It's been a hectic week! I'm absolutely knackered, long hours in the pharmacy have really taken it out of me. I came home from work at 2pm yesterday and just wanted to lie down and sleep forever...
So, Tuesday was the first day back after our trip to the city. Tom and I went to Ngcwanguba to drop off the ARV packs. It was the first time we'd ever just dropped them and left so I'll see next week when we collect all the papers how well that worked. I don't have the highest of hopes given that we had run out of D4T (Stavudine) which is an ARV that pretty much everyone takes. They all had to take a double dose of the kids pill instead which I'm sure would have caused mass confusion - taking ARVs is complicated enough as it is!
Continuing the fun, I returned to the pharmacy to find us the victim of another power cut. Sadly for the three of us in the pharmacy, the backup generator had decided it wouldn't power our lights so we were in pitch darkness using torches to locate all the drugs. I needed to prepare for the next week's clinic so headed on down to the maternity ward to use a desk there. I was working quite well down there then got a bit distracted and ended up going to watch a birth - this one was a bit more gruesome than the last one because the woman needed an episiotomy [I'm sure I've spelt that wrong] and there was blood everywhere. The baby boy was pretty small and wasn't very lively, but the midwife sorted that out using a technique known as 'Holding the Baby Upside Down By One Leg Until He Cries' which I guess must be okay since it worked! After a nice dose of holding cute newborns I decided I should probably do some work so reluctantly handed over the child and went back to my desk.
Later on, Thabo (one of the pharmacy assistants) came down to tell me that one of the hospital managers had told him that the Department of Health had rejected our latest stock take because it was on the wrong computer template and it needed to be transferred to a new one. By the next day at 8am. Now, first of all let me fill you in on a little something called 'The Saga of Zithulele Stock Take':
The Saga of Zithulele Stock Take
Once upon a time in South Africa there was a little hospital in the middle of nowhere with a pharmacy full[ish] of pills. The pharmacist had left for the high life in Johannesburg and when the time came to do the stock take, it was left to a mixture of doctors, physiotherapists, untrained volunteers and random people who happened to be passing at the time. Many days went past and many pills were counted and all the counts were written on pieces of paper.
The next week, a young pharmacy volunteer and physiotherapist-turned-stock-taker spent two entire days inputting the hundreds of items on the papers into a computer template that was riddled with errors and inconsistencies. They then spent another day checking items in store rooms hidden all over the hospital and recounted the entire contents of four fridges. The two intrepid workers were tired of all the counting, but still they carried on.
On the final day of the stock count, with the deadline rapidly approaching, the physio and the chief medical officer of the hospital sat down and spent one final day checking, re-checking and re-re-checking, sending the young pharmacy girl here, there and everywhere recounting this, that and the next thing, until everything was finished.
And on the next day, they saw that the stock take was finished, and it was good.
Now that you have read the saga, you will understand the dismay that came over myself and Megan [the famous physio/stock taker] when we heard that we would have to transfer all of the data across onto another spreadsheet and how hopeless the task seemed when we saw that there were over 4000 items to search through on the new template. Not to be defeated, we organised a work party for that night.
Sam and I were without power anyway so went up to the Gaunts to cook dinner [or more accurately, Sam cooked dinner]. Megan and I then sat in the Gaunts for three hours straight with our laptops, meticulously transferring across all the stock counts. It was infuriating to discover that this new template was missing half the items from it and when it got to 11pm and we weren't even half way through and over 50 items didn't appear on the list, we gave up, resolving to contact the depot and inform them that they were being just a little unreasonable.
The next day saw a continuation of the saga, but it all gets a bit long and complicated so to cut a long story short, in the end Karl Le Roux used his magic powers and talked some sense into the depot and Megan and I were spared many more hours of stock taking. Fingers crossed we won't have to do that again! We had ARV clinic as usual, fun fun fun. The power cut was ongoing, and the generator had run out so I couldn't power the computer to dispense all the ARVs. This was just a tad depressing given that there were ninety patients to write all the labels for by hand and knowing all the time that at the end of the day I would have ninety files waiting for me to enter into the computer system when the power returned.
After work, I was given dinner by the legendary Lisa and Liz [again?! I hear you say] then we had cell group, then I collapsed into bed, for the next day was going to be a hard one since all the other pharmacy staff were going on a course in Mthatha.
Thursday morning I woke up knowing that I had to run the pharmacy and the ARV clinic dispensary by myself so I was a bit stressed from the word go. I went up to the clinic and carted 5 boxes of ARVs back into the pharmacy and then set up a trolley of ARVs and the computer so I could do both from the main dispensary window. Luckily, I had assistance from Nocawe (yes, that's not how you spell her name but I don't know!) who, like me, has no training for this job so together we were perfectly prepared to cope with the endless stream of patients.
It was hard without Thabo and Zandile there to answer my endless questions of where all the different drugs were [even harder when all the prescriptions were done under trade names] so I spent most of the day with my head in the South African Medicines Formulary checking what on earth Akineton, Drilix, Scopex, Myogel etc. etc. etc. were. We have run out of so many medicines that it is ridiculous: paracetamol, certain TB meds, erythromycin, flucloxacillin, pyridoxine, thiamine, lots of IV antibiotics, all the ear/eye/nose drops, gauze, steroid cream, iodine solution...you name it, it's out of stock. Even the ones that aren't out of stock are only available in massive 1000 tablet containers so need to be prepacked. To give you an idea of the scale of pill counting that the two of us did, we went through six containers of 1000 co-trimoxazole tablets alone in that one day!
After around 11am, the ARV patients started arriving so they were added to the mix. Then we started getting my usual Thursday dose of patients who defaulted from the outreach clinics and now need to be sorted out, fun fun fun. Then the ward staff started coming with the prescriptions for inpatients and I had to navigate my way around the injections and getting confused with names like 'benzathine benzylpenicillin' and 'benzamethylphenylhydrazine dibenzylimadethisupvcloxacillin'. Then patients started coming with prescriptions for the restricted drugs and I couldn't find the key for the cabinet, so by this point I kind of wanted to curl up in a ball and pretend none of this was actually happening.
But we carried on, working over lunch, seeing patient after patient and watching as the line got longer and longer. The doctors all finished up at the clinic and came to assist us and at one point there was myself, Nocawe, Karl, Liz, Jo, Joff [all doctors], Asanda and Athini [ARV counsellors] all working from the dispensary window which is little over 2m wide! It was completely crazy but somehow through the madness, everyone was seen at five thirty we said goodbye to the last person and I finally sat down after ten hours on my feet. It was the hardest day of work yet by a mile.
But all was not done! Lurking under the counter was my lovely pile of ARV files that needed to be back captured onto the system! Luckily, there is a person in this world called Liz who carried the massive box to her house [all by herself] and offered to help me with it. Lisa was making muffins with Emma and Sally and I decided enough was enough, I was done with Lent and had a muffin [GOOD TIMES] then Sally brought Tobelerone for Sammy and I to break Lent in style with [also GOOD TIMES]. The people here look after us so well, I am eternally grateful to all of them :)
We watched some Friends [the Gladys is gonna get you episode, remember that Gregor?!] then Liz made a chicken pie and Lisa and I made up a song about the chicken pie which annoyed Liz, so she put on the Lifehouse CD track 2 at maximum volume to annoy Lisa, it's good that everyone gets along so well … ;) After dinner, Liz and I sat up [with the help of some coffee] until 11.30pm inputting all the data onto the computer system which was a total mission but we survived [despite high levels of abuse..I'm joking]. And then the day of work was over!
Quite epic I think you'll agree!
xxxxxx
Saturday 24 April 2010
Return to Civilisation
Last Thursday, Sam and I were offered the chance to get out of Zithulele and get back into the 'real world’. Liz was going to East London to visit friends and offered to let us come on the road trip with her. I've not been anywhere resembling civilisation for 100 days so I was very excited to go and after an unfortunate incident where Sam was bitten by a cockroach in the middle of the night she was also extremely keen to leave the rondavel we are calling home!
Friday morning was a frantic rush to put things in order before we left. As we would be taking Monday off as well, we had to complete all the packing for the next week's clinic and then organise for people to cover all of Sam's Monday activities. After packing prescriptions for 4 hours straight, we finally wrapped up the pharmacy, then spent the next hour sorting out Sam's stuff, went to pack for the trip and were on the road by 2pm [good work!] :D
It was a drive of epic proportions since we first had to traverse the dirt road which was experiencing a minor dust storm where the dust even came into the car through the vents and we all nearly died of dust inhalation. [Well, not really.] Anyway, when we emerged from that in a now-brown car, there was the tar road which would be more accurately described as a 60km series of interconnecting potholes. After that trauma was over we finally arrived at Mqanduli which is one of my favourite places due to the presence of the Post Office :D After trying three times in the previous week to pick up my post there I finally managed to get some mail, yay!
This time the postman had brought me:
1. A letter from Grannie
2. A letter from Auntie Kathryn
3. A letter from Megan
4. A stunning cake postcard from Marjorie
5. Two letters from Mum with stickers for the kids in ARV clinic :)
6. A postcard from Auntie Fiona, Uncle Donald, Cameron and Bruce in Singapore
7. A London postcard from Megan [handwritten for once :P]
I love post. And thank you to everyone who writes to me :)
Back on the road we were now on the N2, one of South Africa's national highways, characterised by a) a lack of dust and b) a lack of potholes. It's still only one or two lanes wide and has cattle, dogs, sheep and people wandering all over it! We drove through endless beautiful African landscape and through the Kei cuttings until we finally left the Transkei [and according to Liz, re-entered the real world]. Then we entered some extreme mist and had to slow to a crawl [not wholly because of the mist, but because some of the other drivers thought that lowered visibility was a good reason to forget that the purpose of the car was to move forward]. We continued on along a long straight road surrounded by whiteness on all sides for what felt like a long time, enjoying the now familiar tunes on Liz's Grammy's 2010 CD [and realising with great sadness that we knew the words to the country western tracks as well].
Finally [finally] after nearly 5 hours of driving [and 4 hours 59 minutes of road rage ;)] we arrived in East London, yay for the city! It is so completely removed from the tiny village of rondavels that we live in that it is properly like entering another world. We went to get showered at Liz's friend Jules' house [a house! A real house!] then went out to the cinema at Hemingway's, East London's new shopping centre.
Entering Hemingway's, which just happens to be the shiniest building in the world, was the strangest feeling, Sam and I were looking around like we had some kind of issue – it felt really surreal to be back in civilisation! We met up with some more of Liz's many friends then went to the cinema to see a film called Leap Year. The cinema here is SO cheap: R20 for a ticket and R18 for a massive box of popcorn (that's a total of less than three pounds!). The film was pretty funny but for all the wrong reasons since it took being cheesy to a new level. Either way, going to the cinema = good. After the film we went for coffee and Sam and I had these stunning cappuccinos with chocolate cream and whipped cream on the top, yum yum. We then got dropped at Buffalo backpackers which was to be our home for the weekend.
