Father Vuni

If I have already had a favorite day on this trip, I was bound to have a worst day as well. But it was not just one worst day…it was this whole weekend.

Since the last time I posted, I woke up every few hours throughout the night, needing to go to the restroom. I had dysentery. And then in the morning, I woke up with a burning fever (100.7 degrees). At first I was terrified because I thought I got Typhoid Fever, which I was not vaccinated for before coming here (stupid, Neesha). But I looked up Where There Is No Doctor (the greatest, life-saving book of all time), and it said that I would be vomiting if had it. So that ruled Typhoid out...thank god.

So in the morning, Emma gave me Gatorade and Pepto-Bismol. It was difficult to drink the Gatorade without feeling like I was going throw up, but I had to force it down to stay hydrated. The one thing I have learned on this trip is that dehydration from diarrhea is the worst thing to happen to anyone, especially in infants (the leading cause of death), and ORS is so important. So I stayed in bed the whole day, attempted to get up a few times when my fever finally lessened, and watched a bit of the first XXX with everyone else.

The next day, I was still in bed. My Mephloquine seemed to be very sympathetic to my illness because it surprisingly rewarded me with a dream about me snorkeling and rising up to see my family around me. It was very comforting, but at the same time it made me very homesick. I also started to crave food more than ever while I was sick. Except for Ethiopian and Eritrean food, East African food is pretty bland, to be honest. I really missed spicy curry dishes, saucy East Asian food, burritos, hot cheesy pizza, and even chips (not french fries). I could not stop thinking about food while I was lying in bed, and it was killing my appetite for the food in the compound. I felt so dissatisfied by the end of each of dinner in Torit, and having these cravings made me want to go home more than ever.

At night, Emma, George, and Jerome went to play pool near the discotheque. On top of my illness and my desire to go home, Torit has been especially boring this week. There is literally no one in the compound except us, the generator is rarely ever on, and there is not much activity within the town. Playing pool has been the only thing we found that has thrown a splash of entertainment into our daily lives here. The last time we went there, Jerome put on a show. He beat every man who played him, but I heard from Emma that this time he lost.

As if all this was not enough, we have been receiving a gazillion emails from the U.S. Embassy telling us to get out of Sudan as soon we can. The ICC has just indicted President Omar al-Bashir for war crimes in the state of Darfur. So they are fearing anti-foreigner hostility (even though this is completely the U.N.’s doing) everywhere in Sudan. But I am not that worried because everyone in Southern Sudan has been very supportive of international aid here…and the mission keeps me safe.

But I feel much better today. I tried looking up what I had in Where There is No Doctor, and the only thing I could figure out was a bacterial infection (Shigella probably?). I did not have an amoeba infection, since I had a fever. I did not have malaria, since I was taking anti-malarial pills. I definitely did not have Giardia. Plus, when I started to take Ciproflaxin, an antibiotic, I started feeling loads better. My Mephloquine also started acting like its normal, evil self again and gave me a terrifying dream about the wildlife in Nimule. I dreamt of a crocodile swimming past, its tail end forming into the head of a squid, and its eye staring at me. There were these huge turtles with shells that expanded into wings so that they could fly off and chase after us. And then there were these large human-like neon lizards that jumped and attacked us in synchronization. I hid from them, but when my cell phone started to ring, they all looked up to where I was. And then I woke up. Yep, bizarre dream. But it wasn’t so bizarre that I dreamt of Nimule. We were supposed to go to Nimule as soon as I got better…and as soon as Father Vuni came back.

I tell you, having Father Vuni come back did so much to my health. This whole week was very depressing for all of us. I was sick, homesick, and just bored to death. We all wanted company in this compound, and Father Vuni arriving was the best thing to happen to us this whole week. He is always genuinely concerned about our wellbeing. For example, he surprised me with fresh milk after I asked him why they drink powdered milk here and not goat’s milk. He even tried to get curry and chicken for me because he thought I missed Indian food haha. He completely lifted my spirits the moment I saw him.

We sat with him during lunch, and he told us about different parts of Sudan and the world. Seriously, he spurts like the fountain of knowledge. Isoke is his favorite place in Sudan, and then Nimule. There are parts to Magwi that do not look like Sudan at all but like Columbia, where they grow coffee beans. The coffee beans and bananas they grow are supported under the Fair trade, and then George started talking about the name Banana Republic. Very interesting. There are also coconuts you let fall so that they grow a long tuber underground that people can eat. This is good to know for the dry season when people need to be particularly resourceful with the food they have, but this knowledge seems to be fading with each generation. Of all the places in Eastern Equatoria, Kuron and Nyanyangachor are probably the most primitive—half-naked people who depend on their cattle for survival. Women in these villages are less educated because families marry their girls off early for cattle. The least resourceful villages are often the most educated because the women and men must survive on schools to get the jobs they need to earn money and stay successful. For example, Loa was one of the first villages to build a school in the 1920-30s, and this really gave the people an advantage. The evidence: the first female vice-president and one of the three chairmen of the nation came from Loa.

When he stayed in Khartoum from May-June, there would be sandstorms once every week starting at 5 PM at night. When it ended at 7 PM, the sand would be about a foot high inside their home, and they would spend up until midnight sweeping it all out. He told us it is very easy to get lost in the desert, as opposed to in a forest. The Arabs are the best at finding their way out of the desert by reading the stars, so that is why they say it is smarter to travel by night. He also visited Sri Lanka right after the Tsunami hit and witnessed utter chaos. There would be NGOs that come in with huge amounts of money but not know what to do with it, so they would dump it where they think it was most needed and then leave (gosh, that sounds awfully familiar!). But he was surprised that for not being a top-tier nation, Sri Lanka had about a 92% literacy rate. He also noticed that the people were very nice, who genuinely try not to cheat and lie to others. He had also talked about Ethiopia’s unique expression of Christianity and the carvings in their mountains. Man, I could listen to him for hours. I just like to type all this down for my own knowledge.

When we informed him about our 4th of July party, Father Vuni remembered that yesterday had been his 11th year anniversary since he was ordained as a priest. Yes, celebration time! We encouraged him to invite his friends to the compound, and he managed to bring his childhood seminary school friends for dinner. He also bought us a dish called fumasara (sp?), which is made with fava beans, feta cheese, onions, and tomatoes. He had this everyday when he was a child and was craving it until now. It tasted like burrito beans, and it was really good.

Then everyone at the table introduced themselves. I met Father Mawa and Father Andrew, who we will visit at Nimule. After dinner, one of the Fathers gave a long speech about Father Vuni for all of us to hear. He talked about how they first met and about Father Vuni’s character. Father Vuni had so many avenues to exploit, but he was a man of his principles. In the Father’s words, “God used him as an instrument for freedom and peace”. Despite the suffering, he gave hope to his people and served as “a voice for the voiceless”. Pretty cliché, but pretty deep…and all true. I can see evidence of these words. Father Vuni always goes out of his way to take care of me and make me feel comfortable. He is an inspiration to the people around him. I could definitely sense that all the Fathers at the table admire Father Vuni. Heck, I admire him.

In my snorkeling dream, one of my family friends pulled me up from the water and I grinned madly. My grinning turned into laughter, and he told me with surprise, “Neesha, I haven’t seen you laugh this much in a long time!” But that was a dream. Now with Father Vuni here, I have started to laugh just as much again. This is real, and I feel so much better.

-Neesha

Downtime

I have slowly lost interest in posting, maybe because we have not gone on any exciting trips lately and maybe because we have more downtime than usual...or maybe because I have truly just lost the interest. I also realize that posting day by day may not be as good of an idea anymore because it restrains me from writing about things that happen outside of simply what we have done. Now that things are becoming more of a routine, the daily entries sound more like repeats. Yet now it is difficult for me to get out of this habit because I am the type that likes consistency within any work I do. So I am just going to stick with this style, maybe.

But don't worry Mom, I will keep posting. I also changed the template back to the Independence Day one just for you.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008
When the generator is off, George, Emma, and I need to occupy ourselves somehow in this compound. So Emma usually does her research, George helps Jerome fix the car or the internet or something, and I listen to Emma's iPod and think about home or my time here.

Sometimes we like to act childish. We have gone on silly missions killing the wasps that come into our rooms with either sun-block spray or shoes. Once, George found spiky spider egg sacks growing beneath his door, and we went on another mission transferring those sacks into Emmanuel's room. Except that we squished them...and they did not look like spider eggs. Emma and I concluded that it was probably just fungus, and that the mama spider probably was not as angry as we imagined it to be. Whatever, it was fun.

