Concerning pictures

First: Check the blog post I made just before this one!

Then: Some people asked me about my week at work (on Facebook): it was good. I worked at the OPD (Out Patient Department) and weighed kids the entire day, as well as taking their temperature. When that was too high, I also got to prescribe some paracetamol. Not really incredibly intensive work, it's really something anyone could do, but - there's a but - I felt useful, really useful, for the first time since my work started. Which is a big YAY, I think!

And last but not least: I showered for the first time in 4 weeks today! No more buckets, hopefully, for the rest of my Ghana stay!!! :D

Doing some washing!

Group picture during Safari-ing.

ELEPHANT!!!!

Concerning Paga and parasites

I know, I know, I was supposed to blog more often and what not, but this time I have a legit excuse. Let me tell the story. (Although I don't have that much time, so it'll be a small small story.)

So, Saturday I went to Paga with my host family. We saw the crocodiles, we touched them, sat on them, etc, etc, which was incredibly scary and also felt a little like animal abuse. Pictures - in which I smile with scared eyes - will be online as soon as I'm back home.

We also went to the slave camp, which was surprisingly run by Ghanainans, not Europeans. While it doesn't justify what we did so many years ago, it does put things a little in perspective - Africans themselves apparently maintained slave trade... It was incredibly interesting. We saw the Punishment Rock, the Musical Rock, the Dinner Rock (in which bowls were carved), etc, etc. Paga is a rocky village.

Sunday I stayed home, while the host family went to Wa - after the week in Kids Ward, I needed some time to myself, and I was also tired. So, I did nothing all day, which turned out to be blissfully boring, and recharged my battery.

Until Monday, when I woke up a bit headachy, and during the morning at work I also got a bit stomach achy, and when I biked back to my host family I got a bit rib painy. And since I work(ed) at the hospital, I happened to know that rib pains are a sign of malaria. So to the lab I went, and they took my blood, and they examined it. And it turned out that those d*mned parasites had invaded my red blood cells, and my liver, which caused me to feel a little sick.

I bought some medication, stayed home for a day, felt better, and returned to work. However, I did not have the feeling it was totally gone, but I still had two pills to take, so whatever. After those two pills, though, I started feeling headachy and nauseous and kind of like before again, so on Thursday I once again went to the lab, and they took my blood, and they examined it. And I still had malaria.

I bought new medication, and this time it worked - right now I'm as healthy as can be after a day of traveling.

And just for the record: no one needs to worry. I did not once have a fever, I felt better than if I would have gotten the flu, or a nasty cold. It's just not a pleasant idea that I have (or had, at this point) parasites in my body, but then again, when you're sick, there are bacteria or viruses - not much better. And I'm better now, so if you'd start worrying right now, it would be a waste of your time, to be honest.

Yesterday I spent the majority of my time packing my bags, and doing my last "chores". And today I left my host family (after going to church with them at 6:30, ugh). I'm really going to miss them. I actually cried a little on leaving, can you believe it? (Ella: "... and then I cried!") I gave Bless a ball today, and when he saw it he started screaming, he was SO happy. And the entire family signed a card for me, so cute. But, I'll be able to call them, and I'll definitely do that. They really want to have some pictures, too, so I'll send those too.

I took a tro-tro to Tamale, where I am right now. Tomorrow at 7 we have the bus to Kumasi, and then the real touristy part of my journey can begin! I'm looking forward to it, and also to going back home. It's been a long time since I've seen friends and family, and I want to show them pictures, and tell them stories, and give them my gifts. But, only 2,5 more weeks! Time flies!

As for this blog: I don't know whether I'll be able to update it while traveling. If not, I'll give a brief overview when I'm back home, so you won't miss any of the most important stories.

And now: dinner!

Love from Ghana, as always, Jonneke

Concerning a lot

I had this really cool title for this blog, "Concerning falls and female ward" and then it turned into "Concerning falls, female ward, Soultrain and shrines" but then that didn't even cover everything I have to say, so hence the above title (haha, in the hospital they ALWAYS write "so hence the above diagnosis" in their reports).