Or not, as it turned out. Described in Coast to Coast, the backpacking bible, as 'designed with travellers in mind...owners with stacks of experience...large garden courtyard....spacious reception...saloon' it would be more accurately described as 'a bit like a prison, designed for local guys to get drunk and shout at each other in the concrete courtyard and give abuse to the owner who doesn't even know what day it is'. I'll give them their dues, the bed was comfortable, it was clean and only cost R75 for the night but the atmosphere and facilities in a prison would probably have been preferable. Needless to say, Sam and I got up and left right away for another backpackers. I think it says it all that when we told the owner of the next backpackers that we had been staying at Buffalo, her only response was, 'Aw, shame!’
Niki-nana's backpackers, with its stripy zebra roof, pool, brightly coloured bedrooms and cable TV was like something out of a dream after our night in the cells. We checked in for the next two nights, ditched our stuff and wandered down to the beach front to have some breakfast and start our 100th day of the trip in style. We ended up at Wimpy [which isn't the greasy fast food joint it is the UK] and had a stunning meal: Sam had a cooked breakfast and I had a toastie and a muffin. Sam ordered a fruit smoothie and I ordered a chocolate milkshake, something which continued throughout the weekend when we did the same everywhere that we ate!
Later on, Liz and Jules dropped us off at the beacon of civilisation that is Hemingway's and we spent the next 12 hours in there. Who would have ever thought of doing that back home? Truth be told, we didn't actually do very much shopping and got tired after about 1.5 hours, clearly we are too used to the snail’s pace of life in Zithulele. We bought new bed linen so now I have a sheet which actually covers my mattress and doesn't come off every time I roll over; some more t-shirts so I don't have to wash clothes every 2 days and a second pair of shoes since my sandals are looking, shall we say, a bit past it.
The cinema beckoned to us so we went and bought tickets for the 5.30pm showing and then set about trying to pass the next five hours. We decided to go for lunch at Mugg & Bean which was STUNNING. After drooling over the menu for a while we managed to order, then ordered some more things just for the hell of it before the first had even arrived, prompting weird looks from our waitress. We then ordered pudding, the biggest scone and muffin in the world, and for some reason they offered to put cheese on my chocolate muffin....err, what? We spent nearly two and a half hours having lunch and managed to see 3 people we knew, very strange!
The second film of the weekend was 'Date Night' which was quite hilarious – Tina Fey and Steve Carrell make a very good double act [Gregor, go see it]. After that it was time for ...yes you guessed it, food. We went to Primi Piatti for dinner and accidentally ordered so much food that we didn't even manage to eat half! The starters which were called 'Pizza breads' were actually full size pizzas and then they brought out massive bowls of pasta so even I was defeated by the huge amount of food! Luckily, they let us take what we didn't eat home :D
We then went and sat in the coffee shop from last night and waited for Liziwe to come and pick us up. We sat and had a brilliant creation called a 'chocolate chocachino' [which I promptly spilled all over myself] and watched the world go by for two and a half hours, during which time we realised that it was just the same ten or fifteen people going back and forth over and over again. Clearly Hemingway's casts it spell over everyone who comes and they feel unable to leave...
Next day I got up and watched the news which was majorly exciting, that ash cloud is pretty impressive! Some weirdo man was telling me about how he had come to South Africa to see this woman but she had rejected him so he was stuck here for two months...a bit creepy, so I moved to a different sofa. Sam then came in and we caught up on all the Hollywood gossip from E! News – Hilary Duff is getting married!? What?
We decided that another trip to Hemingway's was in order so we called a taxi. The taxi driver's name was Charlie and he was a bit crazy and spent the whole trip telling us that he loves taxis so much and just likes talking rubbish to people and he loves taxis so much and hopes we enjoy a fun ride and he loves taxis so much...and oh wait, he's only been a taxi driver for 5 days. Er, OK! Sam and I just seem to attract the crazy people! Anyway, he was very sweet and gave us a cheap fare so we took his number in case we ever wanted another trip/dose of the craziness.
The day followed almost the exact same schedule as the previous. We went to Mugg & Bean for lunch, much to the amusement of our server who was still there and wasn't mad at us despite the measly 20p tip we left yesterday. We had a round of chocolate milkshake and fruit smoothies which were waaay better than the Wimpy ones. Sam ordered lemon meringue for dessert and honestly it was about 20cm high! I've never seen such a big slice of meringue! After lunch we went to Woolworths which is like Marks and Spencer here. Sadly we had to leave sharpish because all the incredible looking food they were selling made us feel sick when we thought of our empty fridge back home :( Our third film of the weekend was Bounty Hunter with Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston which was watchable, not exactly great though. But who cares, it was a cinema and it only cost R20! Hooray!
After the film we thought we should try to leave Hemingway's and decided we would call up our good friend Charlie and get a fun ride back to Niki-nana's. True to form, he livened up the trip with stories about his customers that were frankly a little disturbing, but again he was very sweet and didn't even mind when we realised we didn't have enough money to pay him the fare. What a good guy.
At half five, Liz came to pick me up to take me to church. Walking into the church here was completely different from walking into any of the churches back home. At home, you would expect to go into a big old building with a few old ladies in their Sunday finest scattered about in the pews and the organ droning on in the background. Here, I entered a bright, modern room absolutely buzzing with people, most of them young, a band playing, and in general it just seemed to be far more welcoming and appealing than any other church I've ever been in. Praise and worship was followed by communion then a sermon by a young guy who was so funny and got so excited that his microphone fell off. It was such a different experience from church in the UK and definitely far more enjoyable :D
After that, Liz and her friends asked if Sam and I would like to join them for dinner. Sam was still at the backpackers so had to call upon good old Charlie to take her to Hemingway's [again] so we could eat at Primi Piatti [again!]. There were six of us, Jules, Liz, Monique, Clive, Sam and I and we had dinner and chats and just general good times. :D
The next day was a day for admin – buying food for the next however long until we could get another lift to a supermarket and collecting stuff for Jabulani [well, that part was Liz]. Sam and I managed to keep within our budget for the food shop which was an absolute miracle given that everything on the shelf was screaming at us to buy it! We went for one final civilised lunch and enjoyed our last chocolate milkshake/fruit smoothie combo then it was time to leave the bright lights of the city. With a car laden with R5000 worth of paper etc for Jabulani, all our shopping and our clothes and two new CDs for the road trip, we were ready to go.
Back through the mist we went to the sounds of the Roxettes [and some of their questionable lyrics], then back along the N2, then along/through the pothole road in some lovely rain. Much to the dismay of everyone, the CD player then broke on the random, bad bad bad times and Liz navigated the final stretch of dirt road in the dark and rain [what a pro driver] until we were back in good old Zithulele, all road tripped out.
Good weekend much?
Thank you Liz :)
xxxxx
Friday morning was a frantic rush to put things in order before we left. As we would be taking Monday off as well, we had to complete all the packing for the next week's clinic and then organise for people to cover all of Sam's Monday activities. After packing prescriptions for 4 hours straight, we finally wrapped up the pharmacy, then spent the next hour sorting out Sam's stuff, went to pack for the trip and were on the road by 2pm [good work!] :D
It was a drive of epic proportions since we first had to traverse the dirt road which was experiencing a minor dust storm where the dust even came into the car through the vents and we all nearly died of dust inhalation. [Well, not really.] Anyway, when we emerged from that in a now-brown car, there was the tar road which would be more accurately described as a 60km series of interconnecting potholes. After that trauma was over we finally arrived at Mqanduli which is one of my favourite places due to the presence of the Post Office :D After trying three times in the previous week to pick up my post there I finally managed to get some mail, yay!
This time the postman had brought me:
1. A letter from Grannie
2. A letter from Auntie Kathryn
3. A letter from Megan
4. A stunning cake postcard from Marjorie
5. Two letters from Mum with stickers for the kids in ARV clinic :)
6. A postcard from Auntie Fiona, Uncle Donald, Cameron and Bruce in Singapore
7. A London postcard from Megan [handwritten for once :P]
I love post. And thank you to everyone who writes to me :)
Back on the road we were now on the N2, one of South Africa's national highways, characterised by a) a lack of dust and b) a lack of potholes. It's still only one or two lanes wide and has cattle, dogs, sheep and people wandering all over it! We drove through endless beautiful African landscape and through the Kei cuttings until we finally left the Transkei [and according to Liz, re-entered the real world]. Then we entered some extreme mist and had to slow to a crawl [not wholly because of the mist, but because some of the other drivers thought that lowered visibility was a good reason to forget that the purpose of the car was to move forward]. We continued on along a long straight road surrounded by whiteness on all sides for what felt like a long time, enjoying the now familiar tunes on Liz's Grammy's 2010 CD [and realising with great sadness that we knew the words to the country western tracks as well].
Finally [finally] after nearly 5 hours of driving [and 4 hours 59 minutes of road rage ;)] we arrived in East London, yay for the city! It is so completely removed from the tiny village of rondavels that we live in that it is properly like entering another world. We went to get showered at Liz's friend Jules' house [a house! A real house!] then went out to the cinema at Hemingway's, East London's new shopping centre.
Entering Hemingway's, which just happens to be the shiniest building in the world, was the strangest feeling, Sam and I were looking around like we had some kind of issue – it felt really surreal to be back in civilisation! We met up with some more of Liz's many friends then went to the cinema to see a film called Leap Year. The cinema here is SO cheap: R20 for a ticket and R18 for a massive box of popcorn (that's a total of less than three pounds!). The film was pretty funny but for all the wrong reasons since it took being cheesy to a new level. Either way, going to the cinema = good. After the film we went for coffee and Sam and I had these stunning cappuccinos with chocolate cream and whipped cream on the top, yum yum. We then got dropped at Buffalo backpackers which was to be our home for the weekend.
Or not, as it turned out. Described in Coast to Coast, the backpacking bible, as 'designed with travellers in mind...owners with stacks of experience...large garden courtyard....spacious reception...saloon' it would be more accurately described as 'a bit like a prison, designed for local guys to get drunk and shout at each other in the concrete courtyard and give abuse to the owner who doesn't even know what day it is'. I'll give them their dues, the bed was comfortable, it was clean and only cost R75 for the night but the atmosphere and facilities in a prison would probably have been preferable. Needless to say, Sam and I got up and left right away for another backpackers. I think it says it all that when we told the owner of the next backpackers that we had been staying at Buffalo, her only response was, 'Aw, shame!’