Coincidentally, right after we destroyed the sacks, Emmanuel and his crew arrived. The generator came on, and I tried to get as much done as I possibly could with him here. But he was not very helpful in giving me information on ANC clinics, which made it very difficult for me to work with him. So I eventually stopped attempting because I did not want to annoy him any further. It was already a hectic day for him...and now I regret pushing him too much. But again, he is leaving for Narus tomorrow.

So in the short amount of time he was here, the pressure of trying to get work done with him really drained me. So Jerome, Emma, George, and I watched the second Triple X (XXX2) movie from a DVD that Jerome got. Let's just say it was one of the worst action movies I have ever seen. Then I went to sleep.

Wednesday, July 9, 2008
But it wasn't a good sleep. I woke up in the middle of the night because my stomach was not feeling too well. My body forced me to vomit, but all I could get out was saliva. There was no food coming out, so I still do not know what made me feel that way.

I tried to rest again, and I eventually fell asleep. I woke up feeling better and just in time for lunch. Again the generator was off, so it was time to occupy ourselves again somehow. I had some battery life left in my computer, and we watched the first X-Men movie. Oh man, I forgot how much I missed that movie. And then George went off to the Bishop's to fix the satellite. Emma and I stayed behind and talked.

The whole day just went by, dinner came, and then before falling asleep, George and I watched X-Men 2. But it cut off right at the climactic scene! So now I am left hanging... Oh well, when I get back to the States, I think I will watch X-Men all over again. (Wanna join, Kevin?)

Thursday, July 10, 2008
Anyways, Father Vuni is coming back this Saturday. I can't wait. There is no one here in the mission right now--no priestly presence. And I really missed him.

We were supposed to go to Keyala today, but it was heavily raining earlier and the transportation did not come for SSRRC. So again, we are just going to continue doing work here in Torit. I think I am going to go ahead and work on this ANC thing without Emmanuel's help. Or at least do some research on it...

Yesterday I was looking up malaria drug combinations (I only read about malaria now), and I came across this site: http://www.malariasite.com/malaria/combinations.htm
Read about the Artesunate + Mephloquine and note the disadvantages. The next time I come to Africa, I am not taking Mephloquine.

But for some good news: Lopez Lomong qualified for the 1500 meter! Sweet! He made it barely, so let's just hope he follows up in Beijing.

-Neesha

Idleness

I changed the template again, because it was clearly suited just for Independence Day. The colors were red, white, and blue, and the icons on the template looked like the Capitol Building or something. I wanted to change it to make it look a little more African, but that required me to edit the HTML of the template...and I have no experience with computer science. I tried changing the colors a bit, but that did not work. So I ended up actually trying a little bit of template editing and tweaked some of the code phrasing...damn I was pretty impressed with myself. Just by fooling around with the computer language, I learned a little about moving headlines, deleting icons, changing designs. But obviously, I did not learn enough to completely revamp the whole template into what I imagined. So I gave up and tried a simpler template...this one. I still do not really like it that much, but it will do for now. I might change it again (most likely). I think I will go back to that Independece Day template when I have more time in my hands to change it the way I like...it was already beautiful, but it needed some African influence, I guess, haha. But again, this is when I will have WAYYYY more time in my hands...which is not going to be this summer.

Saturday, July 5, 2008
So our car is falling apart...even more than when we first met it. It is leaking about half a liter of diesel a day, and it still needs welding. If it weren't for the poor roads here, the car would normally need half as much diesel and half as much time to get to where we want to go. This has become an issue for us because we are running a bit low on money. We still have so many remaining places to travel to, and we may have to cut back on our plans because of the car and the cost of accomodations. Who would have thought Sudan was going to be this expensive?

This concern came up today because we planned out our travel schedule for the rest of this month. There is no way in hell now we can make it to Kuron or Nyanyangachor, even though I really wanted to see Bishop Paride...the roads are the worst in the upper east side of Eastern Equatoria, even worse during the rainy season, and it will take forever. So as of now, our plans are to leave for Isoke and Kimatong two days from now so that we can see through our sample 500 net distribution. But we have to wait on Peter Lomong to pick up his phone, tell us he has completed the pre-registration, and give us the nod to come over.

SSRRC scheduled a Keyala trip on the 10th to see if their distribution for the IDPs ended up being successful. So we are going to go there again and check that out.

We still have no idea when in the month of July the RFP will come out; we are guessing that it will come out about by the end of the 2nd or 3rd week. It will be major crunch time and we do not want to do any traveling after it comes out. So we have decided to go to Nimule right after Keyala for some relaxation and fun. We want to see the elephants and hippopotamuses there! But of course, for Ed, we will do some business...like tour around the health facilities. On the way to Nimule, we might stop by Magwi and check out CDoT operations there. Palataka (supposed to be very beautiful) is also another road to Nimule, but after Jerome learned today of an anti-tank mine along the road that he has been driving over all this time without even knowing, he does not want to go. The mine looks like the tire rim of some car overturned next to the road. If the car's weight matches the weight required by the mine, it will detonate. If the car is heavier, the mine will blow 3 seconds after you pass it. But if your car is lighter, like our Pajero, it will not detonate. Still, it is hella nerve wrecking to think about. So we aren't going to Palataka.

And then we are going to go to Narus to check out the new TB treatment center at our Narus PHCC. We may stop by Kapoeta along the way to see our second CDoT hospital.

As of now, these are our plans. We hope they will follow through, but a lot of it is contigent upon Peter Lomong's go say and when the RFP will come out.

Sunday, July 6, 2008
Father Amayo left for Nairobi early today. I did not get the chance to say goodbye because I woke up with massive stomach cramps...so I had to lay in bed for awhile. I feel pretty weak, so I do not think I am going to exert myself too much today. But this is normal; it comes monthly haha. So I started to read a little bit of Emma's War because our generator was off today.

Now that it is on, I am probably going to help out George on drafting our MOU. We are not going to rely on Emmanuel anymore to do it. Maybe I will help him out with the logistics and distribution plans later as well.

Man I really want this RFP to come out...like NOW. I hate waiting around for it.

Monday, July 7, 2008
Last night, Emma, George, and Jerome were scaring me with stories of ghosts and witchdoctors in Uganda, Nairobi...and Mombasa. Jerome told us that we could be talking to someone at some bar in Mombasa, and then find out the next morning that it was actually a ghost. The only way you can tell whether someone is a ghost or not is by flickering a light in front of the person and see if they run away. Then they won't mess with you. And then he told us stories about men coming out of the water--half-men, half-fish. And Emma goes, "Mermaids?!" Haha. But then Jerome tells us they are evil. Last night was a bad time to be telling scary stories because I took my Mephloquine earlier that day, so I was definitely terrified of falling asleep. But thankfully, nothing happened.

Today we were supposed to go to Kimatong and Isoke, but we still got no word from Peter Lomong. So instead, we are just going to continue doing work here in Torit.

Randoms:
The weather today is really nice, very cool. It makes me miss the beach.

I was on wikipedia, reading about mosquito nets (that is all I think about now), and I came across this link from Sports Illustrated. It is an article written in 2006 by Rick Reilly, and it is very funny. But it sparked people all over the nation to donate $1 million for mosquito nets. Amazing. So here it is: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/writers/rick_reilly/04/25/reilly0501/index.html

Sorry that these entries are getting super super boring...haha oh well.

Anyways, until then,
Neesha

Reminders:
Ryan. did you ever set up my desk? Remember my Telebears!

Independence Day

HAPPY 4th of JULY EVERYONE! So I changed the template for this special day.

First off, a big thanks to Chet and Barbara for the E-card! It was really cute haha.

Biggest news of the day: Lopez Lomong has advanced to the Olympic trial semifinals for the 1500 meter. I really hope he makes it. He has already qualified for the U.S. team on the 5000 meter.