Anyway, remember how I told you I was going to the market to buy some fabric and blablabla? Well, I didn't. I mean, I went to the market, but as soon as I entered the market, I had the misfortune to put my foot on a slope with loose sand, and I stumbled, and stumbled some more, and ended up on the ground. Bruised hip, bloody elbow and ankle, and grazed hands. Ouch. So, instead of the market, we raced home to disinfect everything, and I have to say, everything is healing well. The wound on my ankle became a little infected (instead of red, it was white from all the pus), but other than that, it's looking fine. The scabs on my elbow are actually falling off already! It did put me off for a couple of days, though. It hurt, and I was really afraid of infection, and I just wanted to be home for a while. I wasn't homesick, or anything, but it would've been more convenient to be in the Netherlands.

Speaking of being afraid of infection, I almost fainted. I was helping with taking care of a woman's foot, who had a wound on exactly the same place as my ankle-wound, and it looked really nasty, and all of a sudden I wondered, "Is this room always so dark?" but then I noticed black spots in front of my eyes, and then I decided it would be better to sit down. As soon as I sat down, I got cold all over, and I started sweating, and for some odd reason I thought I had malaria. But then the cold feeling stopped, and I realized that there was no malaria or something else to be afraid of - I was plainly busy fainting. Fortunately I didn't, that would've been embarassing.

I did NOT faint when I was holding someone's broken leg. The lower part of her lower leg was independently movable of the upper part of the lower leg. Let me tell you, holding something like that is the weirdest feeling, possibly ever. But, I stood my ground, held it, while trying not to move the two parts too much. No fainting whatsoever. I felt very big and grown up, and finally like I was doing some good.

One of the nurses at the Female Ward had invited me to a wedding of one of her family members. Berte and I decided to go, and I'm happy I did. So much dancing and singing, and that all under the roof of a church. "Let's dance for the Lord!" and yay, there we went again! Unfortunately, the sermon after that, about marriage (apparently, it's ordained by God, but fortunately it's also for sexual pleasure and friendship), lasted 45 minutes, and we were very hungry, so we left after that, and didn't see the marriage vows. Oh well, it was an experience to remember - I didn't know church could be this fun!

That same day, Saturday, I and the other Dutch volunteers decided to go out, to the one and only "niteclub" in Bolga - the Soultrain. 90% consisted of boys, all toohappy to grind into you, not really my cup of tea, but it was something I would not have wanted to miss. Out in Ghana! The only drinks they served were beer and Smirnoff, and I think most of the Ghanaians were drunk after 2 beer... losers. I went to bed at the astounding time of 1:30 in the morning. And I'm not being sarcastic (OK, a little), because normally I go to bed at 9, at the most 10. That's because I get up early, but also because life in Ghana is very tiring; although apparently, it could also be a side effect of the Lariam.

Sunday we went to Tongo, a little village situated in a stunning hill country, where they also have a shrine, which you're only allowed to enter when topless. We first visited the Chief's house/palace. We talked with him, or rather, he talked to us, about Ghana, and Tongo, and himself, and then were shown around his confusing compound. It's a maze, really, but what do you expect, he has 17 wives and there are around 350 people living in his house (I don't know if extended family is also involved, otherwise I feel sorry for those wives - SO many children!). The walk to the shrine was a little more challenging than expected, and since I was still afraid to fall after my market disaster, I unfortunately did not make it to the shrine. So, no topless adventures for me. Apparently I didn't miss much, but I was still a little mad at myself for being such a pussy.

Yesterday - Monday - I started work at the Male Ward. Since there was not much to do, one of the nurses wanted to go to the Maternity Ward to look at babies, and she took me with her. We were being shown around by the "prof", when all of a sudden there was a Labour Alarm - there was a baby coming! We all hurried to the delivery room, where within 20 minutes time, I witnessed two births - two girls. For one woman, it was her first, and after seeing her pain, I think I'm going to wait a little longer for my own kid. OK, OK, the materials aren't what they are in Europe, and we have painkillers, but still. She didn't know how to push, or wasn't able to anymore, because of exhaustion, so one of the doctors pressed on the belly, and he basically pushed the baby out with his hands. Ouch. The other woman had to go off her bed, since the linen had fallen off, and while she was standing next to her bed, she got a contraction again, and while she was kneeling or something (it all went very quick) the baby was born right there on the ground. Fortunately, both baby girls survived. It was so exhilirating to watch!