Niki-nana's backpackers, with its stripy zebra roof, pool, brightly coloured bedrooms and cable TV was like something out of a dream after our night in the cells. We checked in for the next two nights, ditched our stuff and wandered down to the beach front to have some breakfast and start our 100th day of the trip in style. We ended up at Wimpy [which isn't the greasy fast food joint it is the UK] and had a stunning meal: Sam had a cooked breakfast and I had a toastie and a muffin. Sam ordered a fruit smoothie and I ordered a chocolate milkshake, something which continued throughout the weekend when we did the same everywhere that we ate!
Later on, Liz and Jules dropped us off at the beacon of civilisation that is Hemingway's and we spent the next 12 hours in there. Who would have ever thought of doing that back home? Truth be told, we didn't actually do very much shopping and got tired after about 1.5 hours, clearly we are too used to the snail’s pace of life in Zithulele. We bought new bed linen so now I have a sheet which actually covers my mattress and doesn't come off every time I roll over; some more t-shirts so I don't have to wash clothes every 2 days and a second pair of shoes since my sandals are looking, shall we say, a bit past it.
 |
| Sam unearths some gems in Mr Price |
The cinema beckoned to us so we went and bought tickets for the 5.30pm showing and then set about trying to pass the next five hours. We decided to go for lunch at Mugg & Bean which was STUNNING. After drooling over the menu for a while we managed to order, then ordered some more things just for the hell of it before the first had even arrived, prompting weird looks from our waitress. We then ordered pudding, the biggest scone and muffin in the world, and for some reason they offered to put cheese on my chocolate muffin....err, what? We spent nearly two and a half hours having lunch and managed to see 3 people we knew, very strange!
The second film of the weekend was 'Date Night' which was quite hilarious – Tina Fey and Steve Carrell make a very good double act [Gregor, go see it]. After that it was time for ...yes you guessed it, food. We went to Primi Piatti for dinner and accidentally ordered so much food that we didn't even manage to eat half! The starters which were called 'Pizza breads' were actually full size pizzas and then they brought out massive bowls of pasta so even I was defeated by the huge amount of food! Luckily, they let us take what we didn't eat home :D
We then went and sat in the coffee shop from last night and waited for Liziwe to come and pick us up. We sat and had a brilliant creation called a 'chocolate chocachino' [which I promptly spilled all over myself] and watched the world go by for two and a half hours, during which time we realised that it was just the same ten or fifteen people going back and forth over and over again. Clearly Hemingway's casts it spell over everyone who comes and they feel unable to leave...
 |
| Chocolate chocachino |
Next day I got up and watched the news which was majorly exciting, that ash cloud is pretty impressive! Some weirdo man was telling me about how he had come to South Africa to see this woman but she had rejected him so he was stuck here for two months...a bit creepy, so I moved to a different sofa. Sam then came in and we caught up on all the Hollywood gossip from E! News – Hilary Duff is getting married!? What?
We decided that another trip to Hemingway's was in order so we called a taxi. The taxi driver's name was Charlie and he was a bit crazy and spent the whole trip telling us that he loves taxis so much and just likes talking rubbish to people and he loves taxis so much and hopes we enjoy a fun ride and he loves taxis so much...and oh wait, he's only been a taxi driver for 5 days. Er, OK! Sam and I just seem to attract the crazy people! Anyway, he was very sweet and gave us a cheap fare so we took his number in case we ever wanted another trip/dose of the craziness.
The day followed almost the exact same schedule as the previous. We went to Mugg & Bean for lunch, much to the amusement of our server who was still there and wasn't mad at us despite the measly 20p tip we left yesterday. We had a round of chocolate milkshake and fruit smoothies which were waaay better than the Wimpy ones. Sam ordered lemon meringue for dessert and honestly it was about 20cm high! I've never seen such a big slice of meringue! After lunch we went to Woolworths which is like Marks and Spencer here. Sadly we had to leave sharpish because all the incredible looking food they were selling made us feel sick when we thought of our empty fridge back home :( Our third film of the weekend was Bounty Hunter with Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston which was watchable, not exactly great though. But who cares, it was a cinema and it only cost R20! Hooray!
 |
| Our empty fridge [pre East London] |
After the film we thought we should try to leave Hemingway's and decided we would call up our good friend Charlie and get a fun ride back to Niki-nana's. True to form, he livened up the trip with stories about his customers that were frankly a little disturbing, but again he was very sweet and didn't even mind when we realised we didn't have enough money to pay him the fare. What a good guy.
At half five, Liz came to pick me up to take me to church. Walking into the church here was completely different from walking into any of the churches back home. At home, you would expect to go into a big old building with a few old ladies in their Sunday finest scattered about in the pews and the organ droning on in the background. Here, I entered a bright, modern room absolutely buzzing with people, most of them young, a band playing, and in general it just seemed to be far more welcoming and appealing than any other church I've ever been in. Praise and worship was followed by communion then a sermon by a young guy who was so funny and got so excited that his microphone fell off. It was such a different experience from church in the UK and definitely far more enjoyable :D
After that, Liz and her friends asked if Sam and I would like to join them for dinner. Sam was still at the backpackers so had to call upon good old Charlie to take her to Hemingway's [again] so we could eat at Primi Piatti [again!]. There were six of us, Jules, Liz, Monique, Clive, Sam and I and we had dinner and chats and just general good times. :D
The next day was a day for admin – buying food for the next however long until we could get another lift to a supermarket and collecting stuff for Jabulani [well, that part was Liz]. Sam and I managed to keep within our budget for the food shop which was an absolute miracle given that everything on the shelf was screaming at us to buy it! We went for one final civilised lunch and enjoyed our last chocolate milkshake/fruit smoothie combo then it was time to leave the bright lights of the city. With a car laden with R5000 worth of paper etc for Jabulani, all our shopping and our clothes and two new CDs for the road trip, we were ready to go.
Back through the mist we went to the sounds of the Roxettes [and some of their questionable lyrics], then back along the N2, then along/through the pothole road in some lovely rain. Much to the dismay of everyone, the CD player then broke on the random, bad bad bad times and Liz navigated the final stretch of dirt road in the dark and rain [what a pro driver] until we were back in good old Zithulele, all road tripped out.
Good weekend much?
Thank you Liz :)
xxxxx
Mini House Party
[An account of the epic events of the night of 26th March 2010]
At the end of my week as a homeless orphan, I moved out of Liz and Lisa's to give them (and their fridge) some time to recover from having a tramp living on the floor and moved into Anita and Etienne's house. They had gone away on leave to Cape Town and had offered Jess and I the chance to housesit given that their house is a step up from our rondavel and Jess' room in the nurses' residence.
After a long day at work I rocked up at the house where Jess was preparing some stunning dinner :) We watched the Truman Show, a movie that really creeps me out then attempted to watch Coraline. I'm pretty sure the creators were on some kind of recreational drugs when they wrote the script. We watched for exactly 27 minutes during which time Coraline was woken up in the middle of the night by weird bouncing mice, followed them into a tiny hole where everyone had buttons for eyes, then met this guy with stick legs and a massive fat body who was training fleas for a circus...yeah, it was a wonderful plot.
After giving up on that one we put on one of Anita and Etienne's karaoke DVDs at maximum volumes and Jess got out microphones/spatulas (how cool). Although we were expecting our bad singing to be the source of amusement, there turned out to be another far more potent source of hilarity within the DVD as the backing videos were comprised of the most random clips in the world. For example, here is the sequence accompanying Shania Twain's classic 'Man I feel like a woman':
1. Woman walks along next to pond
2. Trees blow in the wind
3. Ducks swim in the pond
4. Old lady sits down on a bench
5. Small child plays on tricycle
6. Woman sways provocatively next to pond [except that the pond was provocative than her]
7. Woman chases ducks along path
As you can see, the creators of the DVD really got the vibe that good old Shania was going for with that song.... Anyway, it was so funny that I had to go and drool into the sink, classy!
At the end of my week as a homeless orphan, I moved out of Liz and Lisa's to give them (and their fridge) some time to recover from having a tramp living on the floor and moved into Anita and Etienne's house. They had gone away on leave to Cape Town and had offered Jess and I the chance to housesit given that their house is a step up from our rondavel and Jess' room in the nurses' residence.
After a long day at work I rocked up at the house where Jess was preparing some stunning dinner :) We watched the Truman Show, a movie that really creeps me out then attempted to watch Coraline. I'm pretty sure the creators were on some kind of recreational drugs when they wrote the script. We watched for exactly 27 minutes during which time Coraline was woken up in the middle of the night by weird bouncing mice, followed them into a tiny hole where everyone had buttons for eyes, then met this guy with stick legs and a massive fat body who was training fleas for a circus...yeah, it was a wonderful plot.
After giving up on that one we put on one of Anita and Etienne's karaoke DVDs at maximum volumes and Jess got out microphones/spatulas (how cool). Although we were expecting our bad singing to be the source of amusement, there turned out to be another far more potent source of hilarity within the DVD as the backing videos were comprised of the most random clips in the world. For example, here is the sequence accompanying Shania Twain's classic 'Man I feel like a woman':
1. Woman walks along next to pond
2. Trees blow in the wind
3. Ducks swim in the pond
4. Old lady sits down on a bench
5. Small child plays on tricycle
6. Woman sways provocatively next to pond [except that the pond was provocative than her]
7. Woman chases ducks along path
As you can see, the creators of the DVD really got the vibe that good old Shania was going for with that song.... Anyway, it was so funny that I had to go and drool into the sink, classy!
RIP Bruno
It is with sad news that I have to announce the passing of one close to many hearts in Zithulele. Bruno disappeared on Easter Sunday and has not been seen since and is now presumed dead. Although his life was short, he accomplished much and brought joy to the masses. A memorial has been erected to him on Anita's garden wall.
Here is a picture:
Here is a picture:
 |
| Bruno |
Tuesday 20 April 2010
100 days, 100 memories
This Saturday was the 100th day of this epic adventure, so I thought I'd make a list of the thing that has stood out for me on each day. Here goes...[warning, although this was a fun exercise for me, it may not be for you!]
7th Jan – that leaving feeling: knowing I won't see any family, friends or familiar places for a very very very long time
8th Jan – the immigration officer shouting 'Enjoy ya work sista' as I crossed over into South Africa
9th Jan – getting out of the car and seeing our home for the next 8 months and how massive it is!
10th Jan – our first swim at Lubanzi (full clothed as it was a spontaneous decision)
11th Jan – finding a metal table buried a foot under the ground in our garden
12th Jan – first trip to Papazela's and Coffee Shack
13th Jan – working in ARV clinic for the first time, the first time I'd ever seen an HIV+ person
14th Jan – chats with Justin in the dark due to our first power cut
15th Jan – holding one day old twins in maternity
16th Jan – getting roaming switched on and being able to text home :)
17th Jan – walking to Lubanzi to find it crowded with a load of cows, then getting sunburned to the max
18th Jan – scoring my first point at Ultimate Frisbee
19th Jan – Sam's birthday meal with Karl, Sally, Mark, Liz and Monique
20th Jan – getting very confused when trying to pack ARV presciptions for the clinic
21st Jan – getting up at 6.00am to go running, finishing running at 6.15am [epic fail]
22nd Jan – driving many miles with Tom to visit every clinic on the planet
23rd Jan – seeing the Gaunts' garden overrun with kids for Grace's birthday
24th Jan – sitting in Orbi's garden with Shannon, Jess, Etienne, Anita and Sam eating icecream and looking out over the beach in the sun...