So today we woke up kinda early and started off getting food items for our little celebration today. Father Amayo let us take his Toyota Prado for a ride into the town, and there was definitely a big difference between his car and our lame Pajero. The Prado ran so smoothly; we actually did not even mind driving over the potholes because the suspension in the car was so good. And the best part of his car—he had a 6-disc CD changer! So Jerome played his Phil Collins and reggae Ugandan music as we drove into the market. I was afraid to park anywhere too close to the market because Father Amayo’s car had a lot of nice electronics that could easily get stolen. Plus, khawajas in the car make it even more conspicuous than it is. But Jerome insisted we park right next to the discotheque, where Ed found our bamboo sticks long time ago. Our first immediate task was finding 4 chickens, but we STILL, at this morning hour, could not find any around the market. I don’t get why chickens are so rare here…they should seriously be considered a delicacy in Torit. The man at the discotheque, who happened to be Jerome’s friend, said we would get them around 11 AM.

So we walk further into the market and buy our produce. Even though I previously promised to take pictures of the place, there were a lot of SPLA and police officers around...maybe next time. Anyways, we buy tomatoes, potatoes, onions, bread, and rice (which tasted really good). We wanted to buy American ketchup because their ketchup has a sweet and sour taste to it, but we could not find any. We thought maybe we could make our own ketchup using the tomatoes we bought, but we never attempted to do this later on in the day. At one point, a couple from behind the counter from one of the shops calls the three of us over. They ask us where we are from, and I tell them I am American. The lady turns to her husband as to confirm and question, “American?” I then have to explain to her my parents are from India, but I was born in the U.S.

We leave them to buy cooking oil, and the owner of the shop prices 15 pounds. But literally within 2 seconds, he changes his mind and asks for 17 pounds. Emma, George, and I get furious! We argue with him, saying we won’t buy it because he jacked up the price within a span of 2 seconds right in front of our faces. So we leave and buy cooking oil at another shop.

We then go get our crate full of soda and Tusker beer, at the posterior of the market. Three white men come over to us and tap us on our shoulders. The main talker says, “So we saw some other white people in the market and wanted to introduce ourselves.” I roll my eyes. We find out that they were all from the Midwest states, and they were here to teach English at a secondary school. Before we say goodbye, I yell to them “Happy 4th of July!” The main talker lifts his eyes in surprise and responds, “Oh yeah! I forgot!” Wow.

We then go buy butchered beef. We ask for 3 kilos, and the man hands over 3 kilos. Before we left for the market, Emmanuel told us we could find a grinder at the Bishop’s to grind up our beef and make hamburger patties. We go to the Bishop’s…..but we find no grinder. I don’t know even know why I listen to Emmanuel anymore; I think he likes to screw around with us. So we go back to the market, and ask Jerome’s friend where we could find a grinder. Lucky us, we find it at the restaurant right next to the discotheque. But unlucky us, we find out that the meat we bought was all made up of bones and fat. We got jipped.

So we went to another shop, asked for 3 kilos of STEAK, and go back home. Someone tells us that there is a grinder in the compound, and obviously, we feel stupid searching for one all this time. Emma and George start trimming the fat, but I get disgusted and leave.

Later on in the day, Emma calls me to go to the market again for the chickens. We still cannot find any. So we ask Jerome’s friend where they are. He was playing pool next to the discotheque, with a group of other men hanging around the table. They really sucked, just to tell you. But anyways, he won and led us deep into the market, winding this way and that through the shops, and finally out into the open. There they were—the chickens. There were about 15 flapping inside a big round basket, and a man took some out to weigh them for us. There was no way in hell we could have find our way through the market and gotten to those chickens on our own. He found 4 good ones, at 25 pounds each, and gave two to Jerome to hold. Emma, after much screaming, finally managed to hold the other two by their wing joint shoulder blade. I admit, I was too much of a big wuss to help out holding the chickens.

We go through the market again, winding through and finally finding our way out to where our car was parked. We throw the chickens in the back and drive back home. I helped Emma and Lucy collect some dry firewood around the compound, but they had thorns so I had to be super careful. I still got some thorns stuck to my sandals. Then Father Amayo, a French guy named Desire (can you believe the name? haha), Lucy, Abigail, and Emma start preparing the chickens. George and Jerome made a mini grill out of the wires and netted material we found around the compound, and started to roll up the ground beef and cooked them over the fire. At first the patties were sticking to the grill, so they put some cooking oil around the patties and it worked better. Desire slaughtered the chickens because none of us had the guts to. Then I left the kitchen. Emma actually helped out with plucking and degutting the chicken. Crazy. I could never have done that. Later on, I saw the intestines outside of the chicken and the remains of the chicken’s lungs on its ribcage. Desire showed me its gizzard and kidneys. Although I was pretty disgusted, I gotta admit, anatomically it was pretty cool. I have dissected rats before, so I tried applying my Bio 1Al knowledge (again) to identify the organs I saw. But still, I would never have tried to actively pull out all the intestines out of the dead chicken’s cut anus the way Emma did (sorry for the graphic details).

George and Emma start building a bonfire, right next to our grill. At first it fails, and then they take some of the leaking diesel from our car and throw it on the firewood (Kids, you should never try this at home). That diesel worked like a charm; the wood burned immediately…but there was also a lot of smoke.

Father Amayo then let us play American music in his car, but we could not get our iPods to work. Even though we managed to connect our speakers to play American music in our Pajero, we did not use the Pajero because our speakers were pretty pathetic. So we said screw it, and played some Ugandan music throughout the night. I decided I liked Kenyan music more (it sounds more like rap), but I did not want to offend Jerome.

Pretty soon dinner was ready. Boy it looked like a good feast. Fried and roasted chicken, hamburger patties, sliced bread, rice, pasta, and sliced onions and tomatoes. We prepared for 15 people, and what do you know? 14 people showed up! I was really worried we would not get about 15 people because earlier today, Emmanuel, Joseph, and Moses ditched us to attend to some business in Kapoeta. These guys are always on the run. We still have not gotten Emmanuel’s MOU draft, and George was very angry with him when he left. One of these days we are going to plot a way to physically tie Emmanuel to his room. Seriously. But whatever, we got 15 people incidentally…15 people we did not even plan for. About 7 strangers dropped by and found us having a big fiesta. So they joined our celebration.

But before we could start eating, Father Amayo and all our guests pressured the three of us to sing the Star-Spangled Banner. So we got in front of the table, everyone stood up, placed their hands over their hearts, and we started to sing. My gosh, the three of us sounded so BAAADDD. We were totally off key, and we did not even remember the words too well. Haha but it was fun making a total fool of ourselves. In the end, everyone gave us a round of applause, and we started to eat. Hardly anyone touched the hamburger patties, much to Emma and George’s disappointment. But they said it was significantly better than the batch they tried out during lunch because of the grill, oil, and salt. Even though the roasted chicken was pretty burnt, everyone ate most of the chicken. My plate had a good 6 pieces of chicken on it. Father Amayo then asks us to tell our guests about the history of America’s Independence, and George narrates it very well. It was very funny.

I don’t drink, and I do not like beer (even though Tusker is the best I have tried). But ever since Jerome has met me, he has been very intent on trying to get me something I would really like. I tell him I like dessert drinks, like liqueur, in which I can hardly taste the alcohol. So today, on this very special day, he bought me a 17 pound ($8.5o) Ugandan V&A Sherry drink. I was very impressed. Although I could still taste the stinging alcohol, it was pretty sweet…the sweetest wine I have ever tasted (and I usually HATE wine). But it was pretty strong, so I could feel a flush of redness rising to my cheeks. Let me just tell you, the rest of the night was fabulous haha. I got all our guests to stand up and dance to the Ugandan music playing from Father Amayo’s car. Father Amayo loved it. It was really cute to see everyone shaking their booties and waving their arms around. Desire, I voted, was the best dancer; Jerome was the worst. Everyone looked like they were having a good time. The bonfire died in the middle, and we poured some more diesel to start it up again. Emma, George, Jerome, and I danced around the bonfire. Father Ben came later on in the day, and he pulled Emma and me up to dance with him. Haha it was great.

The generator stopped at 10:30 PM. Tonight we saw the best stars. I identified the Southern Cross and the Big Dipper with Father Amayo, and then all of a sudden the generator started back on. Desire turned on ours, and he left it on until 12:30 AM! Wow…this was really a good day for us. So for the remainder of the night, Emma insisted that we have some team bonding. We sat out on our porch and played Thumper while sipping some beers. Tusker really tasted like water after drinking that V&A. We then played some other games, talked a lot more, and killed some giant bugs (a HUGE 4 inch beetle and a 5 inch praying mantis). The generator then turned off, and we went off to bed. I could still smell the bonfire smoke in my hair. But man, it was a great night. :-)

So Happy Independence Day everyone! We have proven that it doesn’t matter whether you are American or not; anyone can celebrate the 4th of July! haha

-Neesha, Nous-Nous (half-half), Nemo, Chiqueets, Ping-pong, Missy

Stress, Isoke, Juba, Ed

Be aware, this is a very long post. I had days to catch up since the last time I posted.

