Working myself to the bone
May 26, 2009
Today started out lazy. Feng and I got a late start because we wanted
to watch Highlights of the Nuggets/Lakers game and USA sportscenter only comes
on at 9am. Plus it was dreary out so
that was a good excuse to slack. After
we saw the highlights of the Nugs tying the series at 2, Feng and I headed to
Kawangwari. It never did rain and feng
and I had a plesant walk to WEMA. This
week I am the only medical volunteer at WEMA, which is great because I get all
the opportunities to help, but can suck when we are really busy, and today we
were really busy. We must have seen
upwards of 30 patients just in the morning.
Dr. George had me dress five patients on my own: the girl with the
skinned knee, a man with a torn up heal, a man who had been bitten by dogs on
his hand, another man who had been beaten and had stitches in his head, and
Giershawn, who had two year old ulcers on his scrotum. It was a lot of good practice. We worked so hard that Dr. George offered to
buy me lunch. Of course lunch was at
Java where I had my blue cheese burger, as always. After lunch we had to go pick up Dr. George’s
four-year-old daughter from Kindergarten, and take her home. I was shocked to find that Dr. George’s home is
an apartment in the middle of Kawangware.
He’s a doctor and he lives in one of the worst slums in Nairobi. Rachael’s place is nicer than his place and
she does nothing all day. After we came
back to the office things really slowed down.
We decided to call some previous volunteers like Jon and nan but no one
was home. Well it started to get late
and rain so I decided to head home. I
was really tired. I didn’t sit down for
a second that morning and now the mud clung to my foot like ten-pound weights. Its like walking through water with
snowshoes on. When I finally got home, I
was exhausted and just plopped on the couch for a while. Today was the day we get water so after a
short period of vegging, I helped Sarah dump containers of water into the extra
cistern. Then Eddy, Talia and Rachael
came home. Talia, the 5 year old, had a
cold and goes around the house coughing, sneezing, wiping her nose on her
sleeve, putting her hands in her mouth, and asking to play my iPhone. With Mt. Kilimanjaro only a week a way, I am
despratly trying not to get sick. I made
sure she washed her hands before she handled my iPhone, but within the minute I
handed it to her, she sneezed all over it.
I really expected too much from a 5year old. Now we are about to eat dinner and watching
TV. I’ll get my iPhone back once I find
a sani-wipe. Good night.
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