25th Jan – getting highly excited over battle tetris with Sam, Karen and Roger
26th Jan – sitting in the pharmacy with Monique until well after 8pm packing and getting overloaded with all the millions of things to do in the pharmacy...
27th Jan – standing looking at the pharmacy calendar thinking, 'How will I ever cope?'
28th Jan – getting proposed to by Yanga, one of our computer students
29th Jan – pancakes, beer, 30 seconds at Liz's house :D
30th Jan – windswept sundowners at Hole in the Wall with Sam, Liz, Jules and Cat
31st Jan – going to the shabeen and encountering a casual policewoman with a machine gun!
1st Feb – going for a run and getting laughed at by, err, everyone :(
2nd Feb – the relief of faxing the pharmacy order with 59 seconds left before the deadline
3rd Feb – being introduced to the wonders of Salticrax ;)
6th Feb – sitting in Marlie and Megan's pool at 11pm to avoid 28'C heat and looking at the stars
19th Feb – Mhla coming in for grand tea carrying a bin bag full of amaguena
1st Mar – sitting up late with Sam playing 'Would You Rather?'
2nd Mar – pitching up at Mapuzi soaking wet, in shorts and pink wellies and looking HOT
3rd Mar – trying not to laugh out loud when a patient was refusing to take her treatment home because it wouldn't fit in her handbag...
4th Mar – being swamped in the pharmacy, even with four people dispensing at once!
5th Mar – sitting by the fire eating macaroni cheese with Liz, Lisa, Megan, Joff and Sam
6th Mar - the epic on call day with Liz :)
7th Mar – watching Karl on TV [correcting the other guests' statistics ;)]
8th Mar – out of a VERY hectic/memorable day, I'd have to say the moment when we decided we had to stop doing CPR on a young boy
9th Mar - dispensing through the door of the pharmacy even after it had shut for 1.5 hours
10th Mar – delivering a baby!
11th Mar - surprise visit from the other PT volunteers from Durbanville
12th Mar – watching Zandile's son Hlumelo running around the pharmacy and trying to eat pills off the floor...
13th Mar – galloping along Coffee Bay beach :D
14th Mar - jump starting Shannon's car [eventful day]
15th Mar - running the hospital pharmacy all by myself, fun times
16th Mar – Papazela's pizza night, extreme torrential rain
17th Mar – Sam and I playing Cranium...epic fail
18th Mar – getting out the taxi in Mthatha and feeling like a mugging was imminent
19th Mar – Andrea and I getting our hair braided 'like a spear' on Port St John's beach
20th Mar – jumping off a waterfall in the Amapondo Jungle
21st Mar – being crushed in a taxi for six hours with sweaty men and very very loud gospel music
22nd Mar – chasing after Liz on the way to a 5.30am caesarean section
23rd Mar – going out on a call at 3.30am to a man who later died
24th Mar – Asanda's reaction as she was introduced to Bohemian Rhapsody
25th Mar – waking up to coffee and toast at Lisa and Liz's, getting kidnapped from the JRHF meeting
26th Mar – doing the stupidest karoake ever with Jess and drooling into the sink with laughter!
27th Mar – training Bruno the chicken to come inside the house
28th Mar – watching Transformers 2 with Asanda :D
29th Mar – going to the hospital prayer meeting
30th Mar – Sam coming home and us having an epic fail lads night in ;)
31st Mar – Passover meal at the Gaunts
1st Apr – trying out a wheelchair and realising how difficult they are to use!
2nd Apr – coming over the top of a hill and seeing Hole in the Wall, stunning
3rd Apr – sitting on a cliff ledge for 2 hours contemplating imminent death :D
4th Apr – classy trip to the shabeen with everyone from Coffee Shack
5th Apr – breaking the bars off our back window and climbing through in a very undignified way..
6th Apr – sitting up till all hours writing letters home :)
7th Apr – watching our stock of D4T [an ARV taken by 95% of patients] dwindle away in front of my eyes in clinic
8th Apr – playing indoor frisbee with Liz [and managing a forehand throw]
9th Apr – Sam and I's Lad's Night II – beer, unlevened bread and Never Been Kissed
10th Apr – Sam and I using secret codes to play the 30 seconds/charades game (Obama!)
11th Apr – Asanda teaching me to handwash like a pro
12th Apr – Taryn's birthday party
13th Apr – feeling productive after spending 10 hours on the road for three patients
14th Apr – learning how to do HIV counselling and testing
15th Apr – sitting on the climbing frame outside paeds chatting to Gregor on the phone
16th Apr – walking round Hemingways Mall feeling a bit like I had special needs because I found it so strange being in civilisation
17th Apr – having a two hour 100 day celebration lunch in Mugg and Bean :D
Thank you to everyone who has contributed to all the good times I've had so far, hopefully they will continue!
xxxx
7th Jan – that leaving feeling: knowing I won't see any family, friends or familiar places for a very very very long time
8th Jan – the immigration officer shouting 'Enjoy ya work sista' as I crossed over into South Africa
9th Jan – getting out of the car and seeing our home for the next 8 months and how massive it is!
10th Jan – our first swim at Lubanzi (full clothed as it was a spontaneous decision)
11th Jan – finding a metal table buried a foot under the ground in our garden
12th Jan – first trip to Papazela's and Coffee Shack
13th Jan – working in ARV clinic for the first time, the first time I'd ever seen an HIV+ person
14th Jan – chats with Justin in the dark due to our first power cut
15th Jan – holding one day old twins in maternity
16th Jan – getting roaming switched on and being able to text home :)
17th Jan – walking to Lubanzi to find it crowded with a load of cows, then getting sunburned to the max
18th Jan – scoring my first point at Ultimate Frisbee
19th Jan – Sam's birthday meal with Karl, Sally, Mark, Liz and Monique
20th Jan – getting very confused when trying to pack ARV presciptions for the clinic
21st Jan – getting up at 6.00am to go running, finishing running at 6.15am [epic fail]
22nd Jan – driving many miles with Tom to visit every clinic on the planet
23rd Jan – seeing the Gaunts' garden overrun with kids for Grace's birthday
 |
| Pass the parcel |
25th Jan – getting highly excited over battle tetris with Sam, Karen and Roger
26th Jan – sitting in the pharmacy with Monique until well after 8pm packing and getting overloaded with all the millions of things to do in the pharmacy...
27th Jan – standing looking at the pharmacy calendar thinking, 'How will I ever cope?'
28th Jan – getting proposed to by Yanga, one of our computer students
29th Jan – pancakes, beer, 30 seconds at Liz's house :D
30th Jan – windswept sundowners at Hole in the Wall with Sam, Liz, Jules and Cat
31st Jan – going to the shabeen and encountering a casual policewoman with a machine gun!
1st Feb – going for a run and getting laughed at by, err, everyone :(
2nd Feb – the relief of faxing the pharmacy order with 59 seconds left before the deadline
3rd Feb – being introduced to the wonders of Salticrax ;)
4th Feb – running the ARV dispensary myself without a translator and feeling EPIC (it's now a frequent occurrence and has lost its epicness)
5th Feb – playing with Emma for two hours and going on an imaginary car drive to Johannesburg (please note that she is three), spending the evening discussing Cheryl Cole's appalling lyricist skills with Sam (seriously, listen to the lyrics of her song Make Me Cry)6th Feb – sitting in Marlie and Megan's pool at 11pm to avoid 28'C heat and looking at the stars
7th Feb – swimming in the sea at Hole in the Wall with Sam
8th Feb – sundowner braii at Lubanzi after work9th Feb – nearly expiring with the heat and stresses of Ngcwanguba clinic, windy beach trip fail with Liz, watching Lisa whip cream for ice cream for about an hour...
10th Feb – getting our Zithulele 'welcome pack': a ball of string, some pegs and an empty bottle of toilet duck11th Feb – climbing into the ARV clinic with Joff and Megan to get some Kaletra for a baby called Alive [cutest name ever!] :D
12th Feb – first ever grand rounds, getting seven letters in the post
13th Feb – the craziness that was Eybe's wedding and THAT insane M.C and his techno beats
14th Feb – going running with Jess and Kate to the local school and back
15th Feb – driving back from Lubanzi in the back of a 4x4 with Jess
16th Feb – waking up and seeing how bed bugs had decimated my feet
 |
| Why I hate bed bugs |
17th Feb – having to wear a raincoat for the first time
18th Feb – night out to White Clay and chats with Lisa19th Feb – Mhla coming in for grand tea carrying a bin bag full of amaguena
20th Feb – counting ibuprofen pills. For hours.
21st Feb – trying to move my bedroom and Sam shouting MAYDAY as one of our tables snapped..
22nd Feb – Liz bringing us groceries and chocolate :D
23rd Feb – getting phoned by Gregor and being chuffed until it used up my credit for the entire month
24th Feb – dispensing alone in ARV clinic for many an hour [progress from 4th Feb]
25th Feb – seeing a 9 year old girl looking after her 1 year old sisters ARV medication
26th Feb – watching Liz stand in front of the air conditioning unit trying to cool down boiled water for mixing some potassium chloride suspension [yay for rural medicine]
27th Feb – Project Trust visiting us, abuse from Susie ;)
28th Feb – breakfast in the garden with Megan, Joff, Liz, Lisa and Sam1st Mar – sitting up late with Sam playing 'Would You Rather?'
2nd Mar – pitching up at Mapuzi soaking wet, in shorts and pink wellies and looking HOT
3rd Mar – trying not to laugh out loud when a patient was refusing to take her treatment home because it wouldn't fit in her handbag...
4th Mar – being swamped in the pharmacy, even with four people dispensing at once!
5th Mar – sitting by the fire eating macaroni cheese with Liz, Lisa, Megan, Joff and Sam
6th Mar - the epic on call day with Liz :)
7th Mar – watching Karl on TV [correcting the other guests' statistics ;)]
8th Mar – out of a VERY hectic/memorable day, I'd have to say the moment when we decided we had to stop doing CPR on a young boy
9th Mar - dispensing through the door of the pharmacy even after it had shut for 1.5 hours
10th Mar – delivering a baby!