Thursday, June 26, 2008
We did not do anything special today…just continued to do work. We researched some more for the RFP, looked at budgets, and I found some attachments to the proposal. Sister Florence dropped by and Ed set up a team meeting with her to talk more about our plans. I was getting nervous by the end of the night because I realized that I still had so much to do before Ed leaves on Tuesday. I wanted to get the most out of him while he was still here, but I was really annoyed that I had to help out on a UNDP Expression of Interest for HIV/AIDS and TB this weekend as well…which is totally out of our team’s work on malaria. I really did not plan on working on this, but the deadline for the Expression was this Monday and Ed and I were really worried Emmanuel was going to push it until the night before it was due. This Expression of Interest would enable the Diocese to qualify for the UNDP RFP, so it was important for us to complete it if we wanted support our programs in TB and HIV. Even though I knew so little about HIV or TB in Eastern Equatoria, I really wanted us to qualify to just get the RFP, so I decided to help out Sister Florence and the Diocese. But Emmanuel did not come today when he said he would, which really annoyed me because I needed to work with him on this immediately. So we decided on a whim that we will go to Isoke Hospital tomorrow and hunt for Emmanuel. Well, I wanted to hunt for Emmanuel. Ed and the others wanted to observe the operations of the Diocese hospital. Isoke hospital is one of the best and most trusted hospitals in Eastern Equatoria. In fact, the villagers of Imilai drive all the way to Torit, bypass the Torit hospital, turn roads, and drive even further to get quality service at our hospital in Isoke. After all the drunkenness we have seen, we could understandably see why they would do this.

So I got a training budget out of the way today, but that was about it. I could not wait to find Emmanuel tomorrow and start working on this Expression of Interest.

Friday, June 27, 2008
So we started out early on our trip to Isoke. It was, as usual, very beautiful. The difference between the road from Juba to Torit and this road was that on this road, there are a lot more rocky mountains in the background. There were ranges of them and they were just incredible…majestic. Ed let me even got to drive the Pajero for a good half hour on the road! It took me a while to get used to driving on the right side of the car, swerving around the ditches, and braking before the potholes. I really need to learn how to speed up a bit. Thankfully there are not a lot of cars on these roads. There were some hut villages on the mountains positioned there for security reasons, but they looked really cool. Isoke is definitely the prettiest town we have been in so far. We drove in at the junction and onto a little road with shops. It was really cute because it looked like a western saloon. We then drove into this wonderful road along the hospital which had a line of tall trees planted along both sides of it. We turned, saw a huge brick church set against the mountains, and entered the mission. It was truly impressive. The mountains added everything to the beauty of this town. You could definitely see why the Italians chose to build a mission here.

We got to our rooms at the sister’s and settled in the dining area. OH MY GOSH…the food was heaven. There was hot chapatti (it tasted a lot like puri), bread, fresh local made honey, and local made mango jam. I really wish I brought back some of that honey and mango jam; I knew my parents would have loved it.

We then walked over to the hospital, down a little dirt path out of the mission. The hospital was actually very nice…nicer than Torit hospital for sure. The main buildings were positioned in a U-shape, with a grass lawn in the middle for the patients to sit under the trees. We first entered the out-patient room for children, and there were so many babies and mothers inside the room, about 3-4 sitting upright on each bed. There was definitely a stench when we entered the room, but I could not tell what it was from. The first baby we saw had rashes on its arm and the mother was breastfeeding him. Ed started questioning the doctor and got riled up after he found out that they do not take temperature readings, but this was before he found that this was the same doctor who saved a woman who suffered 6 bullet shots through her body. But in reality, there really is no need to take a temperature because 90% of fever cases in children are due to malaria and children need attention immediately. Still, maybe it would be good to have a temperature reading. We continued walking along the building and entered a dispensary where the pharmacist stocked medicines. They had all sorts of medicines, and of course, we were looking for the artemisinin-based drugs. They had a few courses of them, which they got them from Uganda and other hospitals because the government had delayed their supply (obviously). Some still use quinine IV since ACTs are relatively new phenomena. We saw a lot of drugs exported from India because they were cheap and good quality. Ed told me that India’s pharmaceutical companies also provided the best AIDS medicine because they offered the best combination in their pills. It was kinda amusing. We then went to a surgery room, which was really just a small, dark single room with a bed, sink and some medicines lying on the tables. We went to the adult’s in-patient facility, which was very empty in comparison to the children’s facility. The set up was exactly the same, except there were about 4 people total, each on separate beds. There was one man in the middle of the room whose leg rested on a sling because it was shot with a bullet. I thought I would be disgusted at the sight of it, but with courage I came in closer to take a look at his leg. There was dried blood and yellow coloration on the bandages tied around his leg, but it was not as terrible as I imagined it to be (which gave me some comfort if I actually do decide to go into medicine). Since the hospital does not have a means to store blood, their own staff often donates blood on the spot for their patients. Talk about generosity!

We then went into the laboratory, which was my favorite part of the whole hospital. It brought back some memories of lab in Berkeley…which I guess I have been missing because I felt right at home in front of that microscope. It was so cool to see malaria parasites in the blood sample slide. We had been studying this protozoan forever, and now I actually got to see it live! At first I couldn’t tell where it was on the slide, but then they were just these big, dark hooked blobs…the parasites. I tried to bust out what little picture-taking skills I gained from Bio 1A Lab and tried to take a picture of the parasites through the microscope’s ocular lens, but it took me forever to finally get a decent photo of them. It is strange…walking into that laboratory and feeling a surge of excitement at the sight of that microscope (there is only one in the whole hospital). It made me realize that I like the laboratory and bioresearch aspect of public health. Maybe because all I have taken so far are technical science courses, and I have yet to delve into public health courses.

We went outside where there were a lot of TB patients, women, children, and men sitting under a large tree. I was not fully vaccinated for TB before coming, so I was a little hesitant to walk through. But whatever, I sucked it up again and saw a woman with lesions around her chest area. TB here is treated much like leprosy was in the United States; people do not like to come out and admit they have it for fear of being ostracized. The great thing about Eastern Equatoria is that there has not been much multi-drug resistance to TB because the Diocese has a really good TB program and does good follow-up, which makes me happy.

We walked over a hill and entered the maternal ward. There were two midwives who greeted us and let us in to see the place. We were actually pretty surprised to see two because the people at the health conference (DCP2) were complaining that there were only 10 midwives in all of Southern Sudan. And then Ed tells us that there were probably 10 Sudanese midwives; these two were from and trained in Uganda. The whole place was pretty much empty, except for two pregnant mothers waiting outside. I was really pleased to see mosquito nets on top of each bed in the ward. J They get about 40-60 mothers who come in for their antenatal clinic every week, which is ok. But unfortunately, they only get 40 pregnant mothers to deliver in the hospital the whole year. Oftentimes they have to refer their most complicated cases all the way to Kitgum, Uganda. They tell us that pregnant women would rather be at home around their families and get delivered by a traditional birth attendant (TBA). After looking at the delivery room, we could see why they wanted to stay at home. It was not very comforting to see the bed and the room, and Ed suggested that they build a tukul or some home-type of environment in the room to make the mothers feel more comfortable. We really feel that it is best for mothers to be delivered in hospitals than by TBAs because the maternal mortality rate is so high here and TBAs usually do not refer complicated cases to hospitals because they get paid for each delivery. The DCP2 conference recommended that we train more midwives, but if mothers are too terrified to deliver in a hospital, it does not even matter how many midwives there are. Instead we have to increase maternal attendance in hospitals, and the best way to do that is by educating women. The more educated the woman, the more likely she will come to a hospital for delivery. We also thought it would be a good idea for one of the midwives to travel around the homes and deliver, and have the other midwife stay at the hospital, until the mothers trust the midwives and start going to the hospital by themselves. We should have told the midwives that.

