really hot and started melting the plastic part of the battery, as well as sending charge through the frame of the car and heating up a bunch of other parts including boiling the brake fluid. So a friend came to get us and temporarily fix the problem, and now the car is being fixed. :-D

We decided to delay going to Mathare until tomorrow, it was just going to be easier to do things in the morning. So I get to take one more full shower tomorrow morning. :-P

Welcome to my Saturday!

Saturday:

Today we went in the morning to MCDC- the Mathare Child Development Center, where I will be spending a month starting Monday or Tuesday. Mathare is the 2^nd biggest slum in Nairobi.

There is a clinic right next to the church, which is in a not-that-great-but-not-really-a-slum-yet area. I met James, who is a “clinician” (somewhere between a doctor and a nurse) and runs the clinic. There’s a school building on one side of a courtyard, and a clinic area on the other. Then we went around the corner to James’ sister’s apartment, where I will be staying for my time in Mathare. Beth lives on the 3^rd floor of an apartment building, and she and her friend have two tiny, tiny rooms that are basically a small area with a bed, separated from the living room area by a curtain. The living room area has just enough room for a couch (against the bed curtain) and 2 chairs against the wall. There’s a tiny closet and a table with a heating coil for cooking. The 2^nd room is basically the same thing. The rooms adjoin, but the door is blocked by the cooking table. Down the hall is the washroom, to which you bring your bucket of water you heated on the coil to shower. Beth has her own washroom, which is locked unless you have the key, so ..there’s no shower, but only a couple people use the washroom. Time for my first real Kenyan bath!

James says his sister is an excellent cook, she can cook Kenyan and American food. We’ll see about that. :-P So I’ll be having lunch every day at the clinic, and then dinner with Beth and her friend, I guess. And the apartment is close enough to the clinic that as long as it’s daylight, I can walk there by myself.

I have not yet determined if there is electricity. :-P Pictures will come once I move in...I felt like it would be awkward/rude to start taking pictures of this girl's apartment the first time I went in. I'm not THAT much of a tourist. :-P

So after seeing my living quarters we took the Colorado group with us to visit a tea farm in Limuru, about a half hour away, and higher up in the mountains. It was absolutely BEAUTIFUL there! The farm was built in the early 1900s by the woman who owns it’s grandfather.

We got to drink some of their tea, then she talked to us about how they grow, harvest, and process the tea, then we went on a tour through the tea crops and also the chunk of original jungle that they’ve preserved, it was pretty cool! Pictures will be on facebook and Picasa as soon as they will download!

Welcome to my Friday!

Friday:

Today I spent most of the morning just sort of relaxing, being on the internet, and exploring around the compound…and enjoying sitting in some nice warm, intense sunlight. J

Around noon, we went to a market where there’s a food court, some very upscale clothing stores, a Nakumatt (chain grocery store) and on Fridays they have a huge area cleared out for people to come sell stuff. It was the typical jewelery, clothing, decorative stuff, figurines, etc. I didn’t buy anything because I’m going to be here for a LONG time and I’ll have lots of time for that later. So we met up with the team that’s here from Colorado and hung out a little bit, then came home and did more sitting around and I took a little nap, then we made dinner for everyone (cheeseburgers! I haven’t actually had any Kenyan food yet…lunch today was Chinese/Indian from the food court) and did some more hanging out, played some spoons and apples to apples.

Theeeeen we tried to set up my little mobile USB modem thing so I can have internet anywhere and it took a while but it’s finally working. Funny thing…my computer turns itself off every time I plug it into the USB port. I don’t know what that’s about…anyone have an idea!? :-p

Then I went to bed!

Blog Post 1

I made it!! :-D

Surprisingly, there were NO delays for my flight…and there weren’t eve that many at the airport. So I got to London on time to nap for a while in the airport and make my connecting flight.

I really don’t like flying….it’s probably the most uncomfortable position I could possibly sit in, being on an airplane. The seats were designed for taller people and so it just pushes my head forward in a weird way and ruins the whole experience. I also can’t sleep sitting up, so that’s out of the question. But OH WELL, it’s a necessary evil to get to wonderful places like Kenya!

I was given, for breakfast, a cranberry muffin in a little box that had a word search on the side…in the ingredient list a few words were circled and you were supposed to find them in the word search. I thought that was funny.