11th Mar - surprise visit from the other PT volunteers from Durbanville
 |
| Me, Catherine, Flo, Sarah and Rhiannon |
13th Mar – galloping along Coffee Bay beach :D
14th Mar - jump starting Shannon's car [eventful day]
15th Mar - running the hospital pharmacy all by myself, fun times
16th Mar – Papazela's pizza night, extreme torrential rain
17th Mar – Sam and I playing Cranium...epic fail
18th Mar – getting out the taxi in Mthatha and feeling like a mugging was imminent
19th Mar – Andrea and I getting our hair braided 'like a spear' on Port St John's beach
20th Mar – jumping off a waterfall in the Amapondo Jungle
21st Mar – being crushed in a taxi for six hours with sweaty men and very very loud gospel music
22nd Mar – chasing after Liz on the way to a 5.30am caesarean section
23rd Mar – going out on a call at 3.30am to a man who later died
24th Mar – Asanda's reaction as she was introduced to Bohemian Rhapsody
25th Mar – waking up to coffee and toast at Lisa and Liz's, getting kidnapped from the JRHF meeting
26th Mar – doing the stupidest karoake ever with Jess and drooling into the sink with laughter!
27th Mar – training Bruno the chicken to come inside the house
28th Mar – watching Transformers 2 with Asanda :D
29th Mar – going to the hospital prayer meeting
30th Mar – Sam coming home and us having an epic fail lads night in ;)
31st Mar – Passover meal at the Gaunts
1st Apr – trying out a wheelchair and realising how difficult they are to use!
2nd Apr – coming over the top of a hill and seeing Hole in the Wall, stunning
 |
| Hole in the Wall hike |
4th Apr – classy trip to the shabeen with everyone from Coffee Shack
5th Apr – breaking the bars off our back window and climbing through in a very undignified way..
6th Apr – sitting up till all hours writing letters home :)
7th Apr – watching our stock of D4T [an ARV taken by 95% of patients] dwindle away in front of my eyes in clinic
8th Apr – playing indoor frisbee with Liz [and managing a forehand throw]
9th Apr – Sam and I's Lad's Night II – beer, unlevened bread and Never Been Kissed
10th Apr – Sam and I using secret codes to play the 30 seconds/charades game (Obama!)
11th Apr – Asanda teaching me to handwash like a pro
12th Apr – Taryn's birthday party
13th Apr – feeling productive after spending 10 hours on the road for three patients
14th Apr – learning how to do HIV counselling and testing
15th Apr – sitting on the climbing frame outside paeds chatting to Gregor on the phone
16th Apr – walking round Hemingways Mall feeling a bit like I had special needs because I found it so strange being in civilisation
17th Apr – having a two hour 100 day celebration lunch in Mugg and Bean :D
Thank you to everyone who has contributed to all the good times I've had so far, hopefully they will continue!
xxxx
Monday 19 April 2010
As I Walked Out One Sunday Morning..
So here's what I did last Sunday (11th April). Everyone was going to the beach for a skottle braai breakfast so I got up early and decided to walk down. It was an absolutely stunning morning; the sun was already high in the sky when I left at seven so it was nice and warm. I got some more pictures of the area to add to my collection – just wait until I return and you have to sit through the photo slideshow, this is where you will start with the 'Oh, that's ANOTHER nice picture of a rondavel on a hill with some nice sun...'
I chatted to a few groups of kids and took their pictures, they were all loving it. One group were all playing in a wheelbarrow and looked like they were having the time of their lives, it was so cute to watch. Another group came charging towards me shouting for sweets but then when they saw me get my camera out started doing gangster poses and asking me to take pictures of them, so now I have pictures of 4 year old wannabe gangsters and they forgot all about the sweets. Everybody wins. At the end of the walk down to the beach there is a massive hill (think Kilimanjaro)(actually, don't) and I could see that no one was at the beach yet so I just sat at the top admiring the view and feeling epic.
When I saw the tiny figures below congregating on the beach I headed down to join them. We had a proper fry up/braai breakfast on the beach then went for the obligatory swim in the sea. There were loads of people there since a big group from East London had come over to enjoy a weekend of the chilled back Zithulele lifestyle [that's weekends only by the way!]. I hadn't intended on swimming since I was walking down so offered to watch over Elijah [one of the Gauntlets] while Taryn and Ben went swimming.
Everything was going swimmingly [ha ha ha at my intentional pun] and we were just playing at the edge of the water, quite an achievement for Elijah who is just over a year old. I saw a wave coming that looked a little big so I picked him up, and it was a damned good job I did since it was some kind of tidal wave to rival the one in The Day After Tomorrow! Elijah and I escaped with nothing but a soaking up to the waist but poor Grace who is four was knocked over, dragged under the wave and sent towards the beach, struggling to keep her head above the water. I saw her rush past me on top of the wave with arms and legs everywhere then saw her older brother Josh knocked over two and both of them looked to be in pretty serious trouble.
Suddenly, Ben came out of nowhere at blinding speed, ran through the water to his daughter, scooped her up, ran to the shore and picked up Josh and carried them to safety. If ever a dad was a superhero it would be him! I was so impressed, I'm pretty sure he has some hidden superpowers going on there...
After that drama it was time to head back up to the village for church. Ben and Roger [from East London] were preaching so we all took the opportunity to go as the sermon would be in English as opposed to Xhosa. First up was some singing, mainly of the one hymn [number 74, everyone’s favourite, we did it about three times] and in Xhosa. It makes for an interesting rendition when you don’t know a) the tune, b) the words c) which number the hymn in the book is! I struggled through all the unfamiliar words and the novelty of putting clicks in while you are singing. It's pretty funny to hear as all the clicks come at different times depending on how the people pronounce things. There was praying after that but as it was also in Xhosa, I just made up some of my own.
Ben and Roger's sermons were both centred around the story of the man who built his house on the rock and the man who built his house on the sand and how we should build our lives around Jesus. Following the sermons, we did a bit more of hymn 74, then the visitors got to pick a song to do, have no idea what it was called but there was clapping and hand actions, fun times! Overall, a very worthwhile experience :D
Sammy and I spent some time chilling in our house, enjoying a nice little power cut which was centralised on, er, just our house. Asanda came over for chats having seen me at church earlier. She took me back to see what her house is like – she and her sister stay in one of the rondavels owned by the hospital. I'd never really thought about what her house would be like and I was kind of shocked by how small it was. I think because Asanda works so closely with all of us who are lucky enough to live in the newer accommodation I'd forgotten that she didn't have the same privileges. Her entire home is smaller than my bedroom here and she lives in it with her sister Zandile, her baby nephew Hlumelo and their nanny. They have a bed, kitchen unit and a cabinet and that's pretty much it! Quite humbling to think of when we are complaining about our house and the bugs to be honest...
Anyway, we stopped in at the Vodacom hut, a shop that sells airtime and fat cakes – what an incredible business idea :D After munching our way through the fat cakes, yum yum yum, we decided we should watch a film to pass the afternoon. Sadly, lack of power kind of prevented that plan so we pondered what to do for a while before calling up Sam and I's surrogate guardian, Liz :D She said we could go and chill at hers and use her electricity since she was out having good times elsewhere.
Cut to Asanda, Sam and I enjoying a bit of Step Up and a nice cup of coffee :D We decided to do some washing up for Liz in return for the power usage (not really a fair trade, but what were we meant to do). Asanda showed me how to do hand washing properly so now I might actually have clean clothes as opposed to clothes which I get wet and then dry on the line...
Liziwe came back later on in the evening and asked if we wanted to stay for supper (aka dinner :P) so Sam and I went to get ingredients from our house for once and Liz gave a tutorial on how to cook the legendary dish that is Awesome Chicken. We had a mini-ceilidh to the classic tune that is 5.6.7.8 which was hilarious even though there was some rather suspect dancing going on...Next up Asanda braided my hair which I thought might be a repeat of the spear head incident [see my Port St John's blog] but aside from a comparable amount of unpleasant hair pulling had a much better result. (Sadly for everyone, they are now gone and there are no pictures, haha). We sat and watched Wimbledon, ate chocolate and had generally good times before staying the night.
All in all a good Sunday! Thanks Liz for hosting :D
xxxxxx
PS. I'll post up more about East London and maybe some pics soon!
 |
| The beautiful TK |
I chatted to a few groups of kids and took their pictures, they were all loving it. One group were all playing in a wheelbarrow and looked like they were having the time of their lives, it was so cute to watch. Another group came charging towards me shouting for sweets but then when they saw me get my camera out started doing gangster poses and asking me to take pictures of them, so now I have pictures of 4 year old wannabe gangsters and they forgot all about the sweets. Everybody wins. At the end of the walk down to the beach there is a massive hill (think Kilimanjaro)(actually, don't) and I could see that no one was at the beach yet so I just sat at the top admiring the view and feeling epic.
 |
| The kids at the homestead near the beach :) |
When I saw the tiny figures below congregating on the beach I headed down to join them. We had a proper fry up/braai breakfast on the beach then went for the obligatory swim in the sea. There were loads of people there since a big group from East London had come over to enjoy a weekend of the chilled back Zithulele lifestyle [that's weekends only by the way!]. I hadn't intended on swimming since I was walking down so offered to watch over Elijah [one of the Gauntlets] while Taryn and Ben went swimming.
Everything was going swimmingly [ha ha ha at my intentional pun] and we were just playing at the edge of the water, quite an achievement for Elijah who is just over a year old. I saw a wave coming that looked a little big so I picked him up, and it was a damned good job I did since it was some kind of tidal wave to rival the one in The Day After Tomorrow! Elijah and I escaped with nothing but a soaking up to the waist but poor Grace who is four was knocked over, dragged under the wave and sent towards the beach, struggling to keep her head above the water. I saw her rush past me on top of the wave with arms and legs everywhere then saw her older brother Josh knocked over two and both of them looked to be in pretty serious trouble.
Suddenly, Ben came out of nowhere at blinding speed, ran through the water to his daughter, scooped her up, ran to the shore and picked up Josh and carried them to safety. If ever a dad was a superhero it would be him! I was so impressed, I'm pretty sure he has some hidden superpowers going on there...
 |
| Ben Gaunt: epic Dad |
After that drama it was time to head back up to the village for church. Ben and Roger [from East London] were preaching so we all took the opportunity to go as the sermon would be in English as opposed to Xhosa. First up was some singing, mainly of the one hymn [number 74, everyone’s favourite, we did it about three times] and in Xhosa. It makes for an interesting rendition when you don’t know a) the tune, b) the words c) which number the hymn in the book is! I struggled through all the unfamiliar words and the novelty of putting clicks in while you are singing. It's pretty funny to hear as all the clicks come at different times depending on how the people pronounce things. There was praying after that but as it was also in Xhosa, I just made up some of my own.