We got really hungry and went over to the Sister’s for lunch. The lunch was just as terrific as breakfast: pasta, spinach, boiled potatoes, warm bread, and other good stuff. I really loved Sister Helen’s cooking; I wish she could stay with us at Torit haha. Sooo goooood. Yum! Haha. We met an Italian doctor who took us to the church after lunch. This church was beautiful; we went inside and there were pictures on the walls, rows of benches, and at the very end, the alter. There were also some drums and some string instruments in one brightly lit section, and we started banging on them for some fun. Some schoolchildren started piling in to check out what was going on. They were really hesitant to approach the khawajas, but then they started playing along with us. It was cute. We then went out to the children’s boarding school. It was just several long brick buildings, and the school was in session.

Finally we went back to our rooms and took a small nap before Ed woke us up to go to a monthly staff meeting under a tree, by the hospital. We pulled up our chairs and listened. Sister Florence, Dr. Fred, and some others faced us, went over the agenda, and started addressing the concerns they had in the hospital. They brought up problems with people being late on their shifts, people not putting trash in the correct baskets, people not asking permission before they leave to go somewhere, and about paternal leave. Basically they wanted to be a little bit stricter following the rules of the hospital. Then it started to rain and we all gathered our chairs to sit inside a room within the maternal ward. Emmanuel came in (surprising) but came in late (not surprising). I was furious when I heard from Sister Florence that Emmanuel was not in Isoke when we arrived. And then he finally showed up after Sister pushed him to come today. Good. I can start working on this UNDP interest, which was due in like 2 days. This meeting was supposed to be 2 hours, but it ended up lasting for 4 hours. Everyone talked forever, and Emmanuel talked the most. He wanted to emphasize that it is important for each person to register how many patients enter and leave the hospital so that the donors know and receive the funding necessary. I agree.

So we walked back to the sister’s in the dark for dinner. Dinner, again, was stupendous. Stupendous because there was CHICKEN! Haha. And there were plenty of pieces to eat haha. We also had beans, more pasta, boiled cassava chips, potatoes, and more spinach. Gosh it was so good; I really did not want to leave this place. The best part of it, beside the scenery and the food, was definitely the weather. It was about 10 degrees cooler in Isoke than in Torit, and it made sleeping under a net bearable.

During dinner, we watched the news on TV. This was the first time I had seen television since Nairobi. Obama and Hillary Clinton made a joint appearance, Mugabe won the Zimbabwe elections, and Nelson Mandela was celebrating his 90th birthday. Emmanuel came in, late, and ate with us. Even though his unreliability irritates me, I gotta admit, Emmanuel never fails to make me laugh. Emmanuel, our Health Coordinator, does not vaccinate himself because he is afraid of needles. Pathetic! Haha. Even when there are outbreaks, he claims that his immune system is strong enough. This guy… Then Jerome started to talk about elephants and hippopotamuses at Nimule, and about eating crocodiles. Africans eat some exotic creatures, but even they admit that the Chinese eat animals they would never even dream of eating—snakes, cats, dogs, anything. Hahah I kept laughing at that because it was so true. Then a Sister talked to us about her experience during the war. The SPLA came into Isoke and started to burn down the hospital and the school. They escaped into the mountains and waited until the ceasefire. At one point, the Sister wanted to give up and run away, but then the children piled on top of her to prevent her from leaving. Because of them, she stayed and took care of them. These people never cease to amaze me. Then Ed started to say that forced disarmament would start another civil war because it would stir up tribal rivalries between people like the Dinka and the Taposa. The Dinka soldiers would try to disarm the Taposa, but then the Taposa would get angry and buy their guns from Khartoum. This is a possibility, but people definitely say that the best way for another war to happen is to get the South fighting amongst each other. I just hope that no war happens during our net distribution over the next five years. Nets better help peace in someway, showing that the government is indeed helping its own people.

Saturday, June 28, 2008
We heard a march of children outside our window early in the morning. There were men accompanying them as well, chanting and singing. Apparently they do this every morning as exercise around the town, and it is actually quite festive. Jerome and George went up to hike where the waterfalls were and brought back some tamarind for us to eat. I got up and went to eat breakfast with the sisters, taking in all that good honey. After breakfast, I wanted to get started on the UNDP Interest, but Emmanuel was nowhere in sight…again! He was at another meeting (boy he loves talking in those meetings), so I just sat outside under the trees with Emma, George, and Jerome. I saw Emmanuel come in, and I forced him to sit and draft a letter for the Interest. But then lunch came around (pizza haha!), and he ran away. I hunted for him at the hospital, found him at Sister Florence’s office, and waited until he gave me all the documents he prepared onto my flashdrive so that I had some sort of knowledge about the Diocese’s TB and HIV treatments for me to write these letters on my own. Ed was calling us to leave for Kimatong, so I let Emmanuel off the hook this time around. I pressured him to come to Torit tomorrow so that I could finish this Interest with him, but we all knew he was not going to show up.

So we drove to Kimatong because we wanted to start a small distribution of 500 nets in that small village. The money for these 500 nets were raised by a high school in Palo Alto, and Ed was the one who got them to make sure they would get distributed in time for the rainy season. Kimatong is also a place where Lopez Lomong, the runner, is from. We wanted to make sure this distribution was successful and would serve as a model for our greater distribution throughout Eastern Equatoria.

The road to Kimatong was also very pretty; there were palm trees along the road and dried up river beds surrounded by greenery. We drove on top of a bridge made up of stones, and it was called a lagger. Down the road, closer to Kimatong, we saw herds and herds of cattle in the middle of the road. Just when we thought we passed through one crowd, there were more ahead for us to honk through. The men around the cattle were holding spears, rifles, long bows and arrows, and some bloody meat over their shoulders. They had jewelry around their necks and some had nose rings; their outfits were really mismatched. We waved to them, and they smiled and waved back. Some came over to shake our hands. We got to Kimatong, and it was like another hut village, except that it had some nice buildings set up for school and other purposes and the village was set underneath a big rocky mountain. There were goats walking up it, women coming down with huge barrels of water on their heads, and men sitting along the slope. We parked near a building, and multitudes of children and men greeted us. There was this one man wearing long ragged clothing, who immediately came up to us and attempted to speak English with an American accent. At first I thought he was trying to act cool, but then Ed said he was drunk. He asked us where we were from, and I told him I was American. He tells me as clear as possible, “You know, you are in the Sudan and we here (pause) are black people.” Not shit, Sherlock. He then said I was small and that he should take me as his sister. Let me just tell you, this guy was creepy. We hurried away, behind Ed, and safely by Jerome’s side. We find a group of men sitting in a circle, and they get up to offer us seats. We meet with the chief Hillary, who is very old and thin. There was a man who sat across from us, wanting to give 140 cattle for Emma to marry his son. At first he said 140 bulls (which is obviously a big no), and at first we thought HE wanted to marry Emma. He already had three wives who were all pregnant, and then he had the balls to ask whether he could get a net all to himself. But then we find out he asking for his son to marry, and Ed priced 140 cows. This was all while Emma was away. We always thought 400 cattle was reasonable for someone like Emma, but Ed said that number is merely to impress someone…when someone is really talking about a serious marriage offer, 140 cattle is realistic and very good. Regardless, I couldn’t believe Ed placed a price. We then talked to Peter Lomong, who was very nice but seemed nervous about taking the responsibility to register his people for these nets.

It was getting dark, and I really wanted to get back because I was afraid of bandits on the road. Ed assured me it was safe, but even if it was, it was the most uncomfortable bumpy ride ever. It is harder to see as night, so Ed and Jerome drove over what seemed ALL the potholes on the road. At the same time, George and Emma were trying to scare me about the wildlife nearby. They were waiting to see some leopards, lions, baboons and hyenas jump in front of our car, but I was really happy that the only animals we saw that dark night were cute foxes (or was it deer?), owls, guinea fowl, something small with a long tail, and terrified porcupines! Aww those porcupines were so cute, wobbling ahead of us. Whenever we would stop to switch drivers, I would always imagine some animal launching over the grass, onto where our car was, and attacking us. It never happened, but Emma and George really wanted to come back to the United States with some stories and scars across their shoulders. I was just happy to get back home to Torit, 4 hours later.