As soon as we got back to the Male Ward, I also witnessed my first death. An old man started choking, and even though they started CPR and they used a suction machine, it didn't make a difference, and he died shortly after. I don't believe he was in much distress, though, and I don't think he had a lot of pain, so that's good.

Today we had a rather uneventful day. In the last 2 hours we had some more admissions, so I got to take vital signs and help with some other things, but it wasn't as exciting as yesterday. Oh well, that's life at the hospital, I guess. And life in Ghana, most days are uneventful here. I mean, yesterday I spent the morning mostly watching TV, because there was nothing to do (there was a really interesting snake documentary, Matthijs). The births and death happened after 12.

Anyway, I have the feeling I'm being way too brief about everything I'm telling you about, but if I were to write down everything, then I'd be spending a day behind the computer. At least now you have an idea of what's going on.

As for the spiders: it rained again, there are more to watch. Also, in the Male Ward, the ceilings are covered in spiders. Yuck. But, I'm managing, and rarely afraid anymore.

Love you all, and for those who miss me: almost halfway! Time flies by when you're having fun!

Signawama (or however it's written), Jonneke

P.S.: My Frafra name at home: Ayenema and at the hospital either Akulkpocka or Ayempocka. Hehe.

Concerning elephants and illness

The showers were a lie. The rest was true. There was not enough running water in Mole to actually shower, but there was a pool, which was used plenty. And there were elephants! We had a more expensive room, since our reservation had gone wrong, but I was so happy we got this room! We arrived at night on Friday, so we had to way to look at our surroundings, which gave an incredible surprise the next day. The hotel is elevated above the rest of the park, so you could look miles and miles and miles away, and right underneath the hotel are two water pools where the elephants go. So when I was applying my sunscreen for the day, I suddenly saw an elephant. Berte, one of the other volunteers and with whom I shared a room, came running out of the bathroom when I started yelling "elephants, elephants, elephants!" and we took tons of pictures.

The restaurant also had a quality view over the water pools, and there were more elephants we could see there than from the room - best. breakfast. ever. In the afternoon, we had our first safari, in a jeep. As soon as we spotted elephants, we were allowed to get out of the jeep, and we walked closer - I think we got as close as 50 m! There were antilopes and warthogs (Pumbas! Hakuna matata!) and monkeys as well, so there was plenty to look at and photograph. Besides the 3 elephants we walked to, we saw two other elephants on two other occassions as well. Ahhhh, how I love Africa!

Unfortunately, the hamburger we ate that night did not really agree with us, or rather, we didn't agree with the hamburger. One of us, Anja, got really, really sick, and the rest of us had major intestinal problems as well. So instead of going on foot safari with 6, we went with 4. And let me tell you, foot safaris are so much better than jeep safaris. Antilopes came running past us, we got as close as 10 m away from elephants (they were in the water, and we were standing on a ridge, so they couldn't attack us), warthogs ran away with their tails held high... so beautiful. And you feel really close to nature when you're scampering through it.

Sunday afternoon 3 of us went canooing (the rest was either on the toilet or nauseous or too lazy to get out of the pool), which was fantastic as well. We saw lots of beautiful birds (Matthijs and dad: Paradise Fly Catcher, blue and grey Kingfisher, Bee-eater, Blue "Daika" I think it was called, and some more). The tree hung over the river, and it was so silent around us, except for the noise all the birds and other animals were making. Gosh, I want to go back! I can't express in words how amazing Mole is.

Monday our bus left at 4 in the morning. The bus driver drove like a maniac, while meanwhile radio was on very loud, and tuned in to some kind of sermon. There was a choir singing and a priests preaching vervently, and that combined with the speed of the bus and the absolute total darkness outside of the bus made me feel like I was on a highway to the Afterlife. Fortunately for us, he slowed down after a while.