Ben and Roger's sermons were both centred around the story of the man who built his house on the rock and the man who built his house on the sand and how we should build our lives around Jesus. Following the sermons, we did a bit more of hymn 74, then the visitors got to pick a song to do, have no idea what it was called but there was clapping and hand actions, fun times! Overall, a very worthwhile experience :D
Sammy and I spent some time chilling in our house, enjoying a nice little power cut which was centralised on, er, just our house. Asanda came over for chats having seen me at church earlier. She took me back to see what her house is like – she and her sister stay in one of the rondavels owned by the hospital. I'd never really thought about what her house would be like and I was kind of shocked by how small it was. I think because Asanda works so closely with all of us who are lucky enough to live in the newer accommodation I'd forgotten that she didn't have the same privileges. Her entire home is smaller than my bedroom here and she lives in it with her sister Zandile, her baby nephew Hlumelo and their nanny. They have a bed, kitchen unit and a cabinet and that's pretty much it! Quite humbling to think of when we are complaining about our house and the bugs to be honest...
Anyway, we stopped in at the Vodacom hut, a shop that sells airtime and fat cakes – what an incredible business idea :D After munching our way through the fat cakes, yum yum yum, we decided we should watch a film to pass the afternoon. Sadly, lack of power kind of prevented that plan so we pondered what to do for a while before calling up Sam and I's surrogate guardian, Liz :D She said we could go and chill at hers and use her electricity since she was out having good times elsewhere.
Cut to Asanda, Sam and I enjoying a bit of Step Up and a nice cup of coffee :D We decided to do some washing up for Liz in return for the power usage (not really a fair trade, but what were we meant to do). Asanda showed me how to do hand washing properly so now I might actually have clean clothes as opposed to clothes which I get wet and then dry on the line...
Liziwe came back later on in the evening and asked if we wanted to stay for supper (aka dinner :P) so Sam and I went to get ingredients from our house for once and Liz gave a tutorial on how to cook the legendary dish that is Awesome Chicken. We had a mini-ceilidh to the classic tune that is 5.6.7.8 which was hilarious even though there was some rather suspect dancing going on...Next up Asanda braided my hair which I thought might be a repeat of the spear head incident [see my Port St John's blog] but aside from a comparable amount of unpleasant hair pulling had a much better result. (Sadly for everyone, they are now gone and there are no pictures, haha). We sat and watched Wimbledon, ate chocolate and had generally good times before staying the night.
All in all a good Sunday! Thanks Liz for hosting :D
xxxxxx
PS. I'll post up more about East London and maybe some pics soon!
Monday 5 April 2010
Other Zithulele Blogs
Some of the other people here have blogs, worth a look since we all do the same things....
Lisa: http://lisainthetranskei.blogspot.com/
Tom and Jo: http://lifeinthetranskei.blogspot.com/
Jess: http://jesstrollip.blogspot.com/
Lisa: http://lisainthetranskei.blogspot.com/
Tom and Jo: http://lifeinthetranskei.blogspot.com/
Jess: http://jesstrollip.blogspot.com/
Epic Adventure II: VERY VERY Near Death Experience
Warning: this blog contains an account of the worst experience of my entire life...
The next day we set out on the road again in extreme heat with a serious hike ahead of us, the very long and hilly trek to Coffee Bay. We wandered along the road for a while before cutting across to the coastal paths. There was a massive hill which is actually the second highest mountain in the world (anyone who says that is K2 is lying) so that required an epic bit of hiking. The views from the top were phenomenal, totally worth it. The coast here is absolutely beautiful, especially on a sunny day like that. We kept on going, crossing this gorge which we think might have been the 'Baby Hole', it also should go on the list of stunning places near Zithulele (it could take a considerable amount of time to finish compiling that list!). We dropped down onto the beaches and wandered along the rocks, continuing along kilometre after kilometre of endlessly gorgeous beaches.
Eventually we got to a beach where there we two options: another hike up K2 or hopping along the rocks at the bottom. We decided to go rock hopping, but soon discovered that the rocks ran out. Not wanting to walk all the way back along the beach (and after vetoing Sam's suggestion that we swim!?) Sam suggested that we climb along the rock face a bit and for some reason I agreed and we started going up. The sensible part of my brain (i.e. 99.9% of it) was screaming 'NO NO NO NO NO NO' but in an idiotic move I found myself gritting my teeth and climbing up up up despite my epic fear of heights. It was really difficult to climb up due to the fact that the rock face was made of slate and so crumbled away when you put your weight on it and was also covered in gravel which made it very slippery. With a backpack on, bare feet and extreme fear of heights, nothing was really in my favour and I remember saying out loud as we climbed that this was definitely the most stupid thing I had ever done – words which could not be truer. As it became more and more clear that what had looked like a path across from the ground was in no way passable, we both became increasingly more scared until the point when Sam could see no further way up from the front and I could see no way that we were going down, except from falling to our deaths. So we were stuck.
Hanging on the side of the cliff, with Sam almost in tears at the thought of being stuck there and a million horrible deaths below flashing through my mind, I'm not sure I've ever been more scared. The only way was down, but it would be impossible to climb down backwards when the rocks crumbled beneath us and we couldn't see where we were putting our feet. The drop was very long and punctuated with sharp outcrops - even one mistake would lead us to certain death. I genuinely thought it was the end for us both.
Somehow through the thoughts of imminent death and my all consuming fear of heights I made the rational decision to move one step down onto a small ledge and sit down, Sam following straight behind. We sat huddled on the cliff, looking out at the ironically beautiful scenery and considered our ridiculously not-beautiful situation. I phoned 112, the international emergency number, feeling safe in the fact that someone out there would be able to help. Surely someone had been as stupid as us before and survived?
After listening to some machine tell me that I would be fined if this wasn't a real emergency and that they were recording the call for training purposes (training purposes -I'M GOING TO DIE, DO I CARE?), I was put through to the operator. Here is a rough transcript of our conversation, which I repeated with another two people after being transferred around a bit:
Kayleigh: Hello, we need help, we are stuck on the side of a cliff between Hole in the Wall and Coffee Bay and we can't get down.
Operator: Ok, where are you?
Kayleigh: I'm on the side of a cliff, between Hole in the Wall and Coffee Bay.
Operator: What vehicle do you have?
Kayleigh: We're on foot, we're stuck, we need to be rescued, can we speak to a coastguard?
Operator: Ok Ma'am, please hold.
*horribly inappropriate hold music, inappropriate due to a) it being hold music during an emergency [Kirsty I bet you are loving this!], b) it being reggae*
Operator: Ma’am, why can't you move?
Kayleigh: We. Are. Stranded. High. On. The. Side. Of. A. Cliff
Operator: Ok, Ma’am, where are you?
Kayleigh: Please, we will need a helicopter to get us off here, is there a coastguard?
Operator: I'm going to put you through to towing, please hold.
*brief pause*
Towing operator: 'Hello Ma’am, what vehicle do you have?'
Kayleigh: *hangs up*
And that's how Sam and I learned that 112 in South Africa is a bit, no wait, COMPLETELY useless. Sam made another attempt with much more success - they offered to send the Cape Town fire service to our aid. How wonderful.
With emergency services blatantly not an option, we phoned someone who might actually help, Dr Ben Gaunt, who within one second proved to be more helpful than 112 had in about 8 phone calls. He managed to grasp the basic facts that 112 hadn't, so understood that towing was not a viable lifesaving option and after assuring us he would make a plan and that we should stay put where we were safe, hung up and set about trying to save us. Sam and I were now left alone, hopeless, many feet up in the air, terrified.
I honestly couldn't see any way we were going to get out of there alive, and if we did, I felt certain that we would be repatriated within a second. (Cue Hermione Granger quote: 'We could be killed, or worse, expelled!) We both began to worry how long we would be left there, what if it started to blow a gale, what if they couldn't find us, what if our phones ran out. My fear increased exponentially with every second that I sat there, luckily frozen in place by terror. I worried that one or both of us would be tempted to climb down and fall to a horrible end, I worried that I would slip off the ledge, I worried that if a helicopter came the wincher would drop us, I worried that I'd never go back to Zithulele, I worried I'd never get to go to Cambridge, I worried that I'd never see anyone from home again....it was the worst feeling in the world, to sit there, not knowing if you would live past the end of the day.
Back in Zithulele, things had obviously been put in motion because we were called every so often by Tom and Taryn as they tried to ascertain where we were. Tom and some other guys had set off with a load of ropes and equipment and though maybe he could abseil down to rescue us, while I think Taryn was working on finding a helicopter. It's crazy that they had to even think about doing that when you consider that in the UK we have the coastguard that would have been there pretty damn quickly when you said that two teenage girls were stuck half way up a cliff!
We tried to stay optimistic on the cliff edge, but it was really hard. I prayed to every God I could think of, surely now was not the time? I couldn't stop wondering how I had possibly been so stupid and vowed never to be so idiotic if I ever got onto the ground safely.
Anyway, I'll cut a long essay on 'What I Thought About For Two Hours When I Thought I Was Going To Die' short and tell you how the heck we got out of there! Two and a half hours had passed on the ledge and it was getting a bit desperate but then someone up there in heaven smiled on us and a little head popped up on the ledge, the face of our rescuer. He was a young boy called Nomfeto, and we owe our lives to him. He had scrambled up the cliff like it was nothing and offered to take us down as long as we could answer the fateful question, 'How much?' Luckily, I think value of my life was more than any amount of rands so with our assurances that we would give him anything as long as he got us the hell off that cliff, he took our bags and one by one showed us a safe route down the cliff face. After that, he led us to the road where Tom picked us up and then we were back to safety and continued on our weekend in Coffee Bay, all adventured out.
I have never ever been so grateful to be on the ground and to be alive. It was incredible and we were both euphoric after the incredible stress of the last few hours. I still can't believe that it really happened but damn, I have learnt my lesson.
Please don't worry about me! I don't intend on repeating that experience ever. Ever.
I have to say that we are both eternally grateful to everyone who tried to help us get out of that stupid situation alive, we owe you big time.
Hopefully my next post will be a bit cheerier! (And less epic...)
xxxxx
The next day we set out on the road again in extreme heat with a serious hike ahead of us, the very long and hilly trek to Coffee Bay. We wandered along the road for a while before cutting across to the coastal paths. There was a massive hill which is actually the second highest mountain in the world (anyone who says that is K2 is lying) so that required an epic bit of hiking. The views from the top were phenomenal, totally worth it. The coast here is absolutely beautiful, especially on a sunny day like that. We kept on going, crossing this gorge which we think might have been the 'Baby Hole', it also should go on the list of stunning places near Zithulele (it could take a considerable amount of time to finish compiling that list!). We dropped down onto the beaches and wandered along the rocks, continuing along kilometre after kilometre of endlessly gorgeous beaches.
 |
| Some of the stunning scenery on the way |
Eventually we got to a beach where there we two options: another hike up K2 or hopping along the rocks at the bottom. We decided to go rock hopping, but soon discovered that the rocks ran out. Not wanting to walk all the way back along the beach (and after vetoing Sam's suggestion that we swim!?) Sam suggested that we climb along the rock face a bit and for some reason I agreed and we started going up. The sensible part of my brain (i.e. 99.9% of it) was screaming 'NO NO NO NO NO NO' but in an idiotic move I found myself gritting my teeth and climbing up up up despite my epic fear of heights. It was really difficult to climb up due to the fact that the rock face was made of slate and so crumbled away when you put your weight on it and was also covered in gravel which made it very slippery. With a backpack on, bare feet and extreme fear of heights, nothing was really in my favour and I remember saying out loud as we climbed that this was definitely the most stupid thing I had ever done – words which could not be truer. As it became more and more clear that what had looked like a path across from the ground was in no way passable, we both became increasingly more scared until the point when Sam could see no further way up from the front and I could see no way that we were going down, except from falling to our deaths. So we were stuck.