Sunday, June 29, 2008
So guess who wasn’t here today again? Emmanuel. Gahh I got so frustrated because the UNDP Interest was due tomorrow, and I had no idea where he was at. So I started on both letters, for TB and HIV, and I kept emailing him throughout the day. I started to get real stressed out because we were supposed to leave for Juba tomorrow and Ed was leaving, so I did not have enough time to do all the other work I wanted to do before he left. Instead, I was stuck doing letters for a proposal I never planned to be doing in the first place, for someone else, but then again, I had the whole Diocese in mind. Dinner rolls around, the U.S. Embassy emails us about a Polio outbreak in Juba, where we were supposed to go tomorrow (I curse because I was last vaccinated in ’92). Pressured, I complete the letters and email them to Emmanuel to print out and sign. I threaten him to come to Torit by 7 AM to deliver his documents otherwise we would be leaving without him for Juba. That was a lie, of course.

Monday, June 30, 2008
I wake up at about 7:30 AM, and I do not see Emmanuel anywhere. I see our Health Clinic Officer, Moses, who brings the documents for Emmanuel instead. But then there is last minute trouble. Emmanuel erased Father Amayo’s signature on the letters, and Ed, Ydo, and Father Amayo are infuriated. I am annoyed too because I spent so much time on those letters and the whole Diocese should get credit, not just Emmanuel. So they have an intense meeting, and Ed comes out to tell me I have to edit the letters again and print them out for Father Amayo to sign. Joseph, who has been in the compound since yesterday, would sign on Emmanuel’s behalf. So we finally get it printed and out of the way. I feel stressed and tired, pack, Ed finishes packing, and we ride off to Juba at about 10 AM.

It was strange driving down this same road without Bishop Paride. I really missed him. We saw a group of furry monkeys climbing a tree at one point on the road, and we really wished we had some bananas to give to them. We stopped by Kudo’s Primary Health Care Center (PHCC) to take some pictures and look around. It was built recently, but it is not yet operational. After much traveling, we finally reached the entrance to the bridge over the Nile. We were at first worried whether we would be stopped at the security checkpoint because our license plate was expired. Ours still had NS (New Sudan) on it, but the government wants everyone to have state license plates (like EES for Eastern Equatoria State) probably for more money. But we did not get checked because it was too hot for the policemen to bother noticing our car’s license plate.

Since we were really hungry at this point, we stopped by the Sister’s Yunice Corner Restaurant, which we ate at nearly everyday with Bishop Paride the last time we were at Juba. I really missed the food, and we had chicken, rice, and chips. We then went straight to the highly-protected UNDP office to turn in our Expression of Interest to this Japanese guy. It was such a huge lift off my shoulders once I handed those papers over to him. Glad that was done. We then dropped off George and Ed at Census for mapping information, and Jerome takes Emma and me to search for hotels. We pick up his other friend, Emmanuel (called Emma…or “ding-dong” for short). They take us first to look at the Sunflower Inn, but it looked really sketch, especially with all these men passing by and looking gleefully at us. Already Emma and I did not want to stay there, and we were relieved when we find out the price was way beyond our reach ($160/night for a single). We then travel to White Nile Lounge, and bargain down the price to $100/night for a double. The place was a lot nicer than the other hotel, but it looked a lot like a trailer park. Even though many things were not working or not even there (like toiled seats or shower heads), the air conditioner worked…which was great for me. :-) There was also wireless internet, which was great for Ed.

We went to pick up Ed and George at Dahabashil (sp?), the popular money-exchange bank, but their group taxi driver dropped them off somewhere not even close to Dahabashil. So we find them under a detergent billboard sign and head off to our meeting with Steve at Malaria Consortium. It was a great 2 hour meeting to update him on all our research and work. The best thing we learn from him is to open up the bags with the mosquito nets when giving them out to people. This decreases the net’s retail value, making them less likely to be sold off to the market. We also got the idea to get a flip chart demonstrating how to use and maintain the nets.

We then went to our hotel and relaxed a bit outside the bar, which overlooked the Nile. It was very cool and nice. We headed over for our dinner party at an Ethiopian restaurant called Queen of Sheba because Steve invited us. The restaurant was in some sort of big Christmas-lighted, beach-style hut, and there were about 20 people at our table. It was very chic, I guess. You could tell a lot of khawajas like to hang out there. The food was very good, especially the chicken curry haha. Cutting the injera with my hands and dipping it into the various vegetables reminded me of Indian food. For a moment, I thought I was home, but it was not spicy enough haha. JK.

We drive back, drop off Jerome to where he was sleeping for the night, and expectantly, get lost. We drive in circles, meet the Sunflower Inn about three times, get closer to our hotel (according to George’s GPS), but find roads that lead into unkempt forest-looking environments. We finally reach the hotel after much testing of roads, and Ed claims he has never felt so happy to come back to a hotel.

Then Emma and I spray our room because there were no mosquito nets, but mosquitoes still managed to enter the room and buzz around my ears the entire night.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008
So today was the day Ed had to leave us. He was supposed to leave at 12:30 PM, but he pushed the flight to 1:30 PM so that he could squeeze in a meeting with the head of PSI in Sudan, Marcie Cook. I am actually glad that he did end up coming because this was a really big meeting for us; this was the woman we were going to send our proposal to for review and possibly approval, and Ed did great with his smooching. Haha JK…he did great in general, providing a lot of useful knowledge about Sudan that the three of us did not know much about. We learn a lot, find out some details about the RFP and when it was possibly coming out, and find out some more about changes in PSI’s plans for net distribution. We find out that the original plans they had written out a year ago in their proposal to the Global Fund will be slightly different, so we are going to take those into account when the RFP releases. I liked her a lot. So far, PSI has made some really good impressions on me. If I actually do decide to go into Public Health in the future, I really really would not mind working for an organization like PSI that is so knowledgeable, so successful, and so on top of their shit the way they are. They have done a lot of successful campaigns in other countries…they are just so good.

We then raced Ed to the airport, where he still had to buy his ticket. It took a good hour before he said his final goodbyes. I tell you, right when he left, there was definitely a void in the car. I already missed his endless talking and around-the-clock urgent work meetings. We went to the Sister’s for lunch again, but it was unusually quiet and empty. At one moment, we thought we saw Bishop Paride, and my heart lept. But it was someone else. We went to census again, but the guy we were looking for was not there. We then went to an auto mechanic shop to get our Pajero fixed, but it took way longer than we expected—about 3 hours. I just slept in the back of the car as they were fixing it, and then I was so happy to get out of there once it was fixed. Juba is a lot different than I remembered it to be the last time we were here. It is a lot more dusty…and dirty. The dirt roads seem narrower, meandering, and extremely bumpy. There is a lot more sewage, dilapidated tin-roofed shops, and people walking around then I recall. It was also less…green. I never thought I would like Torit more.

We went to the hotel, relaxed, and then headed out for dinner. Jerome picked up his friend Emmanuel, who took us to another Ethiopian restaurant, but this one was well-lit and had no khawajas in site. We shared all our dishes, surprisingly chatted for a good 2 hours about things not even closely related to work (we were not with Ed anymore, so what do you expect?), laughed a lot, while I drank water and the 4 of them shared beers. Man they drank a lot.

We got back safely and slept.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008
We still woke up really early so that we could leave for Torit as soon as possible. Emma and I wanted to get out of icky Juba, but we still had to go to census. We waited around for the person, but he never came. So we left, stopped by WFP (World Food Program) for Jerome to pick up something, and headed over to meet Dr. Charles Lewis from Tearfund. He was super sweet and gave us some good tips about letters to the Minister, the health budget for 2009, and about the intimidating Dr. Baba we were planning to meet the next time we came to Juba. I am so glad we established a connection with Chris Lewis; I see his name in so many of the South Sudan Health Forum messages.

We go over to the Sister’s for the last time and shake our hands with the schoolchildren as they politely ask, “Morning! How are you?” So cute haha. We then leave for Juba. As expected, this 83 mile trip took 3 hours, but it felt even longer without Ed. We arrived at our compound in Torit, but the whole place seemed empty. I greeted Father Amayo and talked to him for awhile. Ydo had left for the Netherlands. I got back to the rooms and noticed a nice office set up about two doors down. Guess whose it was? Emmanuel’s. He was here finally, doing some work. Although I wanted to snap at him for his behavior, it is really hard for me to get mad at him. Even when I resist, he somehow always manages to make me smile. Jerk. Haha jk. We did not do much today because were tired and wanted to get some rest after all that traveling. So I finally caught up on some blogging...and munched on a lot of sweet dates Father Amayo brought from Khartoum.