Tuesday evening I moved in with my host family. They're extremely nice, and made me feel at home, as far as that is possible in a strange country with a strange culture, immediately. They have a 2,5 year old boy who gives me high fives all the time, and their food is amazing, although I do long for lasagna now and then.

Yesterday (Wednesday) I started working at the hospital. This week I work in the Emergency Ward, which sounds so much more exciting than it is. Basically, when I get there, all the patients have been admitted already, and i.v. lines are in, so there's nothing for me to do. I can't even talk with the patients, because most of them only speak Frafra, and I only know 4 or 5 words or something. Today, at one point, none of the 16 beds were taken, so I spent an hour or more making tables in the administration books they use (they don't have computers, so everything needs to be taken down in composition books). The nurses and other medical students are nice, though, so we talk a lot too, and laugh, and they make fun of me, which I try to laugh at too. Monday I'm going to make a schedule for the rest of the 4 weeks I work at the hospital, hopefully the other wards are a little more eventful!

I had a bit of a tough day yesterday, felt homesick for the first time, but some phone calls made me feel better again. I guess it's because for the first time in 2 weeks, I was entirely alone, and there were so many new things to get used to, like working and living in a host family. My host mother understood me, though, or pretended to at least, which also felt good (and after that she took me to the market, so I'm forgiven for crying...), and in the evening they took me out for a drink - they're sweethearts, they really are.

Right now, my host sister is with me in the internet cafe, I just made an email account for her, and she's exploring it and the rest of the Internet. She's kind of shy, but very nice. There's nothing really to make me unhappy here, but because it's so different from what I'm used to I sometimes want to be back to all the conveniences I have at home, and to not think about eating with my right hand, and not crossing my legs, and asking everyone how they're doing and how their night was. But 99% of the time, I'm happy, so don't worry. And I'm still healthy, except for the expected diarrhea. Oh, and I don't have a toilet at my host family's, I have to go to the public toilet, which is a row of holes in the ground surrounded by concrete. And they have maggots, ew!

This weekend I'm going to Sirigu, where 3 other volunteers do activities with girl clubs, and the clubs are 1 year old this week, so there's going to be a big celebration. I'm looking forward to that!

I hope to blog again soon (Monday, or Tuesday, or whenever I have time). Once again:

Love from Ghana, Jonneke

P.S.: Martin, happy belated birthday! I wanted to call you yesterday, but your number is in my other phone. I hope you had an amazing day! I'm bringing a stone with me!
P.P.S.: Matthijs, no malaria yet, and just to clear things up: I talked to you the day AFTER I wrote my earlier post.
P.P.P.S.: For those of you who have read up until here: my Ghanaian number is 0546854446, the country code is +233 if I'm not mistaken.

Concerning firsts

First of, these are the first stories that are getting out of Ghana into the world. My simcard only started working yesterday, so I was able to talk to my mom for a total of 10 minutes, my dad for 1 and Mirella and Kim for 5 or something. Which is way too little to tell all that I have to say.

While my goodbye from Holland was very teary, my stay in Ghana so far hasn't been at all. I arrived in Accra at 9:30 in the evening, and was greeted by warm air. We had a small dinner at Vic's, the woman who came to pick us up, and went to sleep. First night under a mosquito net! In the heat!

The next day we spent walking around Accra, which seems like an incredibly crowded place, but so African. We went to two markets, saw lots and lots and lots of beautiful fabric (mom, I'll buy a LOT the day before I leave!), and even more chickens and goats and dead, dried fish and pork feet and living crabs and toothpaste. Vic walked us through in a hurry, though, so I wasn't really able to see a lot of it, but the smell was pretty memorable. In the afternoon we went to the beach, where we had lunch (burgers! And fresh pine apple juice!) and walked around in the sea. The sea was too wild for real swimming, and also a little too dirty - there were horses on the beach, and their poo was everywhere in the water. At some point it started to rain, and I managed to get goose bumps, I was that cold! How I long for that right now!

