week 4 in review

Week 4 seemed to fly by. I cannot believe today is Thursday of our 4th week here! Tomorrow Sammie, Katie, Kim and I are renting a car and a driver and going to Dedza (a place that makes pottery) for the day. The drive there is supposed to be really pretty and there is a restaurant there that past groups have raved about...so we are excited! In the evening we are meeting Tom, Shant, Angela and Emily at Zomba Plateau, where the 8 of us will spend the weekend hiking. It should be fun.

Today on my walk home from the hospital a man came up behind me and said "excuse me madam? Chicken?", I turned around a saw 8 live chickens hanging by their feet on the handle bars of his bike! They weren't even putting up a fight! Animals in general are thought of very differently here compared to the US. People here cannot fathom the idea of having a pet in your home with you that you love and treat like a family member like we may in the US. Here animals are looked at as food. Oh, I forgot to tell a funny story in one of my previous blogs. When we got in the minibus on our way back from Mvuu we couldn't help but notice the overwhelming smell of fish. We didn't think much of it until halfway home I call of a sudden heard a thud near the passenger side rear view mirror and noticed what seemed to be bird feathers flopping around near the window. I assumed that we had hit the bird, and it was now somehow stuck. Once we arrived home we discovered that our driver must have gone fishing before he picked us up, and rather than take up room in the bus, he strapped the fish to the rear view mirror, where they must have caught the eye of a hungry bird! I thought the whole situation was funny! Some of my roommates were less than impressed!

Ok, so let me talk about more differences between the hospital here and in the US. On the topic of animals, occasionally I have seen chickens and roosters walking in the halls of the hospital. The hospital is all one story, with doors in the hallways that open up to large areas where the guardians hang out all day. I am assuming that those chickens that I have seen walking the halls belong to one of the guardians and will be a patient's dinner later that day.

On the topic of food, everyday all of the doctors and medical staff get a lunch break from noon to 2. At this time the patient's guardians all come on to the floor, and it is an absolute mad house in the ward, so even if you don't want a two hour lunch break you have to get out of the ward if you want to be able to hear yourself think. As I explained in an earlier blog the guardian is a family member or friend that stays with the patient for their entire hospitalization. Since the only food that the hospital supplies the patient's with is a bag of milk, it is the guardian's responsibility to feed the patient. It is really sad when a patient does not have guardian, but all the patients are so nice to each other that they usually share their food. For one whole week, Shant bought food for one of his patients everyday because he felt so bad for this poor guy that had no family. Guardians also bathe the patients (wipe them down with a wash cloth), change and wash their clothes and the bed linen, and often have to walk back home to pick up old medical records or x-rays that are at the patient's house. Since the hospital is all on one floor the guardians often hang out near the window that is closest to the patient that they are with. What is really funny, is when the doctor has a question about a patient that the patient cannot answer, the doctor will stick his/her head out the window and talk to the guardian, or will call out the name of the guardian and the other guardians will help the doctor find who he/she is looking for. If a lady patient has a small baby, the guardian may hold the baby for a while and then pass the baby through the window to the patient so that she can breast feed.

When we get a new patient both here and in the US the doctors usually ask the patient questions about their "social history". In the US we may ask are you married, do you smoke, do you drink alcohol, do you use any other drugs, and that is typically the extent of the questioning. Here, when getting a social history the doctors ask if the patient is married, if their spouse is HIV positive, how many children do they have, have any of their children died, where do they live, how did they get to the hospital, do they have running water and what is their roof made out of? All of this information is actually quite valuable when considering what may be wrong with the patient.

There is so much more to write about, but I will save it for another day. Last night was a lot of fun. The Carlsberg tour was ok, but there were about 30 other people taking the tour with us, so it was hard to hear everything that the guard was saying, but the 8 of us know how to have a good time, so we had a blast. By the way, it is gorgeous here today, 75 degrees and sunny! We are off to walk to the town to pick up food for tonight's dinner.

Have a good weekend!

Niamh