Thursday, July 3, 2008
Just when I thought I would be able to sleep in without Ed being here, I cannot. I still wake up pretty early and check my emails, only to find Ed on google chat. So I talk to him about business we needed to do today. With George, I work on a health budget spreadsheet that Dr. Charles Lewis wanted all the NGOs to fill out for the Ministry of Health. The deadline was tomorrow, but we finished it fairly quickly. And then I continued blogging; now I have already caught up (except for my days at Juba).

We are waiting for Emmanuel’s MOU and the letter from Chris Lewis to get our ACTs from other counties. So as of now, we have been having a fun time planning out our small party for tomorrow’s 4th of July celebration. There will be about 15 or so people, and we are going to get a whole mess of food: chickens, beef, sodas, beer, bread, home-made fries, ketchup, beans…just an all out obnoxious American time. But of course, we are going to help out with the cooking because no one knows how to grind up beef and make hamburgers here. Also, chickens take some time.

George managed to set up speakers in our Pajero and play music from our iPods. Haha it was great. I never thought I would miss hearing some hardcore American music so much. Everyone here listens to sappy songs. I have heard so much Shania Twain, Aerosmith, Backstreet Boys, Westlife, and slow songs in general, which gets really old when you want to here some rock or hip hop.

So tomorrow we are going to wake up early, buy some chickens and other food items from the market, prepare the dinner, build a bonfire, and sport our red, white, and blue American clothing. Haha. Too bad there are no firecrackers here.

-Neesha

Reminders (I should stop calling these reminders…they are not really reminders):
Mom, I have lasted for a long time without owning anything from Apple. But now…I want an iPod. I gave in after listening to Emma and George’s today.

Corruption, Revised

So I took out a lot from my previous post. I do not know what I should be open about anymore, and I am becoming more cautious with each post I enter now. But this hinders me from expressing my feelings the way I had originally wish I could on this blog. Whatever, I do not want to bring trouble to the team and ruin all our hard work here.

So this is my revision, and again, it still includes as much as I thought was acceptable (but you can correct me):

Sunday, June 22, 2008
This was our first real weekend. We could not do any work today because the generator was not on this whole day until late at night. But by that time, we always get really tired and sleep. So I played Madlibs with Emma and George, read some stuff, and hung out under the mango trees with some of the Fathers. Father Amayo thinks the South would vote 33% for independence, which means it will most likely not happen. He is the first man I have heard who has said that, and I hope it is not the case.

Yeah so we are back to having goat for dinner again. It is fine, there are good vegetable dishes. I tried to work on a spreadsheet of all the malaria statistics we gathered for S. Sudan, E. Equatoria, and possibly the Diocese, but I got tired and went to sleep.

Monday, June 23, 2008
Biggest news for the day: Emmanuel and Joseph are here!!! I couldn’t stop smiling after I saw Emmanuel in the morning. After getting robbed on the way to Torit, I was afraid of him traveling alone at night. But he stayed over in Kapoeta, and left for Torit at about 4 AM when all the robbers are off the road. I am so glad he is safe. Now we can start drafting, and I can help him with the UNDP interest. But besides all that, they will take us around all the clinics, from Isoke to Kapoeta to Narus to Kuron (where Bishop Paride is)!! I am pretty cheerful with the both of them here; Emmanuel’s expressions make me laugh. I really can’t stop smiling. haha

With the both of them here, we set up a meeting with our team. Here are some stats for you: 62% of our total budget is on salaries, 13-14% is on medicine, ACTs make up 30% of our medical supply ($4.5 a course on this expensive drug), and out of the 10,ooo some patients that come into our facilities every month, 30% of them have malaria. From Emmanuel and Joseph, we find out that we are operating at 49% of the staff recommended by the MDTF, meaning we need 193 more workers. But obviously, we do not have the money because our own donor is now going to give up its funds to the MDTF starting next year. However, we would rather maintain the quality of care that we currently have rather than just hire a whole bunch of personnel. At the same time, the government is pressuring us to open up another PHCC.

We later present all of this information to Bishop Akio.

Then we go to the cold chain, and Emmanuel and Joseph notice that the vaccines are not refrigerated at the right temperature. We were supposed to be sending these vaccines throughout East Kapoeta County, the biggest and most difficult-to-reach county in all of Eastern Equatoria, but these vaccines were now spoiled.

We went to the Ministry but the generator was off, so I could not get files from the Malaria Head again. There is also a cholera problem in Torit, but it has not been reported yet. Emmanuel and Joseph met a lot of people they knew at the Ministry, but it turned out, many of the people Emmanuel fired for poor performance in the Diocese were now working for the State Ministry! Emmanuel has some serious guts to fire people, a dangerous thing in Sudan. But it is disappointing to know that the Ministry has hired the same people he fired for being drunk at work. We also find out where the ACTs were that were supposed to arrive from Juba. They had been dispatched in March and arrived in Torit at April, but they have still not gone out to all the counties because of disorganization and incompetence within the Ministry.

I never thought drunkenness was that big of a problem here; it did not seem to be that big of a deal. But in retrospect, I should have realized the magnitude of it. First in Lafon, Emma and George note that the people have beer everyday with breakfast, lunch, and dinner because the water is too unsafe to drink. So they saw people drunk even in the afternoon. Second, I remember there was an old woman in the market coming behind George and yelling incomprehensible Latuko words at him. Lucy told us to get away from her because she was drunk. Third, today at the Ministry I saw the Director of Primary Health, an old man, acting very strangely. He grabbed my arm and pulled me in to ask my name, and then I find out from Ed later on in the day that the man was drunk. I could not believe it.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Today Emmanuel and Joseph left, again, on a short notice. Those guys are way too busy. Before they left, however, our team had a scheduled meeting with the Minister of Health to discuss salaries. Emma and I did not go because this was George’s field. George said that it was a completely worthless meeting…and he also noticed that the Minister had new furniture and fans in her office (where did all that money come from?). It was a three hour meeting, but nothing big was accomplished. It was kind of frustrating because we wanted to get all our information in before the next budget cycle.

Anyways, we end up working the rest of the day. I nearly complete my spreadsheet, but I get really disappointed with my results for calculating the number of children under 5 who die from malaria each year. The four different methods I used to calculate this number should all match, but they did not! I get a range from about 3000-9000 children because I figure out that there are major discrepancies between data in all the sources we compiled. And these were all legit sources, from the government, UNICEF, WHO, the UN… So annoying.

Then I go to sleep because I do not know what else to do about it.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008
We continue working. I think we are pretty much done with all our intro meetings and our researching. We have already started working on our RFP (Request for Proposal) based on the format of the CCM proposal, even though the actual RFP has not come out yet. Considering that we are only going to work on this until the end of next month, we do not have the time to wait around for it anymore.

I continue on the spreadsheet because my portion of the proposal is really short and can be done later. I get more emails out, and I start on another spreadsheet that organizes a potential training budget for community health workers.

I work until my battery dies, and then I go next door to Swiss Karatas with Ed just to change pace a little bit. I did not want to be stuck in the Diocese all day. We met with an epidemiologist, Dr. Monica Benti, who studied in the U.S. She looked at my business card, noticed I was from Berkeley, and asked me if I worked at Livermore. HA I wish! Haha. I had to tell her that I was still a student…yes, I am still so young. Haha. She was great, and she does a lot of cool work traveling from epidemic to epidemic in various counties.

Now I am too burnt out to do any work. But I will have to get back on it tomorrow. I can’t believe it will be already a Thursday. Days go by quickly here now.

My Favorite Day

Saturday, June 21, 2008
Today was, by far, the best day of this whole trip…well, the best day for me and probably the worst day for Emma. Ed let me sleep in until 9 AM (yes!), and I woke up ready to go shopping today. Emma, however, woke up to find $850 not in her wallet. She was not in the mood for shopping, and when Ed gave us an overview of the condition of the car, she definitely did not want to go shopping. This car is just calling for disaster. The brake fluid leaks, the brake lights don’t work (!), the battery is held in place by inner tubes, the fluid containers are sealed with plastic bags, the windows do not roll down, and to top it off, there is only one seatbelt in the back! I need a seatbelt. I am going to die. According to Ed, this car will bring us home without fail about 50% of the time. OH GAD.