After another hot, but better managable night (probably because I was so, so tired), we had to get up really early to go to the bus station. We were supposed to take the 8 o'clock bus, but there wasn't room for our luggage, so we had to wait for the 9 o'clock bus. And after that... 13 hours of driving driving driving. Ghana is incredibly beautiful, though, so I was able to really enjoy the scenery. And the bus was airconditioned, also a major plus point. I knew the south of Ghana was really green and rainforesty, but I hadn't expected the north to be this green. It's the rainy season, that's why. The green, which is incredibly green, only gets greener because of the contrast with the red earth.

Also an interesting part I noticed during the bus journey: Ghanaians like to praise God, a lot. Imagine this: half of an advertisement used to say "In God we trust", with the other half saying "Stop here for your refreshments, Coca Cola". Or a shop called "God is Good Cosmetics" - interpretable in two ways.

When we got to Tamale, there was some confusion.The person supposed to pick us up wasn't there, but there were a lot of boys wanting to be our taxi-driver. We told everyone, stupid as we are, that we were with Meet Africa, and 5 minutes later a guy showed up saying he was from Meet Africa. But he couldn't identify himself, and he was already off with our luggage. We followed him, and fortunately he was indeed from Meet Africa, but it was quite odd. After 13 hours of traveling, though, we couldn't be bothered to make a fuss, and just went to sleep.

The next day, we spent some time in Tamale, going to the local volunteer restaurant, and trying to get our simcards to work. No luck, but it was getting dark (it gets dark really early here) so we went back to the house. We went to the herbal garden of the matriarch of the family, and later on had dinner with her - apparently we had pleased her in some way or another. The Ghanaian food however - we had TZ with a soup called "Indian Spinach" - was not that amazing, I guess I just have to get used to it.

And after that, the more primitive way of living started setting in. Up until then, I had been able to shower under a REAL shower, sleep in relatively cold rooms, travel in airconditioned buses. But boy, the tro-tro is a whole other story. We were cramped together in the back of a sweltering hot little bus, with our bags on our laps and in between our legs. When we were driving, it was still pretty doable, but as soon as the bus stopped moving, the tro-tro got really hot, and really full and pretty unbearable. Fortunately, we could get out after 3 hours (halfway we had dropped off Anne, whose host family lives on the way to Bolga), only to be greeted by a hotter climate than Tamale's and Accra's combined. We went to the Meet Africa office, had a meeting there (everyone got to vent their frustrations, so it was quite a shock for Berte and me - was it really that bad in the host family and in the work place?) and then went to an employee's house. I enjoyed my first bucket shower there, and believe me, when you're sweaty all over and have dust clinging to you in the weirdest places, it's the most refreshing thing you've ever had. We had a meal of Western spaghetti, and loads of water - I don't think I ever drank this much in my life!

Last night was probably the hottest night of my life, I actually woke up while I was wiping the sweat off my face and arms and legs and blaaaah! I'm not a really good sweater, so for me to sweat this much... well, you can imagine the heat. The night was made even more restless because just before we went to sleep, we saw the biggest, most scary spider I've ever seen. It looked like a flattened crab or something, spikes included. So I kept waking up thinking I felt something sit on me or something. Just something I have to get used to, I guess, cause there are plenty of spiders around Bolga, apparently.

Today we explored Bolga a bit, were shown the most important things in town, such as the bank, the restaurant everyone goes to (Swap) and of course the internet cafe. We also cycled by my host family - my host father speaks English, I have electricity, and it's 5 minutes away from the hospital. My host grandma started teaching me Frafra (the local language) immediately, and I hope to pick up some more in the 5 weeks I'll stay there. I have no clue whether I have a real toilet or a corn field, though, but I'll survive both.

On Friday I'm going on my first sightseeing event: Mole National Park. Elephants! Swimming pool!Monkeys! Shower! Real toilet! Birds! Butterflies! I'm excited. Because I leave for Mole on Friday, Berte and I decided to go to our host families on Monday instead of tomorrow. I'll start working in the hospital on Tuesday. We're going this weekend because the other volunteers already here are going together, and we wanted to join them - otherwise we'd be alone during the weekend, and why not go to Mole when we have the chance to go?

Anyway, my computer time is almost up. I'll try to give a more detailed description of happenings around here the next time, but for now, I hope to have updated you enough!

Love from Ghana, Jonneke