At the gate in Heathrow, waiting to get on the plane to Nairobi, I met two other groups who were coming here to do missions trips. One was a pastor taking a team of about 20 high school students to Kenya to do a church planting/orphanage visiting missions trip, and the other was a girl and a doctor who were meeting up with some medical people to go into the bush for a couple weeks and do medical things there, so that was cool to see and get to talk to them. The pastor has been on 20 trips to Kenya in his life. 20. That is insane. And a good goal for me, I think! :-D

Somehow on the LondonàNairobi flight, I ended up in Business class, which was AWESOME because the seats have foot rests and they’re wider, so I was able to curl up in a ball on my side in the seat and sleep. Then I’d wake up an hour later because my bottom leg was completely numb. So I turned over, and just kept doing that every time my leg went numb.

So I FINALLYYYYYYYY got to Nairobi and met up with my “host missionaries”, if you will, and they took me to the AG Missions compound

There are 3 gated, walled-in areas called Compounds 1, 2, and 3. Three is a warehouse, and the other two have houses and apartments. I’m living in an apartment that has a kitchen area with a sink and a mini-fridge, a bathroom with a fully functional toilet and a shower head (you could sit on the toilet and take a shower at the same time if you wanted to) and then a bigger room with 2 bunk beds, a coffee table, dresser, small couch, and 2 arm chairs. It’s pretty nice!

This morning I woke up to the sound of roosters at 5:00….someone needs to redo the whole “cock-a-doodle-dooo” thing, because that is NOT What a rooster sounds like. They sound like dying, mournful coyotes to me. Or Hyenas. So I forced myself back to sleep and had a dream I was running around the African countryside trying to find my way back to the building I’d come from, at night, using a cell phone as a light, trying to avoid various rodents that were sitting around. :-P

Then I woke up again to the sound of the german shepherd guard dogs wrestling with each other literally RIGHT outside my window. So I said hi to them so they would recognize my voice and not eat me when I went outside later. I haven’t been outside yet this morning so that’s yet to be seen if it worked. :-p

The air smells so FRESH her e I LOVE it and I LOVED taking a shower with basically no hair and everything has just been fantastic. :-D

There is a team here from Colorado this week, and they’re leaving tomorrow or the day after, so we’re going to go shopping with them today at the Masai market. I’m pretty sure I’ve been there before, and probably won’t buy anything since I’ll have to hold on to it for so long, but it’ll be nice to get out and explore.

I’m a bit fuzzy on the schedule for the rest of the week but this post is getting long so I’ll write again soon, tonight or tomorrow, to talk about what’s coming up!

Thanks for reading, and for your prayers for my safety and the on-time-ness of my plane, it worked! God is good and Kenya is beautiful, even at night and the tiny bits I can see from my window. J

Check back soon for updates, and hopefully there will be pictures soon! :-D

Finally Going!

Weeeeeeeell since it's past midnight I'm officially leaving for Africa TODAY!!

My flight is supposed to leave from JFK at about 7pm, but we're also getting a large amount of snow through tomorrow morning...so I'm hoping and praying that the plane takes off in time for me to make my connecting flight in London! I have a decently long layover to make it on my plane or the next scheduled one, but I have no idea at this point just how bad the backups are going to be. So it should be interesting.

We're leaving the house around 1pm to get there around 3pm and will probably end up just sitting in the airport from 3 until 6 or 7 or ever much later, for me. so...it's going to be an adventure, for sure! Good thing I have lots of reading material.

Sunday we had a BUNCH of people over the house to say goodbye ad it was justCRAAAAZY! Cars parked aaaall the way down the road...but I am SO incredibly blessed to have so many people in my life who are willing to be there for me and most importantly PRAYING for me while I'm in Kenya! So Thank you Thank you Thank you...(and so on) to all of you!!

People were asking me LOT of questions I have NO idea what the answers are to...about the details of how things are going to work in Kenya...I'm sure I'll figure all that stuff out when I get there, so be prepared for a very informative "I've arrived!" blog post. :-D

So TODAY I had most of my hair chopped off! Pictures are scrolling by on the top, if everything's working as it should! Most people have said they like it, Emmy hates it because she has a strange attachment to my hair... (She told my aunt when she was about 4 that she wanted to be my hair when she grew up...........) So she was very sad to see it go. But that's OKAY because it's gonna grow back!! :-D

So I'm mostly all packed, I have a few random small items that need to be shoved into suitcases somewhere but other than that I'm pretty much set.

oooooooooooh oops. I just remembered I have a full hamper of laundry I was going to do......guess I'm waking up earlier tomorrow than I originally planned. :-P