After much pushing, we finally convinced Emma to come shopping with us. I was happy. Jerome, our driver, once swerved the car to prevent hitting a group of schoolchildren, but ended up crashing into a building. So Ed drove the car to teach Jerome the right way to drive. We wanted to get our dollars exchanged for a good rate, and we knew the bank would jip us from our money (we wanted 215 pounds/$100), so we went to the marketplace searching. We went near the Bishop’s house, at a bigger tin-roofed store, where they sold all sorts of food items. Emma gave the cashier 20 pounds for her mango juice, expecting to get 14 pounds of change back. The guy totally forgot to give us our change, and then when we asked for it, he refused. He then gave us back 10 pounds because he said the juice was 10 pounds. It was 6 pounds! So we forced him to give us the rest of our change, and he finally gave in. Jerk. Ed did not end up getting a good exchange rate offer, so he left the store, told us to stay put, and drove off to search. And so we stayed put. People walked by, stared at us. I took some pictures, Emma kept whining, and George and Lucy kept laughing at Emma. At one point, there were many donkey carts on the road, and Emma wanted to ride one of them. The journalist we met asked his friend if he could let Emma ride his donkey, and the friend let her. But the donkey was getting really uncomfortable and the friend told Emma to get off. That was pretty funny haha.

We definitely did not stay put though. We did not want Ed to again ruin the one chance we had to go shopping and do something fun, since he got to go off and do his own thing. So Lucy walked us along the street, by a row of tin-roofed stores. There were two donkeys standing right in the middle of the main road, blocking all traffic. After much honking, they finally started to move in the direction we were walking. We assumed they wanted to follow Emma. We turned a corner and noticed the familiar SPLM head building, “where all the goats were”. As usual, more people stopped their work, and yep…stared. We walk into the marketplace with no clear objective of what we really wanted to buy. I wanted to buy a shawl, the type that the Kenyan woman, Susan, wears at our compound, but there was nothing that looked distinctly African. And so Emma and I just window shopped (even if there were no windows). The marketplace seemed less chaotic and more organized than the one in Juba. There were no winding, narrow pathways for us to follow through the market. The stores were aligned in pretty distinct rows and the paths between them were pretty broad, most of the time. We saw some pink and blue mosquito nets hanging for sale. At one store we stopped by, a man offered all of us some free lollipops. At first I refused because I already have people staring at me because 1) I do not look American (I overheard two men mumbling to each other, guessing that I was probably Filipino…the first time I heard that one) and 2) I am short. All the schoolchildren stare at me because I do not look like a child, even though I am their height. And so having me suck on a lollipop was not going to help that case at all. But Emma told me it is wrong to refuse offers, which I understand completely because Indians get offended when guests refuse their food, so I accepted. Whatever, I should get used to the stares and the giggles.

After all the trouble Emma faced today, Emma decided she wanted to buy some chickens for dinner tonight. We have not had any chicken to eat since arriving in Torit because everyone eats goat or fish here, and to tell you the truth, I have for a long time been wanting some chicken as well. So we settled on a quest to go around the market and buy some live chickens, only to find out that this was the time of day not many people sell chickens. Lucy said it is best to buy them in the morning because chickens need to be plucked and prepared, but we refused to listen to her. We entered a section of the marketplace that was cubed in with a people shopping for groceries and meat. The stands were covered with pieces of cloth and were open for the public to pick pieces of produce displayed. People were propped up against the stands, chatting, haggling, and tasting, but then as soon as we came in, most of them turned their curious eyes toward us. I really wish I took a picture of the whole festive scene, but I was afraid of drawing more attention with my camera. Plus, there were a lot of SPLM people walking around, so I did not want them to snatch my camera away. The area reminded me of one of those stops my family took on the way to Shrinathaji, where there were lots of people selling food items in a similar setup. I will be brave enough to get a picture one day. We passed through and found a stand that cut up fresh meat. I had to avert my eyes because they had a bloody goat hanging from the top of the stand. But even with all that meat, we still saw no chicken. We got out of the back of the marketplace, walked around the periphery, saw the disco place near where Ed found our bamboo sticks, but failed to find a chicken. We saw some ducks swimming on some green, muddy pool, but we felt bad to steal one of them.

We ended up stopping at one of the outside stands to buy ourselves some soft drinks. I was really craving some coconut juice, but they did not have any…so I just had some guava juice. Luckily in that stand, we saw a family who owned a rooster. Ok, not exactly the chicken we were looking for, but close enough. We bought it off them for 17 pounds, and we bought a bag to hold the rooster. We were afraid Emma was becoming too friendly with the live rooster, so we opened the bag to let the rooster have some air. Ed picked us up from the same spot we asked Lucy to pick us up from that day we got lost, and we drove the chicken home.

Now this was not my favorite part of the whole day. We came home, ate some of the same lunch, and went to our respective rooms to rest. The generator was off, so we could not do much. I took a nap, and then Ed woke us up because he wanted to take us out to the countryside with Father Ben. THIS was my favorite part of the whole day…heck, my favorite part of the whole trip so far! We took a right on the road from our compound, a direction we had never gone before, and started out on our adventure with Father Ben as our guide. We passed by some abandoned brick school buildings that were bombed during the war and a village that Emma wanted to take pictures of, but turned out to be the SPLA barracks. We reached a fork in the road where one led to the towns Isoke and Ikotos, but had 4 landmines on it. We did not take that road. We went on the road toward the Imatong Mountains because, except for the last 12 kilometers, that road was clear of mines. We saw a lot of red markings on the sides of the road to indicate that there were landmines around, and I got scared every time Ed got too close to hitting the grass on the outside of the road. We saw some areas that were cultivated, so we knew those might have been safe. We then passed the abandoned Little Norway, which had more bombed smaller buildings and some small huts around. The Norwegians, by the way, have done so much for Sudan. They have built so many primary health care facilities and schools, and the Norwegian Church Aid is on very good terms here. The whole trip so far looked much like the one from Juba to Torit, except that there were more trees and the mountains were closer. But once we passed Torit County, I was in a state of awe. The dirt road got a lot narrower and bumpier, the trees were more diverse and crowded, and the grass was getting as tall as the hood of our car. We saw more of the green mountains beside us, some small rivers below, a wonderful teak plantation that looked so natural to the area, and so many different kinds of barked trees, from mahogany to banana to acacia to bamboo! We were driving into the hills of a forest, and I just fell in love. It was beautiful…so beautiful I would go back there again. The crazy number of pictures I took will never capture the vivid intensity of this landscape. It was just…gorgeous. My vision of heaven. We saw some villagers on the side of the road and waved to them. At times we would see the frame of an abandoned vehicle that had been overturned next to a river. We saw hills that would rise on both sides of us, where the SPLA used to hide and shoot down on the passing Arabs. We also saw areas in the green where the LRA would stay.

We stopped at a small village, near the end of the road, called Imilai (sp?). Again, I was struck by the beauty of the whole scene. This lucky village was nestled between a range of green mountains and tall trees. The huts did not at all disrupt the integrity of the setting. We walked along a narrow path of the village, through the thick of the grass (grass much taller than me), passed by more of their huts and chickens (amazing, we finally found Emma’s chickens!), some banana trees, and reached the end of a huge fallen tree that served as a bridge for the Kinyette (sp?) river underneath. We all stepped onto the tree, and I was tempted to walk further to explore more of this enchanting place, but we had to turn back.

We then sat at some open common space that the villagers cleared so that we could talk to the local priest. He told us about witchdoctors who did not give the correct kind of treatment, and so he would have to drive his people all the way to Isoke for proper care. Everyone was so friendly and we shook hands with all of them. I even met an old man who spoke Gujarati! Can you believe it?! I come all the way to Africa, to this remote village, expecting to hear some words in Latuko, have Africans shake my hand, when all of a sudden I hear one of them say, “Kemcho!”… I was stunned. He did not even speak Hindi; he spoke Gujarati, my language! At first I thought it was a fluke, but then he asked me what my name was in Gujarati, and then I knew I wasn’t crazy. Wow. Now I am definitely coming back. I loved the people; I loved this place. I did not want to leave. But then the sun was setting, and the time had come for us to go back home. Whatever, I will come back again.

To top this day off, Abigail, our cook, told us we had chicken! YES! Who cares if it was small! I had waited so long, and I was ready to eat some organic chicken. I went to sleep satisfied with our day. No health work on this Saturday; just plain touristy work.

Ok fine, I was not completely satisfied with the day. Ryan told me that the Lakers suffered a humiliating lost to the Celtics. I am sad; there goes our run for the title… See, I knew this day was too good to be true.

But other than that, and the fact that Bishop Paride is getting knee surgery (I hope he will be ok), this day was near perfect. I loved it.

-Neesha