Hanging on the side of the cliff, with Sam almost in tears at the thought of being stuck there and a million horrible deaths below flashing through my mind, I'm not sure I've ever been more scared. The only way was down, but it would be impossible to climb down backwards when the rocks crumbled beneath us and we couldn't see where we were putting our feet. The drop was very long and punctuated with sharp outcrops - even one mistake would lead us to certain death. I genuinely thought it was the end for us both.
Somehow through the thoughts of imminent death and my all consuming fear of heights I made the rational decision to move one step down onto a small ledge and sit down, Sam following straight behind. We sat huddled on the cliff, looking out at the ironically beautiful scenery and considered our ridiculously not-beautiful situation. I phoned 112, the international emergency number, feeling safe in the fact that someone out there would be able to help. Surely someone had been as stupid as us before and survived?
After listening to some machine tell me that I would be fined if this wasn't a real emergency and that they were recording the call for training purposes (training purposes -I'M GOING TO DIE, DO I CARE?), I was put through to the operator. Here is a rough transcript of our conversation, which I repeated with another two people after being transferred around a bit:
Kayleigh: Hello, we need help, we are stuck on the side of a cliff between Hole in the Wall and Coffee Bay and we can't get down.
Operator: Ok, where are you?
Kayleigh: I'm on the side of a cliff, between Hole in the Wall and Coffee Bay.
Operator: What vehicle do you have?
Kayleigh: We're on foot, we're stuck, we need to be rescued, can we speak to a coastguard?
Operator: Ok Ma'am, please hold.
*horribly inappropriate hold music, inappropriate due to a) it being hold music during an emergency [Kirsty I bet you are loving this!], b) it being reggae*
Operator: Ma’am, why can't you move?
Kayleigh: We. Are. Stranded. High. On. The. Side. Of. A. Cliff
Operator: Ok, Ma’am, where are you?
Kayleigh: Please, we will need a helicopter to get us off here, is there a coastguard?
Operator: I'm going to put you through to towing, please hold.
*brief pause*
Towing operator: 'Hello Ma’am, what vehicle do you have?'
Kayleigh: *hangs up*
And that's how Sam and I learned that 112 in South Africa is a bit, no wait, COMPLETELY useless. Sam made another attempt with much more success - they offered to send the Cape Town fire service to our aid. How wonderful.
With emergency services blatantly not an option, we phoned someone who might actually help, Dr Ben Gaunt, who within one second proved to be more helpful than 112 had in about 8 phone calls. He managed to grasp the basic facts that 112 hadn't, so understood that towing was not a viable lifesaving option and after assuring us he would make a plan and that we should stay put where we were safe, hung up and set about trying to save us. Sam and I were now left alone, hopeless, many feet up in the air, terrified.
I honestly couldn't see any way we were going to get out of there alive, and if we did, I felt certain that we would be repatriated within a second. (Cue Hermione Granger quote: 'We could be killed, or worse, expelled!) We both began to worry how long we would be left there, what if it started to blow a gale, what if they couldn't find us, what if our phones ran out. My fear increased exponentially with every second that I sat there, luckily frozen in place by terror. I worried that one or both of us would be tempted to climb down and fall to a horrible end, I worried that I would slip off the ledge, I worried that if a helicopter came the wincher would drop us, I worried that I'd never go back to Zithulele, I worried I'd never get to go to Cambridge, I worried that I'd never see anyone from home again....it was the worst feeling in the world, to sit there, not knowing if you would live past the end of the day.
Back in Zithulele, things had obviously been put in motion because we were called every so often by Tom and Taryn as they tried to ascertain where we were. Tom and some other guys had set off with a load of ropes and equipment and though maybe he could abseil down to rescue us, while I think Taryn was working on finding a helicopter. It's crazy that they had to even think about doing that when you consider that in the UK we have the coastguard that would have been there pretty damn quickly when you said that two teenage girls were stuck half way up a cliff!
We tried to stay optimistic on the cliff edge, but it was really hard. I prayed to every God I could think of, surely now was not the time? I couldn't stop wondering how I had possibly been so stupid and vowed never to be so idiotic if I ever got onto the ground safely.
Anyway, I'll cut a long essay on 'What I Thought About For Two Hours When I Thought I Was Going To Die' short and tell you how the heck we got out of there! Two and a half hours had passed on the ledge and it was getting a bit desperate but then someone up there in heaven smiled on us and a little head popped up on the ledge, the face of our rescuer. He was a young boy called Nomfeto, and we owe our lives to him. He had scrambled up the cliff like it was nothing and offered to take us down as long as we could answer the fateful question, 'How much?' Luckily, I think value of my life was more than any amount of rands so with our assurances that we would give him anything as long as he got us the hell off that cliff, he took our bags and one by one showed us a safe route down the cliff face. After that, he led us to the road where Tom picked us up and then we were back to safety and continued on our weekend in Coffee Bay, all adventured out.
I have never ever been so grateful to be on the ground and to be alive. It was incredible and we were both euphoric after the incredible stress of the last few hours. I still can't believe that it really happened but damn, I have learnt my lesson.
Please don't worry about me! I don't intend on repeating that experience ever. Ever.
I have to say that we are both eternally grateful to everyone who tried to help us get out of that stupid situation alive, we owe you big time.
Hopefully my next post will be a bit cheerier! (And less epic...)
xxxxx
Epic Adventure Part I: Stroll To The Hole
Easter weekend: four days of fun for Sam and I who had planned a bit of a hike to Coffee Bay and some chilling out at the various backpackers along the way.
We set off from Zithulele just after lunch on Good Friday, expecting a difficult 2-3hour hike along the coast to Hole in the Wall. It was a boiling hot day with very little wind so we thought it would be very tough going, but set off in high spirits on our first adventure as just the two of us. It turned out to be a pretty easy walk through the surrounding villages and even though we just meandered along at a snail's pace we arrived at the hole in under an hour and a half!
The Hole was stunning as usual, packed with tourists for the Easter weekend and after a little rest by the river after such a long trek [ha] we continued on to the Hole in the Wall hotel. Fortune was again on our side as we had the dorm to ourselves which meant we would have a peaceful night, good times. Things were all lining up for us, just like that scene in Meet the Fockers where they leave for the airport, all the traffic lights turn green, get upgraded to first class etc etc etc. [See part II for our version of the rest of that movie where it turns disastrous...]
We had dinner at the Hotel then played a bit of pool before calling it a night and heading towards the dorm. Unfortunately for us, two lonely men in the bar had spotted that there were other people still awake at this late hour (it was almost 9pm, shock horror!) and asked if we wanted to have a drink with them in the bar. Being far too polite/poor to turn down free drinks, we returned to the bar and sat and chatted to them for a bit. Sadly, in the light of the bar it became clear that it probably wouldn't be worth the price of a drink to endure the conversation as we were in the company of a massive bald man who looked like a shark and his tiny Indian friend with long greasy hair who were on a fishing trip together...great times. True to his shark-like features, the bald one proceeded to tell us all about the horrible shark attacks that have ever happened in the history of the world and put us off swimming in the sea for life. Sam and I drank our Savannahs as fast as possible in order to escape the scintillating conversation that was threatening to continue into the wee small hours, but only succeeded in being bought another one. Considerably more tipsy, eventually we got out of there, scarpered off to the dorm ASAP and locked the door...
We set off from Zithulele just after lunch on Good Friday, expecting a difficult 2-3hour hike along the coast to Hole in the Wall. It was a boiling hot day with very little wind so we thought it would be very tough going, but set off in high spirits on our first adventure as just the two of us. It turned out to be a pretty easy walk through the surrounding villages and even though we just meandered along at a snail's pace we arrived at the hole in under an hour and a half!
 |
| Setting off from our rondavel |
The Hole was stunning as usual, packed with tourists for the Easter weekend and after a little rest by the river after such a long trek [ha] we continued on to the Hole in the Wall hotel. Fortune was again on our side as we had the dorm to ourselves which meant we would have a peaceful night, good times. Things were all lining up for us, just like that scene in Meet the Fockers where they leave for the airport, all the traffic lights turn green, get upgraded to first class etc etc etc. [See part II for our version of the rest of that movie where it turns disastrous...]
We had dinner at the Hotel then played a bit of pool before calling it a night and heading towards the dorm. Unfortunately for us, two lonely men in the bar had spotted that there were other people still awake at this late hour (it was almost 9pm, shock horror!) and asked if we wanted to have a drink with them in the bar. Being far too polite/poor to turn down free drinks, we returned to the bar and sat and chatted to them for a bit. Sadly, in the light of the bar it became clear that it probably wouldn't be worth the price of a drink to endure the conversation as we were in the company of a massive bald man who looked like a shark and his tiny Indian friend with long greasy hair who were on a fishing trip together...great times. True to his shark-like features, the bald one proceeded to tell us all about the horrible shark attacks that have ever happened in the history of the world and put us off swimming in the sea for life. Sam and I drank our Savannahs as fast as possible in order to escape the scintillating conversation that was threatening to continue into the wee small hours, but only succeeded in being bought another one. Considerably more tipsy, eventually we got out of there, scarpered off to the dorm ASAP and locked the door...
 |
| At Hole in the Wall |
Life as a homeless orphan
Let's pick up where I left off last time, with the discovery that I was homeless! Fortunately for me, there are many many kind and generous people here who have taken me in and looked after me over the last week while Sam has been away [even after I found the key again].
After my arrival back in big bad Zithulele, I went various places on an epic fail of a key hunt. I ended up at the Gaunts' who were throwing a mini birthday party for Thembinkosi, one of our community service doctors. Sadly, no cake for me, bad times, but I had fun and played with the three Gauntlets for a while before being given the use of the shower, HALLELUJAH. It was possibly the most brilliant shower ever after having being bathed in the sweat of the other sixteen people in the Mqanduli taxi of doom for three hours. Then I went back to Liz and Lisa's house [from now on to be known as The Orphanage] for some dinner (chilli if you're interested) and because they are both legends, they let me sleep there for the night.
