My first week at the clinic and other updates

Hello Everyone!

I hope you all enjoyed Newman’s post. I’m sorry that mine are not as funny or entertaining. I am going to try to keep everyone informed and updated, while Newman will probably focus more on the humorous things that come with living here as there are many.  

I would say that we have become pretty comfortable here by now. We know how to get what we need for the most part, and we have begun to form relationships with the people here. We have been welcomed so warmly by everyone we have met. I just walked by a man who I don’t think I have ever met and he asked me, “How is Newman?”  Everyone knows we are the new Mazungus in town even if we have not officially met. The family that I have mentioned before that lives on our footpath to the clinic gave us a taste of Jack fruit last night on our walk home. It was actually very tasty. I dropped off some tangerines on my way to work this morning to repay the favor. I did not tell Newman I had done this, and he asked me, “Why are the children asking me for more oranges?” They are such a sweet family, I couldn’t resist.

So to recap the last few days:
Saturday, Amanda drove Newman and I to the sugar plantation close by which has a private club with a pool and golf course. We went for a couple hours that afternoon just to get away and relax. It’s another thing that is just good to know it’s there. Michael had a lot of work to do for his master’s program, so he couldn’t join us, but we went back to the house and grilled steaks and had a delicious dinner. The “grill” that we used was simply a steel box with legs and a couple layers of chicken wire on top. A little makeshift, but it worked!  On Sunday, there was a big soccer tournament going on in town, and PMI had a team which played 2 games and won both! We went to watch some of it and it was a really fun community event. They had music and a lot of people came out to watch. It was good team building for the clinic staff as well. To continue to staff bonding, there was a party that night at one of the local hotels for all of the staff as a thank you for their hard work and also as a welcome to Newman and me. We had local food which was pretty good, and then they started the dancing, or should I say Newman and I started the dancing. They insisted that we start the dancing by having us get in the middle of the room and dance to a slow song in front of everyone. The song of choice was a Celine Dion song, which I cannot remember right now which one, but let’s just say it was quite hilarious and embarrassing. They immediately started laughing at us when we started to dance, and we quickly motioned for everyone else to join in which they happily did thank goodness! They quickly changed the music to a more up-beat song, and even the babies could dance better than me. One of the staff’s sons, Jack, who is about 3 or 4 had on a 3 piece dark suit and nice black shoes and he was cuttin’ a rug! The next day at the clinic, he spent a few hours on a bed in the hall sleeping. It must have taken everything out of him.

Monday was my first day at the clinic and it was also our one year anniversary! We both worked for a half day and then went to the Masindi Hotel for the afternoon. We spent pretty much the whole time outside opening anniversary cards and gifts and relaxing in their shady courtyard. It was so nice. We then ate a huge yummy dinner. We did not know what to order, so we just ordered a lot. We also had Tuesday morning off, so we had a nice breakfast and then headed back to the clinic that afternoon. That night, 2 pharmacy students from SC showed up for a one month rotation here at the clinic, so we greeted them and they went to the clinic with us that afternoon as well. It’s been nice having more people from home here.

So to sum up my experience so far at the clinic, it’s been really good and I’m figuring out how I can be helpful. I’m still kind of stepping back and observing how they operate right now. I have helped with a few things like starting IVs, giving injections, and making assessments. I taught this week’s CME this morning which is their continuing medical education. I taught on hypertension, and I think it was well understood and received. I am anxious to get into the storage containers which are full of supplies and see what is not being used and if I can train the staff on how to use the supplies so that they are not just sitting there. I have heard several times from them that they think they have some things in the storage containers, but because they don’t know how to use them, they just sit there unused. The staff overall is really great and they have been so kind and helpful to us.

I know this was a long post but I haven’t written anything in a while so I wanted to get everything up to date. There are still more stories I want to share, and I will in future posts. The PMI team from home comes this Saturday so I can’t wait to see everyone. It will be a very busy week but I will try to post some because those trips are pretty amazing. Love to you all and hope to talk with some of you soon!

Below are some pics of the kids that live across the field, and they came to hang out with us. We had just had our laundry done and it was hanging up on the porch. We had our small athletic socks and my sports bras hanging up which I guess looked like small clothes and they asked if they could come see the baby.  I told them there was no baby, and they asked then why do you have these tiny clothes. I just laughed and said there is no baby and gave them some stickers (thanks Lynn by the way) I think they will become frequent visitors.