Monday was a very epic 24 hours. Liz/Dr Gatley was doing her last ever on call day [see my previous post 'On Call with a Rural Doctor'] and kindly allowed me to shadow her, something which began with me pulling my clothes on at 5.30am and jogging to catch up as she went in for an emergency caesarean section. I must point out that Liz had already done a Caesar at 2am that morning, I cannot imagine how tired she was and how on earth she managed to drag herself out the door again!
Anyway, soon enough I was in scrubs (yas :D) and in theatre watching another birth...epic enough for you? I'd always thought that a Caesarean would be a much more pleasant affair than natural birth but after an hour's viewing of that surgery, my mind was completely changed. Getting the baby out was a relatively quick process, and aside from one part where Liz and Thembinkosi literally wrenched the woman's skin apart to make a big enough hole, wasn't too gory. The whole surgery was done without suction as the machine was broken, can you even imagine the uproar that would occur if that happened in the UK!? The baby was cute (as per) and he was fine so it was all good in that department. The closing up bit however, was pretty gross...
The womb got taken outside of the woman's body which is the most bizarre thing ever, and it was just sitting on her chest while the doctor's stitched it back up. I was surprised to see what it looked like, the best way I can describe it is kind of like a squishy egg with really thick walls [you can tell I'm going to be a greeeeeeeeat doctor, not] – I had always imagined it to be kind of transparent, but whatever. Everything was going nicely with the suturing until the woman started to cough and the presence of a gaping hole in her abdomen meant that her intestines literally exploded out of her body! I couldn't quite believe it, it was rather surreal, and made even more so when Liz hastily shoved them back inside...
Once that was over, we went straight to do the maternity ward as there was no point going back to sleep now that we were both awake and it was light. The rounds were pretty uneventful with the exception of one woman who was lying groaning and sweating on the antenatal ward. Liz went to do the PV on her, only to discover that the membranes were in fact bulging out of her, so the nurses then made her get out of bed and run down the labour ward as she was apparently imminently going to deliver, heeeeeeeeectic!
Back at The Orphanage, we had breakfast but no sooner had the coffee been poured than Liz had to go back to the hospital. After finishing my toast I too returned, just in time to see a patient who Liz had been called to by nurses who reported that he was 'acting strangely'. May sound like a pretty vague diagnosis, but after some observation and investigation, Liz too made the same decision. The man had a huge grin, was lying in a very strange position and repeated everything that was said. When we went to see him again later, he was even more odd, spinning around on the spot, repeating the word 'Apha (here)' very loudly and standing with one arm in the air, how bizarre. He was treated with a sedative and put into a cot bed to stop him roaming around like crazy, but apart from that there wasn't much you could do without access to lab tests, x-ray, CT scans and all those fancy things we take for granted back home!
Lunch was completely legendary pizza breads, then we were back in OPD seeing all manner of things, none of which I can particularly remember, Most of them were sick kids, malnourished in some form or other. I do remember there was a seriously melodramatic woman who needed her c-section wound cleaned and exclaimed that she was dying before Liz even touched her!
Liz and Lisa cooked me dinner (again) and let me sleep over (again) for which I am eternally grateful, especially as by this point I had found the key. After phone calls here and there to various people I went to look in the secret key hiding place and by chance saw a little glint of metal in the mud patch that is our garden, our long lost key! It's a complete mystery as to how it got there [let's blame the frogs] but at least I now had access to clean clothes, something that I'm sure everyone else was almost as glad about as I was!
At 3.30am the next morning I was up again with Liz seeing a man who appeared to have lungs filled with fluid. He sounded horrific when he breathed in and out; it was like he was drowning. After syringing about 120ml of fluid out through his back and giving him lots of furosemide injections, Liz took him for an ultrasound and I think I'm right in saying found a suspected pericardial effusion and after seeing that there was very little else that could be done right then, booked him for an urgent x-ray in the morning. The man died before the radiography department opened two hours later.
It's pretty depressing to know that doctors here can spend hours toiling in the night only for the patients to die because they lack a simple diagnostic tool like x-ray. I have so much respect for all the staff here who continue working day after day in the face of all kinds of obstacles that no one would even imagine in the first world, it's been such an enlightening experience, something that will stay with me for a very long time.
Anyway, that was the end of Liz's time on call in Zithulele, so much rejoicing was in order! Sadly, going to work was also in order, so she did that instead, as did I. Work was the same old fun and games in the pharmacy as always. I had one woman from the wards that came to me early in the morning looking for ARVs and then waited the whole day for me to come and see her kid but was so incredibly grateful to me just for a simple thing like giving her drugs :D On the other hand, some new ARV patients got very angry with me when I refused to start them on treatment until the afternoon and crowded up the dispensary door and started shouting 'Jesus Christ' at me...fun times!
Ngcwanguba clinic on Tuesday was a bit of a nightmare with defaulting patients deciding to turn up again and then finding that they hadn't been made a pack, then getting irritated and worried when they heard they must travel all the way to Zithulele to restart their treatment. Eventually I managed to make some kind of coherent plan for them and we got out of there in reasonable time. Hopefully we will stop having to go at all in the next few weeks.
That's all for now!
xxxx
After my arrival back in big bad Zithulele, I went various places on an epic fail of a key hunt. I ended up at the Gaunts' who were throwing a mini birthday party for Thembinkosi, one of our community service doctors. Sadly, no cake for me, bad times, but I had fun and played with the three Gauntlets for a while before being given the use of the shower, HALLELUJAH. It was possibly the most brilliant shower ever after having being bathed in the sweat of the other sixteen people in the Mqanduli taxi of doom for three hours. Then I went back to Liz and Lisa's house [from now on to be known as The Orphanage] for some dinner (chilli if you're interested) and because they are both legends, they let me sleep there for the night.
Monday was a very epic 24 hours. Liz/Dr Gatley was doing her last ever on call day [see my previous post 'On Call with a Rural Doctor'] and kindly allowed me to shadow her, something which began with me pulling my clothes on at 5.30am and jogging to catch up as she went in for an emergency caesarean section. I must point out that Liz had already done a Caesar at 2am that morning, I cannot imagine how tired she was and how on earth she managed to drag herself out the door again!
Anyway, soon enough I was in scrubs (yas :D) and in theatre watching another birth...epic enough for you? I'd always thought that a Caesarean would be a much more pleasant affair than natural birth but after an hour's viewing of that surgery, my mind was completely changed. Getting the baby out was a relatively quick process, and aside from one part where Liz and Thembinkosi literally wrenched the woman's skin apart to make a big enough hole, wasn't too gory. The whole surgery was done without suction as the machine was broken, can you even imagine the uproar that would occur if that happened in the UK!? The baby was cute (as per) and he was fine so it was all good in that department. The closing up bit however, was pretty gross...
The womb got taken outside of the woman's body which is the most bizarre thing ever, and it was just sitting on her chest while the doctor's stitched it back up. I was surprised to see what it looked like, the best way I can describe it is kind of like a squishy egg with really thick walls [you can tell I'm going to be a greeeeeeeeat doctor, not] – I had always imagined it to be kind of transparent, but whatever. Everything was going nicely with the suturing until the woman started to cough and the presence of a gaping hole in her abdomen meant that her intestines literally exploded out of her body! I couldn't quite believe it, it was rather surreal, and made even more so when Liz hastily shoved them back inside...
Once that was over, we went straight to do the maternity ward as there was no point going back to sleep now that we were both awake and it was light. The rounds were pretty uneventful with the exception of one woman who was lying groaning and sweating on the antenatal ward. Liz went to do the PV on her, only to discover that the membranes were in fact bulging out of her, so the nurses then made her get out of bed and run down the labour ward as she was apparently imminently going to deliver, heeeeeeeeectic!
Back at The Orphanage, we had breakfast but no sooner had the coffee been poured than Liz had to go back to the hospital. After finishing my toast I too returned, just in time to see a patient who Liz had been called to by nurses who reported that he was 'acting strangely'. May sound like a pretty vague diagnosis, but after some observation and investigation, Liz too made the same decision. The man had a huge grin, was lying in a very strange position and repeated everything that was said. When we went to see him again later, he was even more odd, spinning around on the spot, repeating the word 'Apha (here)' very loudly and standing with one arm in the air, how bizarre. He was treated with a sedative and put into a cot bed to stop him roaming around like crazy, but apart from that there wasn't much you could do without access to lab tests, x-ray, CT scans and all those fancy things we take for granted back home!
Lunch was completely legendary pizza breads, then we were back in OPD seeing all manner of things, none of which I can particularly remember, Most of them were sick kids, malnourished in some form or other. I do remember there was a seriously melodramatic woman who needed her c-section wound cleaned and exclaimed that she was dying before Liz even touched her!
Liz and Lisa cooked me dinner (again) and let me sleep over (again) for which I am eternally grateful, especially as by this point I had found the key. After phone calls here and there to various people I went to look in the secret key hiding place and by chance saw a little glint of metal in the mud patch that is our garden, our long lost key! It's a complete mystery as to how it got there [let's blame the frogs] but at least I now had access to clean clothes, something that I'm sure everyone else was almost as glad about as I was!
At 3.30am the next morning I was up again with Liz seeing a man who appeared to have lungs filled with fluid. He sounded horrific when he breathed in and out; it was like he was drowning. After syringing about 120ml of fluid out through his back and giving him lots of furosemide injections, Liz took him for an ultrasound and I think I'm right in saying found a suspected pericardial effusion and after seeing that there was very little else that could be done right then, booked him for an urgent x-ray in the morning. The man died before the radiography department opened two hours later.
It's pretty depressing to know that doctors here can spend hours toiling in the night only for the patients to die because they lack a simple diagnostic tool like x-ray. I have so much respect for all the staff here who continue working day after day in the face of all kinds of obstacles that no one would even imagine in the first world, it's been such an enlightening experience, something that will stay with me for a very long time.
Anyway, that was the end of Liz's time on call in Zithulele, so much rejoicing was in order! Sadly, going to work was also in order, so she did that instead, as did I. Work was the same old fun and games in the pharmacy as always. I had one woman from the wards that came to me early in the morning looking for ARVs and then waited the whole day for me to come and see her kid but was so incredibly grateful to me just for a simple thing like giving her drugs :D On the other hand, some new ARV patients got very angry with me when I refused to start them on treatment until the afternoon and crowded up the dispensary door and started shouting 'Jesus Christ' at me...fun times!
Ngcwanguba clinic on Tuesday was a bit of a nightmare with defaulting patients deciding to turn up again and then finding that they hadn't been made a pack, then getting irritated and worried when they heard they must travel all the way to Zithulele to restart their treatment. Eventually I managed to make some kind of coherent plan for them and we got out of there in reasonable time. Hopefully we will stop having to go at all in the next few weeks.
That's all for now!
xxxx
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